What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger novel Chapter 17

That night, I filled the bathtub to the brim with scalding water, watching steam rise in thick clouds. I desperately wanted to wash away every trace of the past twenty-four hours, as if enough hot water could somehow cleanse my soul along with my skin.

But as I undressed in front of the bathroom mirror, the purple-blue marks scattered across my skin told their own story. Love bites on my neck, fingerprint bruises on my hips - each one a reminder I couldn't erase. The bruises weren't ready to fade, just like the memories.

Last night came flooding back uninvited - the burning heat of his skin against mine, his passionate breathing against my ear, the way he'd whispered my name in the dark. The ghost of his touch still lingered everywhere, like phantom hands tracing patterns across my body. The warmth of his chest pressed against my back, his fingers intertwined with mine - memories I wanted to forget but couldn't seem to shake.

I shook my head violently, grabbing the sides of the sink until my knuckles turned white, trying to shake away these fragments of madness. These moments that meant everything to me and nothing to him.

Grabbing my roughest loofah, I scrubbed and scrubbed until my skin turned angry red. My arms, my neck, my chest - anywhere his lips had been. As if I could somehow erase what had become the most humiliating memory of my life. The physical pain felt almost good, like maybe it could overshadow the ache in my chest.

The raw, stinging pain kept me tossing and turning all night. Every position hurt - my skin too sensitive, my body remembering touches I was trying to forget.