CHAPTER 12
1303 Words
Eva did not rush out of the building.
She walked.
The corridor felt longer now, the carpet muting the sound of her heels as though the space itself were holding its breath. The air-conditioning hummed steadily, indifferent, while behind her a door remained closed—Aldrich’s office sealed with all the things left unsaid.
She kept her shoulders straight, her chin level.
The elevator doors slid open with a soft chime. Eva stepped inside alone. As the doors closed, her reflection stared back at her from the mirrored surface—composed, immaculate, untouched.
For a moment, she did not recognize herself.
The elevator descended smoothly. Floor numbers lit up and vanished again. Her fingers curled slightly at her sides, nails pressing into her palms just enough to remind her she was still present, still contained.
When the doors opened into the lobby, the sound returned all at once—voices, footsteps, the faint clatter of coffee cups. Life, continuing without pause.
Eva moved through it like a shadow.
Outside, the sun was brighter than she expected. It caught the glass façade of the building and scattered into sharp reflections that made her blink. Heat pressed against her skin, the city breathing close and heavy.
She paused at the top of the steps.
Just for a second.
Her lips parted as she drew in a slow breath, the faintest tremor passing through it. Then she descended, her heels clicking softly against stone, each step measured, controlled.
Her car waited where she had left it.
She opened the door and slid inside, closing it with a quiet, deliberate motion. The interior smelled faintly of leather and something else—clean, familiar, safe.
Eva rested her forehead briefly against the steering wheel.
Not long enough to be noticed.
Not long enough to be weakness.
She straightened, started the engine, and pulled into traffic.
The city blurred past as she drove. Buildings gave way to quieter streets. Noise softened into distance. Traffic thinned. The radio remained off.
Her hands stayed steady on the wheel, but her jaw tightened, muscles shifting subtly beneath her skin. Her eyes focused ahead, unblinking, as though the road required her full attention to exist.
A memory intruded without warning.
Her husband’s hand on the small of her back at events, a quiet pressure that guided rather than pushed. Her son in the passenger seat years ago, adjusting the mirror, grinning as though the world were waiting for him.
Eva swallowed.
Her chest tightened—not sharply, but persistently, like something slowly pressing outward.
She did not realize where she was going until the turn was already made.
The road narrowed. Trees lined the path, their leaves whispering softly in the breeze. Sunlight filtered through branches, dappling the windshield in uneven patterns that shifted as the car moved.
The cemetery appeared gradually, almost gently.
Eva slowed.
She parked near the entrance, cutting the engine. Silence settled immediately, thick and unmistakable. The air here felt different—cooler, heavier, as though sound itself had learned restraint.
She sat for a moment, hands still on the wheel.
Then she stepped out.
The gravel crunched softly beneath her heels as she walked, the sound intrusive in the quiet. She adjusted her coat absently, fingers brushing the fabric without thought. Her breathing was shallow now, measured.
The path curved.
She saw the headstones before she saw theirs.
White and grey markers stood in orderly rows, names carved neatly into stone, dates marking beginnings and endings that felt too clean to be real. Eva’s pace slowed further, each step heavier than the last.
And then she stopped.
Two stones.
Side by side.
Her husband’s name etched deeply, the letters stark and unyielding. Below it, the dates—too close together, too final.
Her son’s stone beside it was smaller.
That detail undid her.
Eva stood very still, staring.
Her eyes traced the carved letters as though they might rearrange themselves into something temporary. Her lips parted slightly, then pressed together again as her throat tightened.
This was the place she had avoided.
The place where strategy held no meaning.
Her shoulders rose with a slow inhale—and then fell unevenly.
She stepped closer.
The ground beneath her feet felt unsteady now, as though the earth itself were shifting. She knelt slowly, the fabric of her trousers brushing against grass still damp with morning dew.
Her hand hovered over her husband’s name before settling against the cool stone.
Cold.
Immovable.
Her breath hitched.
Eva scoffed softly, the sound breaking against the quiet like something misplaced. Her mouth curved, not in humor, but in disbelief.
“You always hated attention,” she murmured, her voice low, uneven. “And now look at this.”
Her hand trembled.
She pressed her palm flat against the stone, as though grounding herself, as though contact might anchor what felt like it was unraveling inside her.
Then she turned to the smaller grave.
Her son’s.
Her lips began to shake before she could stop them. Her breath stuttered, shallow and sharp, as though her lungs had forgotten their rhythm. She reached out, fingers brushing the carved letters of his name.
Too light.
Too young.
“No,” she whispered.
The word slipped out without permission.
Her eyes burned suddenly, fiercely. She blinked once. Twice.
The tears came anyway.
They slid silently at first, tracing the curve of her cheek, gathering at her jaw before falling onto the grass below. Eva drew in a shaky breath, her chest rising too fast now, control slipping through her fingers.
She covered her mouth with her hand, a soft, broken sound escaping despite her effort to contain it. Her shoulders began to tremble, small at first, then harder, as though her body were finally claiming what her mind had denied.
“I told you to stay back,” she whispered, her voice breaking completely now. “I told you.”
Her head bowed.
Tears blurred the stones until the names dissolved into pale shapes. Her breath came in uneven pulls, quiet sobs she made no attempt to stop. Her free hand clenched in the grass, fingers curling into the earth as though she might pull something back from it.
Grief arrived in full.
Not sharp.
Not explosive.
But deep and suffocating.
Minutes passed. Or hours. Eva could not tell.
Eventually, the sobs softened into something quieter—shuddering breaths, tear-streaked silence. She wiped her face with the back of her hand, leaving faint smudges she did not care to correct.
She straightened slowly, kneeling still, her posture weary now, stripped of precision.
“I see it now,” she said quietly, her voice raw. “All of it.”
Her gaze moved between the two stones.
“You stood in front of me,” she continued. “Both of you.”
Her jaw tightened.
“And they thought that would end it.”
She rose to her feet, unsteady at first, then steadier. She smoothed her coat automatically, a reflex she did not bother to stop.
Her eyes were red. Her face damp.
But something else had settled there too.
Clarity.
Eva took one last look at the graves.
“I won’t let it be for nothing,” she said.
The words were not loud.
They did not need to be.
She turned and walked back toward her car, the gravel crunching beneath her feet once more. When she reached it, she paused, resting her hand briefly against the door.
Her reflection stared back at her from the darkened glass.
Changed.
Not broken.
Eva opened the door, got in, and closed it gently.
As she drove away, the cemetery disappeared behind her—but the weight of it remained, settled firmly, irrevocably, in her chest.
Grief had found its voice.
Now it would give way to action.
- Writer
