Chapter Text
Eli’s hands were covered in clay, shaping something that wasn’t a face this time.
He was working on a cup—lopsided, small, and not meant for actual use. The rim dipped unevenly, and the base was tilted just enough that liquid would probably spill out if anyone ever tried to drink from it. But that wasn’t the point. He didn’t need it to be perfect. He just needed something to focus on.
The early morning air was cold, the kind that made his skin sting and his breath show. Outside, the lake was still quiet, untouched by wind, and the sky above it was just beginning to turn from grey to blue. His sleeves were pushed up past his elbows, and he could feel how stiff his fingers had become from the cold, but he didn’t want to stop. Not yet.
He only worked like this when he couldn’t sleep—when he woke from the same kind of dream he’d had too many times before. No details. No names. Just a strong, restless feeling that stayed with him long after he opened his eyes. The dream was always the same: someone there but not visible, as if their face had been erased. No matter how hard Eli tried to hold onto it, it always faded before he could make sense of it.
And every time it happened, he came here—to the small open-air studio at the back of the guesthouse—to make something with his hands until the shaking stopped.
Behind him, footsteps approached along the gravel path. He didn’t turn around.
“You’re up early,” Tui said, his voice calm but knowing. “Problem sleeping again?”
Eli nodded slightly, still focused on pressing his thumb into the soft clay to adjust the edge of the handle. “I figured I’d make a cup.”
“You say that every time,” Tui replied, walking closer. “And it always ends up looking like something people put in museums instead of cabinets.”
Eli gave a small smile, but it didn’t last long. “Maybe I like making things that don’t pretend to be useful.”
Tui didn’t reply to that. He simply stepped beside the workbench and placed a warm cup of coffee next to Eli on the table.
They didn’t say anything else for a while. The air between them was quiet but not tense, filled with the soft sounds of the studio—the rustle of clay, the distant call of birds near the lake, and the faint creak of wood as Tui leaned against one of the beams.
Eli sipped his coffee, his eyes still on the sculpture in front of him.
He hadn’t sculpted the face in weeks.
Not because he didn’t want to—but because every time he tried, it only ended the same way. He’d get close. The features would almost fall into place. But something would always be wrong. The eyes too wide. The mouth not curved the way it should be. The expression too calm, or too empty, or just… not him.
And that was the part that made it worse.
It was like chasing something he should know by heart and being reminded, again and again, that the most important details were gone.
That was what frustrated him more than the dreams. Not the forgetting—but the fact that some part of him clearly remembered something . Just not enough to finish the face.
So lately, he didn’t even try. He made other things instead—cups, small animals, curled leaves, hands without wrists. Anything that wouldn’t remind him of the way he always came up short.
“Did he have a face this time?” Tui asked after a while.
Eli paused, then shook his head. “No. But it felt like I almost saw it.”
Tui didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.
He just stood there, keeping him company, as the light crept slowly across the edges of the studio floor. Then, without saying anything, he reached behind the door and pulled out the thick grey blanket that always hung there. He draped it over Eli’s shoulders, careful not to disturb the clay on his hands.
Eli didn’t react, but he felt it—warmth settling into the cold that had crept beneath his skin.
Tui was always like that. Quiet in his care, but relentless about it. A cousin by blood, a doctor by training, and somehow, despite everything, more like an older brother he’d never asked for. The kind who noticed too much. The kind who showed up before you even realized you needed him. Protective in ways that were comforting on some days, and borderline annoying on others.
But Eli didn’t shrug the blanket off.
He let it stay.
Because Tui never asked for permission. He just gave what he thought Eli needed.
And maybe, right now, that was enough.
Three Years Earlier
The first thing Eli remembered was the smell.
Not the scent of something familiar, like coffee or someone’s shirt, but the sharp, sterile sting of disinfectant. It clung to the air, seeping into his lungs before he could fully understand where he was. The lights above him buzzed faintly. They were too bright, too white—the kind of light that didn’t belong anywhere but hospitals or morgues.
His head throbbed—slow, heavy pulses that felt like someone had stitched him together using broken pieces of glass and left one or two inside by accident. His body didn’t move the way it should. Even blinking took effort.
“You’re okay,” a voice said, low and calm. “You’re safe.”
That was the first thing he heard, and the words didn’t make him feel better. They made him feel small. Like someone who had been lost and pulled out of something he should have remembered escaping from.
A man sat beside the bed. Clean-cut. Serious. Silver at his temples and worry written across his face like it had been there for years. He wasn’t a stranger, not exactly. He spoke with too much familiarity for that. But Eli didn’t know his name. He didn’t know anything.
