The cliffs rose before them, jagged and wind-beaten, as if carved by sorrow itself. Celeste walked ahead, her boots crunching through frost-laced grass, Elias trailing close behind, breath ragged, the sea's roar threading through his coughs.
Anna's diary had left a final name—Sophie.
A friend.
A witness.
A keeper of silence.
They found her in a seaside cottage laced with ivy, its garden untended, its windows fogged. Sophie, now bent and fading, opened the door as if she'd been expecting them.
"You're her sister," she said to Celeste, voice cracked like wintered porcelain.
Celeste nodded, the diary in her hands. "I need to know the truth."
Sophie sat slowly, her hands folded like closed wings. For a long time, she said nothing. Then, eyes gleaming with old pain, she spoke.
"She loved him, more than she should have. Henri promised her the world—then gave her silence. When she told him about the baby, he disappeared. She broke."
The room went still. Only the sea beyond the window moved, shifting like a restless spirit.
"She came to me the night before," Sophie continued. "She didn't cry. Just said… 'I think the tide will understand me better.' And she left."
Celeste's breath caught. "And you… found her?"
Sophie nodded. "Below the cliff. The sea had been kind. I buried her story to spare her shame."
A soft sob escaped Celeste, years of wondering caving in. Elias wrapped an arm around her, though his body ached with its own unraveling.
"She was so alone," Celeste whispered. "And I never knew."
Sophie reached out, her hand brushing Celeste's. "Now you do. And she's not forgotten."
That night, back in their dim apartment, Celeste sat before a blank canvas. Her fingers trembled.
Elias watched from the couch, notebook in hand, pen shaking.
She painted the cliff—dark, endless, weeping sky—and at its edge, a girl in white, holding nothing but the sea.
He wrote beside her:
"She left with the tide,
but her name clings to the salt.
We remember."