The Family Journal

Lena stood at the cemetery's edge, watching the thin line of mourners scatter, their hushed condolences drifting away on the cold breeze. The ceremony had been short, almost perfunctory, but her father wasn’t the kind of man who drew crowds in life, and his death wasn’t going to change that. Lena barely listened to the murmurs of distant relatives and former colleagues; her mind was elsewhere—on her last conversation with him.

It had been six months ago. An argument that had escalated too quickly. Her father, with his stubborn, domineering voice, and Lena, trying to reason and connect. It had ended with both of them shouting, accusations flying that could never be taken back. And then, silence. Six months of it.

After the burial, a man approached her. “Lena Moore?” he asked, pulling a worn leather envelope from his briefcase. “I’m your father’s lawyer. He asked me to give this to you.”

Lena took the envelope, her fingers brushing against the handwritten words on the front:

“Read it all, Lena. The answers are in here.”

Inside was a single key.

Later that evening, Lena returned to her father’s house, the old two-story colonial looming over her like a stern reminder of her childhood. She wandered through the study, her fingers trailing over his meticulously organised bookshelves and perfectly aligned papers. He had always been precise, everything in its place—a trait that had been both his strength and flaw.

The key unlocked the bottom drawer of his mahogany desk. Inside was an old, leather-bound journal, its corners worn and edges frayed. His initials, R.M., were engraved in faded gold letters. Lena took a deep breath and opened it.

The first few entries were mundane—notes about his work, brief reflections on the news, scattered comments about the weather. But then the entries began to take a darker turn. Her father was writing about someone in the house—a person he referred to only as “the betrayer.”

October 3rd

I think she knows now. She watches me with those calculating eyes, always pretending to be innocent. But I know the truth. She’s planning something. She wants to hurt me. I have to be careful.

October 7th

She’s been rummaging through my things when I’m not home. I can feel her presence even when she’s not here. I’ve tried to confront her, but she denies it. She’s gotten too good at lying. Maybe I’m imagining it, but…no. I’m not. I can’t be.

Lena felt a growing sense of unease. He never mentioned who “she” was, and his writing became more erratic with each page, the paranoia bleeding through every word.

She read on.

October 15th

I have to protect myself. I have to find proof. She’s getting bolder, and I’m running out of time. What happened to my things? I can’t trust anyone. I thought I could, but I was wrong.

October 21st

I’m not crazy. She wants me to think I am. She’s turning people against me, making them believe I’m losing my mind. But I know the truth, and I won’t let her win.

By now, Lena was shaking. His handwriting in the last entry was almost illegible, a frantic scrawl across the page. She slammed the journal shut, trying to understand what she had just read. Her father had been paranoid, convinced that someone in his life was plotting against him. He’d felt threatened, watched, and manipulated. But he never named the person he was so afraid of.

That night, Lena couldn’t sleep. The words from the journal haunted her. The betrayer. Who had he been talking about? Was it a neighbour? A former friend? Someone in the family? Or had her father lost his grip on reality in his final months?

The more she thought about it, the more she felt guilt—had she missed the signs? Had their last fight been the catalyst for his breakdown?

She decided she needed answers.

The next day, Lena began calling people who had known her father—distant family members, old friends, and his colleagues from the company he had co-founded. Each conversation was another piece of a puzzle she didn’t want to assemble. Some of them seemed genuinely surprised by her questions about his mental state, while others hesitated, hinting that he had become more reclusive in recent years.

No one mentioned the existence of a betrayer.

Lena returned to the journal, diving deeper into the entries. Her father had clearly been obsessed with the idea of betrayal. She read how he had started setting traps around the house—intentionally misplacing objects to see if they were moved, writing secret notes to catch the person in a lie.

October 30th

She’s been in my study. I know it. The journal was moved. I checked the drawer three times, and each time, it was different. I’m going to confront her. I need to get it out of her and make her admit what she’s done. I won’t let her ruin me.

November 1st

She denied everything, of course. I played innocent like she always does. I should have seen this coming. I should have known she’d twist everything to make me look like the villain. I have to be careful now. She’ll strike soon. I know she will.

Lena felt a sinking feeling in her chest. Her father had allowed very few people into his study, and Lena was among them. She couldn't shake off the disturbing thought: What if his writing was about me?

