Episode 15: The Things Buried Alive
1113 Words
The days after that became strangely quiet.
Not peaceful.
Never peaceful.
---
Just empty in ways she could not explain.
---
Adults eventually stopped mentioning the incident altogether. The injured boy survived. Rumors faded. Parties resumed. Expensive cars returned to polished driveways while wealthy families carefully pretended nothing unpleasant had ever stained their perfect lives.
The world moved on quickly.
It always did.
---
But she didn’t.
---
Every afternoon, she returned to the garden.
Always alone.
Always at the same hour.
---
The old swing beneath the oak tree had become something sacred now—an invisible space belonging to memories no one else knew existed.
The servants noticed eventually.
Of course they did.
---
“The little miss likes sitting there lately.”
“She barely talks anymore.”
“She keeps carrying papers with her…”
---
Papers.
---
If they had known what was drawn on them, perhaps they would have whispered louder.
---
She unfolded the sketch again carefully beneath the shade of the tree.
The paper had begun wearing thin along the folds from constant handling. Soft fingerprints smudged parts of the graphite slightly, though his drawing still remained painfully detailed.
His eyes had seen everything.
Every small expression.
Every shadow.
---
It frightened her sometimes.
---
Not because he understood her.
Because she liked being understood.
---
The realization felt dangerous.
---
A breeze moved softly through the branches overhead, carrying the scent of wet earth and distant flowers across the garden.
She closed her eyes briefly.
And immediately—
She remembered his voice.
---
*You looked at me like I wasn’t broken.*
---
Her chest tightened painfully.
---
She hated that memory.
Because every time it returned—
So did the unbearable feeling of him disappearing.
---
“You came back again.”
---
Her eyes opened instantly.
---
A maid stood several feet away holding a basket of freshly cut flowers against her chest. Older than the others. Gentle-faced. One of the few servants who spoke to her without sounding afraid.
---
“You’ll catch cold sitting outside so long.”
---
“I like it here.”
---
The woman’s gaze drifted toward the swing beside her.
Toward the sketch half-hidden beneath her hands.
---
Then softly—
“You miss him.”
---
Her entire body stilled.
---
Children were rarely prepared for moments when adults noticed too much.
---
“I don’t.”
---
The lie came immediately.
Sharp.
Defensive.
---
The maid smiled sadly.
Not mocking.
Not disbelieving.
---
Just sad.
---
“My daughter used to deny things too.”
---
Something about the statement irritated her instantly.
---
“I’m not a child.”
---
The maid’s expression softened further.
---
“No,” she murmured quietly. “I don’t think you are.”
---
Silence settled gently between them after that.
The wind moved through the trees again, brushing strands of hair across her face as the swing creaked faintly beneath her.
---
Then—
“Do you know where they took him?”
---
The question escaped before she could stop it.
---
The maid hesitated.
Only briefly.
---
“No one told me directly,” she admitted softly. “But I heard the adults speaking.”
A pause.
“There’s a private hospital outside the city.”
---
Hospital.
---
The word made something cold settle heavily inside her stomach.
---
“He’s not sick.”
---
The response came instinctively.
Emotionally.
---
The maid looked at her carefully for several seconds before answering.
---
“Sometimes adults send children away because they don’t know how to love them properly.”
---
The world seemed to quiet around those words.
---
Her fingers tightened slowly around the sketch.
---
Because somehow—
That sounded far more truthful than anything her parents had said.
---
The maid adjusted the flowers in her arms before stepping closer to the swing.
---
“When my daughter was little,” she said softly, “she used to rescue injured birds.”
---
At that—
Her attention shifted immediately.
---
“She believed if she loved them enough, they would stay alive forever.”
A faint smile crossed the woman’s face.
“She cried every time one died.”
---
The garden blurred slightly around the edges.
---
Birds.
---
Grandmother.
---
Him.
---
Everyone kept leaving.
---
“Did they?”
---
The maid blinked faintly.
---
“What?”
---
“Stay alive.”
---
For a moment, neither of them moved.
---
Then quietly—
“No.”
---
The honesty hurt more than comfort would have.
---
“But,” the maid continued gently, “they probably suffered less because someone cared for them before they went.”
---
Something inside her chest cracked painfully around those words.
---
Because suddenly—
She imagined him alone inside cold white walls.
Surrounded by strangers.
Waiting for people who never came.
---
And worst of all—
Possibly believing she forgot him.
---
The thought became unbearable instantly.
---
She stood abruptly from the swing.
The maid startled slightly.
---
“Miss?”
---
“I need paper.”
---
Confusion flickered briefly across the older woman’s face.
---
“For what?”
---
But she was already moving.
---
The mansion hallways blurred around her as she hurried upstairs, pulse uneven beneath her ribs for reasons she refused to name.
She entered her room quickly before locking the door behind her.
---
Then crossed toward the desk.
---
Paper.
Ink.
---
Her hands trembled slightly as she sat down.
Not from fear.
From urgency.
---
Because if the adults intended to erase him—
Then she would do the opposite.
---
The blank page waited silently beneath her fingers.
For several seconds, she stared at it without moving.
---
She had never written letters before.
Never needed to.
---
But now—
Words pressed painfully against the inside of her chest with nowhere else to go.
---
Slowly—
Carefully—
She lowered the pen.
---
*You said you wouldn’t leave.*
---
The ink looked strangely fragile against the page.
---
Her breathing slowed.
---
Then another sentence followed.
And another.
And another.
---
Outside her bedroom window, evening light faded gradually across the estate grounds while somewhere far beyond the city—
Inside a locked room filled with sketches and silence—
A boy sat awake beside cold fluorescent light, staring at the doorway every time footsteps approached.
---
Still waiting for something impossible.
---
Unaware that miles away,
a little girl who hated abandonment
had finally decided
she would not let him disappear alone.
- Writer
- chap_listContents
- likeADD