Kael Arven woke up crying.
The tears weren't loud or desperate. Just quiet streaks trailing down the sides of his face as if his body remembered something his mind hadn't caught up to yet. The ceiling fan hummed softly above him, casting slow-turning shadows against the wall. For a moment, he lay still in bed, breathing, blinking at the ceiling like it might offer answers.
But it didn't. It never did.
He sat up slowly, wiping his face with the sleeve of his hoodie. There was a hollowness in his chest, a cold residue left by a dream he couldn't recall. He touched his cheeks. Still damp. Still real.
Kael glanced at his alarm clock. 6:04 AM. School started in a few hours. He could lie down again, try to claw his way back into the dream. But what good would that do? He never remembered the important ones anyway—just the feeling afterward. A lingering sense of loss, of something just beyond the edge of memory.
His phone buzzed on the nightstand. A notification. Probably nothing important.
He ignored it.
---
Outside, the morning air was grey and heavy. The sky hadn't decided whether to rain yet. It just hung there, a thick, unmoving mass of clouds draped over the town like a weighted blanket. Kael walked to school with his hood up, earbuds in. No music played. He just liked the silence they gave him.
He walked the same path he always did: down Crescent Avenue, past the old bookshop with the faded awning, and over the small bridge that crossed a quiet stream. Sometimes he'd stop and watch the water flow, see if any fish darted under the stones. Not today.
Today, something about the world felt slightly off.
Like the gravity was different.
Like he wasn't fully here.
---
"Kael! Wait up!"
He turned.
Mina Aoki was jogging to catch up, her schoolbag bouncing against her side. She always wore that same blue ribbon in her hair whenever it was cloudy. Said it was her lucky charm against bad days.
"You looked totally spaced out," she said when she caught up, slightly out of breath. "Didn't even hear me, huh?"
Kael offered her a small smile. "Sorry. Thinking too loud again."
She fell into step beside him. "You've been like this all week. And last week too, actually. You okay?"
He hesitated.
Should he tell her about the dreams? The waking up in tears? The strange sense of déjà vu that shadowed everything?
"Just tired," he said instead.
Mina gave him a look that said she didn't believe it. But she didn't push. That was one of the things he liked about her. She noticed things. But she never forced them out.
---
Classes passed in a blur. Kael stared out the window most of the day, watching the clouds shift but never break. His notebook remained mostly empty. Words didn't come easily when you felt like a ghost wearing someone else's skin.
During lunch, he sat under the tree behind the gymnasium. It was his spot. No one else came there. The quiet was comforting.
He ate slowly, mind still drifting. That face from the dream—he hadn't seen it clearly, but something about it… the shape of the eyes? The silver hair? The way it looked at him like he was someone important?
*"You matter here."*
The voice flickered in his mind, uninvited. Was that something she'd said? Or something he wanted to believe?
---
It was evening when the rain finally came.
Kael didn't bother with an umbrella. The soft patter on his shoulders felt nice, like a hand pressing gently against his back. He walked slower than usual, letting the water soak into his uniform. His thoughts wandered.
*What if dreams were lives you lived somewhere else? What if every time you fell asleep, you were just waking up in another world?*
He liked that idea.
He was halfway across the park when he saw **her**.
Under a flickering streetlamp. Barefoot. Wearing a white dress that shimmered faintly in the rain.
She didn't move. She just stood there, watching him.
And Kael's heart stopped.
Because he knew her.
Not from school. Not from the neighborhood. Not from any place that made sense.
From somewhere deeper.
Somewhere *older*.
She had silver hair, damp and clinging to her cheeks, and eyes the color of fading violets at dusk. She looked exactly like the girl in his dream—the one he couldn't remember, but always felt.
He took a step toward her.
"Lira…?" he whispered.
But before he could take another step, the light blinked out—just for a second.
And she was gone.
The rain kept falling.
Kael stood there for a long moment, staring at the empty space beneath the streetlamp.
Eventually, he walked home.
---
That night, he dreamed again.
He stood in a city made of mirrors. The buildings shimmered like liquid glass. Every reflection showed something different—a younger Kael, a laughing Mina, a sky on fire, a version of himself wearing armor he'd never seen.
And in the middle of it all was **Lira**.
This time, he was sure.
She turned to him slowly. Her white dress fluttered despite the still air. Her bare feet made no sound on the glass.
"You came back," she said.
Kael opened his mouth. No words came.
He reached for her hand.
Their fingers touched.
And then—
The sky cracked.
A thunderous sound split the dream.
The ground shuddered.
And the city of mirrors shattered around them.
Kael screamed her name as the shards tore the world apart—
---
He woke up gasping.
His chest rose and fell rapidly, hands clutching the bedsheet.
Then he noticed it.
His left hand was wet.
Not sweaty.
*Wet.*
He sat up and opened his palm.
There, resting in the center, was a single drop of water.
Still warm.
Still real.