"The Backward Diary"

 December 18th — 11:39 PM

London

Snow fell in slow, deliberate silence, like the city had forgotten how to breathe.

Inside his dimly lit apartment, Zane Faulkner sat cross-legged on the windowsill, a cold cup of coffee in one hand and a half-smile lingering on his lips. The foggy glass pressed against his shoulder as he watched the snowflakes collide with the streetlight glow. It was one of those nights — still, haunting, and too quiet to trust.

Behind him, Eli's muffled snores filled the space. Until—

BZZZT. BZZZT.

Zane’s burner phone vibrated sharply on the table. He didn’t flinch. Just took a slow sip and turned his head slightly. By the third buzz, Eli stirred from the couch.

“Midnight calls? Either someone’s dead or someone wants to be,” Eli grumbled, half asleep.

Zane finally reached for the phone, tapping speaker.

“Faulkner,” he said calmly.

A woman’s voice answered, trembling. “Detective. You… you need to come. He’s—he’s dead. But his diary... it predicted it. The last entry says he would die tonight. At exactly 11:07 PM.”

Zane’s smile disappeared. He stood. “Address?”

“48 Belgrave Crescent. Please... hurry.”

The line went dead.

Eli sat up straight now, alert. “What was that?”

Zane grabbed his overcoat and scarf without a word.

“Wait, seriously? It’s freezing out there!”

Zane tossed Eli his gloves. “All the more reason not to waste time.”

12:06 AM — Belgrave Crescent

The house loomed like something forgotten by time — tall windows, wrought-iron fence, snow piling on stone lions guarding the stairs. A constable stood at the gate, shivering.

Zane flashed his credentials. “Zane Faulkner. That’s my miserable assistant.”

Eli rolled his eyes. “His charming assistant.”

They entered.

Inside, the housekeeper — a pale woman in her fifties — led them through an old Victorian hallway. The walls were lined with bookshelves, grandfather clocks, and somber portraits. Everything reeked of age and wealth… and something colder.

She whispered, “He was in the library. I—I didn’t go in. The door was open when I came upstairs with tea. He was just... sitting there.”

Zane glanced at the carpet. No visible drag marks. “You touched nothing?”

“Nothing.”

They stepped into the library.

The body sat slumped in a leather armchair. Head tilted. Eyes open. A single bullet hole on the right temple. Blood soaked into a Persian rug. On his lap lay a diary — worn leather, pages yellowed.

Zane knelt beside the body. “Name?”

“Edgar Wyllis,” said Eli, reading from a side plaque. “Novelist. Famous for writing murder mysteries.” He looked around. “Kinda poetic, dying in your own library.”

Zane ignored him. He opened the diary.

The last page read:

“December 18, 11:07 PM. I will be murdered tonight. I have seen it. The gun. The hand. The sound. And I have accepted it.”

Zane stared at it for a long moment, then turned the page backward.

The entry before it:

“December 17, 11:02 PM. The vision returned. Each night, one minute earlier. Always the same. I am reading... and then I die.”

Zane flipped again. Every entry before grew one minute earlier. Like someone had written their death backward, a countdown.

Eli leaned over his shoulder. “This… this is nuts.”

Zane’s tone was quiet. “It’s deliberate.”

Eli frowned. “You think he planned his own death?”

Zane stood. “No. I think someone wanted it to look like that.”

1:03 AM — Kitchen

The housekeeper sat nervously at the table, her hands clutching a chipped teacup.

Zane sat across from her. “Tell me about Edgar.”

She nodded. “Brilliant man. Kind. But the last two weeks... he changed. Said strange things. Kept hearing whispers. Said time was... folding in.”

“Did he have enemies?”

She hesitated. “Family. His younger brother — Jeremy. They argued about money. Then there’s Dr. Langdon — his therapist. Edgar stopped seeing him last week. Said he didn’t trust him anymore.”

Eli scribbled notes beside Zane.

Zane asked, “Was anyone else here tonight?”

“No. Just me. Mr. Edgar didn’t have visitors after dark.”

Zane’s gaze lingered on her face. “Did he believe in visions?”

Her lips tightened. “He believed in what he saw.”

2:14 AM — Upstairs Study

Zane paced slowly, hands behind his back. Eli flopped into an armchair.

“So,” Eli said, yawning, “either he was hallucinating… or someone was feeding him delusions. Like, psychological gaslighting?”

Zane nodded. “Someone clever. Someone patient. They wanted him to write that diary. To expect death.”

