Page 49 of Hollowed

No line through it either.

Just a blank space beside it.

Waiting.

For what?

I didn’t want to guess.

I turned the page.

More names.

Different hand. Older. Shaking.

And then?—

One I knew.

Amare.

Not just written.

Crossed out.

Twice.

I stared at it like it might reach up from the page and strike me. Like the weight of it might be enough to pull the air from my lungs.

She had been here.

Not metaphorically. Not whispered. Not guessed.

She had been here. She had knelt. She had been written.

And then erased.

My mother.

The one who wrapped silence around my throat like ribbon.

The one who never told me where I came from.

The one who pushed me through the chapel doors without trembling.

She had been here.

And she hadn’t survived it.

I sat down slowly.

Right there in the dust. Robe tucked around my legs. The book open in my lap like it might bite if I closed it too fast.

The chapel felt different now.

Less sacred.

More true.

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