Chapter 19
Autumn is creeping in Berlin.
The plane trees lining the streets fade to golden, their leaves curling at the edges before the wind picks up – they twirl, flutter, swirl, and slowly and obediently descend.
They fall one layer after another onto the cobblestone streets, crunching gently underfoot.
The seasons change, just like life.
I adapted faster than I expected.
The transition was almost effortless.
The enrollment process was smooth. I became part of the professor’s research lab, integrating into the rhythm of early mornings and late nights, the meticulous data collection, and the sterile smell of the lab.
For the first six months, I shadowed senior researchers – observing, learning, making mistakes.
By the end of the year, I had become a mentor myself.
“Interesting, isn’t it?” my professor mused one afternoon, leaning back in his chair and browsing a set of reports.
“You didn’t come after graduation, you bet you regretted it.”
I laughed.
Regret?How could I regret it?
At that time, I never hesitated.
I just don’t have the money.
That’s the only thing holding me back.
Upon hearing this, one of the senior fellows next to me the one who mentored me when I first joined–looked at me
and a look of elusiveness flashed across his face.
I saw his expression and smiled easily.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I joked. “I’m doing well now, aren’t I?”
Very well.
My scholarship covered everything I needed, and I had enough savings
Enough to remind me that I made the right choice.
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Chapter 19
And in the future.I’ll make more.
I never knew that on the day I left, Pax came looking for me.
That he had stood in the apartment we once shared, expecting to find me there.
That he had gone so far as to bring Nina’s parents, calling them as witnesses to something he should have done a long time ago, the moment he cut ties with her for good.
For that, the Brown family had paid a price.
But Pax didn’t care.It was done.
The next morning, he rushed to my apartment.
His heartbeat hammered against his ribs, his steps hurried, the words already forming on his lips-
“Cecilia, it’s over. It’s all been taken care of.”
“There’s nothing stopping us now.”
But what he didn’t know that five minutes before he arrived, I had already boarded a flight to
The apartment door was still broken from the night he kicked it open days ago.
When he pushed it now, the hinges groaned, the frame shuddering beneath the pressure.
He stepped inside, the words on the tip of his tongue,and then froze.
The person standing there wasn’t me.
A different girl,the new tenant.
Berlin.
She blinked at him, startled, a flicker of confusion crossing her face before recognition settled in.
“Hi?” she asked hesitantly. “I thought you left the country with her?”
The words landed like a punch to the gut.
And for the first time in his life he was panicked.
He grabbed her shoulders, his fingers tightening, his voice sharp, desperate.
“Where is she?”
“Her flight to Norway isn’t for two more days. Where did she go?”
But I hadn’t told anyone. No one knew.
Pax’s hands were already fumbling for his phone, his fingers flying across the screen.
Chapter 19
Dialing. Texting, Calling
Nothing.
No response.
A sharp crack echoed through the empty apartment–his phone shattering against the floor.
But even that wasn’t enough to silence the storm inside his head.
By the time morning light seeped into the stairwell, Pax was still there.
Sitting on the cold, narrow steps of the rundown building.
Head bowed. Hands covering his face. Tears slipped through his fingers, hitting the dust–covered concrete one by one.
Tiny, dark imprints that disappeared almost instantly.
Finally he remembered the night he had gone to pick up Nina.
He hadn’t been able to sleep afterward.
He had tossed and turned, restless, uneasy.
Somewhere between wakefulness and sleep, he had heard himself whispering apologies.
And somewhere, in the haze of that moment he had heard a sigh.
“Seven days left.”
At the time, he hadn’t thought much of it.
Hadn’t realized what it meant.
He had thought he was fighting for another chance.
That with enough effort, with enough time he could turn things back.
It had never once occurred to him that she had been counting down the days until she could leave.
