I buy a secondhand car and, while cleaning the interior, I discover a diary tucked under the passenger seat.
Are you kidding, Alex? Seriously? The whole department has spent three months on this project and youre saying the concept has changed?
Alex stands in the managers office, fists clenched until the knuckles turn white. Oliver Ives, a bulky man with a perpetually sour expression, doesnt even look up from his paperwork.
Alex, cut the drama. The brief changed. The client can rethink and we have to adapt. This is business, not a hobby club.
Adapt? Thats not adapting, thats starting from scratch! All the calculations, all the documentsthrow them in the bin? People have been losing sleep over this!
Theyre being paid for the overtime. If anyones unhappy, HR works from nine to six. You can go. Im not holding you.
Alex turns silently and walks out, slamming the door so hard the glass in the frame rattles. He passes colleagues who watch him with sympathetic eyes, grabs his jacket from the desk and steps into the damp October air. Enough, throbs in his temples. Enough. He walks without noticing the road, angry at his boss, the client, the whole world. Hes tired of being at the mercy of other peoples whims, of the cramped bus timetable, of everything. He needs something of his ownsmall, but his. A slice of personal space nobody can invade with a new concept.
That thought leads him to the sprawling car market on the edge of Birmingham. He wanders among rows of used vehicles, not quite knowing what hes looking for. Shiny foreign hatchbacks sit beside battered veterans of the British auto industry. Then he spots it: a modest, cherryred Kia, spotless on the outside, about seven or eight years old, but clearly loved.
Interested? a friendly salesman in his early thirties approaches. Great choice. One previous owner, driven gently, commuting to work. Genuine mileage, no smoking inside.
Alex circles the car, peers into the cabin. Its clean but not sterile. It feels lived in, not just a box to move a body from A to B. He sits in the drivers seat, places his hands on the cool plastic and, for the first time that day, feels the tension ease.
Ill take it, he says, surprised by his own resolve.
The paperwork takes a couple of hours. Soon hes cruising through the evening streets of the city in his very own car. The word own rings warm in his chest. He turns on the radio, rolls down the window, lets the cool air rush in. Life suddenly seems less bleak.
He parks in the yard of his old council flat, sits there for a long time, adjusting to the new feeling. Then he decides the interior must be spotless, with no trace of the previous owner. He heads to the 24hour autosupply shop, buys cleaning chemicals, rags and a portable vacuum, and returns to the car.
He scrubs everything to a shine: the dashboard, the door panels, the windows. When he reaches the space beneath the seats, his hand bumps into something hard. He pulls out a small notebook bound in dark blue leather. A diary.
Alex flips it open, feeling uneasy. Someone elses life, someone elses secrets. He almost tosses it onto the back seat and forgets it, but something stops him. A tiny, tidy script greets him on the first page: Emily. Just a name. He turns to the first entry.
12 March.
Victor shouted again today. Over something trivialI forgot to buy his favourite yoghurt. Sometimes I feel Im living on a powder keg. One wrong step, one wrong word and it blows up. Then he comes over, hugs me, says he loves me, that the day was just hard. I believe him, or I pretend to. This cherryred little car is my only escape. I turn on the music and drive wherever I want. Just me and the road. No one yelling.
Alex puts the diary down, a knot forming in his stomach. He can almost see Emily behind the wheel, sad eyes, fleeing from domestic storms. He reads on.
2 April.
We fought again. This time over my job. He hates that I stay late. Normal women stay at home and bake pies, he says. I dont want to bake pies. I love my work, the numbers, the reports. I want to feel useful beyond the kitchen. He cant understand that. He threatened to go to my boss if I dont quit. Humiliating. In the evening I went to the Old Park Café, sat alone, drank coffee and watched the rain. So peaceful there, and the cakes are delicious.
Alex pictures the Old Park Cafésmall, cosy, huge windows, not far from his flat. He imagines Emily at a table, alone, watching the rain stream down the glass.
The days that follow blur. Daytime is work, endless rows with Oliver, nighttime is diary reading. He learns that Emily loves autumn, jazz and Remarque. She wishes to learn to paint, but Victor calls it childish scribbling. She has a close friend, Sophie, with whom she can talk for hours on the phone.
18 May.
Victor is away on a business trip. The silence is a blessing. Sophie called, came over, we bought wine and fruit and stayed up till midnight, laughing like teenagers. She says I should leave him. Lena, hell eat you up, youre fading away. Shes right. But where would I go? No parents, his flat is his. Im thirtyfive. Sophie says age doesnt matter, its just the start. Easy for her to sayher husbands a goldmine.
Alex sighs, recognizing that fear. Hes fortytwo, and the thought of a drastic change makes his knees shake. Hes lived in a predictable groovework, home, occasional meetups with his mate, Sam. Now the car and the diary sit in his life like a signpost.
On Saturday he cant hold back. He heads to the Old Park Café, takes a seat by the window, orders coffee and a slice of cakethe one Emily would have loved. He stares at it and wonders what she looks like. In his mind shes sometimes a tall blonde, sometimes a petite brunette, but her eyes are always sad.
