≿━━━━༺ 𝐇𝐢𝐬 𝐈𝐧𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐌𝐚𝐝𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 ༻━━━━≿
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The picture was no longer there. I hadn't shifted it. had left it untouched. It should have remained in the book I tucked it in, tucked between the pages like an unknown fossilized material. However, my fingers found nothing in The Picture of Dorian Gray when I turned the pages that morning.
Not a picture. No sign.
The slight, musty smell of decay and old paper. Also, something else. A flowery thing. There is a problem. Jasmine. Like it had been there longer than memory, it clung to the book's spine. I slowly closed it. I left smudges with my fingertips.
It was 5:17 a.m. when the clock on my desk blinked. I hadn't slept. Not at all. As the rain pounded on the mansion roof like an impatient god, I simply drifted in and out of consciousness.
I also had no plans to go to my university today.
Raventon can wait and go fuck itself if possible.
I was unable to. Not with Mr. Malhotra still staring at me like I was the enemy in a war I never enlisted in and the night feeling haunting but peaceful.
The air in my room was still, too still, like it had been sucked out of it. The walls weren't mine. The ceiling felt too low to me.
My skin didn't feel like it belonged. I couldn't stay still. The need to move was strong. Not bearable.
I began to walk back and forth across the room, each time the same, with the cool, steady floor beneath my bare feet. Every few seconds, I looked at the long mirror by the bookshelf, as if it would tell me something.
It seemed like it could change or grow. It didn't. But my eyes were getting darker. Emptier. Like something had been taken away during the night.
Something I forgot I gave.
I found myself back on the floor, sitting cross-legged in front of the silver box.
My fingers hovered over the things inside: an old concert bracelet, a wilted daisy from Zurich, a love note from someone who didn't love me enough, and a bead from a broken rosary.
Everything that used to make me feel alive is now just empty feelings.
Ghosts made of paper.
I saw it then. A picture, peeking out from under the box's base.
With reluctant fingers, I pulled it free. This one wasn't blank. My door was it. The one in my room. captured from the outdoors. from the corridor. I flipped it over. Not a message. No date. Still, I got it. He was present.
Recently.
Now the jasmine was more powerful. denser. alive. Like ivy, it slithered up the walls. I pulled the drapes open. Grey and smeared with the memory of rain, the morning lacked colour. Below, the garden appeared to be holding its breath. I was, too.
Strange stretches of time went by. I remained indoors. locked up. I was unable to face the people outside the room or leave it. I didn't care enough to charge my phone, which was dead on the desk.
If he wanted to reach me, he would. He always did.
The knock came shortly after sunset. Once. Twice. Three times. Gentle, purposeful. Not a servant. Not by chance. I didn't respond. And it didn't happen again.
However, there was just a black silk ribbon on the floor when I opened the door. in a flawless bow. Something moved down the hall as my fingers touched the fabric as I reached for it.
No one.
A flicker.
A shadow.
disappeared before I had a chance to fully register it.
Later, I took a shower without lights. The tiles were chilly. Steam hung heavy in the air. Once more, jasmine—clinging to the mist, curling up in my lungs. I didn't want to look at myself. Then no. Not when I thought someone else might be looking back at me.
When I laid down again, the ceiling blurred overhead. The words slipped out before I could stop them: "Where are you?"
I didn't know who I was talking to. The boy in the memory? The stalker? The ghost of my past? Didn't matter.
My chest tightened like I'd said something forbidden. My window creaked. Curtains shifted without wind. I didn't move. Didn't speak. But I felt it. A breath behind me. Soft. Warm. Close. Real.
I heard the whisper at 3:07 a.m. Not in the space. in my mind. Not my voice, though. His. The boy. "Remember me."
I straightened my posture. My blood froze. I was unable to respond. Still, the tears came. "Remember me," he repeated. This time, closer. Then nothing.
I spent the remainder of the night awake. Because I knew. This wasn't paranoia; it was bone deep. It wasn't insane. He was present. He had been here all along. He wanted me to remember now.
The following morning arrived far too soon. Everything was painted a dull silver by the grey light that filtered through the drapes.
