In a quiet house nestled on the earth, there lived a little girl with me. She was delicate, around six years old, with thick, dark hair and eyes that seemed to pierce through the very soul. I felt it deep inside - she was mine. My girl. And I was struck by how much she resembled her father… The shape of her ears, the angles of her face: uncanny echoes of his features.
She wrapped her little arms around me with such quiet strength, it was as if the very essence of love found a way back into my chest. In that moment, everything fragile in me softened: the walls, the doubts, the aching solitude... All I could feel was warmth, a pure tenderness that silenced the world outside…
After a moment she brought me a photo album and asked me to look through it with her. As I turned the pages, I saw images of our home: warm, cozy, filled with love. There was one photo where the three of us were together, arms wrapped around each other... I froze, staring at it. Something in me refused to move forward…
“Come on, turn the page!” she urged, smiling. “Let’s see more!”
But I couldn’t… I didn’t want to. It felt like turning the page would mean letting go of something too precious.
And then, as if reading the storm behind my silence, she looked up at me and said softly, “This isn’t your life. And I won’t be hurt. I’m not real.”
A wave of shock crashed over me, leaving me breathless… My hands, trembling with a force I couldn’t control, reached for the next page. But as I flipped it, time itself seemed to stand still… The girl vanished as if she’d never existed, and with her, the warmth of the house, the echo of laughter: everything that once felt real. The room grew colder, emptier, and I was left, hollow, alone in my apartment… The silence was suffocating, a reminder of something precious lost, something I couldn’t even grasp to keep…