Valeria woke up with that strange feeling again — as if something had touched her while she slept. It wasn't fear, but it wasn't peace either. It was more like a nameless nostalgia, an absence crawling between the sheets.
The clock read 6:03 a.m., and the city hadn't fully stirred. Outside, the sky hung somewhere between night and day. Just like her.
She sat on the edge of the bed, bare feet on the cold floor — and there it was again: the box. The same aged wooden box, with no lock, no marks, that showed up at the foot of her bed every time she dreamed of Elías. And last night, she had. Again.
She couldn't fully remember the dream. Just fragments: a gaze frozen in time, a phrase never spoken, a touch she wasn't sure had ever happened. But when she opened the box, as always, there was something new.
A folded paper.
A single sentence.
"What is not named, does not die."
And then she knew: Elías was coming back.
Valeria didn't open the paper right away. She held it between her fingers like it burned. She felt that if she read those words, something inside her —something she had worked so hard to bury— would awaken.
But she did. She always did.
She read the words once, twice, three times. They weren't hers. She didn't remember ever writing them. And yet, it was her handwriting. Her handwriting… and that dark stain in the corner of the page. Dried blood? Spilled ink? She didn't know.
She tucked the paper into her journal —the one she hadn't touched in months— and stood up. She needed to get out. To breathe. To pretend everything was fine.
While brushing her teeth, she looked at herself in the mirror. Something was different in her reflection.
Something… sadder. More tired. Or maybe it was just the way the light hit her face. Or maybe it was the fact that, in her dream, Elías had said: "It's not that I didn't choose you. It's that I never knew how to stay."
And that hurt more than any absence ever could.
The sound of the doorbell pulled her out of her haze. Three short rings. Exactly the way Elías used to ring when he came to pick her up, years ago.
Her body tensed.
It couldn't be. Impossible. She forced herself to laugh, to tell herself it was just coincidence—echoes of the past her mind refused to let go.
But when she opened the door, no one was there.
Only the wind.
And on the floor, a black rose. Not wilted. Not plastic. A fresh, impossible rose, with dew shimmering on its petals.
She looked both ways down the hallway. Nothing. No one.
She picked it up with trembling hands. And then she felt it: a shiver crawling down her spine, as if something —or someone— had just passed right through her.
It wasn't fear. It was… recognition.
Because Elías always said red roses were too obvious. That if he ever wanted to say something without words, he'd use a black one.
And she, foolishly, had once replied: "And where are you going to find a black rose?"
Looks like he already had.
That night, Valeria dreamed of a house she didn't remember ever seeing, yet it felt like her own. The walls were gray, weathered by time, and every window was covered with heavy curtains that blocked out the light. She walked barefoot, dragging her fingers along the walls as if searching for something she couldn't name.
At the end of the hallway: a red door. Closed. Her heart began to race, as if her body recognized what her mind couldn't understand. She tried to open it, but the handle was ice cold. Then, she heard a voice. Her own. But it wasn't speaking. It was whispering.
—Don't open that door if you're not ready to remember.
She jolted awake, sweating. The clock read 3:33 a.m., and the box at the foot of the bed... was no longer shut. It was slightly open, as if something had slipped out or... as if it wanted her to look inside.
Valeria remained frozen, sensing that something —dormant for years— had just awakened.
The next morning, the air in the room felt different. Thicker. Valeria sat on the bed without touching the box. She didn't dare. It was still slightly open, as if the night before hadn't been a dream.
As she walked down the hallway, she heard murmurs. Her mother was on the phone in the kitchen, using that sharp tone she always had when discussing "Valeria's life" like it was a public issue.
—Thirty and still nothing serious. I don't know what else to do… —she said—. I introduced her to Marcos, to Rodrigo… nothing. It's like she doesn't want anyone.
Valeria swallowed hard and kept walking, silently. What they didn't know was that she had wanted. That she had loved. And each of them had left a crack in her soul that still ached.
As she passed the hallway mirror, something made her stop.
It wasn't her. It was her reflection—but different.
Her eyes looked darker, as if something was hiding behind them.
And on her left collarbone, a mark. Not a bruise. Not a birthmark. A shape. Like a thorn or an ancient letter carved into her skin.
She touched it. It burned.
That mark hadn't been there yesterday.
Valeria didn't know whether to be scared or to cry. The mark was still there, hot like a warning. But it didn't look like a thorn, as she'd first thought.
It was a letter.
An "E."
Elías.
The name flashed through her mind like lightning. She hadn't thought of him in weeks, maybe months. Since she had convinced herself their story was a closed chapter.
