DIANE
The cold woke me before the pain did.
It was always the cold. The kind that seeps into your bones when you sleep on bare concrete with nothing but thin fabric between your skin and the floor. My body trembled uncontrollably, not just from the temperature but from exhaustion. From hunger. From days that had long stopped having meaning.
My lips were dry. Cracked. When I tried to swallow, even that hurt.
For a moment I didn't open my eyes, because waking up meant remembering where I was.
And remembering meant surviving another day.
A sudden splash of freezing water hit my face. I gasped sharply, my body jerking as the shock forced my eyes open.
"Up!" a rough voice barked above me.
Water dripped down my face as I tried to focus. A guard stood over me, his boots inches from my arm, his expression bored like this was just another routine morning.
"You're not fed to sleep here" he said coldly. "Move."
