Chapter One: The Shadow of Sin
Autumn was creeping in quietly, like winter sending its first letters—announcing its approach through chilly breezes and yellow leaves falling onto the sidewalks.
Dry, yellow leaves drifted down over the streets of Chorlton-on-Medlock, a district nestled in the heart of Manchester, known for its odd blend of contrasts: sleek university buildings facing worn-out, decaying flats; narrow alleyways echoing with student chatter and the clamor of hospitals, interspersed with the silence seeping from ancient, cracked walls.
In this neighborhood stands the Royal Manchester Hospital—a massive structure with darkened windows, where life sometimes pauses beside a bed, and begins anew on a waiting room chair.
Here, nothing ever stays the same.
People walk fast, but sorrow walks slower...
Behind weary schools and dimly lit alleys, a girl like Anne might be sitting, staring at the world as if through a broken screen—where everything appears distorted, faded, and painful.
And while she stared, her mother's voice reached her—dry and stripped of tenderness, just as she had grown used to describing it.
She was descending the stairs to the living room for dinner. Their home was cold, sometimes so colorless and quiet that Anne felt it wasn't just a house, but an empty shell.
She sat on a wooden chair in front of a small table, her eyes fixed to the floor, afraid of her mother's glances. She had long since learned to read the signals in Marilyn's eyes—regret, blame, sorrow—until she began to avoid looking at them altogether.
The silence shattered when a plate of pasta landed on the table.
Marilyn (sternly): "Pray."
She clasped her hands together. Her mother always insisted on praying before meals. Marilyn came from a deeply religious family, and had once tried to join a convent alongside a group of nuns—until something unexpected happened.
Marilyn: "Start."
Finally, Anne looked up at her mother. It had always been Marilyn who led the prayer, but now it was as if her words stopped halfway, wanting to flee. Still, Anne gathered her strength and spoke quietly:
Anne (softly):
"Thank you, Lord, for your abundant blessings, and for this food we are about to eat. Bless the hands that prepared it, and let us eat it with hearts full of gratitude. Amen."
Marilyn: "Amen."
As they ate, Anne felt her mother's eyes chasing her across the table, silently urging her to speak.
Marilyn: "I was meant to be there... among the nuns. Not here, cooking pasta for you."
Anne paused—but this time, she chose to speak.
Anne:
"That's not my fault. I don't want to live your dream. This is my life. I want to live it the way I choose."
Her words were like a match thrown into dry grass. The tension cracked in the sound of a spoon striking the plate.
Marilyn (furiously):
"What did you just say?! Do you realize that because of you, I lost everything? I had the chance to give you away, but you cried so hard, you clung to my finger. Why didn't you let go? I could've entered the convent. I could've been a nun—pure, untouched by sin. But you... you ruined everything! And now you raise your voice at me? Set rules for your life?
I gave birth to you. I carried your burden. So I'll be the one to control your life. I carry someone else's sin, and now I'm leaving for the hospital. I'm not coming back. And it would be better for you to make up your mind soon—because I'm sure you'll end up in the convent anyway, wearing the robes of a nun. Not like your mother... filthy with sin."
She rose, grabbed her coat and keys, and slammed the door shut behind her.
The sound echoed like a gunshot in Anne's chest. The noise lingered in the cold kitchen, as if the walls had memorized her mother's fury. But Anne was used to this heavy silence—it had become part of her.
She stared at her plate. She'd only eaten a few bites, yet something in her stomach made her feel as if she had swallowed a stone—or perhaps a poison that shattered her heart into cold fragments.
Long moments passed in stillness. She fought back her tears, looked at the chair her mother had sat in, and whispered to no one in particular:
"I'm not a sin... I'm just a child who didn't know any better."
She rose slowly, carried her plate to the sink, and washed it as she always did—without knowing why she continued acting as if nothing had happened.
Maybe because the pain was no longer new... it was routine.
She climbed the stairs to her room. Outside her window, the neighborhood grew darker, and the wind swept up the scattered autumn leaves, like a season expressing her state of mind.
She sat on her bed, knees drawn to her chest, staring at the shifting shadows on the walls.
Her mother's words echoed in her mind:
"Because of you... I lost my life."
But something else stirred inside her—something unclear. It wasn't just sadness or anger. It was a yearning... for understanding.
She pulled out a small notebook from her drawer, the one she had been writing in since childhood—back when she had no one to talk to.
And she began to write, without order or thought:
> "If I am the sin, must I atone for simply existing?
Why am I punished for a crime I didn't commit?
My mother prays every night, but her prayers don't cleanse me—they condemn me.
If her family is so faithful, did they teach her to dump her shame onto someone else?
Where is my father? Why did he disappear and leave her to bleed me out every day?"
She wrote for a long time... but she didn't feel relief. Only a little less suffocated.
She closed the notebook slowly, feeling something strange in her chest—heavier, yet somehow clearer.
That night, she couldn't sleep.
She was thinking... not just about what had been said, but about her entire life ahead of her—and a decision she had not yet made, but which was silently drawing closer.
Anne:
"There must be another place... someone else... who can explain to me why I exist."
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