Chapter 1
Darkness spread around me endlessly and I couldn’t remember how I got here. I couldn’t even remember why I was standing in the middle of an empty street alone in the middle of nowhere. The air was cold. A little too cold. There was only the light of a street light and nothing else. Then at the other side of the road, I saw him. A boy. He stood there in the darkness barely visible. I couldn’t see him clearly but I was supposed to know him because my heart ached after seeing him even if I couldn’t see him clearly. Then I saw it, something like a red thread in his hand and it was stretched across the road and was coming towards me. I looked down towards my finger and it was tied around my little finger. I instinctively moved toward him and the moment I took the first step, he lifted his head.
“Wait”, he said.
I froze. His voice sounded broken. Like he was afraid. Like he knew me and something happened to him.
“Don’t come any closer”.
I wanted to ask him who he was. Why he looked so familiar. Why my heart ached every time I looked at him. But I couldn’t move toward him and before I could say anything, the red thread around my finger suddenly started to tighten. The world around me started to disappear.
“Wait”, I called out.
The boy reached toward me and before he could reach me, I woke up.
I opened my eyes to the familiar ceiling of my room and then I felt something wet on my face. I touched my cheek and that’s when I realized that they were tears and that my heart was aching. I stayed on the bed for a few more minutes and then got up and wiped my face with the back of my hand. It was the same dream. The dream I have been having for the past few days, the same boy, the same place but this is the first time I woke up with tears. The rest of the days it was just a heart ache. It’s like I know this boy but I can’t remember him. Every time I tired, to remember him nothing came to my mind. And every time I walked towards him in the dream, the red thread tightened around my finger and I woke up.
I looked at the clock and my stomach dropped. It was 7:15 in the morning and I have a class at 8:00. The mysterious dream decided to make me late. I got out the bed and rushed towards the bathroom. After changing and grabbing a packet of cookies, I rushed out of the house and hailed a taxi. I ate the cookies in the taxi. During the whole ride to the university, I couldn’t stop thinking about the dream. The boy. Who he was and why I couldn’t remember him?
I reached the university a few minutes before my class. ST. Aurelia University stood at the edge of the city. Something untouched by time. The main building was made of pale stone, its tall arched windows stretching toward the cloudy sky. Ivy climbed across parts of the old walls, curling around balconies and carved columns that had already been there for a decade. A wide courtyard sat at the center of the campus, surrounded by smaller buildings connected by stone pathways. Despite being an old university, St. Aurelia doesn’t feel abandoned. Students filled the pathways every morning, rushing between classes with coffee cups in their hands and backpacks hanging from their shoulders. I slowed down for a moment, looking up at the towering clock above the main entrance. It was beautiful and intimidating. Somehow, even after two weeks, I still felt like I didn’t completely belong there. Then I looked at the time. I was late.
I rushed through the corridors and after 15 minutes I reached the lecture hall. I opened the door and apologized to the professor for being late and took a seat in the back of the class. That was the only seat available. I was wearing an oversized light grey sweater with dark blue jeans and white sneakers. My hair was in a messy bun and I was wearing a thin silver necklace and a silver ring. The class was for Introduction to Investigative Journalism and I couldn’t focus on any word that the professor was saying. I couldn’t get that dream out of my head and was still thinking about it. I still can’t remember who he was. Maybe, I knew him before my accident 2 years ago but I don’t know. After the lecture ended, I put my books in the bag and went to the cafeteria. I was starving since I only had a pack of biscuit for breakfast this morning. St. Aurelia has great food. I got myself a sand which, a cup of coffee and then sat down on the table next to the window at the end of the cafeteria and took out the novel I was reading and started reading while eating. My next class is in 2 hours and I don’t have any friends not since my accident two years ago.
After eating lunch, I decided to go to the library to read some more pages and then study some material before my next class. The library is the most beautiful place on campus. Unlike the rest of the campus, it was always quiet. The building stood behind the main courtyard, hidden slightly between two older academic buildings. Tall arched windows covered the walls, allowing the pale morning light to fall across rows of wooden tables. Bookshelves stretched from floor to ceiling. I had only been there a few times since the semester started, but something about this place felt familiar and comforting. Like I had been there before I was even a student at St. Aurelia. I tightened my grip on the strap of my bag and walked towards the stairs. My next class is about Visual storytelling and Photojournalism. I had chosen it as an elective because Professor Bennet had promised That journalism wasn’t just about writing stories. Sometimes, he said, photographs told the truth before words could. At that time, I thought it sounded interesting but now I don’t. I walked between the bookshelves searching for somewhere quiet to sit. Then I stopped. Someone was standing at the end of the aisle. A boy his back was facing me. For some reason, my chest tightened.
He wore a dark jacket, one hand resting against the shelf beside him. I couldn’t see his face. But suddenly my mind went back to the dream. The boy, the dark street, the red thread. My fingers turned cold. The boy slowly turned around and this time I could see him. It was him. I knew it.
