Soul Path

Chapter 10

The room glows a bright beige color, and to contrast, it has a black-dyed bed in the right corner of the room, a long cabinet extending from the door to the left wall, while to the right of the bed, a large desk sits with stacks of very well-kept books on top, and next to that, a table lined with sculptures and paintings, while the floor is made of hardwood.

After taking in the surroundings, you take a closer look at the details.

The walls are lined with paintings and pictures of what seems to be a joyful family.

Your train of thought is interrupted when you hear the door squeak open.

Looking back, you see a young boy, who you can guess is Harry, when he was around 8 years old.

He enters the room, slamming the door behind him and dropping a backpack on his bed.

"ugh, today was so hard; I could barely get rid of those people, and only four of my paintings were bought." He groans as he rubs his face in frustration.

He is interrupted, like you, by the door opening.

The person who opened it peaks their head through the crack, and you see she's almost a spitting image of Harry. Up to the matching blonde hair, you take a wild guess that this is his mom.

"Hi, honey! How are you? Did the art showcase go well?" She says it in a jolly voice.

"It didn't; I only sold 4 paintings and 1 sculpture."

"Aww, honey, that's okay. I made your favourite meal, meat pudding!" She says this as her hand pushes a pie onto the shelf next to the door.

Harry sits up on the bed, looks over at her, and, in an angry voice, says, "Why? Did you not believe in me!? You never supported me! You're the worst!."

The mother flinches slightly and says, "Please, honey, I tried my best."

Harry simply shakes his head violently before shouting back, "Get out of my room, you horrible women!"

The mother's head drops, she gives the plate a little push on the nightstand, and she leaves the room, slowly shutting the door behind her.

As he lays in bed with his head in his pillow, the door once again opens, and a big, burly, hairy man with blonde hair walks through it.

"hey, sport! I heard you gave your mom a hard time, are you okay?" He says in almost sympathetic voice

"She made my favourite dish because she thought I wouldn't succeed and she wanted to cheer me up." Harry says this as he looks back at his father.

"Listen, a favourite meal could have worked in both situations; if the sale went well, it would have been a nice gift, but if it went well,"

Harry pauses for a moment, looking down at his pillow before gazing back up. "That is true; I didn't mean to be so mean."

At that moment, the door opens again, and in steps the mother with teary eyes.

"Oh mom," his mom doesn't even have time to react as he runs to hug her.

She's shocked at first, but almost immediately returns the hug in full as the father joins them.

They seem like the perfect family—too perfect.

You suddenly dragged yourself through a wormhole into a new memory, except...

Except it feels the same, like you haven't gone back in time or forward.

Taking in your surroundings this time, you're in a cramped room not even big enough to fully stretch your arms out horizontally.

In stark contrast, this room doesn't even have the bare minimum; there's one dinky old bed in the corner that somehow hasn't fallen apart from just looking at it, and the only light comes from a lamp smaller than your hand, probably 2× older than you too.