The man leaned forward slightly, his voice gentle. “Do you know where you are?”
Eli blinked at him. The words didn’t register at first. His mouth was dry, and his eyes stung from the light. After a long moment, he gave the smallest shake of his head.
The man nodded slowly, like he had expected that.
“Do you know who you are?” he asked next—just as gently, but with more weight behind the words.
Eli tried.
He really tried.
His mind reached for something—anything—a name, a voice, an image that made sense. But there was nothing. Just static. Just that pounding ache in his skull and a strange hollowness in his chest.
After a pause, he shook his head again.
The man exhaled softly, like someone who had been holding his breath for too long.
“Your name is Eli,” he said. “Eli Yeung.”
He paused, watching for any flicker of recognition, any twitch that might confirm something was still buried inside.
“You’re my nephew,” he continued. “There was an accident—a bad one. You were injured. We had to move quickly. You needed emergency brain surgery to remove a clot. The doctors said there was trauma... retrograde amnesia. You’ve lost memories, maybe months or years’ worth. Maybe more. But you’re alive. That’s what matters.”
Eli didn’t respond. He didn’t know how. The words came like puzzle pieces from a box that didn’t belong to him.
He wanted to ask questions—What kind of accident? What did I do before this? Was anyone else hurt?—but none of those words made it to his mouth. He was tired. Not just physically, but in a way that ran through his bones. Like waking up had taken more energy than it should have.
Jason—Jason Yeung—stayed by his side for hours. Sometimes reading medical notes, sometimes just watching the machines beep quietly. The nurses treated him with subtle deference, which told Eli more than he could ask. Jason wasn’t just any relative. He had power here.
Another person visited often, too.
Younger than Jason, maybe mid twenties. He wore scrubs, moved with the calm precision of someone trained to notice things before they became problems, and spoke in clipped, quiet tones that avoided drama but never lacked concern.
His name was Dr. Tui Yeung—Jason’s son, Eli was later told.
Tui was Eli’s attending physician. The one who monitored his vitals, adjusted his medication, tracked every improvement and setback. But he was also something else, something harder to define. He never spoke like a stranger. He spoke like someone who knew Eli before Eli forgot himself.
Where Jason offered structure and direction, Tui brought steadiness—quiet check-ins, neutral observations, careful encouragement.
He was there when Eli first tried to sit up and failed.
He was there when Eli couldn’t hold a spoon steady with his dominant hand.
He was there the first time Eli had a panic attack and didn’t understand why.
“You’ll be safe here,” Jason said more than once. “The clinic is private. No media, no noise. No one knows where you are. That’s the most important thing right now.”
Eli didn’t know why that should matter. He didn’t know what kind of attention he was supposedly avoiding.
He remembered nothing.
Not his name. Not his age. Not his own voice.
But it felt easier, in that moment, to nod than to question what he couldn’t begin to grasp.
So he did.
He accepted the name. He accepted the man. He accepted the silence.
They brought him home once he was stable enough to leave the clinic.
Home, in this case, was a quiet timber house tucked near the lake, surrounded by misty hills and pine trees that never quite lost their chill. It belonged to Jason—his uncle—and Eli was told he’d been staying there since before the accident. A place far enough from the city for peace, but close enough to the private clinic for ongoing care.
He shared the house with Jason and Tui.
Tui, Jason’s son, was also his attending doctor. He checked in daily—sometimes as a physician, sometimes like an older brother who hadn’t decided if he liked the title. He brought medications, corrected his posture during stretches, and occasionally just sat across from Eli in the living room, answering half-formed questions Eli didn’t realize he’d spoken aloud.
They told him he had no living parents. That they’d died when he was young. No siblings. No extended family, save Jason and Tui—his only blood left.
His room was simple but fully furnished. Clean linens, new clothes, notebooks stacked on the desk. A shelf of nonfiction books. No internet. No phone. No television. Only quiet and routine.
A schedule appeared one morning on his nightstand, printed neatly in block letters:
7:30 AM – Light physical therapy
10:00 AM – Occupational work (sculpture recommended)
12:30 PM – Lunch (shared or delivered)
2:00 PM – Cognitive exercise (writing, drawing, puzzles)
6:00 PM – Evening medication
10:00 PM – Lights out
It wasn’t a prison. But it didn’t feel like freedom either. It was a life curated around him—softly padded, carefully timed. There was no room for improvisation. No room for memory.
