Michael didn't sleep.

  Not really.

  He lay on the narrow couch in the back room of Field of Waves, staring at the ceiling while the storm worked itself out against the windows. Snow whispered. Pipes ticked. The building breathed around him.

  Pain pulsed dully at his side—bandaged, clean, controlled. It was manageable. Physical pain always was.

  What he couldn't quiet was the feeling.

  The way his body had moved before his mind could catch up.

  The way his hands had known where to go.

  The way his chest had split open at the sound of Willow's voice saying his name.

  He pressed a hand to his ribs and exhaled slowly.

  Across the room, Willow slept curled into the armchair, coat still on, boots abandoned by the door. She hadn't wanted to leave him alone. He hadn't wanted to ask her to stay.

  So they'd settled into this in-between.

  Michael watched her breathe.

  There was a rhythm to it—soft, steady, unafraid. He realised with a jolt that he had never seen her sleep before. Not really. Not like this. Not without tension coiled through her shoulders, not without one eye half-open to the world.

  She trusted this space.

  She trusted him.

  The thought scared him more than the knife had.

  At some point near dawn, his body finally gave in. Not to sleep exactly, but to something close enough to it that the world softened around the edges.

  And then—

  Warmth.

  Not a memory. Not a picture. A sensation.

  Hands on his back.

  A familiar heat at his side.

  The smell of wood smoke and salt.

  Michael gasped and sat up, breath ragged, heart racing.

  Willow stirred instantly. "Hey—hey. I'm here."

  She crossed the room in two steps, kneeling in front of him, eyes searching his face.

  "You're safe," she said, like it was a fact she could anchor him to."You're in Whitby. You're in the kitchen. It's just us."

  Just us.

  His body believed her before his mind did.

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  "I didn't remember," he said hoarsely. "But I felt it. Like—like my skin knew before I did."

  Her hands hovered near his knees, not touching. Letting him choose.

  "That happens," she said gently. "The body remembers before the brain catches up."

  He swallowed. "I didn't think I could feel like that again."

  "Like what?"

  "Like… I knew what mattered."

  Silence settled between them—not awkward, not heavy. Full.

  Outside, the snow slowed. Dawn pressed pale light through the windows.

  Michael looked at her then, really looked.

  Not as a mystery.

  Not as a past he couldn't reach.

  But as the person standing in front of him now.

  And something inside him shifted.

  Not memory.

  Instinct.

  He reached out—slowly, carefully—and rested his forehead against hers.

  Willow's breath caught.

  "I don't know why," he said. "But when I thought I might lose you—my body didn't hesitate. It didn't ask permission. It just moved."

  Her voice was barely a whisper. "That's who you are."

  He closed his eyes. "If I don't remember us… will you hate me for it?"

  "No," she said immediately. "I won't punish you for something you didn't choose."

  He nodded, a muscle jumping in his jaw.

  "Then," he said, voice steady despite the fear beneath it, "I want to choose you anyway."

  She didn't answer with words.

  She leaned in and kissed his forehead—soft, grounding, real.

  And his body relaxed.

  Willow's Diary

  I watched him wake from a nightmare

  that wasn't a dream.

  He didn't remember the past,

  but he remembered how to protect.

  I think love lives somewhere deeper than memory.

  Somewhere that doesn't need permission to act.

  Poem — The Body Knows

  Before the mind can speak,

  the body answers.

  Before the past returns,

  the heart reaches out.

  And maybe love isn't a story we remember—

  maybe it's a truth we return to

  again

  and again

  and again.