In the quiet hum of an unassuming town, there was a woman who collected stories, not just any stories, but those tales left unfinished, the ones longing to be penned down. Her name was Isabelle. She believed each unwritten chapter held potential, a ghost waiting to be exorcised through the act of writing.
A boy named Liam used to sit by her side, listening to the whirl of her imagination as she recounts tales of worlds that could almost be. He found comfort in their unfinished nature; they never seemed to demand more than he could give.
"What happens next?" he once asked. Isabelle smiled, infusing the air with unformed possibilities. "Perhaps it is not what happens next but what was meant to happen," she replied.
Now, years later, Liam walks the same path, a path overgrown with retrospective underbrush. He carries crumpled notes, half-formed ideas he scribbled down, searching for the remains of those lost chapters.
Alongside the well-trodden ground, stray phrases begin to surface: "the rustle of forgotten dreams," or "an echo of silent wishes." He collects these remnants, piecing together a tapestry of what might have been or what still could be.