Jason was kind, in his own reserved way. He worked often but always came home for dinner. Sometimes he cooked. Sometimes he just sat with Eli on the porch in silence, a coffee in one hand, the lake stretching out beyond them in silver stillness.
“You don’t have to remember who you were,” he said once, setting a plate down in front of Eli. “You get to be someone new now. Not everyone gets that chance.”
Eli nodded. Stirred his food. Didn’t eat.
He didn’t feel new.
He felt like a draft. Someone else’s story, rewritten mid-sentence.
And no matter how calm the house was, how still the lake, something inside him tugged and turned. A tension in his chest that refused to settle.
As if something—someone—had been left behind.
And no one around him seemed to think it was worth going back for.
***
Back to Present
The eggs were too runny again.
Eli didn’t bother hiding his grimace this time. He poked at them with his fork and sighed, loud and deliberate.
“You know,” he said, “for two people who claim to be medical professionals, you both suck at basic nutrition.”
Tui didn’t even glance up from his tablet. “We’re not your private chefs.”
Jason, standing at the stove, responded flatly, “You’ve got hands. Use them.”
“Can’t,” Eli replied. “Apparently I’m not to be trusted with anything sharper than a butter knife until further notice.”
“You set a pot of water on fire,” Tui said, still reading.
“For the last time,” Eli huffed, “that was one time, and the stove was faulty.”
“The stove was fine. You were sculpting in the kitchen with headphones in.”
Jason didn’t say anything, but Eli caught the subtle way his mouth twitched at the corner. Victory.
Their mornings had grown like this over the last three years—quiet, lived-in, layered with dry jabs and too-familiar arguments. Eli still rolled his eyes at them daily, but he no longer felt like an outsider in their routines. He knew exactly how Jason took his tea and which brand of instant noodles Tui kept hidden behind the rice jars. And they, in turn, knew the exact moment when to step in… and when to leave him be.
Today, they didn’t press. Not about the dream, not about the shadows under his eyes, not about the fact that Eli had barely touched the eggs. They knew better. The quiet space they gave him wasn’t distance. It was habit.
Then his phone buzzed against the table.
He picked it up, already knowing who it would be. Only three people ever messaged him. And only one of them used a juice box emoji for her contact name.
🧃: “Landing in 2.5 hours. If you’re not at the house when I get there, I’m letting Lego redecorate your studio. Fair warning.”
Eli snorted into his tea.
Tui peeked over his cup. “Punch?”
Eli nodded. “Touchdown before lunch.”
Jason raised an eyebrow from the stove. “Please tell me that’s not another warning about furniture.”
“She says Lego has artistic plans for my workspace if I’m not home on time.”
Jason muttered something that sounded dangerously close to “over my dead body.”
Tui set down his cup. “He’s going to hang neon signs again, isn’t he?”
“He called it ‘post-industrial whimsy’ last time,” Eli said, mock serious. “There were beanbags involved.”
Jason made a sound of disgust. “You three were meant to be the calming influence.”
“Yeah, and instead, I got adopted by a control freak and a judgmental doctor with superiority issues,” Eli fired back, gesturing between them with his spoon.
Tui grinned. “You’re welcome.”
“Thank you,” Eli deadpanned, “for bubble-wrapping my entire life and threatening to confiscate my hairdryer.”
“You nearly electrocuted yourself.”
“It was one spark!”
Jason cleared his throat. “Both of you shut up and eat.”
Eli laughed under his breath and went back to his toast. The heaviness from the dream hadn’t disappeared—but it wasn’t crushing his chest anymore.
Punch was coming.
And so were Lego and Hong.
Together, they were loud and strange and always brought something chaotic with them—Lego’s energy, Punch’s volume, Hong’s quiet observations that always cut too deep. None of it made sense on paper. But somehow, over time, they had become the part of Eli’s life that didn’t feel borrowed.
They didn’t act like he was broken. They didn’t wait for him to be someone else.
They just came back.
And just like that, the thought of seeing them again tugged something loose in his chest. He could almost picture it: Punch dropping her suitcase with a dramatic sigh, Lego yelling about her taking his charger, Hong shaking his head like they were all hopeless but still carrying everyone’s bags anyway.
They were always loud when they arrived—but it was the kind of loud that felt like home.
And just like that, his mind slipped back—back to that first afternoon, six months after the accident, when Jason had walked him to the porch and said he wanted him to meet a few people.
Three strangers.
Or at least, they were supposed to be.
Flashback — The People Who Knew
It happened quietly.
