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~Elsie's POV
The first few days after he left felt like something had been quietly removed from the house without warning. There was no clear moment I could point at and say this is when everything changed. It just did. Slowly at first, then all at once in small ways that kept adding up until I could not ignore it anymore.
The rooms still looked the same, the furniture was still in its place, and people still moved around like normal, but the feeling inside the house was not the same. It was like the air had lost something it used to carry, something I did not even realize I depended on until it was gone.
And somehow, that made everything else feel louder than it should have been.
