The Secret Behind The Silence

The rain had been falling since sunset, turning the narrow village roads into rivers of mud. Amina pulled her shawl tightly around her shoulders as she hurried home, clutching a small brown envelope.She had no idea that the envelope would change her life.

“Amina! Wait!”She stopped and turned.It was Brian, her childhood friend, running toward her, completely soaked.“Why are you following me?” she asked, breathing heavily.

“I need to talk to you.”

“Tomorrow, Brian. I’m tired.”

“No. It has to be tonight.”

Something in his voice made her pause.

Brian reached into his pocket and pulled out an old photograph. Amina stared at it.Her heart stopped.

The photograph showed her mother standing beside a young man Amina had never seen before.

“Who is that?” she whispered.

“Your father.”

Amina almost laughed. “My father died before I was born.”

“That’s what your mother told you.”

The thunder cracked loudly above them.

Brian looked around before lowering his voice. “He didn’t die, Amina. He disappeared.”

Amina’s hands began trembling.

“Where is he?”

“I don’t know. But I found this in my grandmother’s house.”

He handed her another piece of paper. It contained an address in the city.

Amina stared at it for several seconds.

Then her phone rang.

It was her mother.

She answered immediately.

“Hello, Mum?”

There was silence on the other end.

Then her mother whispered, “Amina… where did you get that address?”

Amina looked at Brian.

“How do you know about it?”

Her mother began crying.

“Because,” she said, “that is where your father has been living for the last twenty years.”

Amina felt the world spinning around her.

“Why did you never tell me?”

Before her mother could answer, the call ended.

Amina looked at the envelope in her hand.

For twenty years, she had believed she knew her story.

Tonight, she discovered she had only known the first chapter.