Mia stared at her phone for the hundredth time the next day. No new messages from Ethan. No calls. Nothing since he had hung up on her yesterday after she confessed everything.
The silence was worse than yelling. It felt like a living thing — heavy, cold, and suffocating. Every hour that passed without a reply carved deeper into her chest.
She spent most of the morning sitting on the porch with her sketchbook open, but the page remained blank. She couldn’t draw. Couldn’t focus. Every few minutes her mind replayed the phone call — Ethan’s shocked “You what?”, the way his voice cracked with hurt and anger, and then the brutal finality of him telling her not to contact him.
Aunt Lisa brought her a sandwich and iced tea around noon. She set it down without a word and sat in the chair beside
