The attic groaned beneath their weight, dust motes dancing in the shaft of golden light that pierced the gloom. Celeste moved slowly, as if afraid the silence might break. Old boxes, forgotten fabrics, a trunk clasped shut by rust and memory. Elias coughed, his breath thin and brittle, but his eyes were sharp, drawn to the old leather-bound book that lay buried beneath a faded shawl.
The diary's spine cracked like an old wound as they opened it. Celeste's fingers trembled.
The ink inside was faded, but her sister's voice bled through each page. Anna. Always Anna. Her words began in light—lines filled with hope and reckless joy, the kind born of forbidden love. Henri, she wrote again and again. A married man who whispered promises beneath moonlight and salt.
But the pages darkened.
Hope turned to pleading. Pleading to silence. Then, the final line:
"Maybe it's better if I'm not here."
Celeste pressed her hands to her face, the sobs ripping from her chest raw and ragged. Elias reached for her, his lungs protesting, but he held her close, his own tears silent.
"I didn't know," she whispered.
"She carried it alone," he said, voice rough, "and it broke her."
The diary lay open between them, a wound stitched in ink, and above them, the attic groaned again—like the house remembered.