Page 162 of Sage Haven
I shouldn’t have been surprised.
Of course, she’d been curious.
Of course, she’d gone looking.
“It’s beautiful,” she added softly.
I nodded once. “It’s my favorite place in the house,” I said honestly. “It’s where I can think. Where I go to feel… normal.”
I wasn’t sure why I told her that, but it was the truth, and she deserved the truth.
“It suits you,” she murmured.
But there was more she was holding back. So, I waited and then I pressed, “Is that really all?”
She hesitated. Just long enough.
Then: “The playlist.”
My pulse jumped. “What about it?” I asked, careful to keep my tone neutral.
She swallowed. “It felt like every song understood me on a different level. Every song spoke the words I was too afraid to say… Like whoever made it… knows me better than I know myself.”
I sighed, running a hand through my hair. “I just threw some songs together. It’s nothing.”
A lie. A pathetic one. Her eyes snapped to mine, sharper now, “Stop saying it’s nothing.”
Her voice was firm. It left no room for argument. She wasn’t letting me off easy.
I exhaled slowly. “Maybe,” I said, “the person who made it doesn’t fully understand what she’s been through… but wanted her to know she isn’t alone.”
Her gaze didn’t waver, “Why?”
“Because…” I said, letting the word hang, “Music gives you permission to feel it... The pain... The grief... And maybe—when you’re ready—to let it go. It reminds you that you’re not alone. That others have felt it too.”
“A hundred others to be exact…” I added quietly, “And that’s just a fraction.”
She looked down and I looked away as I went on, “Every time a song resonates with you, it’s because you’ve poured a part of yourself into it. It becomes a mirror—reflecting what lives inside you, what you’ve felt but couldn’t quite say. It gives voice to the things your heart knows but your own words can’t reach.”
I glanced back at her. And there it was.
That glimmer of understanding.
“Reich,” she whispered. “I don’t know how to—”
“You don’t have to,” I cut in. Because I already knew.
I’d made that playlist for her.
And maybe for me, too.
I couldn’t help but silently thank every artist behind those songs in that moment.
The ones who had saved me when I didn’t think anything could.
Now, they were saving her too.
“Thank you…” I said quietly.
