Kara was an unusual child with an unusual mind. From the moment she was born, she was silent—no tears, no screams. Just there.
As she grew older, Kara became a ghost at school. No one paid attention. No one knew her name, her voice, or her face. That was how she liked it: calm, peaceful, wrapped in an uninterrupted loneliness she had learned to carry on her own. Alone in a dark, cold sea—still and unmoving. That was Kara.
By grade twelve, she had perfected the art of invisibility. Footsteps that went unheard. A voice no one recognized. A face that never mattered. She was no longer just quiet—she was an entity, a presence without substance. A ghost.
Even at home, silence followed her. There were no memories to cling to, only a dust-covered picture frame of a father who once ruled through cruelty and now sat behind prison walls, and a mother who had left to build a new life—one that did not include Kara.
Her life became a ritual: wake up, go to school, go to work, come home, shower, eat, sleep. Over and over again. A repetition that began at thirteen and stretched endlessly into the present. This was normal. This was safe.
Everything was exactly as it was meant to be for Kara…
Until something—
or someone—
broke the ritual.
And in the flutter of her dark lashes, her silence shattered, along with the world she thought she understood.