Fiction Scrap: ''The Night Air"

"The night air was fresh, addictive almost. She
took it in with long deep breaths, imagining
that she was drinking the darkness, tasting
the faraway twinkle of the stars. It was a
ritual for her, 3am and here she would be. Sat
on the old metal bench, flaked with rust, the
cold of the metal biting into her flesh through
the cold, cotton pajamas. She sat with her eyes
shut, her head tilted skywards, her body still,
breathing deep regular breaths, gorging
herself on the wind that swept through the
skeletal trees and caressed her skin with an
icy touch.

She would stay at most an hour, whatever the
weather, here she would be, indulging herself
in the cold and the night, drinking the night
air feverently, but never able to sate her
thirst. When she left, she would move languidly
at first, as if awakening from a trance, her
eyes focussing slowly on the grand old house
that was her home, her prison. The house was
faded, worn, crumbling apart on the outside
while the inside desperately clung to life,
just like her. But at 3am every night, she
forgot her pain, her worries and instead she
welcomed the purity of the night, the gaze of
the stars upon her ravaged body.

And every night, she wished the same wish,
that this moment would never end, that she
could stay forever in peace, cradled by the
velvet of the night sky, watched by the ancient
eyes that studded the darkness above.''