Eli blinked. “Wait, you think the killer made him believe he was going to die?”

Zane didn’t answer.

Instead, he pointed to the fireplace. Above it hung a single painting: Edgar and his brother Jeremy — smiling.

10:06 AM — Next Morning
Interview: Jeremy Wyllis

Jeremy was all sharp suits and expensive cologne. He looked irritated, even at a murder.

“He was mad,” Jeremy said flatly. “Started talking about ‘loops in time’ and ‘seeing his own end.’ I told him to see a doctor.”

Zane leaned forward. “He accused you of anything?”

Jeremy scoffed. “Just of wanting my inheritance sooner. Typical.”

“You didn’t?”

Jeremy smiled coldly. “Not soon enough, apparently.”

Zane didn’t blink. “Where were you last night at 11 PM?”

Jeremy crossed his arms. “At the Oxford Club. I’m sure they have footage.”

Zane’s tone remained soft. “And Dr. Langdon?”

Jeremy paused. “No idea. Edgar stopped going last week. Said he was a liar.”

11:47 AM — Interview: Dr. Langdon

Tall, calm, and polished. The kind of man who spoke in measured tones and smiled like nothing ever surprised him.

“Edgar was deteriorating,” Langdon explained. “Paranoia. Nightmares. He believed someone was whispering thoughts into his head.”

“Was someone?” Zane asked.

Langdon didn’t flinch. “People often externalize their fears. Especially those with trauma.”

“Did you encourage the diary writing?”

“I suggested he journal his fears. He interpreted that literally. His genius twisted it into fiction.”

Zane stared. “Was it fiction?”

Langdon’s smile faded. “I don’t know anymore.”

3:03 PM — Zane’s Apartment

Eli was sprawled on the floor, connecting red strings between suspect names on a corkboard. “So far we’ve got: Brother with a motive, therapist with access, and a housekeeper who hears voices.”

Zane stood by the window, reading the diary again. “We’re missing something.”

Eli looked up. “Like what?”

Zane didn’t answer. He flipped through the diary… until a line caught his eye.
Page dated December 14, 11:10 PM:

“She was here again. The woman with red gloves. She whispered backwards. She said I would be forgotten.”

Zane whispered, “Red gloves…”

Eli blinked. “That wasn’t in any testimony.”

Zane turned to him. “Because no one else saw her.”

4:42 PM — Lyra Arrives

The door swung open, snowflakes swirling in. Lyra Blake stepped in — black boots, scarf wrapped around her jawline, eyes sharp as ever.

“You called?” she smirked.

Zane raised an eyebrow. “I needed someone with better instincts than Eli.”

“Rude,” Eli muttered.

Lyra brushed past them. “What’s the case?”

Zane handed her the diary.

She read silently for a minute.

Then her eyes narrowed. “This isn’t just backwards. It’s… mirrored. Look—”

She held the page to the mirror behind the desk.

Suddenly, some of the words revealed letters that weren’t there before.

Eli gasped. “Wait… is this a cipher?”

Zane whispered, “It’s a message. Hidden behind the entries.”

Lyra traced one mirrored page. “It says… ‘I am not alone.’”

Zane’s expression turned to stone.

5:00 PM —

That night, Zane sat alone in the apartment. The others had gone.

He flipped to the final diary page again.

This time, he held it to the mirror.

And there, faintly — hidden in the backwards ink — he read a final message Edgar had never spoken aloud.

It said:

“He is inside my thoughts. He wants me… to bring Zane.”

Zane stared at the words for a long time.

Outside, snow fell harder.

Inside, his hand slowly folded the page closed.
No expression. No movement.

Just three words in a whisper, to the empty room:

“He knows me.”

December 19 — 7:14 AM
Zane’s Apartment

The city outside was buried in white, but Zane’s mind was darker than ever.

He hadn’t slept. The final mirrored line haunted him:
“He is inside my thoughts. He wants me… to bring Zane.”

Eli walked in holding toast. “Okay, I had a dream Edgar was alive and dancing in reverse.”

Zane didn’t look up. “Dreams don’t lie.”

Eli blinked. “That… sounded ominous.”

Zane closed the diary slowly. “Eli. What if Edgar wasn’t insane? What if someone made him believe his death was the ending to a story he couldn’t escape?”

Eli chewed in confusion. “Like… narrative manipulation?”

“Exactly. What if someone wrote the plot... and convinced him he had to follow it?”

10:42 AM — Police HQ, Audio Room

Lyra pressed play on the interview recording between Dr. Langdon and Edgar — two weeks before his death.

