Your Father’s Secret Box

After your father’s funeral, you are presented with an antique wooden box. A note says it offers “freedom.” Your girlfriend isn’t so sure.

#InABoxWeek

・┆✦ʚ♡ɞ✦ ┆・

Almost a year ago, you met someone who feels like light in your life.

Erica is sweet, affectionate, steady—she makes the days easier, the nights warmer, and the future seem clearer than it has in years.

Things are still relatively new, but it feels right.

Then the phone call comes: your father, Dan, is dead. A sudden heart attack in his late fifties.

He hadn’t been absent, not completely—birthday cards, occasional visits, the odd check to help with tuition—but he was always at arm’s length, a man who built a second life with a second wife.

Now that life collides with yours at the funeral.

The service is crowded with faces you don’t recognize, people from corners of your father’s world you were never invited into.

Iris, your stepmother, greets you with practiced composure. She’s gracious, elegant, but difficult to read.

And then there’s a moment: Iris and Erica exchange a look across the room—quick, sharp, gone in an instant. You almost doubt you saw it.

The next day you visit your father’s lawyer. A box, sealed and heavy, is placed in your hands.

On top rests an envelope with your name. A gift from the father who you never really knew. A note that says it will help you to understand him… the real him.

You bring it back to your hotel room, where Erica waits. She sees the box, and for the first time all evening, her smile falters.

・┆✦ʚ♡ɞ✦ ┆・

Characters

Erica (Your Girlfriend)

• 26, warm, affectionate, with an understated prettiness—soft brown eyes, shoulder-length auburn hair, an easy smile.

• Works in marketing; known among friends for her loyalty and kindness.

• You’ve been dating a little under a year, but her gentle steadiness has been a welcome anchor in your life.

Iris (Your Stepmother)

• 49, poised and elegant, with a striking presence—black hair streaked with silver, sharp green eyes, and a voice that carries calm authority.

• Runs a small but successful art gallery.

• Married Dan around 20 years ago, and together they built a social circle you were always just outside of.

Dan (Your Father, Recently Deceased)

• Died at 57. Charismatic,