Jason didn’t tell him much beforehand—just that “some old friends” would be visiting for the afternoon. He didn’t name them. Didn’t explain their connection to Eli. He only said they were people who had once cared about him deeply.
Eli, already used to Jason’s habit of withholding details “for his own good,” didn’t push. He just nodded.
That afternoon, he was sitting under the covered porch beside the guesthouse, sipping warm ginger tea while sketching half-formed shapes in a notebook. His mind still buzzed with leftover tension from a sleepless night—another faceless dream he couldn’t shake—but the fresh air helped.
He heard the car before he saw it. A soft crunch of tires on gravel. The engine cut. Doors opened and closed. Footsteps followed. He felt them before he saw them—like pressure building in the space around him, as if something meaningful was approaching, even if he didn’t know why.
Jason came around the corner first.
Three people followed behind him, all unfamiliar.
Jason stopped a few feet away from where Eli sat. He studied him for a moment, then said carefully, “Eli, I’d like you to meet some friends.”
Eli looked up.
His gaze moved to the three standing behind Jason. Two men, one woman. All three were watching him with something too focused to be polite curiosity. They didn’t speak. They didn’t move forward. They were waiting—for something. For him, maybe.
The woman looked like she was trying hard not to cry. Her hands were clenched in the sleeves of her jacket, and she kept biting the inside of her lip like she didn’t trust herself to stay calm. Her eyes were on him—only him—as if she had been carrying the weight of this moment for a long time.
One of the men, the taller one in a hoodie, had a tense sort of energy. His arms were crossed, sunglasses perched on top of his head. He kept shifting his weight from foot to foot like standing still was too much to ask.
The third man stood slightly back, hands in his pockets. His face was calm, maybe too calm. But his eyes were sharp and unwavering.
Jason spoke again, slower this time. “This is Punch. That’s Lego. And the quiet one is Hong.”
Eli looked at them each in turn.
He didn’t remember them.
Not a name. Not a moment. Not a single thing.
But… he didn’t panic.
There was no surge of fear. No dizziness. No cold sweat. Just the usual, hollow ache of not knowing. He studied them, searching for a trigger, a flash of recognition—but nothing came. Still, something in him didn’t tense up the way it sometimes did around strangers. They weren’t familiar—but they didn’t feel dangerous, either.
He gave a small, uncertain nod.
That was all it took.
Punch inhaled sharply, her composure cracking. “Screw it.”
She stepped forward without waiting for permission and wrapped her arms around him.
Eli went stiff for a second—but only for a second. Something about her—her warmth, the quiet shake in her shoulders, the way she held him like a piece of herself she thought was lost—settled him.
She didn’t cry, not fully. But her voice cracked when she whispered, “You don’t have to remember me. I’m just glad you’re still here.”
Then it happened.
As she pulled back slightly, her hand brushed his cheek and she said, “Est, I—”
She froze. Her mouth hung open just slightly.
“I mean—Eli,” she corrected quickly, voice barely above a whisper, eyes wide with something between apology and heartbreak.
Behind her, the other two had gone still.
Lego blinked and looked away.
Hong’s jaw tightened, just barely.
Eli didn’t react. Not outwardly. But something flickered behind his eyes—an almost-question. Not recognition… but a catch. Like a puzzle piece turning in his chest, almost finding its place, then slipping again.
Before the moment could stretch any further, Lego stepped forward.
“Alright, alright, if you’re getting a hug, I’m not missing out,” he said, his voice a little louder than necessary. He flung his arms around both of them—Punch on one side, Eli in the middle—his hug more of a tangle than a gesture.
Still, there was no hiding how tightly he held on.
Eli heard him exhale against his shoulder, quieter this time. “You scared the hell out of us, man.”
Eli stood there, not moving, not pulling away.
Not confused, either.
Just still.
Then there was Hong.
He had stepped forward silently, his hands now out of his pockets, his eyes still fixed on Eli. For a second, Eli thought he might just offer a nod again, or maybe say something quietly and leave it at that.
Instead, Hong reached out and pulled him into a hug—brief, careful, but firm.
Eli didn’t expect it.
But he felt it.
Felt the way Hong’s hand lingered just a second longer on his back before he stepped away.
He didn’t say anything out loud.
He didn’t need to.
The three of them stood around him like a shield, like they didn’t want to overwhelm him—but had been waiting to hold him for far too long.
Jason watched them all carefully. He didn’t interrupt, but he didn’t relax either. Only when Eli sat back down, expression neutral but not uncomfortable, did Jason nod once and step back.
No one explained the slip.
