I was trained to be perfect before I was allowed to be free.
When I was young, my grandmother made me sit straight on a hard chair inside a quiet room that smelled like old books and tea. The curtains were thick, blocking most of the light. Everything inside that room felt heavy—like even my breathing had rules.
"Straight back, Suvi," she said, tapping my shoulders lightly with her cane. "A fine lady does not bend." I fixed my posture, even when my back hurt.
She taught me how to hold my spoon properly, how to sip tea without sound, how to walk slowly without looking unsure. When I laughed too loudly, she frowned. When I spoke too much, she stopped me with one look.
"People are always watching," she told me. "And they remember mistakes."
I didn't understand then, but I obeyed. I always did. As I grew older, the lessons changed. Dolls disappeared. Storybooks were replaced by papers and folders. I was made to sit beside her during meetings, my feet flat on the floor, my face calm.
"Listen," she whispered once. "Business is not about kindness. It is about control."
Men spoke in low voices about money, land, and power. I watched their hands, their eyes, the way they smiled when they lied. My grandmother nodded when I noticed the right things.
"You are learning," she said. "Good."
I wasn't raised to be happy.
I was raised to be useful.
My father continued his work.
He believed discipline was love.
"Do not ask questions that waste time," he told me. "Do not draw attention." "Do not forget our name."
I nodded every time, even when my chest felt tight. I learned how to smile without feeling. How to speak carefully. How to hide my thoughts behind polite words.
Inside the house, everything was quiet and controlled. Outside, guards stood like shadows. Cameras blinked softly. Even the air felt owned. Sometimes, it felt like I was a diamond trapped in a glass box—valuable, untouchable, and unable to breathe.
At night, when everyone slept, I went to my window. I watched the city lights far below. Cars passed. People walked freely on the streets. Someone laughed too loud. Someone argued. Someone cried openly without shame.
They were living.
I wanted to feel that just once.
So I learned how to sneak out.
I memorized the guards' movements. I found the door that didn't creak. I wore simple clothes and pulled my hair back. My heart beat so loudly it scared me.
Outside, the city air hit my face—it`s hot there, and messy, but it's a alive. I didn't do anything special. I just stood there.
And for those few minutes, I felt human.
Until I got caught.
"Do you know how dangerous that is?" my father asked,
his voice cold.
"I just wanted to walk," I said quietly.
My grandmother didn't shout. She never did.
"Freedom is not meant for girls like you," she said. "You are too important to be careless."
Important.
Just important.
That night, my door was locked from the outside. I cried silently into my pillow, biting my lip so no one would hear. I learned something that night:
Even my tears had rules. When my mother said I would spend the summer in the province, and for the first time, I felt freedom.
The province felt like another world.
No guards. No cameras. No polished silence. Just open skies, dirt roads, and air that smelled like earth. Life there was slow but real.
At first, I didn't know how to live without instructions.
Then I met Lucas.
He stood near the fields, sleeves rolled up, dirt on his hands, sunlight on his skin. He looked at me like I wasn't fragile. Like I wasn't expensive.
"You can't hold the basket like that," he said, pointing at the basket I was carrying.
"I'm fine," I replied.
He smiled, not mocking. "It will hurt you."
He fixed it anyway.
Our fingers touched.
I didn't know then that this small moment would stay with me forever.
Days passed without titles.
Lucas showed me how to walk without rushing, how to laugh without covering my mouth, how to sit on the ground without worrying about stains. He talked about dreams like they were allowed.
"What do you want?" he asked me one afternoon.
I froze. No one had ever asked me that.
"I don't know," I admitted.
"It's okay," he said. "You'll figure it out,"
In the province, I felt light. I can breath, no one watches, no one will followed and no one will get mad.
Until summer ends...
I didn't know that love could disappear without goodbye.
One day, I never see Lucas again.
The fields were too quiet. His house was empty, no note, no explanation. Just absence.
I searched for him. I ran through the fields calling his name until my voice broke. I asked people who avoided my eyes. I waited until night, until my legs shook from standing.
They told me to stop asking questions. They told me to go home.
Back in the city, everything looked the same.
The walls. The lights. The rules.
But I wasn't.
Grief wrapped itself around me quietly. I cried in locked bathrooms, inside cars, behind closed doors. I cried until my chest hurt, until my eyes burned, until I couldn't remember what breathing felt like without pain.
I cried for the boy who showed me freedom.
I cried for the life I almost had.
My grandmother watched me closely.
"Pain makes you weak," she said. "Control it."
I nodded.
But inside, something hardened.
Five years passed.
I learned how to survive the ache. How to smile again. How to pretend summer was just a memory. Then a man returned to our world.
Not the boy from the fields.
A stranger with calm eyes and careful words. A man who understood power, money, and silence.
My family welcomed him.
But when our eyes met, my breath caught.
I knew.
Some summers don't end.
They wait.
And some people don't disappear—
They prepare.