Rain whispered against the windows like secrets no one dared to speak aloud. The kind of rain that came in slow, heavy drops — not wild, not furious — just steady. A quiet grief falling from the sky. Outside, the streetlights glowed softly in the mist, their golden halos blurred by the water sliding down the glass.
David sat cross-legged on a thin mattress pushed against the wall. The sheet underneath him was wrinkled and damp in the corners — the room was always slightly wet in this part of the city. Old buildings had no patience for weather. A single bulb buzzed overhead, naked, hanging from a black cord, swinging slightly as if nervous. The shadows it cast danced in corners like restless ghosts.
His phone rested in his palm. Cold. Silent.
He kept reading the same message.
"He said, 'I will die,' and then… he did."
David didn't blink. His thumb hovered over the screen, motionless. He had read the message thirteen times in the last hour. The first time, he thought it was a joke. The second time, he felt sick. By the seventh time, his mind was making excuses. But by the thirteenth, something inside him cracked.
The message had come from an unknown number — just past two in the morning.
The sender: Meher.
The name didn't register at first. Then it did.
Elley's sister.
And suddenly, the walls of the room felt smaller. The air thinner.
---
David hadn't spoken to Elley in weeks. Not since he'd left Karachi. Not since he disappeared without saying goodbye. He hadn't told anyone — not Elley, not his coworkers, not his landlord. He had just… vanished.
Back then, it had felt like the only way to survive.
His days in Karachi had become a suffocating loop: bills he couldn't pay, dreams he couldn't reach, people he couldn't talk to anymore. Even Elley's laughter — once his favorite sound — had begun to feel like a reminder of how far David had fallen. So he left. He took a bus, turned off his phone, and rented a tiny one-room flat on the third floor of a fading building in Lahore.
The walls were yellowed with old cigarette smoke. The kitchen tap leaked a steady tik-tik-tik into a stained steel sink. His neighbors were quiet, which he liked. He worked during the day — deliveries, mostly. Groceries, parcels, cheap restaurant food. He came home by sunset. Never stayed out too late. Never answered unknown numbers.
He told himself it was healing. Space. Solitude.
But deep down, he knew.
He was hiding.
---
The buzzing of the bulb overhead stuttered, pulling him back into the room.
David's thumb finally moved. He tapped the call icon beside the message.
One ring.
Two.
A breathless voice answered. "Hello?"
It was a woman's voice — dry, tired. Like someone who hadn't slept in days.
"This is… David," he said. "I got your message."
A silence stretched between them.
Then she spoke, softer now. "I'm Meher. Elley's sister."
He didn't know what to say. The name "Elley" hung in the room like a weight. He hadn't said it aloud in weeks.
"What happened?" he asked, almost a whisper.
Meher exhaled like she'd been holding the air in for hours. "He died last night. They think… they say it was suicide. Pills. In his room. He left a note."
David's throat closed.
"A note?" he asked.
"Yes," she replied. "Just one line. It said: 'Tell David he was right.' That's all."
David didn't speak. Couldn't.
His fingers tightened around the phone, knuckles going pale.
He remembered the last call they had — five, maybe six weeks ago. They had argued. David had said something reckless, something cruel, born from exhaustion.
"Nothing matters, Elley. We're just wasting time until we disappear."
And Elley had gone quiet for a long moment before replying:
"Don't say that, Dave. Don't make promises to the dark."
David had ended the call. Then he turned his phone off for the next ten days.
And now… this.
---
Two days later, David stood on the edge of a muddy graveyard under a grey, weeping sky.
He had taken the earliest bus. Didn't speak to anyone. Didn't even know what he would do when he got there.
The funeral was quiet. A handful of relatives stood near the grave, umbrellas clutched tightly against the drizzle. A priest muttered verses in a hushed, tired voice. The ground was soft, and the wooden coffin looked too small, too temporary for someone like Elley.
David didn't get close. He watched from under a tree a few feet away, his jacket soaked at the shoulders, his boots caked in mud. His heart was silent. Not broken — just numb. Like it had forgotten how to feel.
The mourners left slowly. Some crying. Some holding hands. Meher stayed behind. She looked younger than he'd imagined, with long dark hair tied back and a face that looked like it used to smile often but hadn't in a while.
She saw him.
She didn't seem surprised.
They stood under the tree in silence for a few seconds before she spoke.
"Did you… know he was in pain?" she asked gently.
David shook his head. "I didn't know anything. I wasn't there."
"He waited," Meher said, voice barely above the rain. "He kept checking his phone. Every morning. Every night. He stopped talking. Just kept waiting for one message. Yours."
David looked down at his feet, where a worm wriggled through the wet soil.
"I thought he'd be fine without me," he said, the words tasting like ash. "I thought I was the one ruining things."
Meher didn't argue. She just reached into her coat and pulled out a small white envelope.
"He left this for you."
David took it with both hands.
---
That night, back in Lahore, David didn't turn on the lights.
He lit a single candle and sat on the floor beside his mattress, the envelope resting in his lap.
His fingers trembled as he slid it open.
Inside was a single folded sheet of paper. Handwritten. Fast and messy. Typical Elley.
> David,
If you're reading this, I guess I'm gone. I'm sorry. I know you probably hate me for this. I don't blame you. But I needed you to know… I never blamed you.
You left because you had to. I know that now. I kept trying to reach you not because I was angry — but because I understood. You were drowning. And so was I.
You said we were wasting time. But I think we were doing something harder. We were trying. Trying to stay alive. Trying to matter. Trying not to fall apart.
I didn't make it. But you still can. Please don't disappear again. Not like I did.
Try. For both of us.
— E.
David sat in the candlelight, holding the letter against his chest.
The rain started again outside, tapping gently against the windowpane. The kind of rain that doesn't scream or shout. The kind that mourns.
He picked up his phone.
Opened his messaging app.
He didn't know who to text.
So he wrote a message to Elley.
"I'm sorry. I should've answered. I should've been there. I miss you."
He saved the draft.
And for the first time in weeks, he left his phone on.