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The rain had fallen in Forks since before sunrise, a soft, almost reverent drizzle that wrapped itself around the evergreens like an old lover. It moved through the forest like a whisper, soaking bark and moss and pine needles until the world itself seemed steeped in melancholy. Water clung stubbornly to the windowpanes of the small cabin at the forest's edge, blurring the outside into a palette of greens and grays, distorting the view into something oil-painted and dreamlike, soft, impressionistic, untouchable.
Inside, (Y/n) stood in the kitchen barefoot, the chill of the wooden floor grounding her in a way nothing else could. A chipped mug of chamomile tea rested between her hands, cradled like something precious. The steam rose in slow, silent curls, the heat curling gently beneath her fingers, reminding her she was still here, still breathing, still real. The silence inside the cabin was not empty, but full. Full of unsaid things, of things no longer needed.
Six months.
It had been six months since she vanished from the life she once knew. Not disappeared in the theatrical sense, not in running or fleeing, but in erasing, in retreating, in finally choosing herself. A life that once glittered with grandeur, with applause and champagne and private flights and stolen kisses in hotel elevators. A life full of love that bloomed beautifully on the surface but quietly decayed underneath, roots tangled in betrayal. A love that smiled in public and broke in private.
She no longer recognized that version of herself, the one who clung to that life, the one who stayed too long in rooms where her name was only remembered when it served someone elseâs story. That woman had died quietly. Without ceremony. Just faded.
The cabin was hers now. Not borrowed. Not rented. Hers.
Not a temporary refuge, but a deliberate choice. A permanent escape carved out in damp soil and silence. It wasnât much, two bedrooms, a wood-burning stove, a kitchen that overlooked the trees, but it was enough.
And she had paid for it in full. Cash. No paper trail that could be traced back to the girl who used to sit on pit walls and smile for the cameras. She hadnât taken much from her old life, but what she did take, she converted into freedom.
Her real lawyer, the one no one knew about, not even Lando, had handled everything. Quietly. Discreetly. With the same precision she had once admired in engineers and race strategists. The papers were filed under a different name, a name she hadnât spoken aloud in years but had kept tucked away just in case.
A gift from her younger selfâs paranoia.
A contingency plan created long before she ever had reason to need one.
And now, it had become her saving grace.
She liked this place. No paparazzi. No sharp, probing eyes. No whispers about "that woman." No headlines. Just the gentle drip of rain onto mossy roofs, the distant howl of wolves, and the rustle of ancient trees murmuring secrets through the mist.
Her mornings began with silence.
She woke before the sun, not out of necessity, but ritual. She lit a single candle in the reading nook by the window and wrote longhand in her journal, thoughts, metaphors, scraps of future novels. She cooked her own meals now. Real ones. With spices and soft music playing from the old radio perched on the shelf. Her hands, once accustomed to typing a thousand words a minute, now knew the slow grace of kneading dough and slicing fruit.
Outside, the world grew lush. Spring had kissed Forks, and wildflowers bloomed recklessly between the pines. Buttercups, bleeding hearts, columbines. (Y/n) walked every trail she could find, sometimes alone, sometimes with a dog she borrowed from her neighbor, a retired forest ranger named Agnes who had a laugh like dry thunder, and joints that clicked like old door hinges.
Agnes became her first friend here. She didnât pry. She didnât ask who (Y/n) was or why she arrived with nothing but a suitcase and eyes too old for her age. She simply brought over blueberry pie and advice on how to keep raccoons out of the compost bin.
Then came Jasper, the barista at the only decent coffeehouse in Forks. He was tall and lean, with poetry tattooed down his forearms in looping script that peeked out from beneath his sleeves whenever he reached for a mug or wiped down the counter. There was something quietly intentional about the way he moved, like someone who had long ago made peace with solitude. He had a tendency to hum old French songs, soft and melancholic melodies from another time, when the cafÊ was quiet, when there was no line at the register and the rain tapped gently against the windows.
