My mind went completely blank.
It couldn’t be her.
Not after all these years. Not after what I was told had happened.
She shifted slightly in the corner of the shed, hugging herself tighter as if she was trying to disappear into the shadows. Her eyes were sunken, exhausted—but still familiar enough to tear open memories I had buried a long time ago.
I took a slow step forward.
“No…” I whispered under my breath. “That’s not possible.”
Her gaze flicked up at me, cautious, almost fearful. Like she didn’t trust that I was real either.
“I didn’t mean to come here,” she said quickly. “I just… I didn’t know where else to go.”
My throat tightened.
Because I finally understood why her face felt like a shock—why seeing her here, in this place, felt like the ground had dropped beneath me.
She was supposed to be gone.
Everyone said she had left town. Some even said worse things. But standing here, trembling and hungry in my parents’ shed, she was proof that none of those stories had been the truth.
“What happened to you?” I asked, my voice barely steady.
Her lips trembled.
“That’s the problem,” she whispered. “No one ever asked what really happened to me.”
Outside, a door creaked in the wind. I realized then that this wasn’t just a chance encounter.
If she had come back here… someone else might be looking for her too.
