Gothic Addiction
Short Story by Nish
May 29 2026

Laura had developed a ritual around loneliness. Every night around ten-thirty, after the dishes were washed and stacked in the drying rack beside the sink, after the aquarium light dimmed automatically to moon-blue and her cat Marvin settled into his favorite spot at the end of the couch, she would put on her earbuds and disappear into gothic romance audio dramas.

The stories always began the same way. A woman with unusual eyes inherited a crumbling estate in Scotland. A mysterious billionaire widower appeared at midnight in the rain. A handsome vampire surgeon refused to admit he loved the heroine because of some tragic misunderstanding involving a dead fiancée, a hidden child, or an ancient curse. And then, most importantly, nothing would happen. Not really. Not for hundreds of episodes.

Laura had begun noticing the pattern around episode ninety-three of The Duke’s Forbidden Bride. By episode one hundred forty-seven of Dark Moon Manor, she could practically predict every emotional pivot before it arrived. “She’s not going to tell him,” Laura muttered one night, spooning yogurt directly from the container. “And he’s not going to tell her. And the evil cousin is absolutely listening outside the door.” Sure enough, the evil cousin was listening outside the door.

Laura laughed so loudly that Marvin startled awake. Still, she kept listening every night. Sometimes until two in the morning. The stories crawled under her skin in the strange way soap operas could. The endings dangled just out of reach. Every revelation led to another delay. Every confession got interrupted by thunderstorms, fainting spells, car accidents, kidnappings, or a conveniently misunderstood text message. The listeners were being emotionally drip-fed. Laura knew it, but somehow, that made her listen harder.

One warm Thursday night in Los Angeles, she sat on her small apartment balcony overlooking the alley behind her building. The aroma of a neighbor grilling burgers wafted up to her nose. A helicopter buzzed toward downtown. The jacaranda trees on the street glowed purple beneath the streetlights. She held her phone, and in her earbuds, a woman named Vivienne had finally decided to confess her love to the brooding Prince she’d been circling emotionally for 186 episodes.

Laura sat forward. “Oh, thank God,” she whispered. The audio continued.  Vivienne entered the candlelit library. The Prince turned dramatically. Then, before she could speak, a long-lost evil twin brother arrived. Laura pulled out her earbuds. “Oh, come on.”

She scoffed and started laughing. “Damnit!” she said out loud. Marvin stared at her from the sliding door with visible concern. “That’s it,” she told the cat. “This is psychological warfare.” But later that night, brushing her teeth in her tiny bathroom mirror, she stopped momentarily because something uncomfortable had surfaced in her mind. Why was she listening to stories about people refusing to say what they wanted? Why was she spending hours frustrated by characters wasting time? And why did that frustration feel… familiar?

She stood there in her oversized purple T-shirt, toothbrush hanging from her mouth, and suddenly saw herself with startling clarity. Sixty-five years old.Retired.Smart. Funny. Still creative. Still waiting. The realization arrived quietly. She had spent years telling herself there would be more time.

More time to finish the comedy play she’d abandoned halfway through. More time to organize a staged reading. More time to finally meet Richard.  More time to take risks. More time to stop living cautiously. But what if caution was just another endless delay like a Gothic romance plot? Laura rinsed her toothbrush slowly. “Oh no,” she whispered to herself.

The next afternoon, she met her friend Denise at a café on Ventura Boulevard. Denise had once written sitcoms for network television in the nineties and still dressed like she might be called into a writers’ room at any moment. Large sunglasses. Sharp scarf. Expensive sneakers.

“You look confused,” Denise said immediately. Laura stirred her coffee. “I think Pocket FM broke my brain.” Denise smiled and replied. “That’ll happen.” Laura responded,  “I’m serious. These stories are all about emotional cowardice.” Denise added, “Yes, but it’s specifically people refusing to tell the truth. Consistently. Every problem could be solved in fifteen minutes if somebody would just say the thing.”

