THE LETTERS ON DRIFTWOOD BEACH

Every morning, as the fog lifted along the shores of Driftwood Beach, Callie found a letter waiting in the same place by the weathered old pier. The first one had arrived nearly three months ago, nestled under a smooth stone on a damp wooden plank. Its envelope was thick, cream-colored, and sealed with a simple heart drawn in blue ink.

Each letter was addressed only to "You," and Callie had no idea who was writing them. They contained poems, stories, and fragments of someone’s memories—each one filled with longing, like a love that was never spoken aloud. The handwriting was elegant and looping, like an old script from a time she couldn’t quite place.

She would have dismissed it as a harmless mystery if the letters hadn't felt so personal. Somehow, the words seemed to understand her heart better than she did, almost as if whoever wrote them knew her deepest hopes and fears.

One morning, she found the courage to leave a letter in return. She wrote:

“I don’t know who you are, but your words make me feel less alone. Meet me here, tomorrow at dawn.”

The next morning, she waited by the pier, hands shaking with anticipation. The fog was thicker than ever, shrouding the beach in a milky haze, the kind where every sound felt muffled and every shadow seemed alive. She waited until the sun was fully risen, but no one appeared. Disappointed, she started to leave, but there, right where she always found the letters, was another envelope.

“Dear You,” it began, “I’ve wanted to meet you, too. But some loves are best kept as mysteries, woven in words that drift like the sea fog. Look for me tomorrow, in the first rays of dawn.”

Callie returned every morning, drawn to the pier by an invisible pull, always finding another letter but never the writer. As time went on, the words of the letters grew more familiar and warm, the stories even more intimate, almost as if they were unfolding her own life before her eyes. It felt as though she was falling in love with a soul she’d never met.

One day, months after that first letter, Callie sat at the pier at sunrise, a little older, a little wiser, and finally at peace with the mystery. She knew now that some stories didn’t need a perfect ending. As the fog began to thin, she whispered her thanks into the cool morning air, feeling a bittersweet happiness fill her heart.

And that was the last morning she found a letter.