She took a cab home through the cold mist, her heart pounding beneath the illusion of calm she wore like a mask. The streetlights blurred past, glowing halos against the drizzle-smeared window. Her fingers clenched around the cab's worn seatbelt, the faint tremor in her hand betraying the storm inside her.
When she stepped inside, the air of their home greeted her with deceptive warmth — the faint scent of Alden's cologne, the soft hum of the refrigerator, the clock ticking steadily, as if time itself didn't care that her world was unravelling.
She threw her clothes straight into the washing machine — jeans, coat, everything — setting the spin to its fastest. No traces. No clues. Just silence.
The washing machine thumped its last tired rhythm, and Mira dragged the damp clothes from the drum with hands that still trembled. She shoved out of the machine and slammed the lid. The kettle sang faintly; steam fogged the window. She wrapped both hands around her mug and tried to let the warmth settle something inside her chest, but the house felt thin—like a stage set in which the actors had gone missing.
She sat at the kitchen counter, a cup of tea trembling in her grip. The steam curled like ghostly fingers, disappearing into the shadows. Her eyes, hollow with exhaustion and disbelief, drifted toward the study room door. Across the hall, the study waited, quiet and severe. All week, she'd decorated it with daisies and plush toys until the room looked ridiculous and human. Now the light through its window felt wrong, too clinical, as though the walls themselves remembered other things. Mira set her cup down, the clink startling in the hush.
It felt… alive.
Dragging.
Demonic.
The air seemed to thicken there — a dark pull, whispering her name, coaxing her with promises of answers. Of truth.
And as she stared, Alden's words echoed in her mind — that soft, calculated tone he had used before leaving:
"I'll be late today. There's a lot to do."
The tea felt bitter now.
She stood slowly, every step toward the study feeling like crossing a forbidden threshold. The safe loomed behind his desk, silent and immovable, like a heart that refused to beat.
She stared at it for a long time, her pulse thrumming in her ears.
Should I?
The thought curled around her mind, poisonous and tempting.
"Do I trust the life I have now? Or do I throw everything away for a truth that might destroy it all?"
Her reflection caught her eye in the study's mirror — pale, haunted, questioning.
"Is it really that easy to throw it all away?" she whispered, voice trembling. "My husband, our little home, our love... all for a suspicion borne by a certified madman?"
She laughed softly, bitterly, shaking her head. Then, almost in defiance, she whispered to her reflection:
"I'll just look... and decide what feels right. If it's about me... It's my right to know."
Her gaze hardened — fragile resolve turning into steel.
That's when she noticed it — the faint, fresh smudge on the mirror's edge where Alden had checked his hair earlier that morning. His thumbprint. Clear. Perfect.
Her breath caught.
Pulling a strip of clear tape from the drawer, she remembered a scene from Captain Marvel — Nick Fury tricking the scanner with nothing but clever hands and nerve. It almost made her smile. Almost.
She pressed the tape lightly against the glass, holding her breath. The print clung to it like a secret stolen from a god.
"Sorry, love," she whispered shakily. "But I need to know who you really are."
She keyed in the digits she had memorised from countless casual glances — each one tapping like a gunshot in the quiet.
The keypad beeped.
Once.
Twice.
Then — silence.
Her heart lodged in her throat as the mechanism clicked.
The safe door creaked open.
She exhaled a sharp, broken laugh, covering her mouth as if afraid the sound might call something darker forth.
Inside lay the diary — worn leather, edges frayed, the initials O.A. embossed faintly. Her fingers hovered over it, trembling as if the pages might burn her.
Behind her, the house groaned — a floorboard creaking under its own weight. Or perhaps... under someone else's.
She froze.
Her pulse roared in her ears as she turned her head slightly, half expecting Alden's voice to cut through the air.
"What are you doing, love?"
But there was only silence.
And yet — she could feel him there, in every breath, in every corner of that room. His presence. His judgment.
She whispered, almost to herself,
"I'm sorry, Alden... but you made me doubt you."
And as she opened the diary, the pages fluttered like trapped wings — her reflection in the mirror watching her with wide, fearful eyes, as if some part of her already knew...
What she was about to read would change everything.