Chapter 1
Chapter 1: The Girl Who Draws Strangers
The city square was busy like always. People were walking in every direction, some rushing, some just passing time. Vendors were calling out their prices, children were running around the fountain, and everything blended into a constant noise that most people didn’t even notice anymore.
Elina sat in her usual spot near the fountain with her sketchbook resting on her lap. A small board beside her showed she did portraits for anyone who wanted one. Most people passed by without stopping, but she didn’t mind. She wasn’t here for attention. She was here because she needed to draw.
Sometimes she would sit for hours without a single customer, just watching faces pass by. Each face felt like a story she could almost understand but never fully reach.
A man finally stopped in front of her. He looked around, slightly unsure, as if he wasn’t used to being in situations like this.
“So you just draw people?” he asked, sitting down slowly.
Elina didn’t look up immediately. She adjusted her pencil and nodded once. “Yes.”
The man glanced at the sketchbook. “How long does it take?”
“Depends on the face.”
That made him smile a little, though he still looked nervous. He leaned back in the chair while she started working.
At first, it was normal. Just lines forming shape, shape turning into expression. Elina had done this hundreds of times before, so her hand moved automatically. She didn’t need to think too much about it.
But after a few minutes, something shifted.
It started as a small pressure behind her eyes. Nothing new. She had learned to ignore it over time. She kept drawing, thinking it would pass like it always did.
It didn’t.
Instead, the feeling grew stronger, like something inside her was trying to push through.
She slowed her pencil slightly.
The man noticed. “Everything okay?”
Elina nodded quickly. “Yes. Just stay still.”
But her focus was already breaking.
The square around her began to feel distant. The sounds didn’t disappear, but they felt far away, like she was hearing them from underwater. Her grip tightened on the pencil as she tried to finish the outline of his face.
For a moment, she even considered stopping—but she didn’t. She never did.
And then it happened.
A memory.
But not hers.
It hit her suddenly, like stepping into cold water without warning.
She was no longer sitting in the square.
There was smoke everywhere. A building—no, something like a facility—was burning. Alarms were going off in the background, mixed with shouting voices. The air felt heavy, almost impossible to breathe.
And in the middle of it all, she saw the man she had been drawing.
He wasn’t sitting anymore. He was standing, frozen, as if he didn’t know where to go. Fear was clear on his face, but there was something else too—something deeper, like guilt.
Elina tried to step back in shock, but her body didn’t respond properly. It felt like she was inside someone else’s life.
Then she noticed something else.
A girl standing a few steps away from him.
The girl’s face wasn’t fully clear, but something about her made Elina’s chest tighten. It wasn’t recognition in the normal sense. It was deeper than that, like seeing something familiar that shouldn’t exist.
The building cracked loudly. Part of the ceiling fell. Everything became chaotic.
The man reached out his hand toward the girl.
But Elina couldn’t see what happened next clearly.
Because suddenly—
A voice pulled her back.
“Elina?”
She gasped sharply.
The square came rushing back all at once. Noise, movement, light—everything hit her at the same time. She almost lost balance and placed her hand on the table to steady herself.
Her heart was beating faster than normal now, like it couldn’t decide whether she was safe or not.
The man in front of her stood up slightly. “Are you alright?”
Elina blinked a few times, trying to understand what had just happened. Her breath was uneven, and her fingers were still shaking slightly.
“I…” she started, then stopped.
Her eyes fell on the sketch.
The face she had drawn now felt different. Not just ink on paper anymore. Something deeper. Something that didn’t feel like it belonged in her world.
“I’m fine,” she finally said, though her voice didn’t sound fully convinced even to her.
The man studied her for a second, then adjusted his coat. “If you’re done, I should go.”
Elina nodded slowly without looking at him.
He hesitated for a moment, like he wanted to say something else, but in the end he just turned away.
And left.
Elina stayed sitting there for a long time after he was gone.
The square continued moving like nothing had happened. People walked past her, unaware of what had just broken inside her in silence.
She looked down at the sketch again.
Her voice came out barely above a whisper.
“I didn’t imagine that…”
And for the first time, she felt something she couldn’t explain.
Like the world she was living in… was only half real.
