Page 407 of Eternal
But I’m not watching anymore. I flip through pages, faster, slower, then fast again. And then I found it. Page 23.
The poem. My poem. I stop breathing. The page feels too heavy.
I run my thumb along the edge. Something rustles.
I lift the page carefully. Behind it, not one, but several sheets of thin, folded newsprint. Old. Yellowed. Each one marked with a tiny note in Mom’s handwriting:
P2 L4 C6-8
P1 L2 C3
P3 L1 C5-7
At first, it looks like gibberish. Then I realized. P for paragraph. L for line. C for character She wasn’t simply clipping articles. She was encoding something into them. First article.
Paragraph 2. Line 4. Characters 6 to 8. I count. L. U. X. Next clipping. I. Then, S.
Luxis.
I frown. That’s not, I keep going. Another clipping. S. H. I. R. A. Z.Luxis Shiraz.
I blink, but grab the next article. P4 L3 C2-5.
L. U. X. I.
Again. Again. Again.
Every article. Different code. Different paragraph, line, letter, but the same result.Luxis Shiraz.
Every time. Again.Luxis Shiraz. Again.Luxis Shiraz.Like a signature. Hidden. Over and over. Every article she saved. All of them.
She found it. Again and again. She kept it to herself. She must’ve thought…No. She knew.
He was sending her something. She didn’t write his name. She didn’t need to.
Because it was already there. Built into the message. Signed.
Not for the world. Forher.
I grab the last clipping. The ink is smudged, the paper wrinkled. It’s not from a newspaper. It’s been hand-delivered. There’s a note on the back. Faint. Almost invisible. The code’s the same. And the signature is there. But this time, there's something more.
They’re coming for you. Stop everything, take your children. Hide. I’ll cover you. -L
I freeze.
He knew.
She knew. She never said his name. Because she couldn’t. But she trusted him. And now I know. It was never random. It was always a message.
My chest tightens.
Luxis Shiraz.
Who is that? Why have I never heard that name before?
Not once. Not in her journal. Not during all the years I tried to put the pieces together on my own. Not in a single file, a single testimony, a single name drop.
Why?
