Chapter 3... The walls talk back
1215 Words
I didn’t sleep.
Not a wink.
I could not sleep. I just stared up, waiting for the ceiling to give me something…Nothing moved… The bed was too clean, too stiff like nobody ever really used it.
I turned over. Again. And again. Nothing helped. My thoughts felt loud, loud enough to drown me.
I kept seeing Julian in the garden. That slow wave. He gave me that look again. Like he knew something I didn’t. And he wasn’t going to tell me.
I sat up slowly. Everything felt heavy. The light coming in through the window was that pale grey you only see at the edge of morning. I looked over—6:04 a.m.
My eyes were sore. It could’ve been the sleep I didn’t get. Could’ve been something else. I didn’t know.
The dress was still on the chair. I hadn’t touched it, wrinkled now. Good.
I showered. No hot water. Just warm enough to make me angry. It was warm, but not in a way that helped. Not cold, either. Just… off.
They gave me a robe. White. Too clean. Too soft, like it didn’t belong to me.
The robe they’d given me was white. Thick. Monogrammed. I hated it.
Downstairs, I didn’t expect to see anyone, but of course—Liam. Already dressed. Already looking like someone who didn’t sleep because he didn’t need to.
He didn’t say good morning. He just slid a black coffee across the marble island toward me without looking up from whatever was on his laptop.
I stared at it for a second. Then at him.
“You always operate like this?” I asked.
“Like what?”
“Like I’m not here.”
He closed the laptop, finally met my eyes. “I don’t need to explain myself to you, Katherine.”
No apology. No warmth. Just his usual straight line of cold authority.
“I heard you last night,” I said, voice quiet but solid.
His jaw didn’t move. But his eyes did—just slightly. A shift.
“You said I was chosen. For what?”
He didn’t answer right away. Got up. Poured more coffee. Like we were just chatting about the weather.
“You needed help. I needed something simple.”
“Simple,” I repeated. “Is that what this is to you?”
He sipped his coffee. “You’re here. That’s what matters.”
I hated how calm he was. How unbothered. Like none of this touched him.
“I’m not stupid,” I said.
“No,” he replied. “You’re not.”
I waited for more. I didn’t get it.
He handed me a slim folder. “You’ll need to look this over before today’s shoot.”
“Shoot?”
“Brand partnership. My team’s arranging a few lifestyle photos. You’ll be briefed. It won’t take long.”
So this was what I’d signed up for.
Not just a fake wife. Not just human shields. I was a product now. Part of the packaging.
I opened the folder. Photos of us. Poses. Outfits. A ridiculous schedule.
“How many people know this is fake?” I asked.
He didn’t blink. “Enough to keep it from unraveling.”
“And Julian?”
He paused just long enough to make me think I hit something.
“He knows what I tell him.”
“And if he figures it out on his own?”
“He won’t.”
God, the arrogance. The ease.
I didn’t ask anything else. Took the folder. Went upstairs. Slammed the door. Too hard.
Sat on the bed. The photos were still there. I looked at them. Hated that I cared.
Me. Posing with Liam like I knew him. Like I loved him.
There was one of us on a fake picnic blanket in what looked like a park, laughing. The laugh looked real. I hated that the camera caught it.
By 10AM, a stylist showed up. A woman named Bria with flawless skin and six different bags. She talked while she worked—hair, makeup, outfit choices. I nodded. Smiled when she did. Let her tug and pin and curl.
I barely recognized myself in the mirror when she finished.
“You’ll kill the shoot,” she said, stepping back. “You’ve got the look for this.”
I didn’t reply.
She gave me a sympathetic smile. Not fake. Not plastic. Real.
⸻
“Don’t want to be here, do you?” she said, quieter this time.
I looked at her through the mirror.”Does anyone?”
Bria hesitated, then said, “No. But some of us get used to it.”
She left. And I stood there a while longer. Just staring.
⸻
The photo shoot was worse than I thought it would be.
There were lights. Too many people. Everything was staged.
Liam stood next to me like a wax figure. We smiled. Held hands. Walked through a fake garden path for the cameras.
At one point, he leaned close and said, “Laugh.”
So I did. On cue. Like a good girl. Like I wasn’t crumbling inside.
It lasted three hours. By the time we finished, my face hurt.
“Great work,” someone said. Probably the photographer. I didn’t care.
I wanted to peel my skin off. That’s how fake it all felt.
Back at the house, I pulled the dress off and dropped it on the floor. I changed into jeans. Bare face. My real self. Or whatever was left of her.
I needed air.
I found a back stairwell that led to the garden. Didn’t ask for permission. Didn’t care.
It was colder outside than I expected. The wind moved differently back there. Less filtered.
I walked until I reached the stone path near the far wall. That’s when I saw it.
A window. Barely visible behind ivy.
Not just any window. A small one. Half-covered.
Basement?
I shouldn’t have gone closer. But I did.
I knelt down, brushed the leaves back. It was too dark to see inside.
But I heard something.
Faint. Muffled.
A voice.
Then—three knocks.
Slow. Deliberate.
My heart shot into my throat.
I stumbled back, nearly falling. My hand scraped the stone.
I waited. Listened.
Silence.
Did I see it or not?
I backed away. Didn’t stop looking. Until I was on the other side of the garden.
I didn’t go in. I just sat on the wall. Tried to figure it out.
Julian’s wave. Liam’s voice. That basement window. The knock.
None of this was simple. None of this was safe.
I pulled out my phone. No signal.
I made it back inside, and there he was—Liam, just standing at the bottom of the stairs.
“You were gone awhile,” he said.
“I needed air.”
“You found it?”
I nodded. “Enough.”
He didn’t move aside.
“You’re not here to wander.”
“I didn’t realize breathing was off-limits.”
He stared at me for a moment. Then, finally, stepped aside.
Walked up the stairs. He was watching, I swear.
No sleep. Not from the ceiling this time.
It was a knock.
And the feeling that whatever was buried in this house… wasn’t finished with me yet.
- Writer
