chapter four
542 Words
She didn't go back home.
Not yet.
There were too many questions running through her mind, and for the first time, she wasn't going to wait for someone else to give her the answers. The boy had lied to her. The old man had hidden things from her. Even her grandmother, the person she had trusted most, had left behind secrets she couldn't understand.
If everyone wanted to keep her away from the truth, then she would find it herself.
Her eyes fell on the folded paper she had taken from the boy. One word stood out among the strange information written across it.
Meera.
That was where she was going.
She returned to Wilume the following morning.
The place looked different this time. Maybe it was because she was no longer arriving with hope. She walked through the entrance slowly, paying attention to every corner, every face, every whispered conversation. She didn't ask anyone for directions. She didn't trust anyone enough to ask.
Instead, she searched.
She checked the rooms, the courtyard, the small library, and even the hallway where she had first spoken to the boy. Nothing.
Then she noticed a narrow staircase she hadn't seen before.
She climbed slowly.
At the top was a long corridor with several closed doors.
One door stood slightly open.
She pushed it.
The room was dark and dusty, with old boxes stacked against the walls. She switched on the light and began searching through them.
Nothing.
Then she saw a photograph lying beneath a pile of papers.
She picked it up.
Her heart stopped.
It was a picture of her grandmother.
She recognized her immediately.
But Grandma wasn't alone.
Standing beside her was a woman the girl had never seen before.
She turned the photograph over.
Written on the back were two names.
Meera.
And beneath it.
Her daughter.
The girl's hands began to tremble.
She looked at the woman again.
There was something about her face.
Something strangely familiar.
She brought the photograph closer.
The eyes.
The shape of the smile.
The tiny mark near her eyebrow.
She had seen those features before.
Not in a photograph.
In the mirror.
She dropped the photograph.
“No…”
Her voice barely came out.
She picked it up again, hoping she had imagined it.
She hadn't.
There was another piece of paper underneath the photograph.
She unfolded it.
Only one sentence had been written on it.
If she ever comes looking for Mira, do not tell her who she is.
Her breathing stopped.
Who was “she”?
And why did the message sound as though someone had been expecting her to come?
She turned the photograph over again.
Her eyes returned to the woman.
For the first time, she wondered whether the secrets surrounding her grandmother weren't really about her grandmother at all.
Maybe they were about her.
A sound suddenly came from behind the door.
She froze.
Someone was standing in the hallway.
She quickly folded the paper and held the photograph against her chest.
“Who's there?”
Silence.
Then a woman's voice answered from the other side.
“You shouldn't have found that.”
The girl's blood ran cold.
She knew that voice.
But she couldn't remember from where.
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