The Letters We Were Meant to Find

Locker 17

CHAPTER 3

LOCKER 17

The rain had stopped by the time Amara reached the old railway station.

She stood beneath the faded awning, watching commuters hurry past her. The station smelled of wet concrete, diesel, and something metallic that reminded her of the hospitals she had known all her life. She checked the message on her phone again.

LOCKER 17. PLATFORM THREE. COME ALONE.

There was no name attached to it.

Amara slipped the phone into her coat pocket and looked toward Platform Three. A train pulled away slowly, its windows glowing against the grey morning. She waited until the platform had nearly emptied before walking toward the row of old lockers.

Numbers 11 through 20 were covered in dust.

Her pulse quickened when she found seventeen.

For a moment, she simply stared at it.

Then she remembered her mother's letter.

Find Locker 17.

Amara reached into her handbag and pulled out the small key she had discovered inside the envelope. Her fingers trembled as she pushed it into the lock.

It turned.

The locker opened with a soft metallic click.

Inside was a brown leather case.

Nothing else.

Amara looked over her shoulder before removing it. The station appeared normal. People were coming and going. A woman was buying coffee near the entrance. Two students were laughing beside the ticket machines.

Yet Amara couldn't shake the feeling that someone was watching her.

She opened the case.

Inside lay several photographs, a small USB drive, and an envelope bearing her father's handwriting.

AMARA.

Her breath caught.

She picked up the envelope but didn't open it immediately. The handwriting was unmistakable. She had seen it only a handful of times in her childhood, but she remembered the shape of every letter.

Samuel Lin had written her name.

Twenty years ago.

Her phone suddenly vibrated.

A message appeared.

TURN AROUND.

Amara froze.

Slowly, she looked behind her.

At the far end of the platform stood Ethan Kwon.

He wasn't alone.

And the man standing beside him was the same man whose face had been scratched from her mother's photograph.