Zara
Today is my birthday.
Nineteen.
I should feel excited. Giddy. Maybe even a little reckless. It’s supposed to be a milestone—the last stretch of girlhood, the threshold of something new.
But instead…
I feel nothing.
Or worse—empty.
Hollow.
Like something important slipped through my fingers when I wasn’t looking.
I stared at myself in the mirror as sunlight poured through my bedroom window. My golden hair curled over my shoulders in loose waves, my skin tan and clear, my crystal-blue eyes bright beneath soft makeup. I looked like a girl with everything.
Loved. Engaged. Pregnant.
A future laid out neatly in front of her like a ribbon-tied gift.
And yet…
All I felt was the dull echo of something missing.
⸻
The emptiness started the night of the rehearsal dinner.
One minut
