Then-- Suddenly-- His phone rang.
The sound ruptured the quiet like a crack splitting through glass.
Mansh flinched.
He stopped walking--mid-step, one foot hovering in the air before slowly meeting the cold hospital floor. The sound pulsed in his pocket. Familiar, yet completely foreign in this setting.
His heart, which had been galloping all this time, now stumbled.
He stood frozen in the middle of the empty corridor, surrounded by pale green walls and the faint scent of antiseptic. The buzz came again, more insistent this time--vibrating against his thigh. But Mansh didn't move. Not at first.
It was strange, how such a small sound could carry so much weight. It echoed in his bones. He could feel it, not just hear it. And for a fleeting second, he wished it would stop. That it would fade into the sterile silence like everything else. But it didn't.
His hand slowly slipped into his pocket, each movement thick and reluctant, as if the air had turned to water around him. The world felt… paused. Or worse--like it had taken a step back, watching him, waiting for what he'd do next.
He pulled out the phone.
The screen glowed faintly in the dim hallway light.
"Mom"
A simple name.
A familiar one.
But it hit him harder than expected.
That name--so normal, so grounded in reality--felt jarring in this place where everything had started to unravel. Where people disappeared without a trace. Where silence didn't mean peace, but dread.
His thumb hovered over the screen.
He hesitated.
Then, with a shaky breath, he answered.
"…Hello?" His voice came out small. Not a whisper, not quite. Just… cautious. Stripped bare.
The reply was instant. No pause, no concern--just the irritation of a parent who'd been waiting too long.
"Why are you so late?" Her voice cracked down the line, sharp, direct. "You didn't eat breakfast. Then you skipped lunch. Now it's nearly dinner. Do you even know what time it is?"
The words tumbled into his ears like stones. Familiar. Heavy. Annoyed.
But he didn't respond.
His gaze drifted down the corridor again, to the place where fluorescent light failed to reach, where shadow clung to corners like cobwebs. Where he had just come from. Room 969.
Empty.
Cold.
Wrong.
"Mansh?" his mother snapped.
He blinked, suddenly realizing he hadn't said anything.
"I'm… still out," he murmured, voice tight, barely audible.
"Still out? Where are you?"
He paused.
His lips parted slightly, but no words came.
His instinct screamed to say nothing. To bury it. All of it. The hospital. The missing room. The phantom feeling that something was peeling itself from the walls to watch him. It all sat just behind his teeth, begging to be said--but he didn't.
He couldn't.
"…Just walking," he finally said.
The lie felt like paper in his mouth. Thin. Easy to tear.
"Walking where?"
He glanced over his shoulder. The hallway was empty behind him too. Long, pale, and flickering.
"I don't know. Around."
A sigh came through the receiver. Long. Exasperated.
"You know how strange you've been lately?" she said, as if listing off chores. "Always wandering off, never saying anything. Are you trying to worry me? Because it's working."
He leaned against the wall, the chill of it creeping into his skin. A bead of sweat slid from his temple, even though the air was too cold to justify it.
He felt like he was floating.
Untethered.
Like nothing around him was quite… real.
Or worse--like it was too real.
"I'm fine," he whispered.
"No, you're not," she shot back, voice rising. "You think I don't notice when you stop talking at dinner? When you stare at your hands for half an hour like they're not yours?"
His eyes dropped to his hand now--still holding the phone. The skin around his knuckles was pale, stretched tight. He flexed his fingers.
They did feel strange.
"Come home,Now"
***
A/N: is this reality?
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