Los Angeles — 2020
The rain had been falling for hours, pounding the cracked windows of Ethan Hale's apartment like impatient fingers urging him to wake up, face the truth, and stop pretending everything was fine. But Ethan didn't move. He sat motionless on the edge of his bed, elbows on knees, fingers interlocked as if in prayer, though he knew no god was listening.
His phone buzzed again, lighting up the room with a cold glow.
Another message. Another rejection.
He didn't open it. He didn't have to.
He knew exactly what it said.
"Thank you for your audition, but—"
"We've decided to move in another direction—"
"We're pursuing a different type—"
"We're going with someone younger—"
He had memorised the rhythm of failure.
It was the only rhythm left in his life.
The apartment around him was a monument to dreams that had faded quietly, one by one. Old scripts with sticky notes attached. Headshots that had once felt full of promise. A bookshelf cluttered with acting books, half-read, marked with desperate underlines. Posters from films he'd loved — films he had never come close to being part of. The Great Gatsby, The Departed, The Social Network, Birdman. He'd once stared at those posters as if they were maps to the life he wanted.
Now they felt like taunts.
He ran a hand through his thinning hair, feeling the rough strands tug between his fingers. When had he started going grey? When had his skin gotten so dull? When had the bright-eyed young man who moved to Los Angeles become this… exhausted, worn-out version of himself?
The rain grew louder. It sounded like applause he would never hear.
Ethan stood slowly, joints popping, and walked to the bathroom. The fluorescent light flickered before humming to life. He caught his reflection and winced.
"Jesus," he whispered.
The man in the mirror was ten pounds underweight, dark circles carved under his eyes like bruises. His once-strong jawline had softened. His eyes — those eyes that had once held entire worlds inside them — looked hollow.
"How did you get here?" he whispered to his reflection.
The mirror didn't answer.
He wasn't sure he wanted it to.
He splashed water on his face, but it did nothing to wash away the heaviness suffocating him. Not tonight. Not anymore.
His gaze drifted to the pill bottle on the counter — just sleeping meds, nothing dangerous, but in the hollow quiet of the night, everything felt dangerous. He wasn't suicidal. Not exactly. But he was… tired. Bone-deep tired. Tired of trying. Tired of failing. Tired of being reminded, repeatedly and mercilessly, that he wasn't wanted.
The industry had chewed him up quietly, without drama, without scandal — simply by forgetting he existed.
He returned to the bedroom. The rain softened to a drizzle, tapping the window lightly, almost tenderly. The city lights outside blurred into streaks of gold and blue.
The phone buzzed again.
He ignored it.
Instead, he looked toward the corner of the room where a dusty shoebox sat half-buried under laundry. He hesitated only a moment before pulling it free. Inside was something he hadn't touched in years — a photo of him at eighteen, standing in front of a small community theatre, holding his first acting certificate. His grin was so wide it almost hurt to look at.
Behind the photo was a note he had written to himself:
"Don't forget why you started.
Be brave enough to live the life you want."
Ethan laughed weakly and let the photo fall to the floor.
"Yeah," he said aloud to the empty room. "You tried, kid. I tried too. It just didn't work out."
He sat on the edge of the bed again. The bed groaned softly, as tired as he was. His fingers twisted the fabric of his jeans, knuckles whitening. He pressed his palms into his eyes, trying to hold back the pressure building behind them.
He couldn't.
For the first time in years, Ethan let himself break.
Silently at first, just a tremble in his breath. Then a ragged inhale. Then a sob. It tore through him like a dam collapsing. He pressed his hands to his face and cried — not the clean cinematic kind, but the ugly, shaking, desperate kind. The kind where the pain is too old to name. Where regret becomes a living thing inside you.
He cried for the roles he never got.
The friends he pushed away.
The relationships that fell apart.
The voice inside him he had ignored until it turned against him.
He cried because he knew the truth:
He wasn't going to make it.
At thirty-eight, with no agent, no savings, no momentum, no reputation — Hollywood had already closed the doors. He was still knocking because he didn't know what else to do.
When the tears finally slowed, Ethan felt hollow, emptied out. He fell back onto the mattress, staring up at the ceiling.
"I just… wish I could start over," he whispered.
His voice was so small it barely reached the air.
"I'd do it right this time. I'd be better. I'd… I'd make something of myself. I don't want this to be all I ever was."
Lightning flashed outside, illuminating the room in white. Thunder cracked a moment later, shaking the walls. The storm seemed furious, as if the sky itself was responding to his plea.
Ethan rubbed his forehead. The exhaustion that flooded him felt deeper than sleep. Deeper than anything he had felt before. He closed his eyes, just for a moment.
"I don't want it to end like this," he murmured.
"Please… just one more chance."
His chest grew heavy, breaths slowing.
A strange warmth spread through his limbs.
He didn't fight it.
He felt the world begin to slip away.
His last thought before darkness claimed him was a whisper, half-prayer, half-desperation:
"Let me live again."
