The morning sun poured weakly through the blinds, painting faint stripes across Emma's living room floor. She sat on the couch, the jade pendant heavy in her palm, her other hand gripping the workbook like it was both a lifeline and a curse.
Her thoughts circled endlessly: If an object could travel through time… what else could?
For three days, she resisted opening the book, terrified of what she might find. But by the fourth night, exhaustion and curiosity won. She set the pendant on the coffee table, took a deep breath, and flipped the workbook open.
The page where they had left off waited, the last words written in Ethan's teenage scrawl:
I'm not letting you go.
Emma's throat tightened. She dipped her pen and wrote carefully beneath it:
If you truly believe that… then prove it. Write me something in the corner of your desk tomorrow. Something no one else will understand.
She shut the book, almost ashamed. Testing the past felt like a game—but the stakes were far greater.
A shiver ran through her as she realized that the line between childhood memory and present reality had begun to blur.