Letters from the future
Just one word at the bottom, pressed harder into the paper than the rest, as though the pen had nearly torn through.
You.
Ava’s heart gave a hard, uncomfortable thud.
She read it again, slower this time, but the words didn’t change. The threat hung there on the page, bold and certain, like a verdict.
Do not take the shortcut home.
Her shortcut.
Everyone at school knew Ava used the cracked, narrow path behind the gas station to shave ten minutes off her walk home. Everyone teased her for it, too—it stank of motor oil and rotting garbage in the summer, and stray cats always hissed from the shadows—but she took it anyway. Every single day. She hated wasting time, and those ten minutes mattered.