Page 43 of The Story Between Us

Four pages this morning—the most he’d written in three years. Aldric at the Wall of Sorrow, finally understanding what the Keepers had been protecting. The deal taking shape. The cost becoming clear. Four pages that had poured out of him like a dam breaking, words tumbling over each other in their rush to exist.

And then, just over an hour later, a grand total of seven pages.

And now nothing. The cursor blinked with infinite, mocking patience on the last sentence he’d written.

The thing behind the wall had been waiting.

Waiting for what? For whom? For how long? What did it want? What would it cost Aldric to make the deal?

Emma would know. Emma always knew.

He got up and went to his bookshelf and reached for her notebooks, desperate now, pulling three of them from the shelf and spreading them across his desk. He opened them to random pages as if her handwriting might somehow transmit directly into his brain. Her plot notes. Her character sketches. Her brilliant, effortless ideas that used to spark something in him.

The story needs to breathe here. Give the reader space before the next blow.

Aldric’s flaw isn’t pride—it’s the pride he uses to hide his fear.

What does the antagonist want? Not power. Power bores me. She wants to be RIGHT.

Her voice, frozen on paper. Preserved like a pressed flower, beautiful but brittle, impossible to bring back to life.

He read through page after page, looking for something—anything—that would reignite what he’d had this morning. Some spark, some thread, some whisper of her genius that would show him how to continue.

Nothing.

The notebooks functioned as a phone line to someone who’d stopped answering. He could see her words, but he couldn’t hear her voice. The conversation had ended three years ago.

He closed the notebook. Opened it again. Closed it.

Outside the office, Livvie moved around. Dishes clinked. Cushions thumped softly as she straightened them. She was cleaning again—couldn’t seem to help herself—and humming something. Some melody he almost recognized.

She radiated good mood. Of course she did. This morning he’d written four pages. This morning the breakthrough had landed real, and she’d gotten so excited, her eyes bright, her smile enormous.

Go. Write. I’ll be here.

And he had. For about an hour, he had. The thread had still held, the words still coming, and he’d thought: This is it. I’m back. I can do this.

Then just like that, his own wall had shut him down.

He stared at the cursor. Willed something—anything—to come.

The thing behind the wall had been waiting.

Waiting for what?

Her footsteps approached down the hall. A soft knock on the door.

“Nate? I made fresh coffee. Want some?”

He didn’t answer. Couldn’t. His throat had closed too tight.

The door opened anyway. Livvie appeared in the doorway, a mug in each hand, that careful hopefulness on her face. The sage-green sweater she’d changed into at some point made her eyes look warmer, and her hair had come loose from its clip, strands framing her face.

She looked happy. Relaxed. Like being in his disaster of a house put her exactly where she wanted to be.

“How’s it going?” She crossed to the desk, set a mug beside him. She picked up his empty mug from earlier. “Are you still in the zone?”

He looked at the screen. “Just taking a break,” he heard himself say.