Episode 3a - Ari

The snow is falling in Oslo, thick and soft, muting the city to a quiet hum. Rose stands on the corner, boots sinking into fresh powder, her breath curling into the cold night air. Behind her, the glow of Dr. Jekyll’s bar spills into the street. Inside—Ari, the Norwegian bartender with the crooked smile, the one who made her feel something she thought was gone forever. Ahead of her: the path to her hotel, and the solitude of her own company.

In this path, she turns back.

What happens next is not about falling in love. It’s about the first time she lets someone else cross the invisible line her grief built around her body. It’s about the first kiss that doesn’t taste like loss, the first touch that makes her muscles remember how to melt, the first moment she realises she can want again without erasing the man she lost.

Set against the moody, intimate backdrop of a closed bar in Oslo’s Old Town, this slow-burn encounter is tender, charged, and electric. Ari’s touch isn’t a rush toward conquest, it’s a steady, deliberate reminder that she is still here, still alive, still worthy of being seen. From the warmth of his palms on her cheeks to the deliberate way he watches her reactions, every movement becomes a conversation without words.

But with new heat comes complexity. Alongside the glee of rediscovery, Rose feels the whisper of guilt. Can grief and desire live in the same body without tearing it apart? Can you hold on to love lost while opening the door to something new? This is not just a physical encounter, it’s the unravelling of silence, the choice to breathe without armour, even for a single night.

This is Widow on Fire, an interactive storytelling experience where grief meets desire, where intimacy is explored in all its messy, human truth, and where you, the listener, decide the path Rose takes. Each choice leads to a different chapter. Each path holds something the other does not.

If you voted in Episode 2 for Rose to walk away into self-discovery, that path remains behind the curtain for now, you’ll have to wait for the book release at the end of this series to see how it unfolds.

Follow this podcast so you never miss a chapter, new episodes release every 14 days, and be sure to check the poll at the end of each one to decide what happens next.

For more behind-the-scenes content, listener polls, and glimpses into the writing process, join us on Instagram at @widowonfirepod. There you’ll find exclusive story moments, travel inspirations from the cities in Rose’s journey, and the kind of questions that will make you think twice about your own choices.

Snow. Firelight. Firsts. Step into the heat, if you dare.