The night sky looming over us was cluttered with an expanse of stars. Looking up at them, I couldn't help but think there were just as many pinned against the dark as the tear droplets Yanyin had shed over the course of the entire day.
We had tried giving her some space, stepping back to leave her alone in the hope that solitude would act as a cure, to see if the quiet would somehow make things better. It didn't.
The tears didn't stop, and the soft sounds of her weeping stripped away whatever resolve we had left.
With dinnertime approaching, a new anxiety settled over the group. What if she continued like this, and skipped out on eating too? Her tiny frame couldn't handle the physical toll of both grief and starvation.
She was curled up in the furthest corner of the hut, her knees pulled tight to her chest. She was shivering slightly with her breath catching in wet sniffs. She wouldn't look at us. She wouldn't talk to anyone.
