I heard footsteps.
Real ones.
Not basement echoes.
Dad.
Older.
Hair graying.
Shoulders slumped.
Mom beside him.
Hands shaking.
I watched from somewhere above myself.
They stood beside the hospital bed.
Beside me.
Dad held my limp hand.
"Doctor says there's no brain activity left," he whispered.
Mom broke.
She collapsed against his chest.
"I can't let him go," she sobbed.
Nine years.
They had waited nine years.
Every birthday they celebrated beside a machine.
Every Christmas in a sterile room.
Ivy—grown now—stood in the doorway.
She didn't remember my voice anymore.
Only stories.
Dad looked at the doctor.
And nodded.
You know what that nod means.
You've seen it in movies.
But this wasn't a movie.
It was the end of hope.
The machine began its long, flat tone.
That sound—
It's not loud.
It's not dramatic.
It's quiet.
Like something slipping away.
Mom screamed my name.
Not the horror scream from before.
A real one.
The kind that tears something permanent inside a person.
And as the line went flat—
The house inside my mind began collapsing.
Walls turning to dust.
Family photos burning at the edges.
I felt myself unraveling.