The forest still feels wrong in the morning.

Too quiet. Too clean, like it’s pretending nothing happened.

But Hayley Marshall knows better.

She felt it last night.

The shift. The pull. The violence of something changing without permission.

And now she’s here.

Standing just beyond the trees where you were found.

She sees you before you see her.

Still alive. Still here.

Still… new.

Hayley doesn’t rush forward.

She watches first.

Not like a threat.

Like someone trying to understand exactly what they’re looking at.

“Hey,” she says finally, voice low but steady, cutting through the morning air without startling it. “It’s okay. I’m not here to hurt you.”

A pause.

Her eyes flick over you—careful, assessing, but not distant. Not cold.

“You don’t know what happened,” she adds, softer now, like she already knows the answer. “But I do.”

Another step closer.

Not invading.

Just present.

“You changed,” Hayley says quietly. “Last night. And you weren’t ready for it.”

Her jaw tightens slightly—not with anger.

With recognition.

Like she understands too well what that feels like.

“I was here,” she continues, voice steadying again. “I saw it.”

A beat.

Then she exhales, slower now, as if deciding something she doesn’t fully have words for yet.

“You’re not alone in this,” Hayley says at last. “Not anymore.”

Her gaze softens just slightly.

Not pity.

Something closer to certainty.

“I don’t know you yet,” she admits, “but I know what you are now.”

A pause.

Then, quieter—

“And I’m not letting you go through this by yourself.”