Chapter Thirteen: Smoke Without Fire
830 Words
The note sat on Maya’s table like it had a pulse.
Found you.
Two words, yet they echoed louder than any scream. Louder than the Port Harcourt taxis honking on Rumuola Road, louder than the church down the street where voices rose in praise every morning. It was louder than the blood in her ears.
She had thrown the envelope across the room. Then, two hours later, picked it up and smoothed the crumples. The words hadn't changed. Her fear had only deepened.
It was happening again.
Her world, once slowly stitching itself back together with Chika’s laughter and Luca’s quiet steadiness, had started to fray at the edges.
She barely ate that morning. A few spoons of pap, cold and tasteless. Her phone buzzed — three missed calls from Chika, one message from Luca: “I’m at the studio. You okay?”
She didn’t reply. What would she say? That she was unraveling again?
She pulled on jeans and a loose top, tied a scarf around her head, and slipped out into the heat of the day. People bustled, bartered, called out prices for okro and plantain. Maya walked through the market like she wasn’t really there.
Until she felt eyes on her.
She turned. Just a man in a blue shirt counting change.
But her stomach didn’t believe that.
---
At Chika’s compound, the gate creaked open and shut behind her. The yard smelled of rain even though the skies were clear.
Chika opened the door almost instantly. “Babe! I was beginning to—whoa.” She took one look at Maya’s face and stepped aside. “Come in.”
Maya stood for a moment before stepping into the cool, small living room. Chika’s place always smelled like Dettol and roasted peanuts.
“I got another note.”
Chika froze halfway to the sofa. “Where?”
“At my door. This morning.”
She sat slowly. “What did it say?”
“Just two words. Found you.”
A beat of silence.
Then, with all the steadiness in her voice, Chika said, “We are not playing this game again.”
“It’s not a game,” Maya whispered.
“I know. That’s why we won’t do this thing where you shrink and vanish. He wants to see you spiral.”
“I’m scared.”
“I know.”
Maya swallowed. “And angry. That I’m still afraid of him after all this time. Like… like he still owns something in me.”
Chika sat beside her. “He doesn’t. Fear does. And fear isn’t loyal to anyone—it just latches onto whatever opens the door.”
---
Later, Maya wandered into the art studio with her scarf pulled low over her brow. The scent of drying paint greeted her like an old friend.
Luca looked up from the far end of the room where he was mixing colors. His eyes softened the second they landed on her.
“Maya,” he said, voice careful.
“I needed to be here.”
He nodded. “I’m glad you came.”
She didn’t talk as she walked to the supplies. She grabbed a wide brush and started coating a canvas in shades of violet and charcoal. Her hand trembled, but she kept going, the strokes getting bolder, more erratic.
Luca moved closer but didn’t interrupt.
After a while, she said, “I feel like I’m back there. In that old apartment. Windows locked. Music turned up just so I wouldn’t hear the sound of my own breathing.”
“I remember,” he said softly.
Maya turned to him, startled. “I never told you that.”
“No. But I know the signs.”
She swallowed the lump in her throat. “You ever feel like no matter how far you run, something still crawls up your back?”
Luca was quiet for a moment. “I used to.”
“What changed?”
“I stopped running.”
“That’s not fair. Some of us don’t get to stop.”
“No,” he agreed. “But you do get to decide what’s chasing you.”
---
That evening, she sat by her window, sketching again.
She drew Luca’s hands—strong, steady, not soft but safe.
She drew the scarf she wore today, like armor.
She drew herself, a shadow behind her shoulders, and her eyes staring directly at it.
Her phone buzzed again. Luca: “Lock your doors tonight.”
She smiled. Just slightly.
But when she walked toward the door to double-check the bolts, she saw something on the floor.
Another envelope.
It hadn’t been there a moment ago.
Hands trembling, she picked it up.
Inside: a blurry photo of her walking through the market today. Someone had been close. Too close.
On the back, written in a jagged scrawl:
You’re still beautiful when you’re afraid.
Maya’s breath caught in her throat.
And all she could think was: He’s here.
- Writer
