The man didn't move.
He didn't blink.
He didn't breathe loudly.
He just watched me — with that unnerving stillness of someone who had seen this exact moment before.
The library was silent, yet it felt… crowded.
Like the shadows were listening.
The book in my hands gave a soft thrum — a heartbeat that wasn't mine.
His gaze dropped to it the way someone watches a lit fuse burning closer to the bomb.
"You opened it," he said.
Not surprised.
Not accusing.
Just… resigned.
"I didn't open anything," I whispered. "It opened itself."
A faint, humorless smile tugged at the corner of his lips.
"That's how it begins."
He took one step forward — slow, controlled — and the overhead lights flickered violently, as though something unseen brushed past them.
My pulse kicked hard.
"That book," he said quietly, "isn't supposed to recognize you."
"Recognize me?" I repeated. "It's a book, not a—"
"Not a book," he cut in, eyes locking onto mine.
"A memory."
The floor seemed to tilt under me.
He exhaled, long and heavy, like the weight of a truth he didn't want to carry.
"You read a line that wasn't meant for this timeline yet."
"What line?"
His jaw tensed, and he repeated it without looking away from me — like saying it aloud was dangerous:
"You were never supposed to find me."
My breath snagged.
"Who wrote that?" I asked.
A beat of silence.
The kind that felt like the moment before a storm breaks.
Finally, he spoke — softer than before, almost painfully:
"Me."
The book pulsed again.
I stepped back. "This isn't funny."
"It's not meant to be," he murmured.
Another flicker.
The lights dimmed… then brightened… then dimmed again, slower this time, like something was syncing to my heartbeat.
He dragged a hand through his hair, frustrated.
"This shouldn't be happening yet. You weren't supposed to open the book until—"
He stopped.
"Until when?" I demanded.
His eyes — dark, intense, impossibly familiar — locked onto mine.
"Until after you forgot me."
A cold rush ran down my spine. "I don't even know you."
He laughed once — soft, broken — the sound of someone remembering something they wish they didn't.
"Yes," he whispered.
"You do."
Then the temperature in the room shifted sharply — the kind of sudden cold that doesn't feel natural.
He went rigid.
"They're coming."
"Who is 'they'?"
He didn't answer.
Instead, he lunged forward and closed his hand over the book — not taking it, just pressing it shut.
The moment his fingers touched the cover, the entire library fell into a suffocating silence.
Not quiet.
Silent.
Like sound itself had been erased.
He leaned in, voice barely a breath:
"Elise… close the book before it remembers all of you. Because if it does—"
A soft creak echoed in the distance.
Not from a door.
From the aisle behind me.
Something had moved.
His eyes widened — not in fear, but in warning.
"Don't turn around."