Jasper noticed her by her second visit. By the third, he had memorized her order. A lavender oat milk latte. Always the same. No sweetener, extra hot. He never asked twice. He didnât write it down. Just nodded once with a small, knowing smile and got to work. No fuss. No small talk unless she offered it first. Just an unspoken understanding passed over the counter, along with her drink.
And in a town as small and watchful as Forks, that kind of quiet grace felt like a gift.
âYouâre not from here,â he said one morning, his voice soft as the fog outside.
She offered a half-smile. âIs it that obvious?â
âYou donât have the tired Forks look yet. Give it time.â Alarwynn: Wait! Is that code for "you donât look like a vampire yet"? JK HAHAHA okay sorry, back to the story.
And just like that, she had another friend.
There were others, Ellie from the bookstore, who ran a secret book club for misfits; Gabe, the fisherman who sold smoked salmon at the Sunday market and told stories of losing a toe to a snapping turtle (no one knew if it was true).
They became her patchwork of quiet companionship.
No one knew who she really was.
Not the best-selling author behind half the opinion columns shaking up Europeâs intellectual elite. Not the ghost of a Formula One world.
Just (Y/n), the quiet woman who walked barefoot in the river and took too many photos of mushrooms.
On the first warm morning of June, she stood outside on the porch in a linen dress, hair loose, eyes lifted to the sky where the clouds finally parted after weeks of grey.
The sun touched her skin like an apology.
She tilted her face to it and closed her eyes.
Peace was a muscle, she learned, something you had to build, stretch, and fight for. It did not come from running. It did not come from revenge.
It came from choosing yourself every single day.
Still, there were nights when her hand reached across the bed out of habit.
Still, there were songs she skipped on the radio before they could hurt.
But she no longer cried when she remembered him. That was something.
That afternoon, she visited the bookstore. Ellie had saved her a first edition of a poetry collection she adored. On her way out, a little boy bumped into her, breathless and wild from laughter.
âSorry, miss!â he said, wide-eyed.
She knelt to his height. âItâs okay, little man. Just watch where youâre going.â
His mother, red-faced and apologetic, came chasing after him. They exchanged polite smiles.
A simple moment.
Ordinary.
It meant the world.
(Y/n) wandered into the cafÊ next, where Jasper had her drink ready without asking. He slid it across the counter with a smile.
âYou look lighter today.â
âDo I?â
âYeah. Like someone who finally forgave herself.â
She blinked.
That hit harder than she expected.
âIâm trying,â she said, voice barely above a whisper.
âThatâs all any of us can do.â
She took her drink, sat in the back corner, and opened her journal. Pages filled with ideas, fragments of a second novel that her publisher didnât even know she was writing. Her pseudonym remained untouchable, a fortress. They only received her drafts and collected their awards.
She liked it that way.
She was finally hers again.
Later that evening, she returned to the cabin, lit a fire despite the summer air, and curled into her favorite armchair with a blanket and a book. Outside, the rain returned, soft, rhythmic, like a lullaby written just for her.
This was what healing looked like.
Not dramatic revelations.
Not thunderclaps of closure.
Just the slow, persistent work of stitching yourself together in the quiet.
She didnât know what tomorrow held.
But tonight, she was safe.
MEANWHILE
In a mansion that echoed like a mausoleum, Lando Norris sat alone in what used to be their bedroom. The air was stale, embalmed in time, as if the very walls had sealed themselves against the living. Shadows stretched across the floor like scars, the curtains unmoved since the day she left. Nothing had been altered, no fresh linens, no rearranged furniture, not even a new bulb in the lamp that had burned out weeks ago. Everything remained as it was, as though the room itself mourned her absence.
It smelled more like memory than life now, a haunting blend of lavender, old wood, and the remnants of a perfume that had once clung to her skin. It was the scent of something sacred, something lost.
Landoâs fingers trembled as he reached for the drawer of her nightstand. The wood creaked faintly as it slid open, a familiar sound that sliced through the quiet like a blade. He stared into the hollow space inside.
Still empty.
No ring.
No letter.
Just the cruel expanse of nothingness, like the silence that had settled between them in those last few weeks. A silence that begged to be broken but never was.
