The Crimson Farewell

Part 1: The Ghost in Paris

Chapter 1: The City of Echoes

The rain in Paris didn’t wash the city clean; it just made the cobblestones slick and the lights blur into a watercolor painting of gray and gold.

I, Gabriel Thorne, sat in the corner of a bistro in Le Marais, nursing a glass of red wine. I was thirty-five, an architect from New York, in town to finalize the restoration plans for a historic hotel. My career was at its peak, my bank account was full, but my life felt… hollow.

I had been single for five years. Since her.

Sophie.

She was the one who got away. Or rather, the one who ran away. Five years ago, we were engaged, living in Brooklyn, planning a life. Then, one day, I came home to an empty apartment and a note that simply said: “I can’t do this anymore. Don’t look for me.”

I looked for her. God, I looked. But she had vanished.

“Monsieur?” The waiter refilled my water. “Are you waiting for someone?”

“No,” I said. “Just the ghosts.”

I finished my wine and paid the bill. I walked out into the drizzle, pulling my coat collar up. I decided to walk back to my hotel near the Louvre.

As I crossed the Pont des Arts—the bridge where lovers used to lock their promises to the railing—I saw her.

She was standing by the railing, looking down at the dark Seine. She wore a red trench coat that stood out against the night like a wound. Her blonde hair was shorter now, cut in a chic bob, but the curve of her neck was unmistakable.

My heart slammed against my ribs. It was impossible.

“Sophie?” I called out. The wind nearly snatched the name away.

She turned.

It was her.

She looked older, thinner perhaps, with a fragility I didn’t remember. But her eyes—those impossible violet eyes—were the same.

She froze when she saw me. For a second, I thought she would run.

“Gabriel?” she whispered.

I closed the distance between us in three strides. I stopped a foot away, afraid to touch her, afraid she was a hallucination brought on by jet lag and wine.

“It’s you,” I said. “I thought… I thought you were dead.”

“I’m alive,” she said, a sad smile playing on her lips. “Although sometimes, in this city, it feels the same.”

“Why?” I asked. The question I had carried for five years. “Why did you leave?”

She looked away, toward the cathedral of Notre Dame in the distance. “I had to, Gabe. I was… drowning in New York. I needed to find myself.”

It was a cliché. A non-answer. But looking at her, standing there in the rain, I realized I didn’t care about the why right now. I just cared that she was here.

“Are you happy?” I asked.

She looked back at me. Her eyes shimmered with unshed tears.

“I am tonight,” she said.

She reached out and touched my hand. Her skin was cold.

“Buy me a drink?” she asked. “For old times’ sake?”

Chapter 2: The Night of Resurrection

We ended up at the bar of my hotel. It was quiet, intimate. We talked for hours.

We didn’t talk about the breakup. We talked about art, about architecture, about the way the light hits the buildings in Rome. It was easy. It was like no time had passed, and yet, there was a heaviness hanging over us. A sense of urgency.

Sophie drank her wine quickly. She laughed a little too loud. She touched my arm often, her fingers lingering as if she were trying to memorize the texture of my suit.

“You look successful,” she said, tracing the rim of her glass. “You built your skyscrapers.”

“I did,” I said. “But the view from the top is lonely.”

She looked down. “I’m sorry, Gabriel. I never wanted to hurt you.”

“You broke me, Sophie.”

“I know,” she whispered. “I broke myself too.”

She looked up, her gaze intense, burning.

“Gabriel,” she said. “I don’t want to talk about the past anymore. I want… I want tonight. Just tonight. No questions. No tomorrow. Can we have that?”

I knew it was a bad idea. I knew I was reopening a wound that had never really healed.

But I was a starving man, and she was the banquet.

“Yes,” I said.

We went up to my suite.

The moment the door closed, the desperation took over. It wasn’t gentle. It was a collision. We kissed as if we were trying to breathe for each other.

She felt fragile in my arms, her ribs prominent under her skin, but her passion was a firestorm. She cried out my name, clinging to me, her nails digging into my back.

“Love me,” she begged. “Please, Gabe. Make me feel alive.”

I loved her. I loved her with every ounce of anger and longing I had suppressed for five years.

We fell asleep entangled, her head resting on my chest, her breathing shallow and fast.

I stroked her hair, listening to the rain against the window. I thought, I will fix this. I won’t let her leave this time. We will talk in the morning.

I drifted off, dreaming of a future I thought I had lost.

Chapter 3: The Crimson Stain

I woke up to the sound of silence.

The light in the room was gray, the heavy curtains blocking the morning sun.

I reached out for her.

The bed beside me was empty.

“Sophie?” I mumbled, sitting up.

The bathroom door was open. It was dark.

My heart sank. She ran again.

I rubbed my face, feeling the weight of the rejection settling in. I turned to get out of bed.

And then I saw it.

On the white pillow where her head had rested.

A stain.

It wasn’t a smudge of makeup. It wasn’t a spilled drop of wine.

It was bright, vivid red. Blood.

And it wasn’t just a drop. It was a pool, soaking into the cotton, spreading like a blooming flower. There were streaks of it on the sheet, leading to the edge of the bed.

“Sophie!” I shouted, panic seizing my throat.

I jumped up. I checked the bathroom. Empty. I checked the closet. Empty.

Her clothes were gone. Her shoes were gone.

