Rowan's sister's POV
She never meant to keep them.
That was the story she told herself, anyway.
The papers had been folded inside an old exercise book, forgotten at the back of her wardrobe. She'd found them years later while looking for something else—socks, maybe, or proof that she used to be a different person, someone from her past.
The name at the top of the page had made her pause.
Amy.
She remembered her vaguely. Quiet. Watchful. But also shy. The kind of girl teachers worried about and students ignored until there was something to laugh at.
The poem had been written in blue ink.
Messy in places. Careful in others.
Too honest.
She should have thrown it in the bin.
She knew that.
Instead, she read it.
Once.
Then again.
She was quiet.
Not empty—just careful.
The kind of quiet that listens before it speaks,
that learns the room before stepping into it.
Teachers watched her too closely,
voices softened when they said her name,
eyes lingering like worry was a diagnosis.
They asked, Are you okay?
but never waited long enough for an answer.
Students barely saw her at all.
She moved through corridors like a margin note,
present but skippable,
until silence became suspicious
and the difference became funny.
She was shy.
Not weak—just folded inward,
holding her thoughts like glass,
afraid that if she set them down too hard
they'd shatter and cut her hands.
They ignored her
until there was something to laugh at,
until her quiet tripped,
until her voice cracked,
until her words gave them a punchline.
Then suddenly everyone heard her.
Not the way she meant to be heard—
but loud enough to echo,
sharp enough to bruise.
And still, she stayed.
Watchful.
Quiet.
Learning which silences were safe
and which ones learned how to bite.
There was something in it she didn't have words for back then. A tightness. A truth that made her uncomfortable in a way she couldn't explain.
So she folded it back up.
Put it somewhere safe.
Keep it.
Later—much later—her brother had asked about school. About writing. About why she never shared anything she wrote.
She'd laughed it off.
Then, without thinking, she'd said, "There was this girl once. She wrote like it hurt."
He'd asked questions.
She'd answered some of them.
Not all.
She never gave him the papers.
She told herself that mattered.
But she talked.
And words, once spoken, didn't belong to her anymore.
Now, sitting on her bed years later, phone glowing in the dark, she wondered if silence would have been kinder.
She wondered if keeping something was the same as protecting it.
She wondered when curiosity became theft.
Somewhere else, she knew, a girl was trying to stitch herself back together with words.
And she had to live with the fact that she'd helped tear a seam—
even if she'd never touched the fabric herself and even if she was never the prime suspect.