I woke up unable to move.

  “Arghhh!” I can’t move? I felt confused. No matter how drunk I was, how severe could a hangover be? I felt hot, and I couldn’t even lift a finger. If this place was covered in darkness, maybe I really did die and came to hell.

  At first, I thought I was still falling.

  My body felt weightless, yet unbearably heavy. My arms wouldn’t respond. My legs felt distant, like they belonged to someone else. My vision was blurred, the ceiling above me shifting in and out of focus.

  White.

  “Is the ceiling white?” I muttered, trying to focus my eyes.

  “No… it’s not white,” I replied to myself. As I tried to focus, my headache intensified. My vision began fading.

  Stained near the corners.

  I blinked slowly.

  This wasn’t a hospital ceiling. “Is the hospital really this shabby right now?” I tried to piece things together. The only explanation I could think of was that I survived and was currently hospitalized.

  “Brier?”

  Someone called my name. The voice was familiar. Soft, but filled with worry.

  My mother.

  Too close.

  Too young.

  Seeing her in good health eased my heart for a moment. Then guilt began to consume me. Maybe it was the fever. Maybe it was weakness. My tears started to fall.

  I tried to turn my head but couldn’t. Panic rose in my throat.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. My heart ached. I wanted to hug her, but I couldn’t move.

  The words came out dry and cracked.

  “I’m sorry… I’m sorry…”

  I tried to shout, but that was all the strength I had. I could only say it faintly. I hoped they understood.

  For what, I wasn’t sure.

  For falling.

  For drinking.

  For not calling.

  For all the things I failed to do.

  Hands touched my forehead.

  “He’s burning,” my mother said, her voice trembling.

  I could feel the heat consuming me. Every time I tried to move, the pain worsened.

  After a few seconds, I gathered a little strength.

  I forced my eyes open wider.

  The room was small.

  A wooden cabinet I recognized.

  A curtain I hadn’t seen in years.

  A desk near the window with chipped paint.

  This was my old room.

  No.

  That wasn’t possible.

  I wanted Sebas to explain everything, but then I suddenly remembered.

  The balcony flashed in my mind the cold railing, the sudden pressure at my back.

  Someone had pushed me.

  Who?

  “I know I’m not perfect,” I thought. “But I always avoided hurting others. So why?”

  My thoughts spiraled. My parents looked more worried. My face must have turned pale.

  But I was drunk.

  Maybe I leaned too far.

  Maybe someone stumbled.

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  Maybe I imagined it.

  “Arghhh… my head!” I screamed in my mind, but my body was too weak to produce sound. The fever tightened around my skull.

  The ceiling warped again.

  For a moment, I saw stage lights above me. I heard applause blending with my mother calling my name.

  I tried to sit up.

  My body refused.

  Darkness swallowed me.

  When I woke up the second time, the air felt thicker.

  “What should we do?” I heard voices outside. My mind still wasn’t functioning properly.

  My throat burned. My muscles ached as if I had run for miles.

  But thank God, my fingers moved. That meant my injuries from the fall weren’t fatal.

  Then something shocked me.

  When I tilted my head to look around, everything felt wrong.

  They looked smaller.

  Thinner.

  Wrong.

  I stared at my hand for a long time.

  “No, no, no… what happened?”

  This isn’t real.

  A dream.

  A final hallucination before death.

  “Dear Lord… I’ve been a good person. Please give me a chance to thank everyone who was good to me.”

  No words came out.

  I started to panic.

  That would explain the room.

  “I’m dead.”

  Heaven.

  That’s what I thought for a few minutes.

  But nothing changed.

  I tried to calm myself. It took hours.

  Maybe I really was in the hospital.

  But my body ached too much. I let the pain consume me until I grew used to it.

  That would explain my parents’ voices arguing in hushed tones.

  “We should bring him,” my mother said, panic clear in her voice.

  “We’ll see tomorrow,” my father replied quietly.

  Silence followed.

  I closed my eyes and tried to calm myself.

  If this was heaven, it was strangely ordinary.

  The paint was uneven. The electric fan hummed inconsistently. I could hear a neighbor’s television through thin walls.

  Heaven should be brighter.

  But this felt… peaceful.

  Too peaceful.

  “I survived,” I murmured.

  My voice sounded young.

  The fever rose again.

  Fragments returned.

  The railing.

  The shove.

  The empty air.

  I dismissed it.

  I had been drunk.

  That had to be it.

  By the third day, my body rebelled.

  “ARGHHHH!” I screamed as pain exploded through me.

  The memory returned without mercy.

  The impact.

  The unnatural angle of my legs.

  The metallic scent of blood.

  My stomach twisted violently. My muscles locked. My back arched against my will.

  I heard my mother scream in panic.

  “What happened? What happened?!”

  My fingers clawed at the sheets as my body convulsed. I couldn’t tell if I was shouting or if it was only in my head.

  The ground rushed toward me again.

  Again.

  Again.

  “Hold him”

  My father’s voice sounded distant.

  The convulsions came in waves. My neck strained painfully. I couldn’t breathe.

  Then everything went black.

  When I opened my eyes, I was being carried.

  The ceiling moved.

  No—it was the sky.

  The afternoon light stabbed my vision.

  My mother was crying openly.

  My father’s jaw was clenched tightly.

  The vehicle smelled of gasoline and dust.

  Every bump sent shockwaves through my body. I tasted iron.

  Hospital.

  I understood that much.

  The rest blurred.