He continues reading; the entries grow darker.
9 July.
He raised his hand at me. The first time. Because I was on the phone with Sophie instead of him when he called. Just a slap, but it felt like he broke something inside menot my face, but my soul. I spent the whole night in the car in the yard, unable to go back inside. I watched his lights flicker on and off. He was probably looking for me. Or not. I dont know. It was terrifying and lonely. If it werent for my cherryred car, Id have gone mad.
Alex puts the diary down, a surge of injustice tightening his chest. He wants to find Victor and He doesnt know what to do, only that he wants to protect her. The woman he has never met.
That evening Sam calls.
Alex, where have you vanished to? Fishing this weekend?
Hey, Sam. Too many things at work.
What things? You havent even taken a holiday. Whats with the mystery? Bought a new hobby and vanished?
Alex smirks.
Almost. Listen, theres this thing
He tells Sam about the car, the diary, Emily. Sam listens in silence.
Youre deep in someone elses story, mate. Do you need it?
I dont know. I just feel sorry for her.
Feel sorry for him. It was ages ago. She might have married a millionaire a hundred times and forgotten about that Victor. And youre stuck here pining. Dump the notebook.
I cant, Alex admits honestly.
Then look after yourself. Dont end up in a madhouse over it. Call if you need anything.
Sams words dont sober him up. Instead, he feels compelled to finish reading, to see how it ends.
The entries become shorter, more frantic. Emily is reaching her limit.
1 September.
Summer ends. My patience ends too. He smashed the vase Mum gave me, the last thing I had left from her. He called it tasteless, said it ruined his designer interior. I collect the shards and realise this is it. No more. I have to leave.
15 September.
Im planning an escape, like a spy filmfunny and scary. Sophie will let me stay at her flat for a while. Im moving books, a couple of sweaters, cosmeticsmy most valuable things. Victor doesnt notice; hes too wrapped up in himself. Ive found a watercolor course Ive dreamed of. It starts in October. Maybe its a sign?
28 September.
Tomorrow Im gone. Hes off on a twoday conference. Ill have time to collect the rest of my things and leave. Ive handed in my resignation. Ill start a new life, buy an easel and paints, paint autumnyellow leaves, grey sky, and my cherryred car in the rain. Its my symbol of freedom. Im terrified. What if it doesnt work? What if he finds me? But staying is scarier.
The last entry reads like that. Alex flips the pageblank. The next page is also empty, and so on, until the diary ends.
He sits in the quiet of his tiny kitchen, wondering what happened to her. Did Emily manage to leave? Did Sophie get her a flat? Did she start painting? Dozens of questions buzz in his mind. He feels as if hes finished a series at the final episode, only to have the ending cut.
He rereads the final pages and finally notices a folded slip of paper squeezed between thema receipt from The Artists Supply on Mira Street, dated 29 September. It lists: watercolor set, brushes, paper, a small tabletop easelall purchased in pounds.
So she did buy them. She was preparing.
Alex checks the date: the diary is from last year. Exactly one year has passed.
What now? He could try to find her, but shes just Emily, no surname, only a friend named Sophie. Little information, and why? To disrupt a new life she might have built? To remind her of the past?
He puts the diary aside. A week passes. He goes to work, argues with Oliver, returns home. But everything feels different. The world seems larger. He notices details: sunlight glinting in puddles, maple leaves turning gold, a baristas smile at the local café. He sees the world through Emilys eyes, the simple, ordinary life she craved.
One evening, scrolling through an online news feed, he spots an announcement: Autumn Vernissage Emerging Artists Exhibition. Among the participants he sees the name Emily Watson. He clicks. A modest gallery of works opens, and among portraits, landscapes, and still lifes he finds a painting of a cherryred Kia parked under an autumn rain on a quiet street. Watercolor, vivid, a touch melancholy but full of hope.
He smiles at the painting. She made it. She left. She paints. She lives.
He finds Emily Watsons socialmedia profile. The avatar shows a smiling woman in her midthirties, short hair, bright eyes. She stands beside her artwork, no trace of the frightened woman from the diary. Her feed is full of exhibition photos, snapshots of her cat, sketches of city streets. No Victor, no painjust a calm, creative life.
Alex feels a huge release, as if a weight lifts. He doesnt message her or add her as a friend. Theres no need. Her story has its own happy ending, and he simply closes the page.
He picks up the diary again. It is no longer just a collection of someone elses secrets; its a story of courage, proof that its never too late to change everything.
The next day, after work, he stops at The Artists Supplythe same shop from the receipt. He wanders the aisles, buys a small canvas and a set of oil paints. He has never painted before, but a sudden urge pushes him to try.
Back home, he props the canvas on the kitchen table, squeezes bright colours onto a palette, picks up a brush. He doesnt know what will emergemaybe a ruined canvas, maybe the start of his own new story, inspired by the voice of a stranger from an old diary found under the seat of a cherryred car.
He looks out the window as rain begins to fall. Everyone has their own road and their own autumn. Sometimes you have to stumble onto anothers life to discover your own path.
