I wake slowly. The dream clings to me like a thin mist—soft and fading but impossible to shake.
The waiting room comes back, pale and still, folding itself around me like a shroud.
The chair beneath me creaks as I shift, the fabric rough against my skin. The walls glow faintly under the unblinking light, and the clock hangs above the double doors, its hands frozen in the same stubborn place.
I swallow hard.
The scent of pine and sea is gone. Instead, there is only the sterile air, faintly scented with something like old paper and disinfectant.
My fingers trace the edge of the armrest, searching for something to hold onto—something real.
But there is nothing but silence.
I glance toward the double doors, the cold metal handles gleaming dully.
Beyond them is a world I can't reach—one I fear and long for all at once.
The room is too quiet.
Too empty.
I try to hold on to the warmth of the dream—the laughter, the sun, the promise of that forest just beyond the cottage.
But it slips through my fingers, leaving behind only a hollow ache.
A faint sound breaks the silence—a soft shuffle, distant but growing closer.
I look up and see one of the others in the room, a man sitting near the corner, eyes fixed on the floor.
His presence feels sudden and out of place, like a ripple disturbing still water.
He doesn't speak at first.
Then, his voice comes—a low, hesitant murmur.
"Do you think there's a way out of here?"
The question hangs between us, fragile and desperate.
I want to say yes.
I want to believe that beyond these walls, beyond this endless waiting, there is something else—something warm, something real.
But the silence presses in, heavy and unyielding.
I want to tell him about the cottage, the sea, the forest.
But the words catch in my throat.
Instead, I nod slowly.
"We have to believe there is."
His eyes flicker up to meet mine—uncertain, searching.
The others begin to stir, voices rising in a quiet chorus, each one adding their own fears, hopes, fragments of dreams and memories lost.
Together, we begin to speak of escape—not just from this room, but from the waiting itself.
Plans take shape in the dim light—paths through doors that may not open, steps taken in dreams, courage found in the space between moments.
But beneath it all, I feel the pull of the dream's fading warmth—the cottage, the family, the untouched soil—pulling me back to a place I may never reach.
And still, I hold onto the fragile hope that this waiting will end.
That time will wake.
That I will wake.