[Reaction.]
The memory washed over her like warm water, soothing and comfortable and she didn't want to leave it behind. She wanted to stay, to grip her fingers around the laughter and the smiles. She wanted to put family and past into her pocket, and she wanted to keep it there tight and warm. And it was old, old, the memory, like the postcards she liked to collect, but the words were crammed in and mashed together, and she knew them. She didn't need to read and read and read, not to know what happened next. It was balm, familiar and worn, and she felt the familiar stairs beneath her feet, and she could smell the rumpled comforter.
She followed. Follow, follow, step, step, and she stood beyond, just beyond, listening and watching, but not being part of the thing she yearned for, the thing she missed, and it was a time before. Before they'd grown up, and before life changed them. Before, when she hadn't realized that nothing really mattered but this, this, this, and she knew it now, but now it was too late.
And she didn't want to let it slip, but it did slip. Because it had to, it had to slip and go and be something left behind.
But she'd take it with her, the memory, and keep it tucked warm and close, something to relive later, in the dark, when there was only her and only quiet.