Fear soon twisted, vine-like, into a gnawing jealousy. He searched all the places Clara loved: the sun-dappled park bench where she read on weekends, the corner café they visited every Thursday, the cramped bookstore where they’d first met. Each location was empty, indifferent, offering no trace she had been there at all.
Back home, he opened her half-used wardrobe. A few shirts and dresses hung loosely, spaced strangely, as though he couldn’t remember what had filled the gaps just yesterday. Some textures felt familiar, others oddly out of place. He couldn’t tell if something specific was missing or if his mind, frayed from lack of sleep, was playing tricks.
He shut the wardrobe door with trembling hands. If she had left in a rush for another man or some secret rendezvous, then why leave these belongings behind? Unless she was planning to return… or unless something had stopped her from doing so. Had she been *stopped*?
The leap from jealousy to dread was sudden and vertiginous. Adam became convinced Clara hadn’t just left. She had left to meet someone, and something had gone terribly, horribly wrong before she could come back. Had she met with an accident? Had she been abducted?
While rummaging through Clara’s old bedside drawer for any clue, his fingers brushed against a crumpled page torn from her notebook. An address was scribbled across it in a rushed, angular handwriting. He didn’t recognize it, but the uneven scrawl made his chest tighten, as though each jagged letter hinted at urgency or panic.