When I eventually picked the call and he asked us to meet briefly, I should have said no. I had the right to reject a meeting if it wasn’t favourable to me. But again, it was Rowan McRae, a man I once adored. And he said he was leaving town for good…forever.
Maybe I should have chosen to say my goodbye over the phone. Maybe I should have remembered things could go really awry all of a sudden if I stepped out of the house.
But I didn’t. Because it was Rowan McRae. And for some reason, I still felt like I had an unpaid debt. Because this thing called guilt had a way of dressing itself as an obligation.
It was just a harmless goodbye. After all I had done—ruined his life without batting an eye that day, I owed him this much. A few minutes. A simple hug. Something small enough to balance the scale.
But when a simple goodbye came with a kiss, I was in full control and had the right to say no. I knew it then. But right felt theoretical when you had already forfeited them.
With Rowan McRae, I wasn’t just a girl anymore. I was a debtor.
And when goodbye kisses turned into something more, it wasn’t desire that kept me there. Rowan McRae might still hold the title of the most handsome teacher Lochborne Academy of Arts had ever had, but the attraction and the fire wasn’t there anymore. So, was the hesitation.
When he touched me like he memorised my every curve and dents, there was only resignation, the quiet understanding that this was what paying back felt like.
I didn’t stop him. I didn’t stop myself. I watched it happen from somewhere distant, counting the cracks in the ceiling, noting the wallpapers that were peeling off, while Zaghan’sshadow pressed into the edges of my thoughts. And I could swear I saw blood coating his fingers. I smelt iron.
They said fear would make you run. It was ironic, because sometimes, fear did quite the opposite. Sometimes it was a fuel to self-destruction, convincing you that you were already ruined, so you might as well just finish the job.
I was afraid when I stepped out of the house. Afraid while Rowan touched me. Afraid when it was over. But nothing could have compared to the fear of arriving home barely an hour later and meeting Zaghan who wasn’t supposed to be back until the next two hours, sprawled on my bed, flipping through my diary. The book that held my thoughts, my poetry, my secrets.
That was when I was reminded what fear really was. And I thought maybe, just maybe, I should have allowed the fear to stop me then.
My pulse thundered as I shut the door gently behind me, my fingers clenching tightly around the strap of my tote bag, limbs trembling.
“You shouldn’t be reading that,” I said, trying to sound firm, to not show guilt. “That’s invasion of privacy.”
“You write a lot,” he said mildly, ignoring my comment as his gaze remained fix on the opened page. “You don’t filter anything. That can be quite risky, you know?”
My heartbeat thundered in my ears. “Give it back.”
He glanced up, eyes sharp, not angry, but interested, which was even worse. “You think a lot about people,” he noted. “I noticed how names come up often. Names of other men.” His eyes returned to the page briefly. “Some come up a lot.”
My throat tightened. “Stop.”
“Your thoughts about them are…interesting.”
The words lingered between us for a moment, heavy and undefined as he stared at the book, his jaw flexing gently.
Then he snapped the pages shut, keeping it aside, his dark gaze returning to me.
“I noticed something, though,” he said, tone casual. “My name. I didn’t see my name there, Elizabeth.”
“You weren’t supposed to go through someone else’s diary.” I took a step closer, my skin buzzing, heart racing against time.
He tilted his head, as if considering that. “I found his name,” he commented, his eyes darkening, and my pulse skittered. “Callan. I saw his name plenty times.” His hand went to the diary set beside him, fingers tapping on the back mindlessly. “I read about him. He exists in your inner world. Why not me too, Elizabeth? Why do I not exist in your diary?”
My chest tightened at the cold crack in his voice, the way the sharp edges sliced my skin and stilled my breath.
“I have claimed you in every way that leaves a mark,” he said, voice low and precise. “I live in your body, in the way you fucking unravel. I haunt your every breath, and yet.” He paused, offering a smile, a slow, jagged thing that wasn’t quite human. “You erased me from your inner world, denied me space in the place I wanted to be the most…your mind.”
His name wasn’t in my diary not because he was small, insignificant or irrelevant. No. On the contrary, Zaghan was a man whose presence pressed into the skin, wrapped around your ribs, and refused to let go. He was someone who passed through a room and left his scent behind, lingering for hours like a bruise you couldn’t stop touching.
I didn’t write him because he was my secret.
Diary was meant for privacy, yes. But sometimes, there were just some truths whose weight the diary couldn’t bear to hold. Things that would rot the page the moment ink touched the paper.
With Zaghan, I realised I became something else. Something bent,wrong. Not a version of myself I could justify. Not a girl I could explain away with careful sentences and softened edges.
