Strings of Fate: The First Loop

CHAPTER 44

-----Betty-----

I was in that dream again.

It always begins in silence.... dense and smothering, like a thick fog that wraps itself around your limbs before you even realize you’re drifting.

There was the boy again. The same boy I never recognized, but always felt like I should. He stood near the flame, still and solemn, his figure outlined in gold and smoke. His features were soft, half-finished, like a memory I never got to keep. The fire flickered in his pupils. He didn’t look afraid. He looked... willing.Then his skin began to shimmer, stretch, and peel. Delicate wings broke free from his back... powdery, trembling, like he was born from pain. A moth. Not a butterfly. Not something beautiful meant for admiration. No, a moth... drawn to what destroys it. Fragile. Misunderstood. Misguided. He didn’t hesitate. He flew straight into the flame. And I watched him burn.

Then there was me. Weightless, my feet lifted from the ground. I rose, as if something unseen was yanking me toward the stars. But the earth refused to let me go. Vines slithered up from the soil, wet, knotted things that felt more like veins than plants. They wrapped around my ankles, coiled around my calves, spiraled over my hips. I tried to scream, but my voice stuck in my throat like a stone. I clawed at the air. At my chest. At the disappearing sky. But the roots only tightened. They dragged me down, inch by inch, heartbeat by heartbeat, until only my neck remained above the surface. My lips were against the soil. I tasted rot, metal, and something sharp like secrets buried long before I arrived.

And then I heard it. The cracking of the tree. The one that used to stand at the center of the field, once green, then golden, then dead. It screamed as it fell, groaning like a wounded animal, its branches ablaze. The fire spread fast. Too fast. Dried petals curled into ash. The wind turned hot and cruel.

It was coming for me. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t cry. Couldn’t fight. I would burn. And maybe, I thought, maybe I was meant to.

But then...

...

...

...I woke up.

My chest heaved. The sheets were tangled around my legs, damp with sweat. I blinked at the ceiling, eyes unfocused. The fan spun overhead, slow and hypnotic, like a pendulum counting something I couldn’t name, something running out. For a moment, I didn’t move. I didn’t want to know what time it was. Didn’t want to see what the world looked like now that I had surfaced from that dream again. But my hand moved anyway. Muscle memory. Hope pretending to be instinct. I reached for my phone on the nightstand. The screen lit up.

No messages. Not even a missed call. No “Sweet dreams.” No “I’m here.” No “I miss you already.” Just the time: 6:48 AM. And the quiet hum of nothing. I stared at the glow like it would morph into his name if I just waited long enough.

It didn’t.

My thumb hovered over the keyboard, hesitating. Then I typed before my heart could stop me:

> Hey, did you get home safe?

Sent.

A small dot spun in the corner of the screen, as if time itself was thinking about answering. Then… nothing.

I waited. Five minutes. Then ten.

Still nothing.

I let the phone fall on my chest. It landed heavier than it should have, like it knew something I didn’t. Like it carried a weight I wasn’t ready to hold. And yet, somewhere in me, I already knew. Something had shifted. Not a break. Not a crash. Just a subtle, almost imperceptible tilt. Like the first moment the air changes before a storm.