Novels by JUNIOR

Helena's POV It was taking me back, back more than fifteen years ago. To the time before the heavy thoughts, the time before the expectations, the time before the fall.I didn’t realize I had stopped breathing til my chest began to ache.The box sitting in Tessy’s hands looked so small, so normal, but it pulled way more than words could explain.My eyes locked onto it before I could stop myself, before I could pretend it was just another thing pulled from storage, just another piece of a house I had decided meant nothing to me anymore.It was far from just another box.My fingers twitched at my sides as I didn’t move closer, didn’t say a word either. I just stared back at her, like if I looked long enough, it would turn into something else.It didn’t.Tessy's head dropped to her side slightly. “It’s cute,” she said, turning it over in her hands. “What is it though?”My throat tightened as I took one step forward, then another.“Let me see it,” I said, my voice quieter than I expected

Helena’s POVThe words lingered longer than they should have, sitting wrongly in my chest the moment they left my lips, heavy in a way I couldn’t shake off even as Tessy kept staring at me, I wasn't even sure she had spoken..I could only hear myself, my grandfather's weak voice echoing in my head, louder now.He isn’t dead, isn’t gone. He's still there, breathing, talking, asking things of me. And yet… it hadn’t felt that way in that room.A tight pressure settled deep in my chest, slow and suffocating, like something I didn’t want to name was quietly taking shape.Is he actually going to die? The thought slipped in before I could stop it.I swallowed hard, my fingers tightening slightly around the strap of my bag.No. I'm not doing that. I'm not going to stand here and decide how much time he had left like it was already over.Whether he's dying or not… whether this is the end or not… I just want to be there, to do something. To make whatever time he has left, days, weeks, or longer

Helena's POV “Promise me you'll do it,” he whispered.I would have done anything he asked of me. That thought dripped hot through me before he even spoke.Sitting there beside his bed, watching the slow rise and fall of his chest, listening to the quiet rhythm of machines that had no business being louder than his voice. There was nothing he could ask that I wouldn’t give, certainly not now. Not after everything I had seen, everything I had allowed to slip through my fingers.“Just tell me what it is,” I said softly, leaning forward a little, my hands already reaching for his. “You can ask me anything.”He didn’t answer immediately.His gaze drifted away from me for a moment, like he was searching for something beyond the walls of the room, beyond the present.Reaching for somewhere buried in years I hadn’t paid enough attention to. And for a second, I thought maybe he’d changed his mind. Maybe he wouldn’t ask.Then—“It’s about the house,” he finally said and I blinked.“The house?

Helena's POV I let the door slide open slowly, almost carefully, like the room on the other side might shatter if it moved too fast.The smell hit me first, carried by the wind straight into my nose, sterile and pretty overwhelming. It smelled clean in a way that felt too good to hold a body, a kind of silence rested in the air, heavy and quiet, like the room had been emptied of everything color.And then, my eyes fell on him, and with it, my fingers tightened around the hem of my skirt without me meaning to, my breath blocking the air halfway into my chest and refusing to let it out again. For a second, I couldn’t move. Couldn’t blink. Couldn’t even think straight.Cause the man lying on that bed, the man laying with his eyes closed couldn’t be him. It couldn’t be my grandfather.My eyes moved over him slowly, like if I took it all in too fast, it would become real in a way I wouldn’t be able to take back. His face looked smaller, like something had ripped him out from the inside

Helena’s POVThe question didn’t just land, it cut through everything.My hand went still mid-motion, the spoon hovering just slightly above the plate as my mind… blanked for a second.“My grandfather?”The words came out slower than I expected, like I needed to hear them out loud to even begin processing them.When last did I check up on him?I blinked once, then twice, my brows pulling together as I tried to answer that in my head.Last week…?No. Wait. My fingers tightened slightly around the spoon as I tried again.Maybe two weeks? No… that doesn’t feel right either.My chest shifted uncomfortably as I searched harder, pushing back through the days, through everything that had been happening lately, trying to find the last clear moment I had called, or visited, or even just—Three weeks.The thought dawned on me all at once, crashing into me. Three weeks.My breath caught slightly as I stared down at my plate, my appetite melting away in the same second.Three weeks? No. No, that

Helena’s POVThe words didn’t settle right.They didn’t land the way everything else had just landed between us, not clear, just heavy and pressing in.They lingered over me, hovering somewhere in the space between what I already thought I knew and something I couldn’t quite name yet.An idea? Something that could help us?My fingers tightened slightly against the armrest as I watched him, my mind already moving ahead of me, trying to piece together what that could possibly be without letting it dive too far.There were only so many directions something like that could go. And none of them felt… safe.I exhaled slowly, my brows pulling together just a little when I asked, “What kind of idea?”He didn’t answer immediately. Just looked at me for a second, like he was measuring how to say it. Then—“A dinner night.”I blinked. “A Dinner night?”“With them,” he added calmly, like that did any good in making it sound better. “You and your fiancé. Me and Tessy. One night.”For a second, I j