The day had passed without her realizing it.
The light, pale and hazy, filtered through the curtains like a timid presence.
Catarina hadn't moved.
The test still lay on the edge of the sink, next to the fogged-up mirror.
She glanced at it from time to time, as if simply looking away could erase what it said.
Two lines.
Two lives.
Two heartbeats that would never be separated again.
She finally got up.
Her legs trembled slightly.
In the mirror, her reflection seemed only half hers, a stranger carrying her fear in her place.
She ran her fingers over her belly without thinking.
An instinctive gesture.
A touch she immediately withdrew, as if she had touched something too fragile to still exist
The sound of the phone startled her.
She went back to the living room.
The screen flashed: Althea.
She hesitated.
Her hands were clammy.
She didn't answer.
Not this time.
Not yet.
She sat down on the sofa.
Everything inside her wavered between two conflicting impulses: to run away or to talk.
But talk to whom?
To him?
The mere thought of it made her feel nauseous.
She closed her eyes, and the memories came flooding back, as clear as poorly healed scars.
His voice in the dark.
His hands on the piano.
His rare, almost shameful laughter on the evenings when he still allowed himself to be happy.
And then that look, that last morning, before he disappeared.
She put her hand over her mouth to stifle a sob.
No.
This was not the time to break down.
Not now.
She took a shaky breath, got up, and grabbed her notebook.
The pages were still blank.
But this time, the words came easily.
Not beautiful. Not orderly.
Just true.
"I don't know if it's a gift or a punishment.
All I know is that something of him still lives in me.
And I don't know if I have the right to hate him for that."
The ink smudged under her fingers, but she continued.
Page after page.
As if writing allowed her to breathe.
When she looked up, night was already falling.
Outside, the snow was starting to fall again.
The world seemed to want to cover everything.
Silence everything.
She got up and walked over to the window.
A silhouette in the reflection seemed familiar to her.
But it was only her.
Just her, and what she now carried.
She placed a hand against the glass, her gaze lost in the gray sky.
A phrase came back to her, one he had said one evening when he thought she was asleep:
"If you ever leave, at least take something
with you that proves I existed."
She looked down at her belly.
And whispered, in a barely audible breath:
"You still exist, Sylus.
But not as you imagined."
Snow slowly covered the city.
And in the silence, she understood that what she carried inside her was not just a secret.
It was proof.
A promise.
And a condemnation.