Raine hadn't touched the ring.
She'd only stared at it.
For hours.
It sat exactly where Seraphina had rested her hand earlier—on the edge of the counter, close to the old brass cash drawer. A silver band with a faint music note engraved along the curve, catching the dim morning light as if daring her to remember.
But Raine didn't need the dare. Her memory did the work on its own.
Celeste had worn a ring just like this one in her final months. Raine had only glimpsed it a few times, always half-hidden under long sleeves or the edge of a scarf. It was never explained, never spoken about. Just... present, in the way Celeste herself had been—elusive, quietly beautiful, and always just out of reach.
Now it was back.
Not on Celeste's hand.
But on Seraphina's.
It couldn't be coincidence.
Could it?
Raine closed the store early that night. She turned the "OPEN" sign to "SORRY, NOT TODAY," locked the door, and let the silence sit with her like an old friend. She didn't turn on any lights except the one behind the counter. Her tea went cold. She didn't notice.
She found herself upstairs, opening the drawer where she kept Celeste's things—the will, the letter, the music sheet. She didn't read the letter. She never did. Not anymore. She just touched it with her fingertips like it might still pulse with warmth if she tried hard enough.
The ring she kept—Celeste's ring—was still there, in the velvet box lined with a fading ribbon. It was the same. Down to the gentle scratch near the engraving, as if time itself had signed its name across the metal.
She closed the box. Slowly.
The next morning, it rained. Not heavily, just enough to mist the windows and mute the outside world. Raine opened the shop on time. She didn't expect anyone. The rain kept most people away.
But Seraphina came back.
She stepped in, brushing droplets from her coat, her presence calm and unhurried. She held a book in her hands—a copy of Soundless Songs, one Raine knew by heart.
"I think I left this behind," she said.
Raine took it, brushing Seraphina's fingers briefly. "You did."
They stood there for a beat too long. The silence settled in again. Raine wanted to ask about the ring, about the melody Seraphina had hummed the day before—Celeste's melody—but the questions stayed stuck in her throat, tangled with fear and longing.
Instead, she asked, "Have you always lived here?"
Seraphina shook her head. "Just moved in last month. My place is over on Langston Avenue."
"Do you have family nearby?" Raine tried to sound casual.
"No. It's just me."
Another pause.
Seraphina took a slow walk through the store, tracing her hand along the familiar route of poetry to classics to music. She stopped near the back—where Celeste used to lean against the bookshelf and pretend she wasn't watching Raine rearrange the shelves.
"You always keep the music section in the back?" Seraphina asked.
"It's the quietest part of the store," Raine said, voice low.
Seraphina smiled. "It's the part that feels most alive."
That threw Raine off. She folded her arms tightly. "You say things like you've been here before."
"Maybe in another life." Seraphina said it like a joke, but her eyes stayed steady.
Raine hesitated. Her next words came carefully, like they might fracture if said too fast.
"You remind me of someone."
Seraphina didn't ask who. She only tilted her head. "Someone who used to work here?"
"No," Raine replied. "Someone who used to haunt this place with her music and her silence. She never said much, but when she did… it stayed with you."
Seraphina didn't push. Didn't press.
Instead, she turned back to the poetry shelf and ran her fingers along the spines again. Then she looked over her shoulder and said, gently, "I don't want to intrude on what you had with her. I'm just here because... this place feels right."
Raine said nothing. But her hands relaxed at her sides.
Before leaving, Seraphina held out Soundless Songs again. "Actually… I'd like to borrow it again. If that's okay."
Raine looked at the book. Then at Seraphina.
"Keep it for now."
As Seraphina stepped out into the soft drizzle, the bookstore bell rang behind her—gentle, like a breath between chords.
Raine stayed behind the counter long after, her fingers resting on the old velvet box upstairs, her heart unsure which story she was in anymore.
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