The ledger on the desk felt heavier than the gun strapped to my ribs.
L.F.
Little Flame.
The initials were a ghost haunting the paper, an anchor dragging me back to a life I had burned down to escape. I traced the ink with a trembling fingertip. Fifteen years of payments. Every month, like clockwork. A lifeline sent by a monster.
The office door clicked shut.
I didn't look up.
If I looked at him...
the photograph would become real.
The silence stretched between us until it became something neither of us seemed willing to break.
I finally looked at him.
My vision blurred.
Not from tears.
From exhaustion.
Fifteen years.
Fifteen birthdays where I whispered goodbye to a father who couldn't hear me.
Fifteen Christmases staring at the empty chair no one else dared sit in.
Fifteen