Laura leaned back as she looked out the window at Ventura boulevard traffic sliding by while admitting, “And I think I’m doing the same thing.” Denise removed her sunglasses. “Ohhh,” she said softly. “There it is.” Laura hated when friends saw through her immediately. “I’m not talking about romance exactly,” Laura said in defense. Denise interrupted,  “You’re talking about your whole life.” Laura sighed. “Yes.” Denise smiled gently. “You know what the difference is between real life and those audio dramas?” “In real life, nobody has amnesia, or is bitten by a werewolf ” “In real life, the episodes run out.” That sentence stayed with Laura all weekend. The episodes run out…

By Sunday evening she found herself staring at Richard’s face on her laptop screen during one of their regular video calls. Richard lived near Monterey in a quiet coastal town. His silver hair always looked slightly windblown, as though he’d just returned from standing near the ocean. He was seventy-five and had the calm voice of a man who no longer needed to impress anyone. They had met years earlier in Second Life of all places, during a virtual jazz club event. Laura had originally thought he was probably a fifty-year-old married guy pretending to be a single retired artist. Instead he turned out to be exactly who he claimed to be. Kind. Funny. Patient. They had spoken hundreds of times. They had flirted carefully around the edges of possibility for almost three years, but had not met in person.

“You’re quiet tonight,” Richard said. Laura looked at his smiling face. She suddenly felt the absurdity of time passing between two people who clearly cared about one another yet continued behaving like characters trapped in episode one hundred eighty-seven. Before she could lose her nerve, she said it, “Richard, why haven’t we met?” He blinked. “Well…” Laura insisted, “No, seriously. We keep saying someday.” Richard laughed, “I suppose we do, but wasn’t it you that said you liked our relationship the way it is, our avatars play on Second Life and we have this real connection via video calls.” Laura answered, “But we have discussed meeting someday. I’m starting to think someday is fake.”

That landed. She saw it in his expression. Richard leaned back in his chair. “To be honest,” he said slowly, “I think I was afraid.” Laura replied, “Of me?”  “No. Of disappointment. Of changing something that feels safe.” answered Richard with compassion. Laura nodded.

Exactly. Safe. The favorite word of people slowly sleepwalking through their own lives. Richard rubbed his chin. “But I don’t want safe anymore.” Laura felt something loosen inside her chest. Outside her apartment window, somewhere down the block, somebody played jazz on a trumpet badly but enthusiastically. “So come to Los Angeles,” she said. Richard smiled. “Was that difficult?” Laura laughed, “Yes.” Richard raised an eyebrow, “Interesting.” Laura confessed,  “You know what’s ridiculous? I’ve spent months screaming at fictional people for not communicating honestly.” “And now?” Richard asked.  “Now I realize I was yelling at myself,” said Laura  Richard’s smile softened. “Well,” he said, “that’s very writerly of you.”

After the call ended, Laura sat quietly in the blue glow of her apartment. The city hummed around her. Somewhere a siren wailed toward Culver City. Her refrigerator clicked on. Marvin jumped into her lap with the solemn authority of an old soul. Laura looked around the apartment she had lived in since the late nineties. Posters from old theater productions. Bookshelves sagging with scripts and novels. A framed black-and-white photo of Los Angeles from 1948. Stacks of notebooks unfinished with script and book ideas. Half-completed projects. Entire versions of herself waiting politely in drawers. She suddenly understood something about the gothic romances. The addiction wasn’t the romance itself. It was the anticipation. The suspended possibility.

Those stories on Pocket FM kept listeners trapped in emotional waiting rooms because waiting is strangely comforting. As long as the confession hasn’t happened, the dream can’t fail. As long as the characters avoid truth, they avoid consequence. Delay masquerades as safety. But delay is also life leaking away one indecisive episode at a time.