A low, persistent ache throbbed in my head. The same one as previously. I believed I had outrun the same one.
With shaking fingers, I opened the drawer and took out the silver pillbox Sharanya suggested I keep nearby. She said, "If the pressure builds too much, two of these, not more." in a soft but firm voice that I could still hear weeks later.
Whether it was too much didn't matter to me. Whether it was sufficient didn't matter to me. All I wanted was for the firecrackers in my skull to stop blaring and the throbbing pain behind my eyes to stop.
A pair of white pills. Sharp-tipped. Familiar. The bitterness stuck to my tongue like punishment as I winced and dry-swallowed them. I stopped breathing. The world did, too, for a moment.
I knew the memories were still there, though, even as I closed my eyes and leaned back into the pillows. Not really.
Like smoke in the walls, they waited. In the vents, like jasmine. Like a boy I shouldn't have remembered from the outskirts of my childhood.
The silence returned. Not peace, though. I made an attempt to breathe, allowing the pills to relax the sharp edges of my thoughts.
I was afraid I might nod off. I didn't. Rather, I floated—not dreaming, not awake, just somewhere in the middle.
It felt as though you were standing in a fog. I was unable to fully sense my body. It was difficult to distinguish between the floor and the ceiling. Time dragged. I was unaware that my hands were clenching the bedsheet. My throat constricted.
Something was forming once more. behind my skull. A flicker, not a picture. Uncertain. Only warmth. A slight chuckle. My fingers graze mine.
Then there was a new sound—a bell. Not from within the house. from my mind.
Far away. Like a bell from a bicycle decades ago. The piercing ding-ding of memory, that reminded of a ride from childhood. I made an effort to think clearly. However, it slipped. Too supple. Too quickly.
I cracked open my eyes.
There was silence in the room. However, I was certain that I had heard it. Something from the past is attempting to re-enter my thoughts. There's something buried.
I wanted to run after it.
A larger portion—frightened of what I would discover.
As though I could force the thought back in or pull it out completely, my fingers moved to the side of my temple and applied light pressure.
I straightened my posture and stared at the mirror across from me, but the image that reflected back didn't look like me. Not entirely.
My cheekbones were struck incorrectly by the light. For a brief moment, I believed I saw a shadow behind me, but my pupils were blown out and ringing with fatigue. In the mirror, not on the wall.
I turned at once. Nothing.
However, the atmosphere seemed uneasy.
Jasmine once more. And this time, something earthier. damp wood from the rain. Like the interior of an abandoned attic.
I got up and moved in the direction of the mirror. Slowly. I didn't feel in sync with my own reflection. It seemed to move a fraction of a second more slowly than I did. A second late. My heart was pounding as I stared, but I dared not touch the glass.
Then there was a slight sound. Not in my mind.
from the corridor.
scrubbing. Not too loud. Simply... purposeful. like the dragging of fingernails on wood. Or a slow tug across the floor.
My blood froze. My feet did not move.
"No one's there," I muttered, but even I thought it sounded weak.
Then it came to a halt.
Whatever it was, as soon as I recognized it, it stopped.
I moved back toward the bed, away from the door, and away from the mirror.
However, I refrained from reaching for the pillbox this time.
I had to know this time.
even if it caused me pain.
Even if it meant pulling out all the threads that were barely keeping me together in order to remember.
I stared back at the mirror, breathing in tight, steady pulls. It remained motionless. If the shadow had ever existed at all, it was gone. To get back to the numbness, my fingers yearned to close the curtains once more. However, something prevented me from doing so.
I lighted a candle. It flickered strangely.
Then I grabbed the book once more. This time, not Dorian Gray. Another one. A torn and forgotten childhood book from the bottom shelf. I couldn't even recall placing it there.
I took it open.
And there it was.
One more picture.
Not a blank.
Not this time.
A field. A blurred silhouette of two children. A bicycle is in the background. One hand extended. The other reaching
And on the back, in a handwriting that wasn't mine:
"Before the forgetting began."
≿━━━━༺ 𝐇𝐢𝐬 𝐈𝐧𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐌𝐚𝐝𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 ༻━━━━≿
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