But on the nightstand, next to the hotel notepad, was a handkerchief. It was stained with blood.

And a note. Scrawled in shaky handwriting.

Gabriel, I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to see. I didn’t want you to know. Thank you for the night. It was everything. Don’t follow me. Please. S.

I stared at the blood on the pillow. It was a significant amount. A nosebleed? A hemorrhage?

“I didn’t want you to know.”

Know what?

I grabbed my phone. I dialed her old number, knowing it would be disconnected. It was.

I called the front desk.

“This is Room 402,” I said, my voice shaking. “Did a woman leave my room? Blonde, red coat?”

“Yes, Monsieur,” the concierge said. “About an hour ago. She seemed… in distress. She asked for a taxi to the Hôpital Saint-Louis.”

The hospital.

I didn’t bother showering. I threw on my clothes. I ran out of the hotel, leaving the blood-stained bed behind as a terrifying testament to the night.

Chapter 4: The Diagnosis

Hôpital Saint-Louis is one of the oldest hospitals in Paris. It is a place of healing, but to me, it looked like a fortress of secrets.

I ran to the reception. “I’m looking for Sophie… Sophie Miller. She came in an hour ago.”

The receptionist typed slowly. “I have no Sophie Miller.”

I cursed. She must have changed her name. Or used her maiden name. Or…

“She’s American,” I said. “Blonde. Red coat. She might have been bleeding.”

The nurse’s face softened. “Ah. The woman who collapsed in the lobby. She didn’t give a name. She is in the Hematology ward. Dr. Dubois is attending.”

Hematology. Blood.

I ran.

I found Dr. Dubois in the corridor. He looked tired.

“Doctor,” I grabbed his arm. “The woman. The American. Is she okay?”

“Are you family?” he asked.

“I’m her fiancé,” I lied. “Where is she?”

Dr. Dubois sighed. He gestured to a room at the end of the hall.

“She is stabilized,” he said. “The hemorrhage has stopped. But her platelets are critically low.”

“What does that mean?”

“You don’t know?” the doctor looked surprised. “She has Acute Myeloid Leukemia. End-stage.”

The world stopped spinning. The floor seemed to drop out from under me.

“Leukemia?” I whispered.

“She has been fighting it for years,” the doctor said. “She stopped treatment two months ago. She said she wanted to live her last days on her own terms. But last night… the exertion… it caused a rupture.”

Make me feel alive, she had said.

She knew. She knew she was dying. That’s why she was at the bridge. That’s why she came with me. It wasn’t a rekindling. It was a goodbye.

“Can I see her?” I asked, tears streaming down my face.

“She is sleeping. But yes.”

I walked into the room.

Sophie looked tiny in the hospital bed. Tubes ran into her arms. Her skin was translucent, bruising blooming on her arms like dark flowers.

I sat beside her. I took her hand. It was even colder than the night before.

“You idiot,” I whispered, kissing her knuckles. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

She stirred. Her eyes fluttered open. The violet was dull now.

“Gabe,” she rasped.

“I’m here.”

“I told you… not to follow.”

“I never listen,” I said.

She smiled weakly. “I wanted you to remember me… beautiful. Not like this.”

“You are beautiful,” I said. “You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”

“I’m dying, Gabe.”

“I know.”

“I have… I have something to tell you,” she said. Her breath was hitching. “The reason I left… five years ago.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “We’re here now.”

“It matters,” she squeezed my hand with surprising strength. “I didn’t leave because I fell out of love. I left because I got sick. The first diagnosis. They said… they said the treatment would make me infertile. They said I would be a burden. You wanted kids, Gabe. You wanted a big life. I couldn’t… I couldn’t trap you in a hospital room.”

I stared at her. “So you broke my heart to save me?”

“I thought I was saving you,” she wept. “But I just missed you.”

“There’s more,” she whispered.

She pointed to her purse on the chair.

“Look inside. The blue envelope.”

I reached for the purse. I found the envelope. It was worn, as if she had carried it for a long time.

I opened it.

Inside was a photograph.

It was a picture of a little girl. Maybe four years old. She had messy blonde hair and…

She had my eyes.

“Who is this?” I asked, my voice trembling.

“Her name is Lily,” Sophie whispered. “She’s in London. With my sister.”

“Lily?”

“Before the chemo…” Sophie said, tears running into her ears. “Before the first round… I was already pregnant, Gabe. I didn’t know until I left. I refused the radiation until she was born. That’s why… that’s why the cancer came back so hard. I chose her.”

I looked at the photo. My daughter. A daughter I didn’t know existed.

“She’s yours,” Sophie said. “She knows about you. She calls you the ‘Architect’. She builds towers with her blocks.”

I fell to my knees beside the bed. The grief and the joy were a physical blow, tearing me apart.

“You have a daughter, Gabriel,” Sophie said, her voice fading. “You aren’t alone. I’m not leaving you alone.”

The monitor began to beep faster.

“Sophie?” I panicked.

“Go find her,” she whispered. “Build her a castle.”

Her eyes drifted shut. Her hand went limp in mine.

“Sophie!” I screamed.

Doctors rushed in. They pulled me away.

But I knew. I knew the moment her soul left the room.

The red stain on the bed wasn’t just a symptom. It was a message. It was the red string of fate, pulling me back to her, just in time to give me the only thing that could save me from the darkness.

A future.