"Ma'am?
Ma'am?
Are you okay?"
I got up from my bed and opened the door. "Yes Margaret!"
"Ma'am, are you alright? You've been in your room since yesterday and you haven't eaten anything."
"Oh, Margaret, I'm so sorry. What time is it?"
"It has just gone two, ma'am."
"Can I have a cup of coffee please!"
"Sure Ma'am, anything with it?
"No. Just coffee, thank you!"
What is happening to me? Why is everything falling out of place. That intruder first and then Kyle. Am I missing something!
"Ma'am!"
I turned around and it was Maria.
"Yes?"
"You have a call ma'am."
That is what brought my senses back!
WHERE IS MY PHONE?
I ran the staircase to get the call.
"Hello?"
"Vara! Are you okay? Where are you and where is your phone?
Why aren't you picking up my calls?
I'm so sorry, I asked you to leave, but all I wanted was; you to be safe. Vara are you alright?
Alvara?"
"Ray!"
"Alvara, are you okay?"
"What if I say I am not!
Ray! There's a lot going on."
"Vara!"
"Ray, he is back!"
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BEYOND:
"Alvie, let's go."
"Winnie! How could we; just go leaving Raylan all alone."
"Alvie, Raylan is right you shouldn't be here. Please!"
"Winnie, why did he just push me off."
"Alvie, he didn't. He cares for you and doesn't want you to get hurt. And now stop thinking about it."
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It was one of those days you wish you could erase from your life but; little did I know, something else was waiting for me.
I walked into my study, the moment I got home, out of a muscle memory more than intention. And there they were, lying on the table: THE LETTERS!
My heart was racing, my chest felt tight like I couldn't quite catch a full breath. I stood by the table staring down at the mess of envelopes and paper, trying to steady my hands and thoughts. Most of it was just business letters and stray pieces of mail scattered, the usual junk, but; three letters sat apart from the rest, like they were waiting for me. Something about them felt wrong. My fingers hovered over the envelopes, hesitant. They looked plain. No address, just my name written out in a way that made my stomach twist.
It better not have been what I was thinking. It shouldn't have been.
I snatched them off the table, too fast, like if I hesitated any longer I'd fall apart. Papers scattered to the floor, I didn't care. The world narrowed to the weight of those letters in my hand.
I tore open the first one.
"KYLE"
Just the name was enough to make the room tilt. My breath caught. My hands started to shake like the air had been knocked out of me.
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Alvara, my love!
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There are things I should’ve said, things that should’ve stayed hidden. But I can’t leave without you knowing—I've loved you. Always.
You were never meant to see this. I was never meant to be anything more than a shadow in your life. But now, as I write this, I realize the truth can never stay buried.
I’ll never be there to explain. I’ll never be there to hold you, but you should know this: I’ve always been here, in silence, watching from the distance.
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Yours loving,
Kyle.
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I stared at the letter in my hands, the words sinking in slow and heavy.
My chest tightened, a strange, hollow ache blooming under my ribs.
I didn’t know what to feel.
Sadness? Guilt? Anger?
Maybe all of it. Maybe none.
I read it again, slower this time, tracing the lines he had written — the things he was never supposed to say.
The confession sat between us now, even though he was gone.
Too late. Too wrong.
I folded the letter with careful hands, feeling the tremble I refused to show.
I pressed it flat against the table, staring at it like it might explain itself if I waited long enough.
But it didn’t.
It never would.
I opened the second envelope with the same steady hands I used to sign contracts, to end deals, to cut ties.
Hands that never shook.
Hands that didn’t know how to beg.
Two words stared back at me, stripped bare of excuses.
"I love you."
It was like a punch to the gut. Silent. Unexpected.
I felt the crack inside me widen. Quiet, almost invisible.
No one would have seen it.
Not even him — especially not him.
Oh Kyle! What have you done. Why would you send me these now? No way you would take that man up advice this quick!
I set down the letter. The cold edge of the paper pressed against my fingers, and I could feel the tension in my chest tighten, suffocating in the silence.
My throat burned, but I swallowed it back. Whatever tried to rise — anger, grief, guilt — it had no place here.
Not anymore.
Not ever.
