Wren
Two years later
I wake up to sunlight, not fear.
It spills through the wide windows of my living room, catching on polished concrete floors and white walls, turning everything warm. For a moment, I lie completely still, listening — not because I have to, but because I choose to.
No footsteps.
No breathing that isn't mine.
No tension coiled tight in my chest, waiting for permission to snap.
Just silence.
The good kind.
Eventually, I breathe out and let myself move.
The house smells like lavender, coffee, and clean air. A scent I chose. A scent no one else dictated. The living room opens straight into the kitchen, all sharp lines softened by warm neutrals, the kind of space I used to save to mood boards late at night and tell myself I'd have one day, when my life looked different.
The island sits at the centre of it all like it owns the room — marble veined with soft grey, wide enough to spread out canvases or paperwork or absolutely nothing at all.
I love that island more than I should.
It's ridiculous, really. A slab of stone shouldn't feel like freedom. But the first time I stood here, keys still warm in my hand, I cried so hard I had to sit on the floor until my legs stopped shaking.
I swing my feet out of bed and pad barefoot across the cool floor, grounding myself in the reality of this place.
One bedroom.
One bathroom.
One massive art studio attached to the house, like an afterthought, became the main event.
Mine.
The studio door is already open. It always is. I never close it — not fully. Light pours in through the skylights, bright and unapologetic, illuminating canvases stacked against the walls and paint-splattered drop cloths that will never be clean again. Jars of brushes soak in cloudy water on a long wooden table, their handles stained with colour from a hundred different moods.
Half-finished pieces lean against easels like they're waiting for me to come back to them.
It still amazes me that I'm painting again.
For a long time, I thought that part of me had died quietly while I wasn't paying attention. Like it had slipped away in pieces — first the joy, then the confidence, then the instinct to create anything that wasn't useful to someone else.
Turns out it was just buried.
When I left that night, I didn't have a plan. I had a phone, a wallet, and shaking hands, and one name repeating in my head like a lifeline.
Tiffany.
Tif had been my best friend at uni. Loud where I was quiet. Unapologetic, where I'd learned to fold myself smaller. She took up space without asking permission and dared anyone to challenge her for it.
Daniel hated her instantly.
Said she was a bad influence.
Said she made me reckless.
Said she didn't respect him.
Eventually, he didn't let me see her at all.
I remember the last message I sent her — a weak excuse, something about being busy, about life getting in the way. I remember the typing bubble appearing and disappearing, her waiting for me to say something real.
I never did.
So, when I showed up on her doorstep in the middle of the night, bruised and broken and barely recognisable as myself, I half expected her to slam the door in my face.
We hadn't spoken in years.
I wouldn't have blamed her.
Instead, she took one look at me and pulled me into her arms like she'd been holding the space open the whole time.
"You're safe," she whispered into my hair. "You're home."
No questions.
No judgment.
No, I told you so.
I slept in her spare room that night, wrapped in borrowed blankets, the sound of her moving around the apartment a quiet reassurance that I wasn't alone. I kept waiting for the panic to hit, for regret to claw its way back in.
It never did.
I moved in properly the next day.
She didn't ask questions I wasn't ready to answer. Didn't push me to explain things I didn't yet have the language for. She just filled the fridge, handed me clean clothes, and bought me my first set of paints a week later, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"You don't have to be good," she told me, setting the box down on the table between us. "You just have to start."
So, I did.
At first, I painted at night, when the world felt quieter and less demanding. When my hands stopped shaking enough to hold a brush steady. I painted in silence, then with music, then eventually with the windows open.
I painted under a different name.
A name Daniel had never heard.
A name that didn't exist on any paperwork tied to me.
A name that couldn't be searched, traced and weaponised.
It felt like stepping out of my own skin and into something new. Something lighter. Something that didn't flinch every time a door closed too loudly.
The art sold faster than I expected.
One piece, then another. A small gallery inquiry that made me laugh out loud because it felt like a mistake. A commission that paid more than I'd ever earned in a month before.
Then more.
I learned how to keep myself untraceable. How to separate Wren from the artist the world was buying from. How to build a wall between who I was and who I needed to be to survive.
By the end of the first year, I was making more money than I ever had before.
By the end of the second, I bought this house.
I wrap my hands around my coffee mug and lean against the island, staring out into the open space like it might disappear if I don't keep an eye on it. Old habits die hard.
I still check the locks twice.
Still memorise exits without meaning to.
Still notice cars that slow down too much outside my house.
Still wake up sometimes with my heart racing, convinced I've heard something I can't place.
But the fear doesn't run me anymore.
That's the difference.
I did this.
I built this life piece by piece, brushstroke by brushstroke, with my own two hands. Every inch of this place is intentional. Every choice is mine.
My phone buzzes on the counter, breaking the quiet.
Tif:
Coming over later. Don't lock me out like last time 😘
I smile — a real one — and type back, " Wouldn't dream of it.
I glance toward the studio again, toward the blank canvas waiting for me. Something is comforting about its emptiness. About the possibility of it becoming anything I want.
Two years ago, I left with nothing but the certainty that if I stayed, I would die.
Now I have a house full of light. A friend who never let go. A name the world knows — even if it isn't the one I was born with.
I'm safe.
At least, that's what I tell myself.
And for now, I believe it.