THE LAST MESSAGE U SENT ME

THE LAST MESSAGE YOU SENT ME A Young Adult Romantic Suspense Novel Some people leave your life. Others disappear from it. And sometimes, the person you have been mourning is the one keeping the truth from you. ### Chapter One: The Boy in the Rain The first time I saw Noah Vale, he was standing outside my lecture hall, holding an umbrella over a girl who wasn't me. I know that sounds ordinary. A boy. An umbrella. A girl standing too close to him. But Noah had been missing for exactly 147 days, and the last message he had sent me said he was never coming back. I had read that message so many times that I could remember every punctuation mark. I'm sorry, Amara. Please don't look for me. Forget that I ever existed. No explanation. No goodbye in person. Just seven words that had turned my first year at Bellweather University into something I barely recognized. And now, on a rainy Thursday afternoon, there he was. Alive. Wearing the charcoal coat I had bought him for his twentieth birthday. His hair was shorter, his face thinner, and there was a pale scar running from his jaw toward his ear. But it was Noah. I would have recognized him in a crowd of a thousand strangers. I stopped walking. Students moved around me, laughing and complaining about the rain. Someone bumped my shoulder. I barely felt it. "Noah?" The girl beneath his umbrella turned first. She was beautiful in a way that made me instantly dislike myself for noticing. Tall, with dark curls and a silver necklace resting against her collarbone. Noah turned slowly. For one impossible second, our eyes met. I waited for him to smile. For him to say my name. For him to cross the distance between us and explain why I had spent nearly five months believing the boy I loved had chosen to disappear. Instead, he looked at me like I was a stranger asking for directions. "Can I help you?" he asked. The words landed harder than they should have. I stared at him. "You're joking." He glanced at the girl beside him. "I'm sorry. Do we know each other?" My throat tightened. I wanted to slap him. I wanted to cry. I wanted to grab the front of his coat and demand that he stop pretending. Instead, I laughed. It was a small, ugly sound. "You really want to do this here?" His expression didn't change. "I'm afraid you've mistaken me for someone else." Then he turned away. Just like that. He walked off with the girl, leaving me standing in the rain with the sudden, terrifying realization that someone could break your heart twice without ever raising their voice. The first time, Noah had left. The second time, he had looked me in the eye and pretended I had never mattered. I didn't attend my next lecture. I went straight to my room in Hawthorne Hall, locked the door, and pulled out the shoebox I kept beneath my bed. Inside were the things I had promised myself I would eventually throw away. A cinema ticket. A dried flower from the university gardens. A photograph of Noah asleep against my shoulder on a train. And a black notebook. On the first page, in Noah's handwriting, were the words: For Amara, in case I forget how to tell you things. He had given it to me on the night we first kissed. We had been sitting on the library steps after midnight, sharing a packet of biscuits because neither of us had enough money for dinner. Noah had been telling me about his mother, who had died when he was fourteen, and how he hated that everyone expected grief to have an expiration date. I'd told him that some losses never became smaller. You simply learned how to carry them. He had looked at me for a long time. Then he kissed me. It was gentle and uncertain, and afterward he rested his forehead against mine. "Promise me something," he whispered. "What?" "If I ever disappear, don't believe the first story they tell you." I had laughed. "Planning to become a criminal, Vale?" "Promise me, Amara." So I had. I had promised him without understanding that, one day, the promise would become the only thing keeping me standing. Now I opened the notebook. Most of its pages contained ordinary things: song lyrics he'd written himself, ridiculous sketches of our lecturers, lists of places he wanted to visit. Near the back, I found a sentence I hadn't noticed before. If you ever see me again and I don't recognize you, find the girl with the silver necklace. I read it once. Then again. The girl beneath his umbrella had worn a silver necklace. My hands began to shake. I turned the page. A small photograph fell onto my lap. It showed Noah standing beside the university's old clock tower. He was wearing the same coat he'd worn that