The nightmares didn't come that night.
Not like before.
No screaming mirrors.No echoing hallways.No shadow versions of myself dragging me back into that place.
But sleep didn't come easy either.
My body rested.
My mind… processed.
A slow, painful digestion of everything I had locked away.
In the morning, I made coffee.
Black.
No sugar.
No cream.
The way I used to drink it—before I tried to forget who I was.
The sunlight hit differently now. Softer. Warmer.
I sat by the window, notebook in hand, and started writing.
Every memory.
Good.Bad.Ugly.Wretched.
I wasn't trying to exorcise them anymore.
I was documenting them.
Owning them.
Day by day, I rebuilt myself.
I reached out to people I had ghosted.
Apologized.
Some responded with warmth.
Some didn't respond at all.
But that was okay.
I didn't expect forgiveness from others until I fully gave it to myself.
It wasn't until the third week that I passed by the old building again.
By accident, or maybe fate.
There it was.
Still boarded up.
Still abandoned.
But I stopped anyway.
Just… stared at it.
It didn't seem threatening now.
It just looked tired.
Like something that had lived too long and held too much.
The chain-link fence rattled in the wind.
Then stopped.
No wind.
Still rattling.
I stepped closer.
The rattling grew louder.
And then—a whisper.
Low.
Barely audible.
"Elias."
I froze.
Not fear.
Recognition.
The voice was… me.
One of me.
Or all of me.
I shouldn't have gone in.
But I did.
I climbed the fence.
Slipped through a gap in the boards.
Inside: darkness.
Dust.
Decay.
The furniture was gone.Walls stripped.No sign of the other versions.No scrolls.No contracts.
But the essence still lingered.
That psychic imprint. That hum beneath the silence.
Like the building itself had a memory now.
I walked down the hallway to 0B.
The door stood open.
Inside, the room was… normal.
Unremarkable.
Peeling wallpaper.
Broken mirror.
Cracked tile.
Yet my pulse quickened.
I stepped inside.
And immediately—
I remembered everything again.
Like a dam breaking.
All the pain. All the screams. All the other me's.
They flooded my chest like cold water.
But I didn't run.
I stood there.
Faced it.
From the mirror, a figure emerged.
Not hostile.
Not vengeful.
Just… waiting.
It looked like me.
But softer.
Younger.
The version that had signed the original contract.
"You left," he said.
I nodded.
"I had to."
"But we're still here."
He reached out—not to grab me.To offer me something.
A single item.
A key.
I took it.
It was small, old, heavy.
Worn down from use.
But there was no lock in sight.
"What's it for?" I asked.
He stepped back into the mirror.
"You'll know when it's time."
Then he was gone.
I left the building.
Didn't look back.
Back home, I placed the key on my desk.
Stared at it for hours.
Something about it pulsed with unfinished business.
But I also knew: I couldn't go back in again.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
That night, I dreamed.
But it wasn't a nightmare.
It was… a memory.
One I hadn't recovered until now.
I was young.
Six, maybe seven.
Sitting in my parents' kitchen, holding a key.
Same shape. Same weight.
My brother sat beside me.
He whispered:
"This is the key to your future, Elias. Just don't forget who you are when you use it."
I had laughed back then.
A child's imagination.
Now, I wasn't laughing.
Because somehow…
That moment was real.
And the key had returned to me at the right time.
When I woke up, the key was gone.
In its place:
A door.
Not in my apartment.
Not in the hallway.
Inside me.
A door I had never noticed before.
Waiting.
Not demanding.
Not threatening.
Just… ready.