There is a place inside you No map has ever traced, a quiet room behind the ribs where light forgets to stay. No one sees it when you smile, No one hears it when you speak. It moves beneath your laughter like a river running deep. It is yours alone to carry, not carved for other hands, a language made of silence Only your soul understands. Some mornings it is heavier, a stone you cannot name, And still you rise and wear your life as if it were the same. But pain, it does not leave you when ignored or pushed away, it waits within the folds of time, it learns you day by day. It is not your enemy, though it cuts without a sound; it is the truth you buried but still lives underground. And yes, there are nights it breaks you, when endurance feels too wide, when even breath feels borrowed And there is nowhere left to hide. Yet somehow you continue, not because you do not fall, but because within the breaking You still answer life’s call. You learn to walk beside it, not beneath it, not above...
Deep in the jungle, where paths forget themselves and birds grow silent, stood her house. It leaned as if it were listening, its walls darkened by years of secrets. People said going there was a journey with no return—and those who laughed at the warning were never seen again.
The old lady lived alone. No family, no friends, no visitors she didn’t invite. Her smile was famous in nearby villages, but not for warmth. It was a tight, bloodless curve of the lips, stretched too carefully, as if it had been practiced in a mirror for decades. It never reached her eyes. Those eyes were always busy—measuring, planning, deciding.
She was mean in ways that didn’t shout. Her cruelty whispered.
Beneath the house was a basement carved into the earth, damp and airless. That was where people disappeared to. Travelers who needed rest. Relatives who trusted blood too much. Strangers who believed old age meant weakness. She locked them away and broke them slowly, not with chains alone, but with time. Years passed underground. People forgot their names. They became hands, backs, shadows—slaves to her quiet commands.
No one was special to her. Not cousins. Not nephews. Not those who shared her bloodline. Love had no meaning in that house. She needed no one, and that was the most dangerous thing about her. Loneliness did not frighten her—it empowered her.
Above ground, she moved calmly, tending her plants, cooking her meals, smiling at anyone unlucky enough to cross her path. Hypocrisy clung to her like perfume. Evil lived in her patience, in the way she waited for the right moment.
Those who thought they could leave learned too late: the jungle listened to her. The house obeyed her. And endings came suddenly—unexpectedly—like a door closing where a future once stood.
The old lady remained alone, just as she preferred. And the jungle kept her secrets well.
© 2026 Gloria Penelope
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