Strings of Fate: The First Loop

CHAPTER 8

I was dreaming again.

But this time, it didn’t feel like drowning.

It felt like something else entirely, like standing waist-deep in the ocean at night, waves rolling slow and steady against my ribs, the stars blurred above like brushstrokes on glass. I could feel her hand on my face. Warm. Grounding. Like sunlight slipping through the cracks of a cold house. My eyes fluttered shut the second she touched me.

Then I heard her.

“I love you, James.”

It was so clear. Not like a whisper or an echo this time, but a truth spoken softly, like it had always been waiting inside me. Her voice, whoever she was, melted straight into my chest, as if my ribs had been holding a space for it all along.

There was music too. Distant, muffled like it was playing through water, or through walls thick with time. I didn’t know the lyrics, not really, but I didn’t need to. I felt it. Like heat blooming in my sternum. Like being pulled under by something soft and inevitable.

She smiled. I think she did. I couldn’t fully see her face, but I felt her smile the way you feel wind before it moves the trees.

And then I looked at her eyes.

That was the moment I fell.

Not in the way you fall when you're scared, clinging to the edges of sleep. This wasn’t panic or fear or gasping for air. This was different. Like being cradled by gravity instead of crushed by it. Like floating down in slow motion, arms open, chest open, heart cracked wide with something too big to name.

I didn’t want to wake up.

But I did.

With a thud and a curse, I hit the floor face-first, blanket tangled around my knees. My elbow smarted where it had landed, but I didn’t move for a second. I just lay there, staring up at the ceiling like it had something to say.

The morning light slanted through my curtains in thin gold ribbons. My room was quiet, too quiet, but inside me, it wasn’t.

I could still feel it.

Her hand. Her voice. That song with no words.

My heart beat slow but loud, as if it was remembering something before my brain could catch up. And for the first time in a long while, I didn’t wake up afraid.

I woke up... lighter.

Confused, yeah. But lighter.

Maybe because the dream didn’t feel like a warning this time. It didn’t feel like the world collapsing, or a voice screaming betrayal. It felt like possibility. Like whatever part of me had built walls was starting to peek out from behind them.

I ran a hand through my hair, still half-lost in the tide of it all, and sat up slowly. My phone buzzed beside the bed.

Betty.
Library in 15? Bring your brain this time, not just your charm. :)

I smiled.

Not a full-on grin, just something small and crooked that tugged at the side of my mouth like a secret. My chest still felt warm. Like that dream had stitched something in me I didn’t know was broken.

I stood, stretched, and started getting ready.
Today felt different.

And I didn’t want to waste it.

I took a quick shower, hotter than usual, letting the steam rise around me like fog in a dream I hadn't quite woken from. The tiles burned under my feet, the heat crawling over my skin like something trying to purify me. I let it. I stood there longer than I needed to, water trailing down my face, my shoulders, dripping from my chin like something sacred was being washed away.