Lina had always started her mornings with the sound of her mother humming in the kitchen. The smell of tea leaves and freshly baked bread would drift into her room, wrapping her in warmth before the day began. But now, the kitchen was silent. The air was heavy. And the chair her mother always sat in remained empty — untouched.
The day her mother passed away, Lina’s world cracked open. At first, she told herself it was just a bad dream, that her mother would return with her gentle laugh and soft hands. But each sunrise only reminded her of the truth.
She began talking to the empty chair, whispering secrets, asking questions, waiting for answers that never came. Friends visited, trying to pull her back into the world, but she could not leave the house. She feared if she stepped outside, she might return to find the memory of her mother gone too.
At night, she wandered through the house, tracing her fingers along her mother’s scarves, smelling her clothes, hearing her voice in the wind. But the voice wasn’t real. Slowly, Lina’s mind blurred the line between memory and reality.
One morning, she swore she saw her mother sitting in the chair again, smiling, calling her name. Lina smiled back, tears streaming down her face, certain that she was home again — not in this cold, motherless world, but in the warm embrace she had been chasing all along.
And from then on, Lina stayed there, in the small kitchen, talking, laughing, and crying to the mother who lived only in her mind.
