Chapter 26 - Letters to the Future
It was a slim volume with a tattered rose-coloured cover and soft gold lettering across the spine. Hearts Entwined. One of her favourites. She had read it too many times to count, but tonight she flipped back to the same page she always did when life felt heavy. Chapter fourteen. The part where the soldier-turned-florist finally confesses, awkward and breathless, to the widowed scholar he’d been bringing garden cuttings to for weeks.
Alena knew the lines by heart, but still… she smiled when she saw them.
“If I bring you one more bloom, it won’t be for your desk. It’ll be for your hair. And if you still don’t see it then, gods help me, I’ll spell it into the soil, so you trip over it every morning until you believe I mean it.”
A laugh bubbled up from her throat before she could help it. Just a small one, tucked behind her fingers. Her cheeks warmed slightly as she curled tighter into her seat, trying to hide the way her smile refused to leave.
It was always like this with these stories. She fell too hard for the quiet gestures, the unspoken things, the yearning that lived between teacups and unfinished sentences.
Alena turned the page.
The tram’s rattle faded into a rhythm beneath her, the soft glow of the cabin casting everything in pale amber. Outside, Korth passed by in a blur of stone and lamplight, but she barely noticed. Her finger traced the edge of the page as she read, her mind slipping somewhere gentler. Somewhere where love bloomed with patience and longing, where people said what they felt, even if their voices shook.
Her favourite characters always confessed, eventually. Even if it took them a hundred pages.
And every time, she believed it could happen for her, too.
Not that she would ever tell anyone she read books like this. Not even Devon. Especially not Devon.
She pressed the book to her chest with a dreamy sigh just as the tram gave a soft jolt, announcing the final stop. She slipped a pressed violet between the pages, marked her place, and tucked the book back into her satchel with delicate care.
The wind had settled by the time Alena stepped off the city tram and began the short walk to the outskirts of Korth. The sky was dark, clouds yawning across it like tired beasts, but her little path home was lined with flickering lamps that cast long, warm shadows. The cold nipped at her fingertips, but she moved with quiet purpose. Past the boundary stones, past the last rows of tall brick buildings, into the tree-framed space where her cottage stood waiting.
It wasn’t large. It wasn’t grand. But it was hers, or close enough. A modest place owned by the founder of Arkwright Dispatch, nestled just where the city gave way to green. Alena paid fair rent for it, but more importantly, she had been given a place of calm. And tonight, she needed calm more than anything.
The cottage was quiet when Alena stepped inside, the familiar creak of the floorboards greeting her like a weary old friend. She closed the door behind her, sealing out the night air, and leaned her back against it for a breath longer than usual.
Her boots came off with a practiced tug. She hung her jacket and courier bag on the wooden rack by the entrance. The scent of lemongrass from a nearly spent candle still lingered in the space. It was faint but comforting, like the tail end of a memory.
She walked to the bathroom in silence and stepped into the shower. The water poured hot and steady down her back. She tilted her head forward, eyes closed, letting the stream run over her shoulders and down her spine. The noise in her mind had been loud all day, juggling delivery routes, rent, groceries, the bills she had to send home, the ache in her legs from walking uphill in the rain, but here, under the water, the thoughts quieted. Not gone, but softened. She could finally think in order. One thought at a time.
When she emerged, wrapped in her favourite oversized shirt and worn cotton shorts, the air in the cottage was warm and still. She lit a fresh lemongrass candle and placed it near the window, watching the flame flicker before she moved to water her plants. Her fiddle leaf had grown two new leaves this week. The little succulent by the window hadn’t died yet. Small victories.
The record spun quietly in the corner, a jazz melody floating through the air like a memory from another life. Her father used to play something like this, she remembered. Always when he needed to concentrate. The thought made her chest ache, just slightly, but she let it pass.
Tea in hand, she settled on the couch and reached for her journal. It had been a long day, and she had promised herself she would write. Not for anyone else, not even really for herself. Just for the version of her that might need this again someday.
She flipped to a blank page.
Dear future Alena,
Today wasn’t terrible. But I’m tired. Not just in the way my body feels after a long shift, but in that deep, quiet way. The kind of tired that doesn’t leave when you sleep. The kind that lives behind your ribs and sits there, waiting.
I miss Dad today. It’s funny how grief works. I lit a candle, and the scent reminded me of the air after his favourite cologne faded. Then I was watering the plants and remembered the way he used to check the soil with one finger and nod like he was a forest druid or something. I laughed. Then I cried. It came out of nowhere. It always does.
No one really tells you how grief sneaks up on you. Not the big waves, not always. Sometimes it’s just a scent. A song. A joke you wanted to tell him. It hits you like a tide pulling you under, and there’s nothing to do but let it pass. And it always passes. But gods, does it hurt while it’s here.
Sometimes I feel like life moved on without me. Like I was just starting to figure out who I wanted to be, and suddenly, I had to become everything for everyone. Mum needed someone to steady her. My older brother couldn’t keep up with the bills. My little brother still had school and dreams and a future to worry about. So, I packed mine up and told myself I’d circle back to them later.
I’m trying not to resent that. I really am. It’s not anyone’s fault. Life isn’t fair, that’s all. I just wish I had more time to be… softer. Lighter. Maybe even happy.
She stopped writing for a moment. The tears had already started, sliding silently down her cheeks, darkening the corners of the journal page. She let them fall. There was no one to see. No one to tell her it was too much. This was hers.
She pressed the side of her hand to her face and let out a breath that trembled at the end. The ache in her chest refused to move, but she wasn’t ready to let go of it yet. It was proof of everything she still carried. Of everything she still loved.
When the tears finally slowed, she reached again for her pen.
You’ll be alright, she wrote, the ink shaky. You have to be. And even if you’re not right now, you will be again. One step at a time.
She closed the journal gently, resting her hand on it for a moment before reaching for her cup of tea. The cup was still warm. The candlelight danced along the cottage walls.
And in this stillness, in this quiet room filled only with breath and memories and music, Alena felt it.
Peace.
Not the kind that meant everything was fine. But the kind that reminded her it was okay to keep going anyway.
And tonight, that was enough.