afternoon. On the back was a date. Two days from today. Beneath it, in unfamiliar handwriting, were six words. Ask what happened on October 11. I checked the calendar on my phone. October 11 had been the date Noah disappeared. For the first time since seeing him, I stopped thinking about how badly he had hurt me. Because there was something worse than a boy who abandoned you. A boy who returned with no memory of loving you—and a stranger's warning hidden inside the one thing he had left behind. My phone vibrated. Unknown number. You saw him. I stared at the screen. Another message appeared. Good. Now don't let him remember. Before I could reply, a final message arrived. Because the last person who remembered what happened on October 11 is dead. I sat motionless on my bed. Outside my window, the rain thickened, turning the campus lights into blurred gold. Then someone knocked on my door. Three slow knocks. I stood and approached it carefully. "Who is it?" A girl's voice answered. "Amara? My name is Celeste. We need to talk about Noah." I opened the door. The girl from beneath his umbrella stood in the hallway. Up close, I noticed that her silver necklace wasn't a necklace at all. It was a small key hanging from a chain. She looked frightened. "Listen to me," she whispered. "I know what he told you today. I know he pretended not to recognize you." "Who are you?" She swallowed. "My name is Celeste Ward. I was Noah's girlfriend before you." I felt the floor tilt beneath me. "Before me?" She nodded, tears gathering in her eyes. "But that's not why I'm here." She glanced over her shoulder, checking the empty hallway. Then she leaned closer. "Amara, Noah didn't disappear on October 11." I stared at her. "What are you talking about?" Celeste's voice broke. "He died that night." For a moment, I couldn't hear anything. Not the rain. Not the distant voices from the stairwell. Not even my own breathing. I looked at her silver key, then at the black notebook in my hand. "But I just saw him." "I know." "He's alive." Celeste shook her head. "No, Amara. The boy you saw today is alive." She gripped my wrist. "But Noah Vale is not his real name." And before I could ask another question, the lights in the hallway went out. ### Chapter Two: The Girl Who Remembered Celeste didn't leave when the lights went out. She pulled me into my room, shut the door, and stood with her back against it until the emergency lights flickered on. I couldn't stop looking at her. "Explain," I said. She rubbed her hands together. "I know how this sounds." "No, you don't. You don't know anything about how this sounds." "You're right." "Then start talking." Celeste looked at the black notebook lying open on my bed. "Where did you get that?" "Noah gave it to me." "When?" "Before he disappeared." Her expression changed. Not surprise. Recognition. "Then he trusted you more than I thought." "Celeste, if you know something, tell me." She sat down. "On October 11, Noah was supposed to meet me at the old clock tower. He called me at 9:17 p.m. and told me something terrible had happened. He said he had evidence that someone at Bellweather had been changing student records. People were being removed from the university database. Their photographs disappeared. Their accommodation records vanished. Eventually, even their friends began insisting they'd never existed." "That's impossible." "So I thought." She reached into her coat and removed a folded piece of paper. It was a list of names. Beside each name was a date. Some had been crossed out. At the bottom was a name I recognized. ELLIOT REED — OCTOBER 11. Elliot had been Noah's roommate. A quiet boy who played the piano in the student lounge and always remembered everyone's birthday. I hadn't seen him since the week Noah disappeared. "Where is Elliot?" I asked. Celeste looked down. "That's the problem. According to the university, Elliot Reed never attended Bellweather." I shook my head. "I knew him." "So did I." "Then why isn't he here?" "Because someone has made it look as if he never existed." She paused. "And I think Noah found out how." I sat beside her. "What happened on October 11?" Celeste took a shaky breath. "Noah asked me to meet him at the clock tower. I went there at ten. He never arrived. At eleven, campus security told me there had been an accident near the river. They said a student had fallen from the old footbridge." My fingers tightened around the notebook. "Was it Noah?" "They wouldn't tell me. The university closed the area, and by morning, everyone was saying there had been no accident." "Everyone?" "Everyone who had known the