I felt like I was suffocating, unable to draw a single breath. My lungs burned, desperate for air that refused to come. An invisible force pressed down on my chest, crushing me beneath its weight. Though I wasn't underwater, it felt exactly like drowning, like my body was being deprived of the one thing it needed to survive. I gasped, but my lungs remained empty.
A deep, relentless pressure formed behind my eyes, as if unseen hands were pressing them back into my skull. My stomach twisted into tight, agonizing knots, while a dull, consuming ache spread through my limbs. It wasn't the sharp sting of a knife or the throbbing pain of a bruise. This was something far worse, something deeper. It felt as though my body was unraveling, like the very essence of my being was slipping away, little by little.
Yet, somehow, I knew this moment was inevitable.
There was a strange familiarity in this pain, as if my body had been waiting for it all along. But even knowing that did nothing to help me endure it. My throat burned with every breath, as though I had swallowed fire. Tears pooled at the corners of my eyes, but I couldn't open them. I couldn't scream. I couldn't move. I was trapped in my own body, completely powerless.
A violent tremor overtook me, my body shaking beyond my control. My fingers twitched, but I couldn't feel them, couldn't feel anything beyond the torment that held me captive. It was as if my body no longer belonged to me. The pain was real, overwhelming, yet I felt disconnected from it, like I was merely an observer of my own suffering.
Every bone in my body ached as if it were breaking apart, crumbling from the inside out. The pain pulsed from my very core, spreading outward until it consumed every part of me. A strange wetness pooled beneath me, soaking into my clothes. The scent of blood, thick and metallic, filled the air.
Had I been injured? Attacked? Was there an intruder?
The questions swirled in my mind, but my body remained frozen, locked in this unrelenting agony. My eyelids felt too heavy to lift, my limbs useless. And then, through the haze of pain, something began to form behind my closed eyes.
A vision.
A room.
Dimly lit, with only the flickering glow of candlelight to cut through the darkness. The walls, lined with aged wooden panels, felt untouched by time. There were no modern lights, no technology, only the soft, golden glow of flames casting shifting shadows across the space. It looked like something from the 1950s, a moment frozen in time.
At the center of the room stood a boy.
His back was turned to me, his figure cloaked in shadow. He was tall, unnervingly still, and before him, resting on a dust-covered table, lay an old diary. Despite its age, it was well-kept, its dark leather cover embossed with a striking image of two hands reaching outward as if trying to grasp something unseen.
There were letters carved into the cover, but they were blurred, unreadable. Yet, even without understanding the words, I could feel their weight.
A chill ran down my spine.
My heartbeat pounded in my chest, too fast, too erratic, each beat echoing in my ears like the ticking of a clock counting down to something inevitable. My body, if it even belonged to me anymore, felt strange, foreign, as if something deep within me was shifting, changing beyond my control.
I didn't feel human anymore.
How was I even surviving this pain?
The boy in the room remained motionless. Not even a breath disturbed his stillness. But as I continued to stare, the vision began to distort. The edges blurred, the image dissolving into darkness. And then, just as suddenly as it had come, the pain began to fade. The crushing weight on my chest lifted. For the first time in what felt like forever, air rushed into my lungs.
I gasped.
The agony withdrew, my senses returning to me in sharp, overwhelming waves. My eyelids fluttered open. The candlelit room was gone.
I was in my bedroom.
The ceiling fan hummed softly above me, its blades casting slow-moving shadows across the walls. Sweat clung to my skin, my sheets tangled around me. My breath came in short, uneven gasps as I fought to steady myself.
Has it all been a dream?
A nightmare?
It felt real, too real. My fingers trembled as I lifted a hand to my face, half-expecting to feel bruises or blood. But there was nothing. No wounds, no pain, just the ghost of something I couldn't explain.
I turned my head toward my desk, my vision still unfocused. The clock read 8:00. Outside, the sky was dark, the streetlights casting their dim glow onto the pavement. Had I fallen asleep doing my homework?
No. This wasn't homework. My gaze landed on the paper in front of me. A permission slip. The school trip, I had nearly forgotten.
I exhaled shakily, trying to push off the lingering unease. I needed my mother's signature on it. I doubt she'd give it but still I decided to give it a try.
For now, I convinced myself that what I had just experienced was nothing more than a bad dream.
Just a dream.