YOURS TRULY
Mondays at Westfield High smelled like boiled eggs, cheap perfume, and too-strong coffee. The hallway lights hummed in a steady, tired rhythm that made the lockers look like a row of closed mouths — secrets tucked behind metal doors.
Amara Blake shoved her history textbook under her arm and wrestled her locker open with a thumb and a stubborn kick. Her fingers brushed old gum, a faded sticker of a cartoon skull, and the faint scrape where someone had tried to pry the lock last year. She thought of the letter before she saw it: a quick, small image — folded edges, blue ink, someone else's handwriting. A silly daydream. A town rumour in the making. She told herself not to believe in small miracles or anonymous admirers. Still, she wanted the small miracle.
The letter was folded twice, placed upright between a math workbook and a half-empty packet of crisps. Beige paper, the corners softened as if someone had kept it in their pocket. "Yours Truly" was written on the back in a looping, sure hand.
Her breath snagged. The top of the page had a single sentence: I saw you in the bathroom, crying at 11:45 PM.
Amara's fingers went cold. She could feel the panic starting, a familiar, hot scrape behind her ribs — like an alarm that went off in the wrong building. The hallway blurred for a second; a locker door slammed three lockers down and sound bounced back, bright and foreign.
Someone had been watching her. Someone had seen the night she pressed her face to the cool tile of the school bathroom and let the tears fall until they blurred the fluorescent light into something kinder. She swallowed hard and tried to laugh. "Weird," she murmured to no one.
"Hey, Am! You okay?"
Her best friend, Nia, elbowed her with the practiced casualness of someone who'd been reading instagram captions for longer than she'd been alive. Nia's hair was pulled into a high bun that defied gravity, and she wore sneakers with tiny stars stitched by the toes. She was the sort of person who laughed loudly enough to cancel out the awkwardness of any day.
Amara slid the letter into her pocket before Nia could see. "Yeah, struggling with my locker as usual," she said.
"You and your locker are always struggling," Nia said.
On the sound of the bell, Amara heaved a sigh of relief, she couldn't bear lying to her best friend but also didn't think it was the right time to let her know. Students peeled away like stickers from a poster, voices swelling into the cubbyholes of classrooms. Amara stuffed the letter into her pocket, deeper this time, as if keeping it there would make it less true.
History felt like a blur of the teacher's voice and the scratch of pens. Her mind kept returning to the night the letter mentioned. She'd been awake because sleep felt like a risk: a place where her mother's face, thin and unmoored, would reappear. She'd gone to the school because the hospital was too close to home, and home smelled like medicine and the sound of someone counting pills. The school bathroom had tiles that were mercifully cold against her forehead. She remembered checking the clock, the way the digital numbers had blinked 11:45 until she believed they were a code. She had no idea who would have seen her. The school was mostly empty, save for a janitor who hummed into his radio and the faded echoes of a cleaning cart.
When the lunch bell rang she considered telling the teacher. Ms. Opare — the one who assigned too much homework and always wore scarves like she stitched them from patience — would say the right things, nod, and give a look that somehow made worry legitimate. But she couldn't report because of a letter that would also implicate her.
At break, she avoided the cafeteria and sat on the far steps outside the drama block where Nia was having practice. The sunlight made a patchwork of warmth on the concrete, and for a minute she let the day be ordinary. She unfolded the letter she had brought out from her pocket and read the sentence until it blurred into letters whose meaning lost its sharp edges.
A shadow fell across her knees and she folded the letter back.
"What are you hiding?" came a voice she knew well without having seen the face first.
Amara looked up. A boy from her art class leaned against the railing. He had paint under his nails and a loose beanie that always looked as if it had been wrestled into place. His name was Jonah Kaze — a quiet, observant, the kind of person who watched people like they were paintings he didn't want to ruin. He didn't speak much, but when he did the room paid attention.
"Is it for me?" he asked, eyes flicking to the paper.
"No, it's private," she said before she could stop herself. She quickly slid it into her pocket.
Jonah's mouth curled, not quite a smile "Love letter from who or to who?"
"It's none of your business, Jonah," she said planning to get away from him as soon as possible. She stood up and walked away from him.
"Do you want me to walk you to your next class?" he asked loud enough for only her to hear.
"Let me be, Jonah," she shouted as she walked away from him.
A part of her wanted him to walk her to class, it shouldn't have mattered, but it did. For reasons she couldn't explain, the thought of someone walking beside her — a measured, steady presence — would ease a knot in her chest.
As she walked to her next class her eyes darted through the school compound, looking at everyone like a suspect. Asking herself who it couldbe? Could it have been Jonah? Or the senior who just looked at her weirdly? Or one of the teachers?
"Someone had been there. Someone was watching me. Who could it be? And why am I their interest?" she said to herself as she walked towards the Language building.
