Chapter One
The world has become a never-ending wake full of souls mourning what used to be.
This was the last thing Emma had scribbled in her notebook full of thoughts and memories written in her hybrid handwriting. Words written in a disorganized mixture of print and cursive, flowed to make streams of conscious thought. She had opened it with pen in hand only to draw another blank before exchanging the pen for a glass of vodka.
Emma sat in the living room, staring at the blank TV screen. The remote clenched in her hand like she had every intention of turning it on. But she hadn’t. Not after three glasses of vodka. The silence had seeped into the walls, as heavy and immovable as the grief that hung in her heart.
The house, haunted by all the unspoken words, had become too quiet. The laughter that used to fill the corners of this room, the soft conversations that spilled over the kitchen table during late nights, all gone. She could still picture it in flashes. Ava curled up in the armchair. Her messy hair fell over her eyes as she spoke in excited bursts about new painting ideas. Alex sitting beside her on the couch, his arm draped lazily over Emma’s shoulders while they debated what to watch next.
That had been their last night together.
Emma couldn’t stop thinking about it. The memory played on a loop in her mind, sharp and clear like it had happened mere moments ago; not months. She still remembered the text she’d gotten the next morning from a friend of Ava’s:
Are you okay? I just heard what happened on the news. I am so sorry. Please let me know if there’s anything I can do!
The words blurred now in her memory, not knowing what had happened until her phone rang. It was the hospital informing her of the fatal car wreck involving the only two people she cared about.
After re-reading that text over and over, she hit Delete, forgetting it as another smudge on the wreckage of her life. She’d never say goodbye.
Now she lived with ghosts. The apartment they had shared was once alive and full of love. Now, its rooms and hallways sat empty, scarred with residual memories of the dead.
Emma stood and walked to the window, the floorboards creaking beneath her weight. Outside, the fog rolled in thick from the woods, swallowing the streets, the houses, and everything in its path. The mist had a way of clinging to the town, wrapping itself around the familiar landmarks like a blanket of sorrow. A part of her wished it would just smother everything, herself included. Maybe then she wouldn’t feel so hollow.
She pressed her forehead against the cool glass, her breath fogging the window as she whispered to no one, “I don’t know how to do this.”
How was she supposed to keep going in a world that no longer made sense? In a world where Alex’s voice was nothing more than an echo, and Ava’s laughter had faded into silence?
Her phone buzzed on the counter, shattering the stillness for just a moment. She ignored it. Nothing mattered. Nothing could bring them back.
She’d tried everything to numb the pain. Counseling sessions that felt like empty words spoken in a hollow room. Medications that dulled the edges of her grief but left her feeling like a ghost herself. Drinking until the ache in her chest was drowned out by alcohol and blurred memories.
Emma had even tried to meet other people online. After a few glasses of liquid courage, she found herself with an inbox full of messages she would have to pay to read. She did. After each conversation going nowhere, she was asked to pay more. That’s when she realized that none of these people were real. She’d been had. Once again, she had found herself in an online room full of ghosts.
Emma had immediately reached for her notebook after that, scribbling intensely:
Feeling lonely in a chat room full of bots within the World Wide Ouija Board. I can’t even summon a friend online.
With everything she tried, nothing had worked.
Nothing.
Emma turned away from the window, her hands trembling as she gripped the back of the chair. The weight of it all threatened to crush her, to pull her under. And there was a part of her— a dark, quiet part—that wanted it to. If death was the only release, maybe it was time to stop fighting.
The guilt that usually followed such thoughts didn’t come this time. Instead, a kind of numb resignation settled over her. She stood abruptly, leaving the empty glass, and drifted into the living room. The air was stale, thick with the smell of unopened windows and forgotten plans.
She should eat, maybe try to sleep, but what was the point? Everything felt hollow as if she were moving through someone else’s life. The thought drifted through her mind, unbidden, like a whisper:
Just end it.
As the words echoed in her head, Emma’s eyes landed on the small bookshelf in the corner. Wedged between dusty novels was the book—Ava’s book—the one about the town’s local legends. Emma pulled it free, the pages dry and yellowed with age, and thumbed through it absently. Her fingers stopped on a chapter near the back, the one Ava had joked about in passing, years before. A man, cursed by death. The one everyone whispered about.
Elias.
Her heartbeat quickened. The name wasn’t unfamiliar—she’d heard the whispers herself, the way people spoke his name with a mix of fear and pity. The story was absurd, impossible, but there was something about it that tugged at her now, something that resonated in the deep hollow within her chest.
Emma scanned the page. The man who lived on the outskirts, whose very love was a death sentence to all those close to him. Some called him cursed, others said it was all coincidence, but no one dared to go near him.
She hesitated, her eyes lingering on the final sentence of the chapter: And so, Elias lived alone, fearing his own heart, keeping the world at arm’s length lest it succumb to his touch.
A bitter smile tugged at the corner of her lips. Keeping the world at arm’s length… It was a feeling she understood all too well.
Her mind raced. Maybe this was it—maybe this was the way out. If the curse was real, if his love truly brought death, then she wanted it. She needed it. It was a chance to end the unbearable weight of surviving in a world that she no longer wanted any part of. If the world had already taken everything from her, maybe it was time to give herself to it.
Without thinking, she slammed the book shut, the sound echoing in the empty room. The decision settled in her chest like a stone sinking to the bottom of a river. She’d find him—Elias. If the curse was real, he’d take her away from all this, from the suffocating silence and the endless ache.
The sky outside had darkened into deep purples and grays. Emma didn’t bother turning on the lights. She moved through the darkness, her footsteps slow but deliberate, gathering a few things—a coat, her keys.
Emma jumped at the twinkling sound and bright light emanating from the table. She walked over to the table and grabbed her phone to see who kept calling.
She held the phone in her hand, watching the name SAM blink once, twice, before it stopped vibrating in her hand.
Oh, what does he want? she thought. Whatever. I’ll call him later.
Her fingers trembled as she gripped the doorknob, pausing for just a moment. She could hear the distant hum of life outside, the world continuing as if nothing had happened, as if Alex and Ava were still here, laughing and alive. But that world wasn’t for her anymore.
Emma opened the door, stepping out into the cool evening air, her heart pounding in her chest. The wind stirred, carrying the faint scent of pine and earth, but it did nothing to ground her.
She wasn’t afraid. There was no fear in this decision. Only a strange sense of calm, like standing at the edge of a cliff and knowing there was no way back.
Allevi8ed Writing 
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