The smell of fresh bread lingered in the little bakery, a mix of flour, butter, and warmth that seemed to embrace every soul that walked in. Morning sunlight fell across the counter, dust motes dancing in the air. Behind the counter stood a young man in his twenties, his apron dusted with flour, his hands working automatically, kneading, shaping, arranging, selling.
Life was plain, almost colorless—days folding into nights with the rhythm of dough rising and ovens cooling. Customers came and went. Faces blurred. Orders repeated. It was a modest life, but not an unhappy one. The bakery owner, a kind man with grey streaks in his hair, often reminded him, "Work is dignity. Bread feeds not only the stomach, but also the soul."
Then, one afternoon, everything changed.
She walked in.
Not in a dramatic gust of wind, not with a crowd turning heads—but quietly, gracefully, as if she had always belonged there. A young woman, her hair falling over her shoulders, her eyes carrying something soft yet unspoken. She asked for bread—simple, ordinary bread. And yet, when he handed it to her, their eyes met for a fleeting second. That second lodged itself in him like a seed planted in the hollow of his heart.
The next day, she returned. Then the day after that. Her smile grew warmer, her words a little longer. She asked about the bread, about the work, even about the weather. He answered shyly, fumbling sometimes, but she never seemed to mind.
It was absurd, he thought. To feel so much from something so little. And yet, each time she came, the dull colors of his days brightened. Each evening, when he cleaned the counters, he found himself replaying her voice, the curve of her smile, the faint fragrance she left behind.
Weeks passed. The bakery owner noticed. One evening, after closing, the old man patted his shoulder.
"Young man," he said kindly, "you work hard, but life is more than bread. A man needs family. A wife, children. Someone to sit with him when he's old and grey. You understand?"
He lowered his gaze, embarrassed. The words sank into him, and at last, he whispered about the girl. The owner listened carefully, then smiled.
"She is my niece," the man said. "If your heart is true, then I see no reason to oppose."
The world shifted again. A weight lifted. For once, hope didn't feel like a dangerous dream.
The days that followed were filled with a quiet, secret happiness. Their talks grew longer. She laughed more freely. And one night, under the bakery's lantern glow, when he shyly spoke of marriage, she didn't say no. Instead, her eyes lowered, cheeks tinged with red, and she softly agreed: next year. Time to know each other more, to build slowly, not rush.
It was enough.
For the first time in his life, he believed in a future—one where warmth filled his home, where laughter replaced silence, where love stood beside him. He even wrote her letters when words spilled too heavily from his heart. Letters about his dreams, about the little ring he had chosen, about how every loaf he baked now carried her in its scent.
And then… the silence began.
No reply. Not one word. A week passed. His chest grew restless. Doubts swarmed him like crows. But he still believed—perhaps she was busy, perhaps the letters had been misplaced.
Two days later, the newspaper hit the bakery doorstep.
The words cut deeper than any knife: A young woman's body found under the City River Bridge.
His hands trembled as the paper slid from his fingers. His ears roared with the sound of blood rushing. The world, once golden, turned cruel and grey again. He refused to believe it. Refused. He ran, asked, pleaded. But the truth was merciless.
She was gone.
The bakery's ovens still burned, but to him the warmth was cold. His letters lay unopened in a drawer, mocking him. His mind frayed, cracked, splintered. He began seeing her in the corners of his vision—at the doorway, beside the bread shelf, across the street. Sometimes she even smiled, sometimes she whispered. At first he was terrified. Then he welcomed it.
Because to him, she wasn't gone. She couldn't be.
And then, the second blow came. The owner, his only anchor, collapsed with a heart attack after hearing his niece had been murdered. The old man didn't live long enough to recover from the grief.
Now, the young man was alone. Alone with his broken heart. Alone with the ghost he loved.
The years passed, but not for him. Time may have changed the city, the bakery, the people around him—but inside, he was frozen in that single winter morning when her body was found.
The bakery owner had been his last anchor. The man's sudden death—struck down by a heart that couldn't bear the news of his niece's murder—severed the final thread that tied him to ordinary life.
After that, the young man simply became… invisible.
He worked at the bakery a while longer, but the bread lost its warmth in his hands. The laughter of customers sounded like mockery. He left without a word, drifting through small jobs, living in rented rooms, never belonging anywhere.
Every night, she came back to him. Sometimes in dreams, sometimes in the dim corner of his rented room. Her ghost would sit quietly by the window, hair falling over her face, and when she looked up… it was always with the same smile she had given him on the day she bought her first loaf of bread.
"You promised me forever," he whispered to the empty air.
And in his mind, she always answered: Then keep your promise.
---
Two decades passed. His hair thinned, his shoulders hunched, but his eyes burned brighter than ever. They weren't the eyes of a man who had aged—they were the eyes of someone who had refused to let go.
One cold dawn, he lit a candle and placed it beside a crumbling photograph of her—the only one he had ever stolen from the owner's house before it was sold.
He knelt, clutching the candlelight, and whispered:
"Don't worry, dear. I will take revenge."
His hands moved with the precision of someone who had rehearsed for years. From under his bed, he pulled a wooden box. Inside it lay a mask—white, with the painted grin of a joker stretched too wide across its face.
When he placed the mask against his skin, it was as if the world tilted. He was no longer the quiet worker, the silent mourner, the nameless man. He was the echo of her pain, the embodiment of promises unkept, the laughter of madness that no one else could hear.
To the world, he had always been faceless. But to himself, he finally spoke the truth:
"My name is Harold James.
I am the fool who loved a ghost."
And with that, the story of love ended, and the story of vengeance began.