Theme song:"Youth by daughter "
Mira
The first time I wrote about Elian, my hands shook so badly I had to stop halfway through the sentence.
I sat at the tiny desk in my flat—the one where he once left me a cup of coffee and a note that read, "For the stories you haven't told yet." His handwriting had always felt like it was spoken with his smile.
The letter from Claire lay open beside me. I had read it over a hundred times since she gave it to me. The ink was beginning to smudge from my fingertips, or maybe from the silent tears I never bothered to wipe away anymore.
I stared at the blank document on my screen.
What do you even say when you're writing about someone you loved so fiercely, it changed the shape of who you were?
I tried to start simply.
"Elian was—"
Was.
Even that word hurt.
---
I took a break before I even began. I stepped out into the cold London air, where dusk hung in the sky like an unfinished painting. The city was always a blur at this time—red buses humming past, footsteps echoing against wet pavements, laughter escaping warm cafés.
I used to think London was loud. Now it just sounded distant.
---
I walked past the coffee shop where we met. The tiny bell above the door chimed as a woman walked out, holding a cappuccino in one hand and a book in the other.
"Books and coffee," Elian once said, "That's the closest thing to heaven you'll find on Earth."
It hit me again—how easily his words stayed behind.
I crossed the street and wandered to the Thames. The river was dark, but it reflected the streetlights like small fireflies floating on the surface. I sat by the water, thinking of the bridge where he kissed me the first time. Where he told me he loved me. Where I cried the night he told me he was sick.
---
I don't know how long I stayed there, but the city began to sleep, and I returned home with sore eyes and colder fingers.
I made tea. I didn't drink it.
Then I sat back down and opened the letter again.
---
> Don't let the silence fool you—my love never left with me...
Write the stories. Chase the sun. Fall in love with the world again.
I'll be somewhere in every chapter.
---
So I wrote.
---
I started with our first meeting—how he walked into the café looking like he didn't belong there, in his crisp shirt and tired eyes. How he ordered black coffee and sat in the corner, reading a book I couldn't pronounce. How I teased him for not smiling.
"Maybe I'm waiting for someone worth smiling at."
How I didn't realize then, that I would become that someone.
---
I wrote about the quiet days. The ones that never made it into photo albums or phone screens.
The morning he fell asleep on my shoulder on the train. The afternoon he bought me secondhand poetry books because "they smell like forgotten stories." The night he cried in the middle of a thunderstorm and told me he didn't want to die.
The world didn't see those days. But I did. And now I would make sure the world remembered them too.
---
The more I wrote, the more the grief poured through the cracks in my chest. But alongside it, something else returned.
His voice.
Not in some ghostly, spiritual way. But in the way memory clings like perfume. In the way love never quite packs its bags.
---
Two weeks later, Claire called again.
"I've read what you sent me," she said, "and Mira… it's beautiful."
I didn't speak.
"I know he would've been proud of you."
That broke me.
"Do you think it's worth finishing?" I asked, whispering the words like a confession.
"I think it's already saving someone," she replied.
---
So I kept going.
---
I found myself healing in the writing.
There were days when I couldn't breathe through the pain, but somehow, I found comfort in knowing I wasn't just writing about Elian—I was keeping him alive.
And I started noticing the world again.
The boy at the train station who painted in a sketchbook.
The old couple who always sat by the river holding hands.
The woman who played violin under the bridge every Thursday evening.
Life hadn't stopped being beautiful. I had just stopped seeing it.
---
One night, I walked to the place where Elian and I used to stargaze.
The city lights dimmed the stars, but I still looked up.
"Do you still watch over me?" I whispered.
The sky didn't answer. But a soft breeze passed through the trees.
And maybe that was enough.
---
One month later, I finished the manuscript.
The final page was the hardest.
I wrote about the last sunrise we watched together.
How he smiled, even when the pain made his hands tremble.
How he whispered, "Don't remember me in sadness, Mira. Remember me when the sky turns gold."
How I never wanted that morning to end.
---
I titled it Before the Last Sunrise.
Claire cried when she read the ending.
So did I.
---
Then one day, I got an email from a small publisher.
"Your story moved us. We'd love to publish it."
I stared at the screen for a long time. My hand hovered over the reply button.
I clicked "Yes."
---
Months passed.
The book was printed.
My name on the cover.
His story between the pages.
Our love inked in every line.
Readers began to reach out.
Strangers from across the world.
One message said:
"I lost someone too. Your words made me feel less alone."
Another said:
"This book made me cry at 3 a.m. Thank you for reminding me that love, even when it ends, still matters."
---
And just like that, Elian's memory became a lighthouse.
Not only for me.
But for anyone who had ever loved and lost.
---
A year later, on the anniversary of his passing, I visited the hill where we once watched fireworks.
I left a copy of the book there, beneath a tree we carved our initials into.
A note tucked inside:
> We danced in rain.
We kissed under stars.
And in the end, we wrote a story that didn't need forever to be eternal.
Love, always—Mira.
---
I stood there for a long time.
The sky turned golden again.
And I finally smiled through the tears.
Because this wasn't the end.
Not for me.
Not for him.
Not for the story.