Goodbye, Mr. Regret

Timothy stared at the message on his phone, his dark eyes fixed on the glowing

screen for a long while.

[Do you like it?]

He typed a reply.

[Yeah, just like Happy and Lucky.]

He pressed his lips together, thinking.

If Sheila liked them, there was no harm in giving her one too.

There were twenty-two left.

He bought them all, though he only intended to keep one.

The rest, he'd throw away.

It was just an excuse to set one aside for Sheila.

[If you like it, keep it.]

Capital City.

Jessica was too afraid to sleep. She huddled in the corner of the hotel room, knees pulled to her chest, shivering so hard her fingernails nearly broke the skin of her palms.

Every clap of thunder struck like a hammer against her heart.

The storm had knocked out the power, plunging the room into total darkness. Only when lightning ripped across the sky did the world briefly flicker into view. The wind howled, rain hammered the windows with a relentless drone, and Jessica felt her courage drain away, fear flooding every corner of her mind.

Childhood memories crashed over her.

That evening, the sky was heavy and gray, rain threatening at any moment.

Her mother had handed her a twenty, told her to run to the corner store for a bottle of soy sauce, and said she could buy whatever snacks she wanted.

Jessica had spent ages picking out candy, even choosing a piece of cake she knew her mom loved.noveldrama

She was practically skipping on the way home, swinging her bag of groceries, when she reached the foot of her apartment building-and someone fell from above.

There was a sickening thud.

Jessica froze. When she finally looked, she saw it was her mother.

Her mom's gentle eyes stared wide and unseeing, blood spreading from the back

of her head in dark, snaking rivulets across the concrete.

Blood welled from her eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. Her skin was as white as paper-utterly lifeless.

Someone shouted that a woman had jumped.

People quickly surrounded her mother.

Jessica's groceries crashed to the ground. She pushed through the crowd,

desperate to call out, to scream for her mom.

Her lips parted, but no sound came out.

Then the thunder and lightning began.

Her father rushed home, locked Jessica alone in their apartment, and followed the ambulance to the hospital.

The lights were out. In the darkness, the image of her mother's broken body played on a loop in Jessica's mind.

The keening wind and rolling thunder outside never stopped, battering her small world with each stormy breath.

She never understood why her mother had jumped.

She regretted, with every fiber in her body, the time she'd wasted picking out snacks.

If only she had come home earlier, maybe her mother wouldn't have jumped...

Jessica gritted her teeth, hands shaking as she pulled out her phone.

The glow of the screen was blinding in the pitch-black room.

Her lips trembled.

Another crash of thunder nearly made her drop the phone.

Her chest ached with panic, breath coming in ragged gasps, as if she might suffocate.

She hadn't faced a night like this in years.

Timothy.

He was the only person she could think of.

Her fingers trembled as she scrolled through her contacts, removing Timothy's

number from her blocked list and dialing.

Timothy had just stepped out of the shower when his phone rang.

Jessica's name flashed across the screen.

His jaw tightened until his lips were a hard, thin line.

So she remembered how to unblock his number after all.

She had caused him enough trouble these past days.

He'd rushed back from Capital City because of her, and now he was scrambling to

get there again.

If it hadn't been for this brutal storm, he'd still be on the road right now.

Irritated, Timothy set the phone down.

But a moment later, he picked it up again.

He swiped to answer, his voice cold and low. "So you do remember how to call

me."