Chapter 0014: The Room with No Name
The door was waiting.
It had no handle, no keyhole. Just the sound of my heartbeat pulsing behind it.
Leo didn't speak as I stepped toward it.
Neither did I.
The store was breathing again — slow and deep — like it knew something had shifted.
Like it was watching.
My fingers hovered over the wooden frame.
It was warm.
I hadn't touched it yet, but I swear it shivered.
I looked back at Leo once.
He nodded.
Just that.
And I stepped through.
At first, I thought I was falling.
Not down — but inward.
Like something inside me was unfolding and folding at the same time.
Light blinked around me — soft, golden light that didn't seem to come from anywhere.
It pulsed with the rhythm of a lullaby I almost remembered.
When the light faded, I wasn't in the bookstore anymore.
Or maybe I was — just a part of it no one else had walked through in a very long time.
The room was circular.
Stone walls wrapped in ivy that shouldn't grow indoors.
Books floated, gently, as if afraid of making noise.
And in the center — a chair.
Wooden. Simple.
Empty.
Except it wasn't.
A book rested there. Closed.
My name was written on the cover.
But this time, beneath my name… was Lena's.
Emma & Lena.
I swallowed.
My legs moved before my thoughts could catch up.
I reached the book and touched it with both hands.
It felt like touching a heartbeat.
I opened it.
The first page was blank.
The second page… not quite.
It held a single sentence:
"I'm sorry I left you."
My vision blurred.
I hadn't even known what I was missing.
But my heart… it had.
The pages began to flip on their own.
Images spilled out.
Not drawings.
Memories.
A little girl in a yellow raincoat — me.
Running through puddles, laughing.
A hand reaching out to steady me — Lena.
Her voice: "Careful, star-child."
My knees gave out.
I knelt on the floor, the book glowing in my lap.
I remembered her.
All at once.
She used to visit my dreams.
She used to hum songs I'd forgotten how to sing.
She used to say the bookstore was a secret garden for the forgotten parts of the soul.
Leo had said she brought me once.
He hadn't said she loved me.
Like a sister. Maybe more.
And I had loved her back.
I wiped my cheeks.
There was something else in the room now.
A shimmer.
Like someone almost visible.
I turned.
And there she was.
Not a ghost.
Not a vision.
But not quite real either.
Lena.
Just as I remembered her — long dark hair, a smirk that softened into kindness.
She didn't speak.
She just knelt beside me, her eyes wet.
"I thought you were gone," I whispered.
She smiled, a little crooked. "I was. For a while."
I reached for her, but my hand passed through.
Cold.
Empty.
She shook her head gently.
"Don't. You'll lose the tether."
"What is this place?" I asked.
"A room for stories that were interrupted."
Her voice was thinner than I remembered.
Fraying at the edges.
"You're fading," I said.
"I've been fading for a long time."
I clutched the book to my chest.
"I don't want to lose you again."
"You already did once," she said, smiling sadly. "But now you remember. That's the difference."
The light around her began to dim.
"The store gave me this moment," she said softly. "To remind you. To thank you."
"For what?"
"For coming back."
I choked on a sob. "Will I ever see you again?"
Lena tilted her head.
"Maybe. But even if you don't — I'm part of the story now. That's all I ever wanted."
She turned toward the floating books.
"You're not just reading the story anymore, Emma."
She looked back at me one last time.
"You're writing it."
And then — she was gone.
Just gone.
No sound. No shimmer. No goodbye.
Only the book in my hands.
Only my name… and hers.
When I came back through the door, Leo was still there.
But he didn't need to ask anything.
He just pulled me into a hug that said everything.
And I let him.
The bookstore sighed around us.
Outside, the rain had stopped.
The wind had stilled.
And for the first time in a long, long while…
I felt like I was exactly where I was supposed to be.