Chapter 13 – Selene's Conflict
The letter sat on Selene's desk for hours before she touched it. She had recognized his handwriting instantly — the sharp lines, the way he pressed too hard at the beginnings of words. Each envelope from him carried a strange electricity, as if she could feel the weight of what lay inside before she even slit it open.
When she finally unfolded the page, her eyes trailed across the sentences slowly, hesitantly.
He died in a plane crash. I wasn't there, but a part of me feels like I was… Since then, silence has been the only way I knew how to live.
The words were heavy, almost unbearable. She read them twice, then a third time, her chest tightening with every line. This was no ordinary confession, no fleeting sadness. This was a wound carved deep into him, one that time hadn't closed.
Her fingers brushed the ink blotch near the name, as if touching it might allow her to feel the tremor in his hand as he wrote. She imagined him alone in some small apartment, surrounded by silence, folding this letter with the same careful weight with which she now held it.
She pressed the page flat, but the words still rose like scars.
He's not just lonely, she thought. He's ill. He's drowning in something I can't even name.
The realization left her shaken. Until now, their letters had been a lifeline — fragile, yes, but steady. This letter, though, was a storm. She felt its power in her bones.
For the first time since she began writing to him, she questioned herself.
What if I can't help him? What if I make things worse? What if I become part of the weight he's already carrying?
She closed the letter, pressed it against her chest, and sat in silence. The photograph of her and Maren peeked out from the drawer, a quiet reminder of the promises she had made to herself: to protect, to endure, to never let anyone see the cracks.
But Adrian had shown her his cracks — no, more than cracks. He had handed her a piece of himself she wasn't sure how to hold.
She took out a blank sheet of paper and laid it in front of her. The pen hovered above it.
She wrote three words. I'm so sorry. Then she stopped.
It felt inadequate. Too small for the weight of his pain. She scratched the words out, leaving the page scarred with dark ink lines.
She tried again. This time, she wrote: Thank you for trusting me. But again she froze, staring at the sentence until her vision blurred.
Nothing she wrote felt enough. Nothing felt safe.
She pressed the pen down harder, leaving a dot of ink, then set it aside. The blank page lay in front of her, an accusation.
She wanted to write back. She wanted to reach across the silence the way he had reached for her. But fear rooted her in place — fear that she was not strong enough, not wise enough, not steady enough to hold him without breaking herself.
Her hand drifted to the letter he had sent. She traced the sentence again and again with her fingertip. Maybe strangers can carry each other's truths when they're too heavy to hold alone.
She whispered the words aloud, as if speaking them would make them true.
Still, the page before her remained blank.