Chapter 6: The Name He Never Spoke

It had been four days since David found the letter addressed to Zayan.

Four days of rereading every word Mavia had ever written.

Four days of trying to understand how a single name could carry so much weight—so much silence.

Four days of wondering who Zayan was, and why everything that shattered Mavia seemed to start with him.

David barely spoke during that time. He drifted through the house like a ghost chasing the memory of another. The shoebox of letters stayed sealed on the desk, tied gently with a black ribbon Meher had placed there—as if even grief needed to be held together by something.

But Zayan's name lingered like a whisper caught behind locked doors.

Who was he?

Why had Mavia never mentioned him?

And why did David feel, in the pit of his stomach, that this was the piece that explained everything Mavia couldn't say?

---

Meher noticed.

She always did.

"You're not eating," she said one afternoon, placing a plate of toast beside him.

"I'm not hungry," David murmured, eyes unfocused.

"That's what Mavia used to say."

David looked up. Meher wasn't teasing. She wasn't even sad. Just honest.

"He wrote to Zayan like someone writes to a ghost," David whispered. "Like someone who was already gone."

Meher sat across from him. "Then find out who he was."

David hesitated. "I don't even know if Zayan is a first name or a last name."

"Then start somewhere," she said gently. "Start anywhere."

---

That night, David went back to the place where everything began—Mavia's school.

The literature class list was still pinned to the noticeboard just outside the library. Names faded by time and sunlight. Karim. Areeba. His own, almost illegible now.

And at the very bottom: Zayan Khalid.

David snapped a photo.

He didn't wait. He went straight to the admin office, where the receptionist glanced up with practiced disinterest.

"I'm trying to find a former student," David said. "Zayan Khalid."

She frowned. "He transferred last year."

"Is he still in town?"

A pause.

"I believe so."

David didn't ask for more. That was enough.

---

Back home, he dove into a quiet hunt—scrolling through alumni groups, tagged photos, posts by classmates he barely remembered.

And then he found him.

A grainy group photo from a school event. The overhead lighting cast shadows across tired faces.

Mavia stood slightly apart, arms crossed, smiling faintly.

And beside him, a boy with unruly dark hair and eyes that looked like they were always somewhere else.

Zayan.

There was something hollow in his gaze. Not sadness. Not anger. Just… distance.

The kind of distance Mavia used to wear when he thought no one was watching.

---

It took David two more days to track down a contact—through an alumni thread, a shared comment, a mutual connection. Finally, he sent a message.

> I'm David. Mavia's friend. I need to talk.

No response.

Then, at 3:41 p.m. the next day, one line came through:

> Meet me tomorrow. Same place he always went to be alone.

David didn't need clarification.

He already knew where to go.

---

The overlook.

The "quiet world," they had called it.

Where the hills rolled into nothing, and the silence didn't feel like emptiness—it felt like shelter.

David arrived early.

He sat on the weather-worn bench, Mavia's notebook cradled in his lap. The wind moved through the trees like breath.

Then footsteps.

Zayan appeared, taller than David remembered, shoulders hunched slightly as if still carrying a weight no one could see.

They stood in silence.

"I thought you'd hate me," Zayan said.

David's fingers tightened around the notebook. "I don't know you."

Zayan nodded. "Fair."

"But Mavia did," David said. "And he never told me about you."

Zayan exhaled and sat. "He wasn't supposed to."

"Why?"

"Because I hurt him."

The words were plain. Practiced. Like he'd said them in his mind a hundred times.

---

"I met him when I was at my lowest," Zayan continued. "He saw through people. Not just who they were—who they were afraid to be."

David said nothing.

"He didn't try to fix me," Zayan added. "He just… stayed."

"Until you left."

Zayan nodded slowly. "I got scared. Of how much I needed him. Of what he might see in me if I stayed. I thought if I left before I broke him, I was doing him a favor."

David's voice cracked. "You didn't save him. You left him hollow."

"I know." Zayan looked down. "I tried reaching out once. He never replied."

David pulled the folded letter from his jacket pocket and handed it over.

Zayan took it with shaking hands, staring at the familiar handwriting.

"I don't know if I deserve to read this."

"Read it anyway," David said softly.

Zayan did.

And though he didn't cry, something in him shifted.

The way his shoulders dropped. The way his eyes stopped blinking.

The way he looked like someone who had finally been told the truth.

"I didn't know he still felt this way," he murmured.

"He never stopped," David said.

---

They sat there, the letter between them. Wind brushing past like a boy with quiet footsteps had just walked by.

"I'm sorry," Zayan said. "For whatever it's worth."

David nodded. He didn't forgive him for Mavia's sake.

He forgave him for his own.

---

That evening, Meher sat on the porch as David approached.

"Did you find him?"

David nodded.

"And?"

"He wasn't the villain I imagined," David said. "Just another boy who didn't know how to stay."

Meher touched his arm. "But you did."

David looked up. The sky had turned lavender with the coming night.

"Yes," he said. "And I still am."

---

Later, in Mavia's room, David opened the notebook.

He turned to a blank page.

And he wrote:

> To the ones who stayed too late.

To the ones who left too soon.

To the ones who wrote in silence because they were too afraid to speak —

I hear you.

And I won't let the quiet win.

He signed it, not with his own name.

But with Mavia's.

Because the story wasn't over.

And maybe it never would be.

---

End of Chapter