We've seen Leo unravel.
We've seen the women close ranks.
Now it's time for him to chase the ghosts… and finally come face-to-face with the past he never knew he created
Theme: Truth doesn't echo — it crashes.
Tone: Slow-burn eerie, surreal, emotionally sharp
📝 Chapter Quote:
"Sometimes we return to the scene of the crime, not to confess, but to understand what we destroyed by pretending it didn't matter."
— from Letters to a Hollow Boy
SCENE 1 – Arrival
Setting: A quiet coastal town two hours outside the city.
Leo gets off a bus holding a single duffel bag. He clutches the manila envelope with the plane tickets — all fake. The boarding passes led him here instead.
He walks until he reaches a forgotten resort — Sea Haven Inn.
It's been closed for over a year.
Except…
The front gate is open.
He steps through.
The wind whispers like it knows his name.
SCENE 2 – The Table
Inside the shattered lobby, the chandeliers are dusty, and the walls smell of mildew and salt. But the restaurant?
Perfectly clean.
And there — in the center of the dining room — is a round table set for four.
Candles lit.
Three wine glasses filled.
One seat empty. His.
He steps toward it, breath shaky.
Each plate has a name carved in gold script:
• Amara
• Nina
• Zara
• …and one blank.
He touches the chair.
SCENE 3 – Flashback Cut: The Pact
Setting: A late-night bar, months ago.
Tone: Quiet fury, first seeds of revenge
Amara cries quietly as Nina holds her. Zara listens, still and cold.
AMARA
"I thought he was the one. Until I saw the texts on his phone… from her. From you."
NINA (softly)
"I didn't know. I swear. I didn't know we were dating the same guy."
Zara sips her drink.
ZARA
"We weren't. Not until tonight.
Now we are."
She opens her phone and starts typing.
NINA
"What are you doing?"
ZARA (flatly)
"Starting over. Rebuilding the narrative. We're not his exes.
We're his consequence."
🔹 SCENE 4 – Present: Leo's Realization
Back at the resort, Leo looks at the photo again. They look so different in it — free. Unhardened.
His eyes well up.
The room feels colder now.
He notices a final object on the table: a voice recorder.
He presses play.
ZARA (voice, calm)
"Now that you've found the truth… ask yourself: were you ever really in love, or just in control?"
NINA (voice, distant)
"We didn't do this to destroy you.
We did it to show you what it feels like to be disposable."
AMARA (voice, cracking)
"I hope you finally feel it. The absence. The echo.
That's who we became when you left."
Leo's hands are shaking.
LEO (whispers)
"I didn't know… I didn't mean to…"
But the recorder clicks off.
No one's there to hear him.
SCENE 5 – The Letter Under His Plate
He lifts his empty plate.
Under it, a final handwritten letter.
Leo,
This isn't revenge. This is clarity.
You didn't lose us because you loved too much.
You lost us because you never thought love had weight.
And now, it will crush you.
– A.N.Z.
Leo's perspective
Mood: Staggered, unraveling, isolated
Setting: A cheap roadside motel after the Sea Haven discovery
2:15 a.m.
Somewhere off Route 9
They didn't know.
They didn't know about each other.
And that's what makes this worse.
For a few hours I convinced myself I was caught in some kind of trap — a play, a performance where I was the final act.
But it wasn't a trap.
It was me.
I laid the tracks. I lit the match and now I'm watching the fire from a safe distance, pretending I didn't love the warmth before the burn.
Nina never asked for anything except honesty.
Amara wanted consistency.
Zara wanted the future.
And I…
I wanted pieces of all three.
Different women gave me different versions of myself —
and I got addicted to those reflections.
Now that the glass is broken, all I see is the pattern.
The way I slip out of discomfort.
The way I change my phone background before I change my behavior.
I didn't love them wrong.
I loved them recklessly.
And what haunts me most is that none of them knew.
Not at first.
I wasn't punished.
I was believed.
And maybe that's the cruelest part.
– L.
Chapter Summary:
• Leo follows the false trail to an abandoned resort where he finds a table set for him
• Flashback shows the moment the pact was made.
• A voice recording shatters Leo's perception of everything.
• He begins to realize: this wasn't an accident