Kyle
The forest breathed around him.
Kyle's shoes struck the narrow dirt trail in a steady rhythm, crunching against fallen leaves still damp with morning dew. The air was sharp—pine, soil, something metallic beneath it all—and it filled his lungs with a clarity he hadn't felt in years. Each inhale burned. Each exhale steadied him. This trail was new, unfamiliar, carved through dense woods that rose like a wall on either side of him, tall and indifferent.
He welcomed that indifference.
Here, no one knew his name. No cameras waited behind tinted windows. No board members whispered behind closed doors. No lawyers calculated his worth like a sum on a page. Out here, he was just another runner chasing silence.
His muscles protested as he climbed a gradual incline, sweat gathering along his temples despite the cool air. He welcomed the pain. Physical exhaustion was simpler than the kind that lived behind his eyes—the kind that never slept.
The flash always came without warning.
Twisted metal. Shattered glass. The smell of burning rubber. His mother's hand slipping from his.
Kyle forced the memory down and increased his pace.
This was why he had come here. This quiet town on the edge of nowhere. This trail that hadn't existed in his life a week ago. Running was the only thing that quieted the noise long enough for him to breathe without guilt clawing at his chest.
The road ahead curved sharply—and then the trees thinned.
Kyle slowed.
The hill rose abruptly beyond the tree line, its slope steep and unnatural, as if it had been carved rather than formed. At the top stood a structure that did not belong to the forest.
A building.
No—a hospital.
Gray stone walls stretched wide, crowned with narrow windows that reflected the pale morning light like watchful eyes. The architecture was old, almost forgotten by time. A wrought-iron gate stood open, creaking faintly as the wind moved through it.
Kyle stopped running.
His pulse quickened—not from exertion, but something else. Instinct. Unease.
A sign stood near the path, weathered and half-hidden by ivy.
Hollowridge Mental Health Institute
The name settled heavily in his chest.
He should have turned back. He knew that. This place had nothing to do with him. It was a relic from a life he didn't belong to. Yet his feet remained rooted to the ground as his gaze lifted toward the entrance.
That's when he saw her.
She stood near the edge of the hill, motionless.
At first, Kyle thought she was part of the building—another shadow cast by the rising sun. But then the wind caught her hair, lifting dark strands around her face, and he realized she was real.
She was far away. Too far to see clearly.
Her face was barely visible, blurred by distance and light, but there was something unmistakable in the way she stood—still, deliberate, as if she were waiting. Or watching.
Kyle's chest tightened.
He didn't know why he was looking at her. Didn't know why his curiosity sharpened into something almost… unsettling. She wore simple clothes, pale against the dark stone behind her, and her posture was straight, composed.
Not fragile.
Not lost.
The image burned itself into his mind.
A sudden gust of wind carried the sound of the forest back to him, snapping him out of the moment. Kyle checked his watch. He was late—again. A board call waited, lawyers ready to argue over a future that felt more like a battleground than a legacy.
He forced himself to turn away.
As he jogged back down the trail, the image followed him—the girl on the hill, the silent hospital watching the woods like a secret.
Kyle had learned early that chaos did not ask for permission.
The car crash had happened on a rain-slick highway, headlights blinding him just before impact. One moment, his parents were arguing softly about schedules and shareholders. The next, everything shattered.
They never woke up.
The company—Harrington Global—became a warzone overnight.
Family members he barely spoke to emerged with lawyers and entitlement, clawing for shares they had never earned. Meetings turned into interrogations. Grief became weakness in their eyes. At twenty-eight, Kyle was expected to fold.
He didn't.
Adam—his grandfather—held the majority shares. A man forged by decades of ruthless business, he had raised Kyle in boardrooms and factories instead of playgrounds. While others doubted him, Adam watched silently as Kyle stepped into the fire.
Kyle worked harder than anyone.
He slept in his office. Learned contracts line by line. Answered questions without hesitation. When the board tested him, he didn't ask for sympathy—he proved competence.
Three months later, they named him CEO.
Not because of his last name.
Because he was the only one capable of holding the company together.
But strength came at a cost.
Sleep became a stranger. Work became an obsession. Emotion became a liability. He grew strict, controlled, unyielding—because softness had already taken too much from him.
This town was supposed to be an escape.
Yet as Kyle pulled into the parking lot of his temporary rental later that morning, his thoughts drifted back to the hill. To the building. To the girl whose face he couldn't see but couldn't forget.
For the first time in a long while, something had unsettled him that wasn't tied to the past.
And that frightened him more than any boardroom ever had.