The final cut ("Afterwards")

Here's the heavily shortened version of my 'holiday' fic for competition purposes, reduced from 6000 words to 3800; it will be interesting to see how a full version stands up alongside it!

I really don't like the title 'Monsters', not least because several of the original references to this theme have now been excised. So I ideally need a new title and a summary overnight...

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Afterwards

She could not find Thomas. And the world was breaking apart.

She was not certain who she was, or what had happened. It was as if parts of her had ebbed away to leave only a tenuous knot of hatred and desire and need, twisting together like smoke. The house moaned about her, but the notes of the piano beneath her hands woke no answering vibrations in the air. There was no reply at all, no presence anywhere. She was utterly alone.

Thomas. The name welled up from some place deeper than memory, spinning together wavering strands into a sudden focus of panic and loss.

Thomas— Thomas! She could not be left here by herself for always. He could not leave her. He had promised. She had made him promise.

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