Amelia woke with a sudden gasp, heart pounding before her eyes even opened.The sheets beside her were untouched.Cold.Empty.
She sat up fast—hair disheveled, breath shaky.
"No," she whispered.
Her eyes darted to the window.No figure.No silhouette.No shadow left behind.
Just the wind.
He was gone.
And with him, that unbearable weight of possibility.Of almost believing.Of maybe letting go of the pain she had worn like armor for years.
He had meant it."If you wake up and still can't forgive me, I'll leave."
She thought it was a bluff.
She thought he'd stay and fight harder.
She was wrong.
Her chest felt like shattered glass—held together only by breath,and one more breath might make it collapse.
She pulled the comforter around herself like a shield,but it couldn't protect her from the gaping hole inside her ribs—a hole shaped like the man who left without slamming the door.
Even silence had manners when it walked away.
She stumbled to the dresser.
A note.Folded.Crisp.No name.
But she knew the handwriting.
"I won't fight your hate anymore.I'll carry it, if that's all I'm allowed to have."
Tears blurred her vision, turning ink to shadows.
Then she saw it.
Under the note—a photograph.
Yellowed at the edges.
Them.Years ago.At the pier.Smiling.
And on the back, in his handwriting:
"I loved you before you remembered.I'll love you after you forget."
She dropped everything.Ran barefoot out the room,out the house,into the storm.
Because maybe this time—she had to be the one to chase.