Liam hadn't planned on staying long in Nigeria. He'd come to pay his respects, maybe apologize one last time. But when he saw Amara standing beside her father's coffin, dressed in sorrow and silence, he knew he couldn't just leave.
She didn't speak to him after the funeral.
Not when they passed each other at the family compound.
Not when she caught him helping her mother carry boxes into the storage room.
Not even when he fixed the broken gate, the one her father always meant to fix.
But silence didn't mean indifference. He could feel her watching. Listening.
Late one night, as the house settled into stillness, he heard the soft creak of the floorboards behind him.
"You're still here," she said, voice hushed.
"I said I'd stay."
"You're not family."
"I could be."
She scoffed. "Don't joke like that."
"I'm not."
They stared at each other in the dim hallway, caught between past tension and something dangerously tender. Her nightdress brushed against her knees. His shirt was half-buttoned. The moment was one breath from falling into something irreversible.
"Why did you come here, really?" she asked.
Liam stepped closer, enough for her to hear the truth in his voice. "Because you were the only thing I left unfinished."
Her breath hitched. "You're not making this easy."
"I'm not trying to."
She didn't pull away when he leaned in. She didn't move when his hand touched her waist, tentative. Testing.
But she didn't let him kiss her either.
Instead, she whispered, "You hurt me once, Liam. I don't think I can survive a second time."
And she walked away—barefoot and bruised, leaving him with a heart full of regrets and a hallway full of silence.