And then —
Everything vanished.
The rain faded first.
Then the lights outside the window.
Then the heaviness in his chest.
Then the apartment.
Then the city.
Then time.
Silence swallowed him whole.
What Ethan didn't know — not yet — is that the universe had been listening.
And sometimes, rarely, impossibly, painfully, beautifully…
It answers.
Even broken men.
Even failed men.
Even forgotten men.
And Ethan Hale was about to wake up in a world he had already lived —
but never truly lived at all.
Ethan sat at the edge of the mattress, the springs creaking under his weight, staring at the faint glow of the city spilling through the blinds. Los Angeles looked different at night depending on who you were. For dreamers, it shimmered. For the broken, it flickered like a failing lightbulb.
Tonight, it flickered.
He rubbed his temples, trying to dull the pounding ache behind his eyes. Maybe it was exhaustion. Maybe defeat. Maybe the emotional hangover of realising that the last twenty years had slipped through his fingers like sand, and he hadn't noticed until it was too late.
His phone buzzed again.
Another message.
Another rejection.
Another reminder he was invisible in the very world he sacrificed everything for.
He didn't look at it. Instead, he lay back on the mattress and exhaled sharply, a sound that came from somewhere deep, somewhere hollow.
His apartment felt smaller tonight — a cramped studio with peeling paint, mismatched curtains, and a patch of water damage near the ceiling that he had promised himself he would fix two years ago. Life had a way of shrinking around him, closing in like a tightening fist.
He turned his face toward the ceiling.
"What am I doing?" he whispered.
The words didn't echo. They barely reached the air.
Acting had once been magic. The first time he had stood on a stage in a community theatre, nerves jittering like live wires, he felt something awaken inside him. That spark had kept him going through unpaid gigs, humiliating auditions, and endless "We went another direction."
But sparks died.
And his had been extinguished long ago — he was just too stubborn to admit it.
He sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, fingers tangled in his hair. His breath shook. Not a panic attack. Not quite. But close.
A worn binder on the floor caught his attention. His old acting journal — filled with notes, dreams, goals, and quotes that used to inspire him. He reached down and picked it up.
The first page had a list titled:
"Things I Will Achieve by 2020"
He read it with a bitter laugh.
Be in a studio film
Become a respected supporting actor
Get nominated for an Oscar
Build a circle of trusted friends
Find love
Make my parents proud
Be someone worth remembering
He closed the binder before the ache in his chest could twist any deeper.
A gust of wind slammed against the window, making it rattle. Outside, thunder cracked across the sky — so sudden, so loud that the lamp on his nightstand flickered.
It never rained like this in LA.
He stood and walked to the window. Rain streaked down the glass like silver threads, each droplet reflecting small, distorted lights from the street. Cars hissed by on the wet pavement. Far away, sirens wailed.
The city was restless.
Much like him.
A bolt of lightning split the sky, illuminating his reflection in the glass. He hardly recognized himself. The man staring back was tired. Worn. The kind of tired that wasn't just physical — it was the kind etched into bones and spirit.
"I used to believe…" he whispered, finishing the sentence in his mind:
…that I'd be someone by now.
His hands trembled slightly. He placed them flat against the window, feeling the faint vibration of thunder rolling across the city.
A sudden, sharp memory hit him — his mother's voice from years ago:
"Ethan, promise me you'll never give up on yourself."
He had. He absolutely had.
Tears burned at the corners of his eyes. He blinked them away, but they returned stronger, overflowing despite his attempts to hold them back. He slid down the wall, sitting on the floor with his back against the cold plaster.
He didn't sob.
He didn't wail.
He simply… cried. Quietly. Devastatingly.
A lifetime of disappointments finally found their exit.
He pressed the heel of his palm against his eyes and breathed unevenly.
"Please," he whispered again, voice cracking. "Please… I just want another chance. I don't want this to be everything."
The room felt colder. The storm outside intensified, the thunder rumbling like distant explosions. He wiped his face with his sleeve, feeling the exhaustion settle heavily into his limbs.
He crawled back onto the bed — not because he wanted to sleep, but because he didn't know what else to do. His heart felt hollow. His mind felt crowded. His soul felt bruised.
Lightning flashed again, and for a moment the entire room lit up in stark, white brilliance — the posters, the old furniture, the broken dreams scattered like debris.
Then darkness reclaimed everything.
Ethan exhaled shakily, sinking into the pillow, the fabric cool against his cheek. He stared at the ceiling one last time, eyes half-lidded.
"If I could just… start over," he murmured. "I'd get it right. This time, I'd get it right."
His breath slowed.
His eyes fluttered.
The storm roared outside.
Something deep within him — something he had buried — made one final plea to the universe.
He didn't expect an answer.
But as sleep finally overtook him, as the stormlight flickered across his closed eyelids, the familiar world around him began to dissolve…
…and fate began to rewrite itself.