Twisted Plot

CHAPTER 17

Six months had passed since the transplant. Ramiel’s strength had returned, but life hadn’t.

His body worked again his appetite came back, his meetings resumed, and his calendar filled with expectations. But nothing settled inside him. The nameless donor still lingered in his mind, like a word on the tip of his tongue. A life had ended to save his. And he didn’t know their face. He didn’t know their name. It felt like living in a second skin that didn’t quite belong.

He returned to painting.

Not for galleries, not for auctions just for himself. The pieces he created now were raw, layered with grief and reverence. A figure in the rain with no face. A woman with eyes closed and a child in her arms. A girl staring through glass in a Paris café. He didn’t even know he was painting her until Raquel walked in and said, “You’re painting ghosts.”

“I know,” he whispered.

*********

In another part of the city, Aria Rose took her first real steps on the sun-warmed tiles of an art therapy centre. Her grandmother clapped with tears in her eyes while Sonia filmed and laughed. Harmony’s mother, once guarded with grief, now clung to Aria as her heartbeat.

“Your mother would have drawn this moment,” she told Aria one afternoon. “She’d have sketched it a hundred times. She would’ve painted your curls and your wild giggle and every single toe.”

Aria babbled something that sounded like “Ma.”

The grief was quieter now. Not gone—never gone,but softened by the joy of the living. Still, every once in a while, Sonia would pull out the envelope from the drawer, fingers tracing the word Ramiel on the front.

Not yet.

She needed to wait.

**
5 years later

It was a Saturday morning when Ramiel’s path curved toward the missing pieces.

He had agreed begrudgingly—to host a charity art event for a children’s foundation. Raquel had strong-armed him into it, saying it would “be good for his soul.” He walked into the gallery like a man still half in shadow.

The space buzzed with soft music, delicate brushstrokes, and young laughter. Canvases from underprivileged youth lined the walls wild, free, full of unfiltered emotion.

But one painting made him stop.

It was of a woman, faceless, cradling a child against a swirl of blues and greys. The child’s eyes were painted in intricate detail wide, hopeful, hauntingly familiar. Beneath it was the artist’s name, scribbled in pencil:

"A. Rose, Harmony "
 
He stepped back, breath catching.

At the far end of the room, a young girl chased a fallen crayon beneath a display table. She giggled as she grabbed it and turned, locking eyes with him.

He froze.

Those eyes. That smile. That wild, untamed curl of hair.

A woman Harmony’s mother—swooped in to pick her up. She glanced up at Ramiel politely, not recognizing him, and walked away.

He stood rooted. The pieces shifted.

That laugh. That painting. That name.

"A. Rose, Harmony."!

A terrible, beautiful thought struck him.

Could it be…?

He left the gallery in a daze.

That night, he called Sonia. He had kept her contact from the old art registry she managed for Harmony. She picked up cautiously.

“I need to ask you something,” Ramiel said. His voice was quiet but urgent. “Was her name Harmony?”

There was silence.

Then a sigh.

Sonia said softly. “I think… it’s time.”

---
If you have reached this far with this story I thank you I'm so honoured. Much love ❤️ 😍