Chapter 59 Malrissa

He died mid-sentence.

No cry. No warning. No final breath drawn with drama or noise.
Just a quiet collapse—like part of the house giving way.
Unnoticed.
Between dishes and laundry. Between errands and reminders.
Between being needed and being forgotten.

Malrissa sat beside his body for a long time.

Not as a reaper.
Not as a monster.
But as a witness.

Someone had to see him.

She knelt close, her red veil draped over her shoulders like dusk clinging to a silhouette.
The air was still, as if time itself was holding its breath.

“A man who bent until he broke,” she whispered.
“Unseen. Unheard.”

Her fingers brushed his forehead, slow and reverent. No fear in the touch. No judgment.
“Not anymore.”

The veil shifted, catching the light.
Reality warped gently around her. Shadows lengthened where they shouldn’t. Colors pulled at the edges.
Something in the house recognized her—and didn’t resist.

But she didn’t leave. Not yet.

She stood and walked the small, quiet rooms.
The walls were worn. Loved.
Crayon drawings taped to the fridge—some crooked, one falling.
Dishes washed and stacked with care.
A grocery list folded in his wallet, half checked off.

She moved slowly, pausing in each room, her steps matching his old routines.
Where he tucked in the youngest.
Where he fixed the drawer she kept slamming shut.
Where he sat alone sometimes, phone in hand, staring at messages that never came.

She saw the life he held together. The small, invisible ways he carried others.

“This world never deserved you,” she said softly.
“But maybe the next one will.”

She reached the front door.
Paused.
Ran her fingers over the frame he once sanded smooth.

“He’ll do better in the next one.”

Then she was gone—before anyone else could enter.
Before the questions started.
Before the story was rewritten without him.

And the dream began.