But then she felt it.
Not a memory. A presence.
She rushed back to her room. The box was still there. Closed again. But now, something new rested on top: a feather.
Black. Perfect. Weightless.
She touched it, and an image pierced through her without asking.
A kiss. One of those that hurt more than it healed. One of the last ones with Elías. In that park where they always said goodbye as if it were the last time.
Valeria stepped back, as if the feather burned her. And in that instant, the mark on her collarbone pulsed.
Was that what her scars did? Speak to her? Warn her?
Or worse… were they doors?
The silence in her room was different that night. It wasn't peace. It was something older. As if the air remembered things she had long forgotten.
Valeria opened the desk drawer without knowing exactly what she was looking for. Her fingers found a worn notebook, soft covers, her name scribbled in the corner in shaky little-girl handwriting: "Valeria S."
She hadn't opened it in years.
She turned the pages carefully, afraid to tear the yellowed paper. Until she stopped. There it was: a clumsy drawing of a house with only one lit window, and a sentence written underneath in red crayon.
"If they see me, they'll love me."
Her throat tightened. She remembered that night perfectly. She was eight, hiding in the closet while her parents argued in the kitchen. Her father had said she was "too sensitive." Her mother had stayed silent. And Valeria, in her own silence, drew that picture to convince herself that someday, someone would truly see her… and stay.
She looked back at the page. And then she felt it. A faint burning on her left wrist.
She pulled up her sleeve.
A reddish line crossed her skin, thin and glowing. It hadn't been there before. And as if a truth had surfaced from the past, she understood: it wasn't a wound. It was a memory. A broken promise, etched into her body like a warning.
She froze. As if something —or someone— was watching her from a corner she couldn't see.
And for the first time in a long while, she was afraid of herself.
That night, Valeria woke up startled. She didn't know if it was a noise, a dream, or simply anxiety disguised as insomnia. She sat up in bed and saw it: the box. Closed, as always, at the foot of the bed.
But something was different this time.
Her reflection in the wardrobe mirror… wasn't moving with her.
She swallowed hard. Blinked. Took a slow step toward the mirror. The reflection remained still, eyes locked on her. It was her face, her body, her clothes… but the eyes were darker. Sadder. Older.
"What do you want?" Valeria whispered, unsure if she was talking to a dream or something else.
And then she felt it. A rush of cold air brushed against her back, and for a moment, a distant, childlike voice whispered:
"You opened it once before. You don't remember… but he does."
Valeria stepped back. The mirror now showed only her usual reflection—confused, trembling.
But the box… was open.
Inside, an envelope with a name she didn't recognize: Ariel.
That night, Valeria couldn't sleep. Elías's silhouette still lingered at the edge of her thoughts, like a shadow refusing to leave, even with the lights on. She turned on her bedside lamp and reached for the journal. She didn't remember where she had left off.
Flipping it open at random, something made her freeze.
The handwriting wasn't hers. Not entirely.
It looked like hers… but firmer, more precise.
On the page, a single sentence:
"You keep repeating yourself. Every time you bleed, it's in the same place."
Valeria didn't move. She had no memory of writing those words. Not in that tone. Not with that clarity.
She turned the page and found a date: March 12… but from a year that hadn't happened yet.
2026.
Her heart pounded in her throat. She slammed the journal shut and set it aside. But the sentence was already etched into her mind.
And for the first time, she wasn't sure she was alone in her own story.
The next morning, Valeria woke up with the odd feeling that something had shifted. Not in the world. In her.
She got up slowly, as if every movement peeled her away from a previous version of herself. The journal was still on the nightstand, but she didn't touch it. She pretended not to see it. As if nothing had happened.
She went downstairs, crossed the empty kitchen, and stepped into the backyard. The morning air sliced across her skin. She breathed in deeply, hoping the cold could make sense of things where her thoughts failed.
And then she saw it.
A hummingbird, completely still, suspended in midair in front of her.
Unnerving. Perfect. Unreal.
She blinked. The hummingbird didn't move. Not even a flutter.
It just stared at her.
And then, without warning, it vanished.
Not flew away. Not escaped. It simply… dissolved into the air.
Valeria didn't scream. She only pressed her lips together. Because she understood that the world wasn't broken.
It was her. She had started to see more than she was meant to.
That night, before sleeping, she looked at the journal one last time.
She didn't open it. She just held it in her hands, as if guessing its weight.
—Alright —she whispered—. If you have more to tell me… say it slowly.
She turned off the light.
And the chapter ended, though she didn't know it yet.