Iris woke before dawn, but her consciousness didn't return as a gentle awakening; it arrived like a physical blow. Her face was already burning, a feverish heat spreading across her cheeks that had nothing to do with the morning temperature.
She lay utterly motionless, staring up at the ceiling of her room where shadows danced in the dim, predawn light. Her breathing was shallow, each inhale sending a sharp, grinding ache through her hips and lower abdomen.
Her body felt foreign to her, heavy, swollen, and violated. Every nerve ending seemed to be screaming, vibrating with a residual electricity that made her skin crawl.
'Why does it feel like this?' she wondered, her mind struggling to process the shame that flooded her system before she was even fully conscious.