With a shaking breath, he reached into the inner pocket of his coat and withdrew the one fragment of hope he still clung to, a worn, creased photograph from their wedding day. The edges were frayed, like his resolve, soft from too much handling. He stared at it for a long time.
In the photo, she was leaning into him, her head resting gently against his chest as though she could hear the rhythm of his heartbeat and trusted it more than the world around her. His arms were around her like he feared she'd slip through his fingers if he let go.
And her eyes, God, her eyes.
She looked at him like he was her future. Like he was more than just a man; he was her promise.
But now, no matter how hard he tried to conjure the warmth of that gaze, it slipped from his mind like water through clenched fists. He could remember the way she laughed, how her hand would find his beneath the table, how she used to hum when nervousâbut that look? That unwavering belief?
Gone.
And with it, any belief he once held in himself.
The candle flickered on the desk beside him, its flame dancing in defiance of the stillness. Wax had pooled around the base, hardened and cracked like the fault lines running through his soul.
Lando bowed his head, the photograph cradled in both hands as though it were something fragile, holy. He brought it to his lips, pressing a kiss against her image.
âPlease,â he whispered, barely able to finish the word as emotion clawed at his throat. âIf thereâs any god, any cosmic force out thereâĻ please, just show me where she is.â
Nothing replied. Not the wind. Not the walls. Not even the hollow ache inside his chest.
A minute passed.
Then two.
Still nothing.
Just the ticking of the old clock down the hallway.
Just the ragged, uneven sound of his own breathing, sharp, broken, lonely.
But somewhere far away, in a place he couldnât yet reach, a thread began to stir.
The answer would come.
Not as a miracle.
Not as a sudden knock on the door or a voice from the heavens or a text message that would rewrite the silence she left him in.
No.
It would come in the quietest way. As answers often do, when you're not looking for them, not truly.
To be continued...đ§Ą
âī¸ á´ĄĘá´Ęá´ á´Ęá´ ęąÉĒĘá´É´á´á´ á´á´á´á´ Ęá´Ę - á´Ęá´á´á´á´Ę 7: á´ĄĘÉĒęąá´á´Ęęą Ęá´ĘÉĒÉ´á´ á´Ęá´ á´á´Éĸá´ęą âī¸
đ Note from the Author: Sweet sixteen! I canât believe itâs already been 16 days of heartbreak, healing, and haunting prose here on Tumblr. Thank you, always, to my beloved Alarwynnites for staying with me through every update, every cliffhanger, every soft moment of quiet ache. You are the rain to my emotionally-wrecked forest cabin đđ˛
NowâĻ
âShe no longer cried when she remembered him. That was something.â
This chapter felt different. Softer. Not necessarily lighter, but earned. Itâs a chapter about the long, slow work of choosing yourself after destruction. Of finding yourself in silence instead of in screaming. Of collecting ordinary moments like theyâre goldâbecause they are.
And okayâĻ LET'S ADDRESS THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM:
JASPER???
Yes. I see what I did. YOU see what I did. We ALL see what I did. HAHAHAHAHAHA
Was that name choice intentional? Was it subconscious Twilight-core seeping into my veins? Or was it just a barista with poetry tattoos and a name that felt oddly familiar? Weâll never know. (We know. We so know.)
And speaking of Twilight, why Forks? Why not Forks?
Itâs gloomy. Itâs damp. Itâs where people go when they want to disappear but secretly hope someone follows. And yes. I absolutely thought of Bella Swan walking into the forest in a cardigan, and I said, âYup. Thatâs the vibe.â Forks is the perfect place for women who are tired of being known. Where trauma breathes moss and healing smells like woodsmoke.
This is her âI live in a cabin now and make bread with my bare handsâ era. This is me writing her cathedral out of grief and mushrooms.
So again, thank you for sticking with me. Thank you for your tags, your comments, your screaming in the inbox. This story has taken on a life of its own because you kept breathing into it.
Until next time (or next breakdown),
With love, me đ§Ą