student." I stared at her. "How is that possible?" "I don't know. I only know that when I asked the dean about Noah Vale, he said there had never been a student by that name." A cold sensation crawled up my spine. "But I have photographs." "Keep them safe." "I have messages." "Back them up somewhere outside the university." "Why?" Celeste looked directly at me. "Because three days after Noah disappeared, my entire phone reset itself. Every message, every photograph, every contact connected to him vanished." She lifted the silver key around her neck. "This is all I have left." "What does it open?" "The university's old records room." I stared at the key. "How did you get it?" "Elliot gave it to me the night before he disappeared." She stood. "I need you to come with me tonight." "Absolutely not." "Amara—" "You just told me that a boy I loved is dead, that the university erases people, and that somebody is sending me anonymous messages. You cannot seriously expect me to go wandering around a locked building with you." Celeste's face crumpled. "I don't expect you to trust me." "Good." "But I think you're the only person Noah left a clue for." She nodded toward the notebook. I looked down. The page with the photograph had a faint indentation beneath the writing. I tilted it toward the desk lamp. More words appeared in the angled light. ROOM 314. MIDNIGHT. BRING THE KEY. I looked at Celeste. "What's in Room 314?" "I don't know." "Then how do you know it's in the records building?" "Because Elliot wrote it on the inside of my locker before he disappeared." She moved toward the door. "Midnight. If you decide to come, meet me behind the library." Then she left. I should have stayed in my room. I should have taken the notebook to the police, packed my things, and left Bellweather University before the next morning. Instead, at 11:47 p.m., I put on my coat and walked into the rain. Because I had loved Noah Vale. And whatever else he had been, I needed to know why he had left me with a mystery instead of a goodbye. The old records building stood behind the university chapel, separated from the main campus by a narrow courtyard and a row of dead trees. Celeste was waiting beneath an archway. "You came," she said. "Don't make me regret it." She led me through a side entrance. The corridor smelled of damp stone and old paper. We climbed two flights of stairs, passing doors with faded numbers until we reached Room 314. Celeste inserted the silver key. The lock clicked. Inside, shelves lined the walls. Boxes of student files covered the floor. A single desk stood beneath a dusty window. Someone had been here recently. A chair was overturned. Papers lay scattered across the desk, and a computer monitor glowed faintly in the darkness. I approached it. The screen displayed a photograph of Noah. Underneath it was a date. OCTOBER 11 — 11:43 P.M. And beneath that: IDENTITY TRANSFER: COMPLETE. "What does that mean?" I whispered. Celeste had gone very still. "Amara," she said, "don't touch anything." But I had already noticed a folder lying beside the keyboard. It was labelled with my name. I opened it. Inside was a copy of my university application, my birth certificate, and a photograph of a baby wrapped in a white blanket. On the back, someone had written: SUBJECT NINE. My vision blurred. "Celeste?" She didn't answer. I turned toward her. She was staring at the photograph with an expression of absolute terror. "Tell me what this means." Before she could speak, the computer chimed. A video opened automatically. Noah appeared on the screen. He looked exhausted. His hair was wet, and there was a cut on his forehead. He stared into the camera as though he knew exactly who would be watching. "Amara," he said, "if you're seeing this, it means they have found you." I moved closer. "I need you to understand something. Whatever they tell you about me, whatever you remember, don't trust the dates. Don't trust the photographs. And whatever happens, don't let them show you the original recording." He looked over his shoulder. Then he whispered the words that made my blood run cold. "You're not the girl I fell in love with." The screen went black. Behind me, the door slammed shut. A lock clicked into place. And from the corridor outside, a man's voice said: "Thank you for bringing us the key, Miss Ward." Celeste grabbed my hand. "Run." But there was nowhere to go. The computer screen flickered back to life. A new message appeared. SUBJECT NINE HAS BEEN LOCATED. Then another. BEGINNING RECOVERY. And finally, beneath it, a name. Not Noah's. Not Celeste's. Mine. AMARA VALE. End of Chapter Two.