I had spent a lifetime keeping myself guarded, never letting anyone get too close. Love was something I never asked for, never wanted, and never knew how to handle. But it always found its way to me, bringing with it feelings I wasn’t ready for, emotions I wasn’t sure what to do with.
I wasn’t going to let this one more confession destroy what was left of me.
I couldn’t. Not again.
Without thinking, I smoothed the edge of the paper flat. Then I turned away, leaving both; Kyle, and letters behind me, like I had learned to leave everything else.
Because that’s what I did, wasn’t it?
I left.
Before anyone could break me.
But I was so wrong. This was the day I came to know, one can be quite unpredictable about oneself.
Something did break me. The question is; why?
I was about to leave, but then that last letter caught my eye. That shiny, sparkly golden envelope. This was something familiar. I was drained to the core, but I don't know what made me pick up that letter and tear it open.
"GOTTEN UP FROM THE COMA QUITE QUICK; HUH MATE?"
It was just one line. One sentence. I read it once—and the world stopped moving. My eyes didn’t blink. My fingers tightened around the paper like it might dissolve if I let go. My pulse—loud, uneven—thudded in my ears as if my body already knew this was going to change something in me forever.
It didn’t scream. It didn’t shout. It whispered. And somehow, that whisper was louder than anything I'd ever heard.
Something inside me folded in on itself—like a paper crane catching fire mid-flight. There was rage, yes. A blinding flash of it, as if someone had reached inside me and rewired everything with barbed wire. But deeper than that, underneath the fury, was a hollow scream. A kind of pain that didn't make a sound but still rang through every bone.
My throat dried. My skin crawled. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something—no, someone—was watching. Not from outside, but from inside that line. From within the ink itself. Like the words were alive. Like they had teeth.
I kept rereading it, hoping I’d misunderstood. That maybe I’d missed a word, a comma, anything that might soften the blow. But no. It was precise. Cold. Unforgiving. And it was meant for me.
Suddenly, the room felt smaller. The walls leaned in. I couldn’t tell if I was shaking or if the ground had started to hum beneath me. My thoughts scattered, scrambling for answers that didn’t exist.
And for the first time in a long while… I was scared. Not the kind of fear that startles you in the dark—but the kind that follows you into the light. The kind that knows your name.
At the bottom of the letter, barely visible in the fold, were four more words. Scribbled. Rushed. Almost like they were added at the last second. I hadn’t seen them before.
But now I wish I hadn’t seen them at all.
Some truths are written not to be read—but to be survived.
I forgot what he was. Thought he’d vanished. But monsters don’t always leave footprints—some leave signatures instead, and somehow, they still find their way in. I should’ve remembered; fear doesn’t fade. It just waits for the ink to dry.
ADJACENT:
My mind was screaming at me, just tell him, just say it! Let him know there's so much more going on than what you're letting him see. Let him in. But the words wouldn’t come. Instead, I just nodded, even though he couldn’t see it. The silence between us felt too heavy, but I kept it there, tucked behind the lie. "I’m okay," I said, the words feeling hollow as they left my mouth. It wasn’t true. There’s nothing okay, I wanted to scream. Nothing at all. But I swallowed it down. He was already carrying his own weight, already suffocating under his grief, and I couldn’t be the one to burden him with mine.
He asked, "You don't seem okay to me, Vara?" and I replied, "I’m okay, Ray. Trust me! How are you?" The words fell from my mouth like they were rehearsed, like I had said them a million times before. I could hear the sadness in his voice, but I couldn't let him hear mine. I couldn’t let him hear the truth I kept buried deep inside me. Inside, I wasn’t okay.
I was falling apart in ways that made no sense, in ways that I couldn’t even explain.
And so I continued, pretending. I was the one who needed reassurance, but I gave it to him instead, hiding the storm inside me, burying it even deeper. I became the keeper of my own suffering, silently watching myself unravel. He grieved a brother. I grieved a self no one else could see.
Somewhere in my mind, the code played on a loop, I couldn’t escape. But it wasn’t okay. It never was.
The words echoed in my mind, sharper now. I'm okay. But something deeper lingered, something that should have never been said. The darkness swirled around the edges of my thoughts, as if the room itself could hear me lying, as if something, someone, was listening. And I wondered, in the deepest recess of my mind—was I really alone on this call?
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and then Add to home screen.