91. Smelled Good

The cold air bit through my skin, chilling me to the bone, but I didn't care. I sat on the steps outside the dorm, legs pulled up, arms wrapped tight around them, trying to keep myself together.

It was freezing, but it wasn't the cold that had me shaking.

It was the voices.

“Jamie… Jamie…”

They whispered repeatedly, the name grating at me like nails on glass.

My real name. A name that didn't feel like mine anymore. I hadn't been Jamie in a long time.

But the voices wouldn't stop.

"You're not who you say you are."

It kept going relentlessly, pushing against my skull. My thoughts tangled up in themselves, a knot I couldn't untie. They were loud, louder than anything I could handle.

And they weren't just words.

They were pulling at something deeper. My insecurities, my secrets, things I'd buried long ago.

I wasn't Jamie anymore. I'd changed. I had to. I wasn't that scared girl hiding in the shadows, pretending to fit into a world that would never accept her.

Not anymore.

But the vo