Laura got up abruptly and walked to her desk. She opened a neglected file on her computer labeled:
UNTITLED PLAY. She stared at it. Then opened it. The play was about three aging background actors trapped overnight on an abandoned studio backlot during a heat wave. Reading it now, Laura found herself laughing out loud at lines she had forgotten writing. It was good. Not perfect, but alive. Why had she stopped? Because nobody produced new plays anymore? Because theater audiences were shrinking? Because she was older? Because success wasn’t guaranteed? She knew the answer already. Fear disguised as practicality. A gothic plot twist. The thought stung.

She worked until nearly three in the morning. Not because she was disciplined. Because she suddenly felt awake. The next few weeks unfolded differently. Not magically, just honestly. Laura contacted friends from the theater community she hadn’t spoken to in months.  She sent the unfinished play to Denise and agreed to attend a staged reading workshop in Venice despite nearly canceling three times. She even stopped listening obsessively to gothic romance dramas every night.

Well… mostly. One evening she did return to Dark Moon Manor while cleaning the kitchen. The heroine was once again refusing to admit she loved the mysterious doctor despite overwhelming evidence and approximately fourteen kidnappings. Laura shook her head affectionately. “You sweet idiot,” she murmured. But now she heard the stories differently, not as fantasies, but as warnings.

Several weeks later Richard arrived in Los Angeles on a gray Saturday morning. Laura stood outside a café in Culver City wearing entirely too much lipstick for eleven in the morning. She felt sixteen and ninety years old simultaneously. Richard stepped out of the rideshare car, and recognized him instantly. Not because he looked exactly like the screen version of himself. Because he moved like himself, gentle. slightly careful, warm-eyed. 

For one terrifying second both of them hesitated. Years of digital intimacy, suddenly confronted by actual sunlight and air and human presence. Then Richard smiled, and Laura realized something extraordinary. Real life had no dramatic soundtrack. No sweeping orchestral cue. No thunderstorms. No interruption from an evil twin.  Just a mature couple standing awkwardly beside a coffee shop  trying not to cry. “Hi,” they both said simultaneously. Then they hugged. It was not cinematic. It was better.

Later that afternoon they shared a Waymo to Venice and walked on the boardwalk along the beach while gulls circled overhead and the many visitors and locals enjoyed the colorful and lively Venice scene together. As they walked, Richard told stories about his years learning wood carving and working for a local gallery where he also sold his watercolor paintings. Laura told him about her interesting and satisfying career in TV Syndication that led to her writing career and theater production. They laughed constantly. At one point Richard stopped walking and looked at her carefully. “You know,” he said, “I almost canceled this trip.” Laura groaned.  “Of course you did.” Richard continued carefully, “I thought maybe the fantasy was safer.” “And?” He took her hand.  “The fantasy doesn’t hold your hand back.”

Laura looked out at the beach. The horizon stretched endlessly westward, golden beneath the late afternoon light. She thought about all the years people spent waiting for certainty before beginning their lives. How strange that humans understood mortality intellectually yet behaved emotionally as though there would always be another season, another episode, another someday. That night, Richard stayed with Laura at her apartment and they now shared real intimacy after years of only the digital kind. It was romantic in a naturally real way. She didn’t expect it to be fireworks, but she was happy with their physical closeness. After breakfast Richard let Laura know he would love to visit her again, then returned to his hotel to retrieve his luggage before taking his return flight home. 

Laura sat alone in her apartment again. Los Angeles glowed behind her, messy, sprawling, hopeful Los Angeles. A city built almost entirely from ambition, dreams and magic. Laura still loved it fiercely. Maybe because the city itself understood reinvention. The loneliness felt different now. Not erased, just honest. 

Marvin curled beside her while she opened her laptop and began writing notes for a new play. This one wasn’t a comedy exactly. Or maybe it was. It centered around a woman addicted to serialized gothic romances who slowly realizes she is wasting her own life waiting for emotional permission. Laura smiled to herself. There was probably something there.

Before bed she glanced at her phone. Pocket FM suggested another new gothic romance:
The Baron’s Secret Desire. Laura laughed so hard she scared Marvin. Then, she pressed play.