Ava and Liam had been best friends since they were ten.
Not the loud, inseparable kind.
They just got each other, like two introverts who never had to explain why they hated crowds, or why some days felt heavier than others.
In their final year of high school, they started writing things they couldn’t say out loud; secrets, fears, unfinished thoughts.
They locked them in a small black notebook Ava kept under her bed.
Liam called it “The Quiet Box.”
Rule was simple:
“No reading anything until we’re both ready. Together.”
They promised. Pinky swear.
But time doesn’t keep promises.
After graduation, Ava left for university across the country.
Liam stayed behind, said college wasn’t for him.
They texted for a while. Then… less.
Then one day, Ava stopped hearing from him altogether.
No calls. No replies..
She gave it months.
Then flew home one weekend and broke the rule.
She found the notebook, opened it alone.
Most of the pages were hers.
But near the back, Liam had started writing darker things.
Real things.
“I think there’s something wrong with me.”
“I don’t think I’m real to people unless I’m needed.”
“What if I disappear and no one notices?”
And the last entry; dated the day before he cut contact:
“If Ava reads this alone, she broke the promise. But maybe that’s what I needed to know.”
She sat there for hours, just staring at the page.
No one knows where Liam is.
His parents say he packed a bag and left, didn’t say where.
The police called it a voluntary disappearance.
But every year, on the exact date she opened the notebook, Ava receives a plain white envelope.
No return address.
No message.
Just a torn-out page from the notebook…
and three words written in Liam’s handwriting:
“You chose alone.”
