Three days earlier I’d stood in a bookstore, not looking for anything in particular.

The woman at the counter had spoken before I said a word:

“You’re looking for absence,” she said.

I blinked.

She handed me a copy of No Longer Human by Osamu Dazai. “It’s about a man who can’t belong to the world,” she said. “Thought you might relate.”

I didn’t buy it. But I remembered the title.

Now

It began with a letter. No stamp. No name. Just the folded shape slipped through my door, like a whisper with hands.

I didn’t open it immediately.

I stared at it. Like it might vanish if I looked away.

When I finally unfolded it, the page smelled faintly of dust and something older— like books kept too long in locked drawers.

The note was short:“I saw what you took in the gray building. I’ve taken something in return.”

The photo of the woman in a summer dress, I had to take it.

Felt strangely warm, or it was the delusion of thinking that I am the one she is starring at outside the frame.

No signature. No threat. Just that.

At first, I thought it was a joke. Then I checked the drawer.

The photo of the smiling boy was gone.

Only that. Nothing else.

I walked back to the gray building. Tried the door.

Locked.