I had a dream... a month before I quit my job.
The dazzling sunlight fell on the frozen lake. The transparent, shimmering, round ice film was like the head of an angel crushed and sprinkled with morning star powder.
And then everything came crashing down.
The ice beneath my feet shattered... and I sank...
The more I resisted, the deeper I went ... like something was pulling me in.
It was all so blue...
So quiet...
And,
So peaceful.
I didn't hate it...
But it was suffocating — of course. The kind of pain that comes from not being able to breathe.
My lungs gave out.
I thought I was going to die.. haha...
And then I woke up.
But even after waking... something had changed.
Though the dream had ended.. the suffocation hadn't.
It stayed...
It was like a numb wake-up call for me...in a black-and-white world.
It felt like my emotions, my feelings — my everything — had drowned in that frozen lake.
Darkness crept over me... dragging me down.. the way the lake's something once did.
And with each passing day,
Everything that i felt was magnified —
The faces of people I knew blurred with the rest of the world.
Nothing felt important anymore.
Not the weather.
Not a change in the lunch menu.
Not friends.
Not even family.
Their words couldn't reach me.
But why?
Why this emptiness?
Why the guilt of feeling nothing — not even love — for those I once cared about?
After I quit my job, my mother came to see me a few times.
But I couldn't open the door.
Because I was afraid...
Afraid she'd know.
The fading. The numbness.
Afraid I'd say something that would hurt her.
Because I could no longer think clearly.
I wasn't capable of feeling, of responding the way I used to.
I thought things would get better after quitting job. Thought i just needed a change. Just some time. That maybe i was just burned out and needed a break.
But...
Even when walking down a crowded, buzzing street — I couldn't see their faces.
Everything was loud. Too loud.
Voices, emotions, people — all blurred into a noise I couldn't bear.
I felt like I would lose my mind every time I stepped outside.
Until... I went to that park.
Hoping nature might heal me — like the books used to say.
And then...
I saw him.
A lone man standing with a bird perched on his arm.. as the autumn leaves swung around with gentle wind. Straight out of a fiction...I'd say.
"Leap through time like wind... and wish,"
he said softly, shaking the bird gently from his arm.
His dark-blue hair fluttered in the wind as the bird took flight.
Then he turned, noticed me, and smiled.
I didn't know him.
I'd never seen him before.
But something about him felt familiar.
Strangely familiar.
For the first time in a long while...
I could see someone's face clearly.
His eyes stared into mine — blue eyes, deep as the ocean.
Quiet. Still.
And just as empty as mine.
There was something about him that pulled me in.
He smiled again... like he'd been waiting.
But why?
"Ex...cuse me," I said, hesitantly.
"Is that bird... a pet of yours?"
The bird flew and landed on his shoulder again.
"Oh, this? " he smiled. "...That's right."
"I see... it's... pretty," I mumbled.
I didn't know why I was trying to keep the conversation going.
"Yes."
He looked at me, more intently this time.
"So... do you want to see it up close? "
"..."
"Come here~"
He reached out his hand.
I stepped forward slowly.
Drawn toward the bird — or maybe toward him.
The bird's eyes sparkled like yellow gemstones, its wings unlike any I'd seen.
As I lifted my gaze, my eyes met his.
But nothing happened.
No racing heart.
No skipped beats.
I knew why.
It wasn't romantic attraction.
My heart had already frozen that day in the lake.
I didn't know what this feeling was — this strange sense of familiarity.
All I could do was stare into those hollow, ocean-blue eyes.
Eyes that don't hedonistically seek pleasure... a bright air. The gaze that gives you chills all over. Blue eyes that look straight into mine.
"If you keep staring like this," he said,
"I might blush."
Liar.
to be continued...