The rain had stopped, but Paris still smelled of yesterday's drizzle — damp stone, coffee, and the faint trace of lavender.

Arias sat by the window of her small attic room, looking down at the street below. The café where she had last seen Henry was just two blocks away, but she hadn't gone back since that day.
Every afternoon, she told herself she would.
And every afternoon, she didn't.

On her desk lay a small stack of envelopes — some sealed, some half-written, all addressed to the same person.
Henry Laurent.
None of them had ever been sent.

She opened the top one, read a few lines, and smiled sadly.

Dear Henry,
It rained again today. I went back to Edelweiss, but your seat was empty. Maybe that's how rain works — it leaves just enough to remind us it was here.

Arias put the letter down.
She didn't write to be answered. She wrote to remember.

Every night, she painted under the dim light of a single lamp.
Sometimes she painted Henry's hands, sometimes his shadow, sometimes just the reflection of rain on glass.
Each canvas was a piece of silence — her way of holding on to something already slipping away.

When the loneliness became too heavy, she would climb up to the rooftop and look at the lights stretching across Paris.
She would close her eyes and pretend that somewhere, under the same sky, Henry might be watching the same city — from a different window.

One morning, a letter arrived from London.
It wasn't from Henry. It was from his friend, the gallery assistant.

Henry has fallen ill. He asked that no one worry. He says he's still painting, still chasing the light — and that Paris should not wait for him.

The words felt cold. Too careful. Too final.
Arias folded the letter and placed it inside her sketchbook, between the pages where she had once drawn his face.

That evening, she returned to Edelweiss Café for the first time in weeks.
The seat across from her was still empty. The waiter, recognizing her, smiled faintly and brought her usual cup of tea without asking.

Outside, it began to rain again — softly, almost kindly.
She opened her sketchbook and began to draw.
Line by line, stroke by stroke, the image of Henry appeared once more — only this time, she drew him looking away, his eyes fading into the distance.

When she finished, Arias tore a page from her notebook, wrote a few words, and slipped it into an envelope.
Then she tucked it under the sugar jar on the table — as if the rain might someday carry it to him.

Dear Henry,
If you ever come back, you'll find me here — painting the sky before the rain.

Arias left the café quietly, her lavender scarf trailing behind her like a piece of evening cloud.
And as she stepped into the mist, the bell on the café door rang — a small, tender sound that felt almost like goodbye.

Some letters are never sent because the heart already knows the answer.
And yet, we write them — not to be heard, but to remember how it felt to love.