In the hush of a seaside town where fog rolled in like a held breath, sixteen-year-old Mira kept a secret beneath her floorboards. Not a dead thing—worse. A stack of letters tied with a red ribbon. Each one began Dear little innocent , a name her late grandmother had called her, now repurposed by Leo, the fisherman’s son.
The word innocent floated back, a ghost of a whisper. She let it go. little innocent taboo
She stopped writing letters. Started noticing how he never held her hand in daylight, how his friends smirked when she passed. The fog lifted the morning she found an old photo of her grandmother—same red ribbon, same words scrawled on the back. To my little innocent. Keep our secret. In the hush of a seaside town where
Mira believed him. Until one night, his thumb traced her collarbone, and his voice dropped lower: You’re my little innocent taboo. No one else’s. And for the first time, the words felt less like a lullaby and more like a lock clicking shut. Each one began Dear little innocent , a