A Nobody Novels & Stories

The name nobody had spoken in twenty-six years. "My name is Joel Aliet."

Matt himself got out alive, but after that, no one in New York ever saw him again. Some said he had retreated to the countryside, taken a new name, and was living a quiet, ordinary life. Some said he had gone to Europe. Others said he never made it out at all. I didn't look into it. Whether he was alive or dead was no longer any concern of mine. David once asked me why I hadn't simply had Matt dealt with directly. I smiled and said nothing. A man like Matt, stripped of power, was as good as dead already. I wanted him to watch himself lose everything and become nobody.

Just ten digits. Her heart began beating faster. “Okay,” she muttered under her breath, forcing herself upright. “Let’s see who you really are.” She opened her laptop and typed the number into a search engine. Nothing. No results. No business listing. No social media. No records at all. Her brows furrowed. “That’s impossible.” Everyone had something online. Everyone left traces. She tried another website—one of those reverse phone lookup services that usually dug up embarrassing details about people’s addresses and relatives.

No notifications trying to pull me back into anyone else’s orbit. Relief hit first, warm and immediate. Good. No expectations. No one waiting for me to respond. No silent disappointment disguised as Just checking in. Then, because my brain enjoys chaos, disappointment followed. It wasn’t sharp or dramatic. Just a small, annoying flicker. The kind that made me roll my eyes at myself. What exactly were you hoping for? I didn’t know. I never did. I sighed and shoved the phone back into my pocket, already exhausted by the mental gymnastics required to interpret my own emotions.

Anything. Nothing.