On the fifty-sixth day after she had started waking up to the same day, the same blithe, sunny Saturday morning every time, she stood at the top of the stairs, staring down at where her father’s still, broken body had fallen.

Sprawled unreal as a doll, his eyes still wide with the same betrayal as when her hands had struck his chest. She would have tried to explain, if she’d had the slightest hope he would remember and understand.

But she had tried so many different ways. To escape, to wake up, to make him understand. Even if she could convince him for the day, he would wake up forgetful in the morning, and she just couldn’t listen to his voice quaver up the stairs again as he came to tell her that her mother was dead.