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┏━━━━━ CHAPTER SIX ━━━━━┓ ★゜・。。・゜゜・an unexpected reunion ──── Chicago Rhee
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❝ And you've just gotta keep on keeping on Gotta keep on going Looking straight out on the road Can't worry 'bout what's behind you Or what's coming for you further up the road ❞ — my silver lining, first aid kit
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PRESENT DAY
THERE WAS NO GUARANTEE THAT WE COULD PREDICT EVERY OUTCOME OF OUR LIFE. We could think of fifty outcomes to one scenario and yet there's still a trillion more possibilities right around the corner. Every step we took, every decision we made triggered a whole colossal event that fragmented into even more. We only got to explore one of these stories and that was why I believe so many people harbor on their past lives. Knowing that we both designed our destiny and had no control created a whirlwind of anxiety. In which path do we die prematurely and in which one do we live 90 years? How much was fate and how much was crafted by our own hand?
I believe in dreams we get to see the different versions of ourselves. Worlds we could never imagine leak into our subconscious through a shared mind, connecting us to so much more than ourselves. Perhaps this was where the idea of deja vu came from. We became convinced we lived through an experience before because another version of ourselves turned left when we turned right. And perhaps the reason we hardly remembered our dreams was because our minds were not strong enough to fully immerse into this vast universe of possibilities. That was why dreaming was always far more indulging than it should've been, knowing that for some split second I could live a totally different life. I could only imagine the phenomenons we could've explored and explained had we opened ourselves up to this idea.
There was a world where the apocalypse never happened. Where I was not familiarized with the creaking of my heart. Where my spirit hadn't been broken and put back together with some tacky glue. Where I had not lost friends and seen far more death than my poor soul could handle. Where my dreams were once an escape, there now lived a battlefield. Sometimes I was released from this pain, sometimes I would wake in a flurry of cold sweat.
Sometimes the universe decided that reality could be kind in the midst of suffering and chaos.
I awakened into the world feeling like a thousand weights were pressing down onto my chest, releasing the air from my lungs. My eyes opened slowly, my vision hazy at first before I began to make out the dull gray roof above me. My left-hand fingers danced along what I came to realize was a stiff yet somehow comforting blanket. My body was supported by a thin mattress, yet anything in my book was better than the forest floor.
