At 7:00 a.m., the alarm rang as it always did.
Not too loud, not too soft. The kind of sound that doesn't tear you out of sleep, but reminds you that you don't really have a choice. He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling of his room for a few seconds. The crack in the upper left corner had been there for years. He knew it so well he barely noticed it anymore.
He got up, went to the bathroom, and splashed cold water on his face. The neon light above the mirror flickered for a moment before stabilizing. His movements were automatic, precise. By 7:10, he was already in the kitchen.
Breakfast never changed. Warm milk, dry biscuits, a slice of bread. The television was on, the volume low. The news talked about traffic, finance, a city that moved faster than itself. The images showed crowded streets, lit office buildings, people walking quickly. Everything seemed to work.
He checked the clock on the wall. 7:28.
He put on his jacket, grabbed his backpack, and left the apartment at 7:30, just like every morning.
The city was already awake. Scooters passing too close, packed buses, shop windows reflecting cold white light. He walked to school, always the same route. The bar on the corner with fogged-up windows, the newsstand arranging magazines, the traffic light that never seemed to turn green.
It wasn't the true city center, but it wasn't the outskirts either. It was a transit area, built for movement, not for staying. Modern, functional, without memory.
As he got closer to the school, the traffic thickened.
In front of the entrance, there was the same scene every day.
Large cars. Polished. Expensive.They slowed silently, doors opened, and teenagers his age stepped out. Well dressed, confident, always in groups. They laughed among themselves, spoke quietly. They seemed to belong somewhere else.
Only in his head, he called them the elite group.
It wasn't a real name. No one said it out loud. But everyone knew who they were. There was an unspoken rule among the students: don't talk about them in front of them. Not because they were violent. But because it was better that way.
He entered the school with the others. The sound changed. Voices bounced along the corridors, footsteps echoed on the polished floor. The smell was the same as always: paper, detergent, stale air.
He reached his classroom and sat down.
A moment later, a classmate dropped into the chair beside him.
"Hey.""Hey, Marco."
They talked about a test, about a subject no one had studied enough. The lesson began. Time moved slowly, evenly. From time to time he looked out the window: gray buildings, antennas, a flat sky.
At 12:00, he left the building and walked back home.
When he entered the apartment, the kitchen clock showed a little past 12:30.
His mother was already there. She didn't need to say anything. She looked at him, and he understood immediately. The math test had arrived before he did.
"I told you that you needed to study more," she said, without raising her voice.
The punishment was simple. No going out for the afternoon. Study. He nodded without arguing.
They ate lunch in silence. Reheated pasta, bread, water. The television talked about politics, about decisions made far away, in rooms that never appeared on screen. He ate slowly.
The afternoon passed sluggishly. Channels changing, books open, pages underlined without conviction. At 7:00 p.m., when he was finally allowed to leave the house, the light was different.
In the evening, the city changed.
Shops closed. Display windows turned into dark mirrors. Streets emptied in waves, then filled again. Streetlights cast long, unnatural shadows. Everything seemed larger, more distant.
He walked without a clear destination, along the streets near his home.
That's when he saw her.
She was walking on the opposite side of the street. An elderly woman, very elegant. White hair carefully styled, a long black coat, sunglasses even though it was already dark. She didn't look lost. She didn't look out of place. She seemed to belong to the city in a way he couldn't explain.
He slowed down.
He saw the wallet slip from her coat pocket and fall to the ground. She didn't notice.
He crossed the street and picked it up.
"Ma'am," he called out.
She turned slowly and approached him. He handed her the wallet. She took it with both hands. For more than a second, their hands remained in contact.
Her grip was firm. Warm.
"Thank you," she said. "What's your name?"
"Fiab."
She nodded, as if the name carried a precise meaning. She gave a barely perceptible smile and walked away without looking back.
Fiab stood there for a moment.
He felt something strange. Not pain. Not fear. A light pressure, as if something inside him had shifted. The city around him kept moving. Cars, footsteps, distant voices. Everything normal.
He shook his head and went back home.
They had dinner. His mother talked about work. He listened halfway. Then he brushed his teeth, went to his room, and turned off the light.
He fell asleep.
Like in the previous nights, he first felt his body grow heavy.
But this time, it didn't pass.
He opened his eyes.
The room was identical. Same wardrobe, same desk, the same light filtering through the window. But he was not in the bed.
He turned.
He saw his own body sleeping.
Breathing slowly. Regularly. Alive.
He couldn't feel the weight of his body. He couldn't feel the floor beneath his feet. He didn't panic. Only an unnatural clarity, as if he were more awake than he had ever been before.
He understood one thing with certainty:
he was not dreaming the way everyone else did.
And the night, in a city that by day seemed to function perfectly, finally began to show something different.