________________________________________
When my eyes opened, I was not in the room I had been in before. I didn't know where I was, but it felt familiar, as if I had spent my entire life there.
There was a staircase in front of me. I climbed it because there was nowhere else to go and it felt like i was meant to climb it. At the top, there was a door. I opened it.
Inside, my daughter and my wife were sitting on a bed.
My daughter had beautiful hazel eyes, black hair, and a slightly chubby face.
No.
No, that's not how my daughter looked.
She… she was—
I began trying to remember how my daughter looked, but I couldn't. Or maybe I could, but the details were hazy, like a distant memory.
But I had seen her yesterday. Hadn't I?
I began to wonder, while both mother and daughter held each other and cried. Maybe they were crying because of my sudden disappearance.
Then my daughter began to speak.
"W-why… why would D-Da—" She stopped. "No… why would he do that?"
She wrapped her arms around herself like a small, helpless animal.
My wife replied softly, "Baby, don't cr—"
"You want me not to cry after what happened?" my daughter said in a chilling calm tone, cutting her off. "You were there and you didn't do anything. You just stood there. While… while I—I…"
The words didn't come out. She began to cry even more loudly, tears flowing down her face. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying.
Seeing this, her mother also began to cry. Between breaths, she tried to say something, but the words came out as nothing more than mumbling. I think I heard her say, "I'm sorry," in broken words.
I began to wonder what they were talking about, because they weren't talking about my disappearance.
Then their faces and figures began to expand and stretch, turning into shapes similar to demons.
Before I could react, someone put a hand on my shoulder it sent a chill down my spine on instincts without thinking i turned.
As I turned to look behind me, the world began to disappear — or maybe it was being pulled away and stretch to infinity. When I turned completely, there was nothing around us. Just a pure and endless white expanse.
That's when I looked at the figure in front of me.
It was… it was my wife.
Or someone who looked like her.
I couldn't tell anymore.
I—I couldn't remember anymore.
I was forgetting. My past memories felt like a dream. I had been there, but I couldn't remember anything clearly.
She looked at me.
Her eyes were almost empty and hollow, except for faint, suppressed anger and disgust.
"Do you remember?" she said.
She began to repeat those words again and again.
"Do you remember? Do you remember what you did? I should have stopped you when I had the chance."
The voices began to sound in my head and it began to distort no longer the voice of my wife more like the sound of a demon .
Just then, the floor beneath me gave way, and I began to fall into dark emptiness. All the while, the voices continued:
"You destroyed a family with your own hands."
"You are a monster."
"You deserve even worse."
"Death is a mercy for you."
Then I blinked.
I was in a red room.
It was suffocating.
Six or seven stone statues surrounded me.
The voices became louder and more chaotic.
I began to clutch my head between my hands and crouched down on the ground. My hands were shaking. My heart was pounding so hard I felt like it would jump out of my chest.
Tears and mucus were running down my face.
I was panicking.
It was getting hard to breathe.
I blinked again.
Now the statues were upon me, surrounding me almost like part of a ritual.
Then I began to scream loudly as loud as I can.
"It was not my fault! I didn't do anything wrong!"
I didn't know what I was saying or why I was saying it. Or even To whom was I even speaking? I just yelled my heart out.
Then I blinked again.
The statues disappeared.
In their place, the floor was filled with my face — or what I could remember of my face.
Some were clear.
Some were distorted.
Some looked older.
Some younger.
But none of them felt completely right.
They stared up at me.
And they all spoke at once.
"Why did you do it?"
Hundreds of them.
All staring at me.
All speaking.
"Why did you do it?"
I recoiled in fear and staggered back. I pushed myself up and tried to run — to run as far and as fast as I could.
But before I could take even a full step, my legs felt as heavy as concrete.
I couldn't move.
I looked down to see what had happened.
That's when I noticed I was sinking into the ground like quicksand.
At first, it was slow.
Barely noticeable.
Then it began to pull me down faster.
I tried to wiggle my way out, struggling desperately, but it only quickened the pace at which I was sinking.
The more I fought, the deeper I went.
I felt helpless.
Lost.
"I need help!" I shouted. "Someone— please!"
But the only sound I heard was my own faces repeating, over and over:
"Why did you do it?"
Then she appeared again, with my daughter beside her.
Now, both of their faces were question marks.
Not blank.
Not blurred.
Just twisted into the shape of a question, as if their very identities had become doubt.
I reached my hand toward my daughter in the hope that she would help me — help me get out of wherever I was stuck.
But she began crying.
Then she also repeated the same words.
"Why did you do it?"
For some reason I couldn't explain, that hurt more than anything I had experienced in the last couple of days.
I had no words left to reply to her.
I just kept my hand stretched toward her in hope of help that I knew I would never get.
I stopped resisting.
Then I sank completely.
Only my hand remained above the surface.
Then my vision turned red.
And then I woke up in the white room, my face and clothes drenched in what seemed and smelled like sweat. My scalp was wet.
The old man was sitting in the corner, not sleeping — just staring at me.
Not in a hostile way.
In a strange way that sent a chill down my spine.
I didn't have the time or energy to think about it.
I was hyperventilating. My nerves were on edge. I tried to calm myself down, to steady my breathing.
The old man spoke.
"Had a nightmare? A bad dream, did ya?" he said in a sarcastic tone. "Are ya scared?"
He let out a quiet, mocking laugh.
________________________________________
Hello guys I am very proud of this chapter . And if you liked it as well then make sure to tell me what is your favorite part of the chapter and see you in the next chapter bye.