Entry 3 — The Box

Journal of Isla Loren — March 19

 

Location: the craft room (formerly the back sitting room) at the white house above the Aiglin Sea

Weather: sunlight soft and pale, like gauze against the windows

Notes: fragments of memory, unknown belongings, and echoes from the past

Time: 8:27 a.m.

 

 

~

 

 

I woke early this morning, the quiet punctuated by the slow drip of rain from the eaves. 

 

By dawn, the storm passed. 
 

I had hardly slept, haunted by dreams of a room I once called safe—a cramped bedroom in the house I grew up in. 

 

Back then, that room was my only refuge from the endless battles: the hushed arguments that morphed into shouts, the crashing of doors, the steady hum of my father’s radio, and my mother’s measured, sometimes sharp, praise.

 

I remember her saying, “I like the pink ones,” when I’d fashioned paper roses for a collage. 

 

I’d nod, careful not to spark something else—because every word back then counted. 

 

I never had the luxury of opinion, so I learned to save my breath, my essence, for crafting. That small act—shaping driftwood, fusing scraps of sea glass into art—was how I held onto a piece of myself.

 

 

~

 

 

Now, as I write this, surrounded by my tools in this sunlit room, I feel again that same urge to create. 

 

To fix what time and memory have unspooled. 

 

The table is cluttered with glue guns, fabric scraps, paintbrushes, and fragments of driftwood. Every object here is a lifeline—stitched together from broken parts, like me. 

 

I laid it all out weeks ago, let each piece breathe before I attempted a scrap-collage of my own making: a whale in storm colors, with sharp lines that battle soft, tender eyes.

 

 

~

 

 

But several days ago, as I sorted through my supplies, I found something that shouldn’t be there. 

 

Tucked behind a spool of tangled silk ribbon. 

 

A small wooden box. 

 

I picked it up gingerly, its surface warm beneath my palms, almost pulsing, worn smooth around the edges, as if it had passed through many lives before reaching mine. 

 

There was no inscription, no sticker or tag, just the worn grain… and an odd familiarity that sent a chill down my spine.

 

I don’t remember packing it. Don’t remember owning it. 

 

Had my mother slipped it in? My father?

 

Some quiet part of me wanted to believe that. 

 

 

~

 

 

I brought the box to my worktable and, using a small tool I kept for delicate things, eased open the lid.
 

Inside lay a miniature sketchbook. The pages were yellowed and brittle, filled with hurried sketches, notes, and—strangely—a recurring symbol: a simple heart crossed by a single star. 

 

I couldn’t read the faded script fully, but a fragment caught my eye:

 

“Safe in art; safe in nothing else.”

 

The words struck me like a memory. I thought of my younger self, crafting in that tiny bedroom, desperate to create my own space amid chaos. I recognized the line’s pain, and I felt a quiet kinship with whoever had written it. 
 

Perhaps it was a remnant of my own past. A part of me I’d buried long ago.

 

At the time, I set it aside like any other half-familiar thing. Thought nothing of it.

 

But even closed, it didn’t stay quiet.

 

It’s hard to explain. Like the room changed around it. Like something old had been unsettled.

 

I kept hearing small sounds—rustles, creaks. Once, I was sure I heard the soft tick of a clock, though I don’t own one.

 

More than once, I returned to the room and found the light on when I’d left it off. Or the curtains drawn when I’d opened them.

 

I told myself it was forgetfulness. I told myself I was tired.

 

 

~

 

 

I couldn’t stop thinking about that line in the sketchbook: Safe in art; safe in nothing else.

 

It wasn’t just familiar. It felt aimed. Like someone meant for me to read it.

 

And that symbol—the star-crossed heart—

 

I swear I’ve seen it before. Somewhere. 

 

But when I try to remember, the thought pulls away like a tide.

 

I keep expecting the box to shift. To open on its own.

To whisper something I wouldn’t know how to understand.

 

I closed the sketchbook. Slipped it back inside the box.

 

Then I rose, and crossed to where jars lined the wall like old glass organs. I reached for the ribbon jar, my fingers brushing the curve of the wishbone.

 

I’d planned to use it in something abstract. But I haven’t touched it since I brought it in. It felt too raw now. Too wrong.

 

I pulled the fabric swatch, too. The one with the stitched initials.

 

The box took all three. I shut the lid, nested it up high—on the top shelf, behind the lesser-used thread cases. I didn’t need any of that.
 

I needed tea.

 

While the kettle boiled, I checked my reflection in the kitchen cabinet door. It looked normal.

 

As it should. 

 

The kettle cried. I poured, steeped, waited.

 

Then, I carried my mug back to the craft room, both hands warm around it.

 

And there—like a presentation… the box was back out on my work table.

 

Open.

 

The sketchbook. The fabric. The wishbone.

 

Laid out in a careful fan. As if someone had arranged them. 

 

I didn’t go any closer.

 

I didn’t touch a thing.

 

Not until this morning. I meant to start the whale again. Rearrange the shoreline, maybe. 

 

But then I found the sketchbook. Open to a different page—one I never turned to. 

 

And the faint crackle of old paper flinching. From somewhere else. In here. 

 

Don’t spiral.

 

—Isla

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AI-generated image created with OpenAI’s DALL·E. Prompt by me (Jessica) via ChatGPT.​
Entry 4 — The Things We Cover