But that didn’t make sense. She hadn’t been to his house for months before he died. They hadn’t spoken since the argument. The last thing she remembered was leaving in tears, slamming the door behind her, his voice calling her name but not following her.

She forced herself to keep reading.

November 6th

The betrayer came into the house today. She didn’t know I was watching. I saw her rifling through my things, looking for the journal. She’s trying to destroy the evidence before I can expose her. I’m going to keep the journal with me from now on. I won’t let her win.

November 8th

I confronted her again. She tried to play innocent, as always. They wanted to turn it back on me, making me seem like the one losing control. She’s good at that—always has been. But I know the truth now. It’s her or me.

There were no more entries after that.

Lena closed the journal and sat in silence, her heart pounding. Her father had believed that someone close to him was out to destroy him, but he had never named her. And yet, as she read the entries, she couldn’t shake the feeling that he had been talking about her all along. Their argument had been about trust, his overbearing nature and his refusal to let her live her own life. He had accused her of abandoning him, of plotting against him in some way she couldn’t understand. She had shouted back, words she now regretted, things that couldn’t be unsaid.

Her head swam with questions and guilt. Had he been trying to warn her? Or had he lost his mind in the end, driven mad by his paranoia?

The journal was her only clue, yet it seemed to condemn her without mentioning her name.

Lena felt a surge of anger. She had done nothing wrong. He had pushed her away with his suspicions, his control, and his relentless need to have power over her, even as an adult. Why was she feeling guilty for his delusions?

But then, a terrible thought took root. What if it wasn’t a delusion? What if she had done something, unknowingly, that had pushed him to this point? Her memories of their last argument were hazy—emotions running high, words said in anger. What if she had betrayed him in some way she couldn’t remember?

Lena flipped back through the pages, looking for a clue, a name, anything to explain what had happened. And then she saw it.

October 18th

I don’t know if she remembers what she did, but I do. It’s too late to change what happened, but I must ensure she understands the consequences. I need her to know what she did to me—what she’s always done to me. The evidence is in the journal. One day, she’ll read this, and maybe she’ll understand.

Lena’s blood ran cold. I don’t know if she remembers what she did. Her father had been convinced she had done something terrible, but the journal never revealed it. His words became like a dark fog, obscuring her thoughts.

Suddenly, she remembered the envelope the lawyer had given her. She pulled it from her bag and inspected it more closely. Tucked inside was a slip of paper she hadn’t noticed before—a photocopy of a note in her father’s handwriting. It was dated the day before he died.

“Lena, if you’re reading this, you finally found the journal. You might be angry, confused, or even betrayed, but I need you to understand why I did what I did. I couldn’t tell you face-to-face because I knew you’d never forgive me. The truth is, you hurt me in ways you never knew, and I couldn’t let it go. I didn’t want to die without leaving you a way to see what happened.”

Lena felt dizzy. What was he talking about? What had she done?

And then it hit her. Their final argument. The last words he had said to her, words she had tried to forget.

“You’re just like your mother,” he had shouted. “Manipulative, deceitful, always trying to make me the bad guy!”

But Lena’s mother had died when she was six. She had always assumed their father had idolised her memory, never speaking ill of her. But now Lena remembered something else—a long-buried memory of her father storming out of the house after a similar argument with her mother, slamming doors, shouting accusations—a pattern repeating itself over decades.

Lena realised that her father had never been betrayed by anyone but himself. His paranoia, his obsession with control—it had poisoned every relationship he had ever had. He had driven her mother away with his accusations and did the same to Lena. In his final days, he constructed a narrative where she was the villain in his story, just as he had once painted her mother.

She let out a shuddering breath, feeling both relieved and horrified. He had left the journal for her not to expose her but to justify his actions, to make her share in his madness.

Lena closed the journal for the last time and placed it back in the drawer. She locked it, pocketing the key. There was nothing left to read, nothing left to confront. The man she had buried today had died long before his heart stopped beating, consumed by his fears.

But as she left the house, she couldn’t shake the feeling that somewhere, in the silence of his empty study, he was still watching her and still waiting for her to read between the lines and find the guilt he had so desperately wanted her to feel.