The Third Year

The villa was silent, except for the murmuring of waves below, the steady clinking of glass and the soulful sound of Cinnamon Girl by Lana Del Rey playing in the background while Winter Park arranged the dinner table for two. The sun had just begun to drip into the ocean, bleeding orange and gold across the balcony tiles. Alex would be showing up soon, and she wanted everything to be a masterpiece, just like their love and marriage.

Winter lit the last candle on the table and stood back, admiring the scene. The room was dimly lit to set the right mood. Every detail was perfect — the exact wine from their honeymoon, the same blue napkins from their wedding reception, and the playlist of soft, old songs they both loved.

It was her third wedding anniversary with Alex Whitemore, and this particular anniversary was special. It was a celebration of survival, sacrifice, and secrets.

The first year had nearly killed them both.

Winter could still remember the sterile white room, her husband Alex pale as salt, his liver failing fast, and the whimper of the heart monitor keeping time with her ragged breaths. The decision wasn’t hard. Of course, she’d donate her liver. He was her whole life. Marriage wasn’t just in vows, it was in flesh and sacrifice. Two years. Two chaotic, healing, and beautiful years. And now the third was around the corner.

She adjusted the napkins and position of the candles once again, her hands too calm for the storm behind her ribs.

The wind from the waves dancing outside the villa sent a cold chill down her spine as she sat on the balcony, facing the now raging ocean.

“For someone named Winter, your cold tolerance is poor, Winnie.” Summer’s voice echoed in the back of her mind.

She missed her other half. Her twin. Her only family until Alex came in.

Looking back, she wasn’t prepared for the stillness that welcomed her on that very day. A gurney stood in the center, draped in a sheet that did nothing to hide the outline of a body too familiar to mistake. Her legs moved of their own accord, slow and trembling, each step like walking through thick water. Then the sheet was pulled back.

And there Summer was. Her face, once radiant with laughter, was pale — the color of wax and silence. Purple bruises bloomed across her jaw and cheekbone, angry and swollen. Dried blood had crusted at the corner of her mouth. There was a gash above her eyebrow, jagged and unfinished, as if someone had carved pain into her and walked away. Her lips were parted, just slightly, as if caught mid-breath — but there was no air left in her. What broke her more was the autopsy report that she had been raped even after death. What a monster!

The police had called it a robbery gone wrong. But there were bruises on her wrists. Her inner thighs. Defensive wounds. Signs they didn’t talk about in the news reports. Alex was there that day and held her while she stared into oblivion, unable to convert her pain into tears. A month later, and she still hasn’t mourned her.

Winter pulls out her phone from the pocket of her hoodie and opens the email she had starred as important. It had arrived on a quiet Tuesday morning, while she was sipping coffee and browsing anniversary cake designs.

The subject read “If I’m gone, it’s because I couldn’t stay silent.”

She didn’t open it at first. Seeing her sister’s name, even in pixels, still punched holes through her chest. Then she opened it.

Winter,

Alex raped me. If I’m dead, he did it. He was everything to you, and I couldn’t bring myself to break the love and trust you had for him outside of me. I felt ashamed, disgusted and broken, but most importantly, he knew I wouldn’t be able to bring myself to let you know. After a month of therapy, I decided it was time to let you know he was a monster. That’s when he started following me. Waiting outside my workplace. He said if I ever said a word, he’d end me. I knew someday he might try. So I scheduled this message — just in case. He destroyed me, but you deserve better. I’m sorry, Winnie.

The air left Winter’s lungs. Her heartbeat stumbled and twisted, a jagged rhythm she couldn’t control. It couldn’t be.

But the words were there. And then, the pieces began to shift. Summer had grown distant in the past months and stopped calling or coming over. She would suddenly become awkward whenever Alex spoke over the phone, but Winter never paid much attention to it.

She thought of the night Summer died.

How Alex had held her in her sickening silence, whispering comfort, making tea, saying all the right things. How he had gone to identify the body with her, standing quietly, just behind her, like a husband should.

But there had been that odd bruise on Summer’s wrist. And Winter had noticed how fast Alex insisted they move on when the police called it a dead end.

That night, Winter couldn’t sleep. She searched through Summer’s things. Found a notebook. Found old messages. Found bruises in words. She pulled every thread, and the story unravelled until only one truth remained.

Alex had raped and killed her sister and then kissed her forehead afterward. She was completely disgusted and filled with rage.

Another wave of wind blows, drawing her attention back to the peeping moon and now calm waves. Still seated, she pressed her left hand to the scar on her belly. The one from the surgery. The one that saved him.

Familiar footsteps approached from the path beyond the garden. She turned, composed and smiling.

Alex stepped into view, arms wide with a boyish grin. “God, this place is beautiful. You outdid yourself, babe.”

“I wanted it to be special,” she said, entering the embrace of what used to feel like home.

He pulls her in for a kiss, and she kisses him back.

He didn’t suspect a thing.

“Three years,” he whispered into her neck, hands around her waist as they danced under the open sky. “We made it.”

“Yes,” she smiled, her eyes glassy. “We made it.”

She poured him a drink — Vintage Chianti, his favourite. She had laced it with nothing dramatic — just enough to slow him down silently.

“I’ve been thinking,” Winter said softly as they sat down, “about how far we’ve come. That first year nearly broke us. Your illness, the surgery, losing Summer…”

He winced slightly at her name, but smiled. “I couldn’t have made it without you.”

“No,” she murmured, “you couldn’t have.”

When he staggered toward the bed, Winter followed. She undressed him slowly, like a lover, kissed his chest and touched his scar—the mirror of hers.

And then, she pressed the cold knife into it.

Deep.

Slow.

His eyes flew open, blood staining his lips.

“Winnie—why?” he rasped in disbelief.

“You raped her.” She pulls out the knife, but not completely, leaving a few inches in.

“What—no—”

“Then you killed her.” She drives the knife inside him for the second time, each stab leaving her more broken. This was the man she loved, yet he showed no mercy when he made Summer breathe her last breath.

He wasn’t going to get mercy from her either.

Alex’s face contorted with something between pain and horror. But he didn’t fight back because he knew there was no escaping.

“I gave you a part of me to keep you alive,” she whispered. “And you used it to destroy the one person I had left.” The blade sank in deep for the last time.

His breathing slowed down, his eyes unfocused.

As the life drained from him, Winter kissed his forehead.

“Happy anniversary,” she whispered.

The next morning, she took a hot shower and got settled at her favourite spot in the villa— the balcony. While drinking a hot coffee, she sent a reply to Summer’s email.

Dear Summer,

The first year, I gave him life.

The second year, I gave him love.

The third year, I gave him justice.

But I regret saying I do, and I’ll be repenting for the rest of my life.