Chapter 3The Last Letter of My Heart

Three years ago, my mother died.

All she left me was this bar.

For a moment, standing in the ruins, I had no idea where to go. A wave of pain, sharp and searing, washed over my entire body, making it impossible to even think about moving. I just sat there, in the middle of the wreckage, and let the rain soak me to the bone for the rest of the night.

By morning, Harbor City was buzzing with the scandal: Hayden Cole had returned, only to violently retaliate against his first love.

As the sun rose, I prepared to leave. But first, I knelt before the wreckage and bowed my head three times, a final farewell.

I didn't realize Hayden was there until he was standing right in front of me. He stepped over a pile of broken wood and hauled me to my feet with one hand.

“It’s just a damn bar, Avery. You don’t have to destroy yourself over it.”

I dusted off my hands, planted my feet firmly on the ground, and slapped him three times, hard, across the face.

“My mother’s memorial plaque was in there,” I said, my voice hollow. “I can’t find it. So yes, I had to pay my respects.”

He raised an eyebrow, a flicker of something unreadable in his eyes. “Is that so? Three slaps in exchange for your mother’s plaque. Sounds like a fair trade.”

I ignored him, my gaze fixed on the desolation that had once been my life.

He wouldn’t shut up, following me and spewing a stream of vitriol designed to get a reaction.

“Avery, I’m talking to you.”

I kept walking as if I hadn't heard him. He rushed to catch up.

“Don’t pretend you don’t care. Do you have any idea how awful you look right now? Stop the act.”

“I was sick for a while,” I shot back, finally turning to face him. “It took a toll. But don’t flatter yourself. You really think you have the power to affect me anymore?”

One thing was clear, though. He had come back specifically to make my life a living hell.

If I were healthy, I wouldn’t have minded breaking a few more of his bones. But now… I just didn’t have the energy.

…

At the hospital, a panel of doctors studied my scans, their faces grim.

“How many of the last pills I gave you are left?” my primary physician, Dr. Evans, asked.

“None.”

“None?!” He stared at me, aghast. “That was a three-month supply! You finished it in a week?”

Dr. Evans had been managing my case from the beginning. The moment he started hedging, using vague language about my prognosis, I knew. I knew my time was short.

“Where are… your parents?” he asked gently.

“Dr. Evans, you of all people should know better,” I said with a wry smile. “We’ve known each other a long time. It’s just a few more years of suffering, then a handful of dust. I can handle it.”

He adjusted his glasses, his expression pained. “Your emotional state was stable for three years. What happened this past week to cause such a drastic change?”

I glanced at the news notification on my phone. Sometimes, the person you care about the least becomes the very thing that seals your fate.

“Your condition is deteriorating rapidly,” he finally admitted. “Without the medication… it could be a week, a month, maybe three. There’s no way to know.”

“Take this,” he said, pushing a new bottle of pills toward me. “When the pain comes, take three. Remember, no more than three at a time…”

He didn’t get to finish. I twisted the cap off and poured a handful of pills into my mouth. I didn’t care how many. I’d take however many I needed until the pain stopped.

A week or three months, it was all the same to me now.

Afterward, I found an empty corner in the hospital and huddled there, my back pressed against the ice-cold wall, as wave after wave of pain and sweat washed over me. For ten minutes, I listened to the muffled sounds of prayers and whispered pleas drifting from a nearby surgical waiting room. The most desperate bargains with God are always made outside an operating theater.

“Mommy, is that the lady from before?” a little girl’s voice piped up. “Now that we’re all better, should we go say goodbye to her?”

“Her illness isn’t going to get better, sweetie,” the mother whispered back. “We shouldn’t bother her. Poor thing. No mother, no father, and so sick. She might die without anyone even there to claim her body.”

The little girl looked up, confused. “But her mommy and daddy… isn't there someone in the world who cares about her?”

I stared down at the blurry screen of my phone, rubbing my eyes.

It was a text from Hayden.

He’d been messaging me since last night, relentlessly asking about compensation.

No one who cares, I thought. But maybe someone to claim the body.

I pulled up the contact I hadn't called in a decade and pressed the button.

He answered almost immediately.

“Made up your mind?” he asked, his voice laced with impatience.

“If you really want to compensate me, Hayden,” I said, “then you can collect my body.”