Edgar’s voice crackled through the speakers, distressed:

“I hear him. He tells me what to write. I asked him once who he was. He said... ‘I’m your ending.’”

Zane’s knuckles whitened.

Eli whispered, “This guy was being programmed.”

Lyra tapped the table. “Langdon said he encouraged journaling… but these entries? They’re deliberate psychological implantation.”

Zane stood suddenly. “Langdon didn’t just treat Edgar. He wrote him.”

12:03 PM — Dr. Langdon’s Office

Zane didn’t knock.

Langdon looked up from his desk, startled. “Detective—?”

Zane tossed the diary on his desk. “You didn’t just counsel him. You controlled him.”

Langdon sat back slowly. “You’re reaching.”

Zane leaned in. “You knew his trauma. You planted fears. Timed visions. Backwards writing. You turned therapy into scripting.”

Langdon was silent.

Lyra crossed her arms. “The mirrored pages? The cipher? That wasn’t Edgar. That was your method of control.”

Langdon smiled faintly. “You think you’ve solved it?”

Zane’s tone turned ice. “No. But I know what Edgar meant when he said, ‘Bring Zane.’”

Langdon finally spoke. Calm. Precise.

“Because I was never interested in Edgar. He was just a rehearsal. You… were the real subject.”

12:15 PM — Flashback Reveal

As Langdon speaks, his voice overlays memory flashes:

Zane, age 12, sitting silently in a group home.

A man (Langdon, younger) observing from behind a glass.

Files marked “Subject Z-31: Trauma-Induced Memory Control Experiment.”

The word “RECOVERED” stamped on a folder… then scratched out.

Back to present.

Langdon:

“Your mind resisted everything. But Edgar? He obeyed. I whispered backwards thoughts into his dreams. And he made them real. Just like I once tried… with you.”

Zane’s voice was barely a whisper. “You were the man from the orphanage.”

Langdon smiled coldly. “You don’t remember me. But I remember every reaction. Every silence. Every refusal to break. That… fascinated me.”

1:22 PM — Outside the Office

Eli was pacing in shock. “He experimented on you? As a kid?”

Zane nodded slowly.

Lyra touched his arm. “Why didn’t you ever mention this?”

Zane stared into the snowfall. “Because I buried it so deep… even I didn’t know it was there.”

Silence.

Eli muttered, “He killed Edgar to prove he could write someone’s end.”

Zane’s voice was low. “And now he wants to finish mine.”

5:44 PM — Police Interrogation Room

Langdon was being booked, calm as ever. But before he was taken away, he leaned toward Zane through the bars.

His voice was soft.

“This isn’t over. You’re still in the story. You just haven’t read your last page yet.”

Zane didn’t blink.

“You got one thing wrong,” he replied.
“I never read stories. I rewrite them.”

Langdon’s smile finally cracked.

Later That Night — 10:57 PM
Zane’s Apartment

Eli had gone quiet. Lyra sat curled on the couch, blanket around her shoulders. She hadn’t said much since the arrest.

Zane stood at the window again, coffee cold in his hands, snow falling outside like soft static.

Lyra finally spoke. “Do you think he’ll come after you again?”

Zane didn’t respond. Just watched the dark.

Then Lyra whispered, “You really don’t remember your childhood?”

Zane gave a faint smile. “Some doors are locked for a reason.”

She stood, walked to him, touched his shoulder lightly. “I’m sorry.”

Zane looked at her. “Don’t be. He failed.”

Lyra looked down. “Still… you don’t have to carry it alone.”

He looked at her gently.

Then said, “You’ll catch cold.”

Lyra laughed through her tears. “You jerk.”

Eli returned, holding three mugs. “Did I miss the emotional climax?”

Lyra threw a cushion at him.

11:59 PM — Balcony

Zane stepped outside, alone. The snow whispered against his coat, wind curling around the edges of memory.

He stared at the stars, breath curling like smoke.

Inside, Lyra watched him through the window. Eli joined her.

“He’s quiet,” Eli said softly.

Lyra whispered, “He’s remembering a story he didn’t write.”

Then, they heard his voice. Calm. Distant. Cold.

Zane, still facing the sky, said:

“Some men die reading their ending. I was raised in blank pages... and taught how to bleed in ink.”

Silence.

Eli swallowed hard. “Damn.”

Lyra had tears in her eyes.

And for a long moment, the snow kept falling — as if the world itself had paused, mourning not just the dead…
…but the broken boy who had finally remembered he was never allowed to forget.

THE END