Ghost of Broken Love
1209 Words
Some memories never fade.
They don’t soften with time or blur around the edges. They stay sharp, waiting quietly in the corners of your mind, ready to rise the moment you let your guard down.
Adrian Black carried his ghosts everywhere.
They lived in the silence between gunshots. In the spaces between breaths. In the rare moments when the city stopped screaming long enough for his thoughts to catch up with him.
Tonight, they came back with vengeance.
The meeting room on the forty-second floor was wrapped in shadows, lit only by the glow of the city beyond the glass walls. Adrian sat at the head of a long obsidian table, listening as his lieutenants delivered reports on shipments, territory lines, and a brewing conflict near the docks.
He acknowledged each update with brief nods and quiet commands.
His mind wasn’t here.
It was years ago, in a tiny apartment with peeling paint and broken radiators.
“Boss?”
Marco’s voice pulled him back.
“Yes.”
“The Valenti crew is testing the eastern routes. They moved product without permission.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“Let them,” he said. “They’re fishing.”
“And if they push?”
Adrian’s eyes hardened.
“They’ll drown.”
The meeting ended shortly after. Chairs slid back. Footsteps echoed. His men filtered out, leaving Adrian alone with the hum of electricity and the city pulsing beneath him.
He didn’t move right away.
Instead, he stared at his reflection in the glass.
A powerful man stared back.
A dangerous man.
Not the boy he used to be.
Not the man Sofia once loved.
He closed his eyes.
And the past claimed him.
⸻
He had been twenty-two when he met Sofia.
He wasn’t Adrian Black yet.
He was just Adrian.
Back then, he worked construction during the day and ran errands for local operators at night. He was trying to save money. Trying to keep his mother comfortable. Trying to pretend he wasn’t already halfway into a criminal life.
Sofia worked at a small bookstore near the old train station.
She had ink-stained fingers and laughter that filled rooms. She talked with her hands and argued passionately about novels Adrian had never heard of. She wore oversized sweaters and drank too much coffee.
She made him feel human.
They met when Adrian wandered into the shop to escape the rain.
She looked up from behind the counter and smiled.
“Can I help you?”
That smile ruined him.
He started finding excuses to walk past the bookstore.
Sometimes he bought books he didn’t read. Sometimes he just stood there pretending to browse while she chatted about authors and stories. Eventually, she invited him out for coffee.
He said yes without hesitation.
They spent hours talking in a cheap café, sharing childhood memories and dreams that felt fragile in their honesty.
Sofia wanted to leave the city someday. She talked about traveling, opening her own shop, building a quiet life away from violence and noise.
Adrian listened.
He didn’t tell her about the things he did at night.
He didn’t tell her about the men he answered to.
He told himself it was temporary.
With Sofia, he allowed himself to imagine a different future.
They moved in together after six months.
Their apartment was small, but it was theirs.
They cooked together. They argued about music. They fell asleep tangled in each other’s arms.
For a while, Adrian almost believed love could save him.
But ambition is louder than love.
The deeper Adrian went into the underworld, the harder it became to hide it. He started coming home late. He stopped answering questions. Bruises appeared on his knuckles. Blood stained his shirts.
Sofia noticed everything.
“You’re changing,” she told him one night.
He didn’t deny it.
“You don’t tell me where you go anymore.”
“I’m working.”
“That’s not an answer.”
He turned away, unable to meet her eyes.
“I’m doing what I have to.”
Sofia cried quietly that night.
The first time Adrian killed someone, he didn’t tell her.
He sat beside her on the couch afterward, numb, staring at the wall while she rested her head on his shoulder.
He felt like a stranger in his own body.
Weeks later, Sofia found a gun hidden in their bedroom.
Everything unraveled after that.
She begged him to leave the life.
She begged him to choose her.
They fought for hours, words flying like knives.
“This isn’t who you are,” she said through tears.
“This is who I have to be.”
She packed a bag that same night.
“I love you,” she told him at the door. “But I won’t watch you destroy yourself.”
He didn’t stop her.
That was his first heartbreak.
He buried it under work and violence and ambition.
⸻
Years later came Elena.
By then, Adrian had power.
Money.
Influence.
Elena was glamorous, ambitious, and fully aware of who he was. She loved the expensive dinners and designer clothes. She loved the way people treated her differently when she walked beside him.
Adrian never trusted her completely.
But he allowed himself to care.
She stayed in his penthouse. She accompanied him to events. She whispered encouragement when business got difficult.
For a time, it felt almost normal.
Then one of his shipments got seized.
Then another.
Then a police raid nearly took him down.
Adrian traced the leaks carefully.
All roads led to Elena.
He confronted her in the same living room where she once danced barefoot to music.
She didn’t deny it.
“They offered me immunity,” she said, voice shaking. “I was scared.”
He stared at her, something inside him breaking cleanly in half.
“You traded my life.”
She cried.
He felt nothing.
He let her walk away.
From that day on, Adrian stopped believing anyone could love him without wanting something in return.
After Elena, he kept relationships shallow and distant.
Women became temporary comforts.
Never commitments.
Never vulnerabilities.
He trained himself not to feel.
⸻
The memory dissolved, leaving Adrian alone again in the present.
He opened his eyes slowly.
His chest felt tight.
He poured himself another drink, though he didn’t need it.
Love had nearly destroyed him twice.
He wasn’t going to give it a third chance.
Across town, Mila sat on her bed scrolling through old photos on her phone.
Pictures of her mother. Of friends who drifted away. Of moments that no longer existed.
She paused on one image of herself at eighteen, smiling without reservation.
She barely recognized that girl.
Life had hardened her too, just in different ways.
She tossed the phone aside and lay back, staring at the ceiling.
She didn’t know Adrian Black.
Not really.
But soon, their paths would cross.
And neither of them was prepared for what that collision would awaken.
Adrian finished his drink and stood at the window again.
The city glowed beneath him, alive and indifferent.
He placed a hand against the glass.
His reflection stared back.
Powerful.
Untouchable.
Empty.
He whispered into the silence, voice barely audible.
“Never again.”
He turned away.
The ghosts followed.
- Writer
