The thunder rattled the windows, shaking the curtains like the storm wanted to come inside. Rain poured in sheets, loud and relentless.
Anya hugged her pillow tighter, pressing her face against it like it could understand her. Dark black hairs fell messily over her eyes, and her hazel eyes glistened with tears. She was thirty-two, practical, independent, composed — the perfect image of an adult who had her life together. And yet, here she was, crying quietly in a stormy night, feeling emptier than ever.
One week married. A contract. A husband she barely knew. And somehow, none of it mattered as much as the ache in her chest. She buried her face deeper into the pillow, wishing for someone to hold her. She wished for someone who could see through her, reach the little girl she'd hidden for years.
Lightning flashed, lighting up her room for a brief second. Anya flinched, hugging the pillow even tighter. The storm outside was like her heart — chaotic, loud, impossible to ignore.
She let out a shaky sigh. What if things weren't always going to be this way?
And then, somewhere deep inside, she felt a strange shiver. A sense that something… unusual was about to happen.
Somewhere, in a bedroom not so far away — or maybe in another time entirely — her younger self lay sprawled on a different bed, hugging a pillow like it was her soulmate.
Twenty at heart. Dramatic. Hopelessly romantic. Clumsy. Talked before thinking. And, of course, frustrated as hell that she was still single.
The storm outside only made it worse. The rain beating on the window, the dark sky flashing with lightning — all perfectly romantic, all perfectly cruel. She rolled over dramatically, pillow smushed against her cheek. "Why am I still single?" she groaned, staring at the ceiling like it held answers.
Her mind refused to sleep. Instead, she created little love stories in her head. Moonlit walks, stolen kisses in the rain, the perfect someone who would hold her just right. She sighed, hugging the pillow tighter. The world was wrong. She was twenty, single, hopelessly dramatic, and the universe clearly didn't get it.
A loud crash of thunder made her flinch and laugh at herself. "Ugh, stop mocking me, storm!" she whispered. The pillow absorbed it all — her complaints, her dreams, her ridiculous romantic fantasies.
And for the first time tonight, somewhere deep in her chest, a strange shiver ran through her. Something was about to change. Something big. Something… utterly, impossibly strange.