  The next days blended together.

  Voices.

  Needles.

  The steady beeping of machines.

  I drifted between sleep and something heavier.

  Sometimes the IV stand became a balcony railing.

  Sometimes hospital lights turned into stage lights.

  Sometimes applause mixed with the monitor’s rhythm.

  I saw the push again.

  Slower this time.

  A hand.

  Firm.

  Deliberate.

  Not playful.

  Not clumsy.

  But I pushed the thought away.

  I had been drunk.

  Drunk people misremember.

  My mother stayed beside me every day.

  I heard her whisper about fees.

  About installments.

  About waiting before doing more tests.

  My father spoke less.

  He signed papers quietly.

  On the fifth night, I woke up.

  They thought I was asleep.

  My mother counted crumpled bills under dim light.

  My father stared at the floor.

  “I’ll borrow,” he said weakly. “I know someone who can help us.”

  “But that friend of yours has no heart,” my mother replied softly.

  “We have to do this for our son,” my father said.

  She shook her head.

  “We’ll manage.”

  I closed my eyes.

  In my first life, I stood on stages with my name on banners.

  Here, my parents struggled just to keep me alive.

  On the sixth day, the fever weakened.

  The hallucinations stopped.

  The ceiling remained a ceiling.

  The IV stand remained metal.

  The memory remained memory.

  When I woke that morning, my mind was clear.

  No distortion.

  No blending.

  Just reality.

  I turned my head.

  My mother was asleep in a chair.

  My father leaned against the wall.

  They looked smaller than I remembered.

  Younger than the parents I buried.

  Alive.

  I said nothing.

  I only watched.

  And for the first time, I stopped fighting the thought.

  This was not heaven.

  This was not a dream.

  “What day is it?” I whispered, glancing at the calendar.

  I was thirteen.

  And I had returned.

  ------_

  “Finally… no pain. Thank God. I thought I’d die again,” I told myself.

  I had just regained full consciousness after dying once already. To think the pain from my last life could have followed me here — life truly works in mysteries.

  Or maybe death does.

  I don’t know anymore.

  I woke up before my parents.

  The room was pale with early morning light. For a moment, I waited for dizziness. For the ceiling to bend. For the railing to appear where it shouldn’t.

  Nothing moved.

  The air smelled faintly of disinfectant and something warm from the hallway — food being prepared.

  “I really did go back.”

  My body felt light.

  Weak, but steady.

  I flexed my fingers slowly.

  Small.

  Unscarred.

  Alive.

  “But why? And how?”

  A slight headache began to form as the memory of the fall surfaced again. This time, it did not drag me into panic. I watched it from a distance.

  The balcony.

  The night air.

  The hand at my back.

  I stayed still.

  “Who did that?” I asked myself.

  Drunk or not, I knew the difference between losing balance and being pushed.

  The pressure had been firm.

  Decisive.

  I exhaled slowly.

  “I clearly came from someone who had a problem with me.”

  Someone had meant it.

  The realization did not explode inside me.

  It settled.

  Cold.

  Clear.

  I did not know who.

  I did not know why.

  And I would not speak of it.

  Not yet.

  Footsteps approached.

  My mother entered, carrying a small bowl. Steam rose gently from it thin, plain rice porridge.

  “You’re awake,” she said softly, relief passing through her eyes before she tried to hide it. “Try to eat a little.”

  “Thank you,” I replied. My voice was weak, but I felt the hunger clearly.

  She helped me sit up. My muscles trembled from the effort, but I managed.

  She placed the spoon in my hand.

  It shook slightly.

  “Slowly,” she reminded me.

  I nodded.

  The first bite was bland.

  Warm.

  It spread through my chest in a way alcohol never had.

  I swallowed carefully.

  In my first life, I skipped meals without thinking. I filled quiet nights with drinks instead of rest. I told myself I was too busy. Too important. Too composed to need something this simple.

  Another spoonful.

  My vision blurred.

  Not from fever.

  A tear fell before I noticed it.

  It dropped silently into the bowl.

  My mother didn’t see. She was adjusting the blanket at my feet.

  I lowered my head.

  The taste of salt mixed with warmth.

  I remembered my apartment clean, organized, empty.

  I remembered the applause.

  I remembered standing alone on a balcony, thinking I still had time. Thinking rest could wait.

  My chest tightened, but I kept eating.

  No one said anything.

  No one noticed.

  Quietly, without lifting my head, I whispered,

  “I won’t live like before.”

  I bound the words in my heart.

  They were not grand.

  Not a vow to succeed.

  Not a vow to be admired.

  Not even a vow to find the one who pushed me.

  Just this:

  I would not betray myself again.

  I would not silence what I wanted.

  I would not hide behind certainty.

  I would not wait for a perfect time that never came.

  I finished the bowl slowly.

  Later that afternoon, relatives began to visit.

  Neighbors.

  A classmate.

  An aunt I barely remembered.

  They spoke about how frightening it had been.

  How lucky I was.

  How I should rest.

  I sat upright against the pillow.

  I answered calmly.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m better.”

  “Thank you.”

  They saw a recovering boy.

  They did not see the man who had already died once.

  By evening, the room was quiet again.

  I lay back and stared at the ceiling.

  Plain.

  Unmoving.

  Real.

  Six days of confusion.

  And now, rest.

  Not the kind I once imagined.

  But the kind that comes after surviving.

  I closed my eyes.

  This life had begun again.

  And this time

  I would not waste it.