Fear changes shape when it comes close. On the street, fear is noise. Shouts. Gunshots. Screams. You can run from it. But when it slides into your room, your shop, the place where your scissors cut and your needles pierce — then fear becomes silence. Tight. Suffocating. Invisible.
That morning, the silence came folded on paper.
I unlocked the glass doors early, as I always did. The streets had not yet swollen with hawkers and horns; the air still carried the wetness of dawn. I loved those openings, the brief hour before apprentices arrived, when the shop was mine alone. A kingdom of fabric and polished counters, still and waiting.
But that morning, something was waiting with it.
On one of the cutting tables, between stacked damask and rolls of satin, a sheet of paper lay flat. Ordinary white. Too ordinary.
I stopped short.
The night before, I had been the last to leave. I remembered locking the doors, sliding the glass until it sealed, pressing the bolts into place with the same hands that now trembled. The table had been clean. Empty. No paper.
The note had not been there.
My palms dampened before I touched it. I expected heat, ash — some residue of the fire that had already devoured my life once. Instead, the paper was cool, smooth.
Four words. Written in block letters, neat and sharp as knife slashes:
"Every fabric burns twice."
No signature. No date. No stain of ink beyond the message.
I read it again, my throat locking. Twice.
The image came instantly — flames clawing through my old shop, thick black smoke strangling the curtains I had stitched with my own sweat, bolts of fabric curling into ash, the hiss of burning foam from pillows, the crackle of cotton surrendering. My chest squeezed tight, lungs filling with memory.
Twice meant what? That this shop would burn? That I would burn?
My hand gripped the table until the edge cut into my palm. My eyes swept the shop, hunting for more signs — an open drawer, a shifted chair, anything to suggest intrusion. But everything was neat. Perfect. Except for the words that didn't belong.
I folded the paper sharply, slipped it into my apron pocket. My heart thudded loud, each beat hammering against my ribs.
Faces flickered through my mind. Benjamin, quick with jokes but always watching. Adesewa, quiet, diligent, her eyes sometimes too sharp. Chioma, clumsy but loyal. Which of them had lingered? Which had slipped back after I locked up?
The idea that it could be one of them curled cold in my stomach.
When they arrived, laughter tumbling ahead of them, I watched with new eyes. Every giggle too loud, every glance too quick. They greeted me with smiles, unaware, and I nodded back, stiff. My ears tuned to every word, searching for a slip, a clue. But no one mentioned paper. No one looked guilty.
Still, suspicion clung.
I cut fabric harder that day, scissors snapping like teeth. Measured with a precision that bordered on violence. When customers arrived, I smiled too wide, arranged duvets too neatly, pressing corners until my knuckles whitened. Anything to keep my hands from trembling.
And all the while, the paper sat in my pocket, warm against my thigh, burning hotter than the Lagos sun.
Gregory came to see me, sleeves rolled, voice calm. He leaned on the counter, easy, steady, as though his presence alone could anchor the day. My chest ached with the urge to tell him. To unfold the paper, press it into his hands, and whisper, look — it's starting again.
But I didn't.
Because, Officer, I had seen how his jaw ticked whenever Raymond's name surfaced. How his hand curled into a fist at the faintest mention of the fire. I knew the promise he had given me — not to touch him — dangled by a single, fragile thread. And this note, this threat, would cut it loose.
So I swallowed the words. Smiled instead. Leaned into his presence. Pretended I was whole.
That night, the storm followed me home.
Gregory saw it in me, though I denied it. He closed the curtains, dimmed the lights, drew me into his arms without asking. His lips found mine, slow at first, tasting, coaxing. I clung to him as if my skin could hide the paper still tucked in my bag, as if desire could smother dread.
The intimacy was fierce, Officer. Not gentle, not tentative — it was fire layered on fear. His hands mapped me with heat, grounding me in a body I feared would soon be ash. He kissed me until breath was pain, until the room spun, until the only sound was the tangled symphony of our need.
I gave myself harder than I ever had. Because in my mind, shadows whispered of burning twice, and I needed to be sure that if fire came again, I would not go untouched.
Later, when I lay against his chest, my skin still humming, his heartbeat steady under my ear, I thought of the note again. The words pulsed behind my eyelids. Every fabric burns twice.
I reached for his hand, squeezed it. He murmured something soft, half-asleep. I didn't answer.
I couldn't.
Because even in that sanctuary, the silence pressed close, heavier than any flame.
Fear is loud when it is far. But when it is close, Officer, fear is quiet. And I was learning to live inside its silence.