No one said the name again.
But it stayed there, in the space between them, quietly waiting.
They stayed for a while.
They didn’t bring up the accident. Or the memory loss. Or what he had been like before.
Instead, they sat with him on the porch, talking about the weather, the food in town, a movie none of them agreed on. They laughed too hard at small jokes and kept glancing at him, like they were trying to see whether it was still him under the quiet confusion.
And Eli didn’t ask why they looked at him like that.
He didn’t ask what he meant to them—because he could already feel it.
Even without memory, something about their presence stirred an ache that had no name. Like standing too close to a fire and feeling warmth you didn’t know you’d missed.
They didn’t feel like friends from a story he’d been told.
They felt like friends from a story he had lived—and forgotten.
***
It wasn’t loud—not at first. Just tires crunching slowly along the gravel path leading toward the guesthouse. But the second the engine stopped, the chaos began.
The back door of the car flung open, and Punch tumbled out first—sweater half-tied around her waist, phone clutched in one hand, and hair already coming loose from her braid.
“I swear to God, if Lego tries to mansplain airport security to me one more time—”
“I wasn’t mansplaining ! I was trying to prevent a fine! ”
Lego’s voice followed from the other side of the car as he pulled out two backpacks and what looked suspiciously like a plastic bag filled with energy drinks.
“I didn’t know you couldn’t bring wet snacks. What does that even mean?”
Hong exited last, quiet and composed, closing the trunk with one hand and balancing everyone’s carry-ons with the other. He didn’t say anything, but his expression screamed I’m with idiots.
Eli stood by the edge of the porch, watching them.
It had been nearly four months since their last visit.
And yet, it felt like this was exactly where they’d left off.
Punch spotted him first. Her face lit up instantly—real, no filter. She grabbed her suitcase and practically jogged the last few steps toward him.
“You didn’t cut your hair,” she said breathlessly, stopping just close enough to look at him, really look at him. “You were thinking about it last time.”
Eli shrugged. “I got lazy.”
She beamed. “I like it.”
Then, without asking, she pulled him into a hug.
It wasn’t hesitant this time. It wasn’t cautious or questioning.
It was like she knew exactly where her arms belonged around him.
Eli didn’t freeze.
He didn’t hesitate, either.
He hugged her back.
Lego was next. “Alright, step aside, affection monster.”
He elbowed his way in and threw his arms around Eli like they were still in high school and had just survived exams.
“You better have missed me,” he said dramatically. “Or I’ll cry. I’ll do it. I’ll cry right here on your porch.”
Eli pulled back just enough to look him dead in the eye. “I missed your cooking. Everything else is negotiable.”
Lego gasped like he’d been stabbed. “Rude.”
“Honest,” Hong said as he approached, already setting down their bags in the corner. He didn’t hug Eli right away, but after a brief pause, he stepped forward and gave him a firm pat on the shoulder—and then a quick, one-armed hug that was gone as soon as it arrived.
Eli was fine with that. That was Hong’s version of an emotional breakdown.
“Welcome back,” Eli said quietly.
“You okay?” Punch asked, still watching his face like she was scanning for cracks.
“Yeah,” he said, voice a little steadier than it had been this morning. “Now I am.”
***
That night, by the time the dishes were done and the leftovers packed into every available container in the fridge—despite Jason’s warning not to cook like they were feeding an army—Punch had already taken over the living room. She was dragging pillows, comforters, and beanbags into a fortress of cushions and chaos, declaring territory like it was a national holiday.
“Movie time!” she yelled, her head popping out from behind a mound of blankets. “Snacks at your feet, phones on silent, and anyone who talks during an emotional moment gets tackled.”
“Unless it’s me,” Lego called from the kitchen. “I provide commentary. That’s a public service.”
“Your commentary is a crime,” Hong said as he entered with a blanket over his shoulder and a water bottle tucked under one arm.
Eli appeared last, hoodie draped over his shoulder, mug of hot chocolate in hand, and a look of mild suspicion on his face as he surveyed the disaster they’d made of his living room.
“Do I at least get to pick the movie this time?” he asked, stepping carefully over a half-squashed cushion and dropping onto the biggest beanbag in the center.
“You can always pick the movie,” Punch replied.
“And it’s always animated,” Lego added.
“Well,…I want to branch out,” Eli said, scrolling through the TV menu. “What about action movie tonight?”
The room went still.
Punch’s head slowly turned toward him. “Like… action action?”
“Yeah,” Eli said casually. “Guns, explosions, rooftop chases. All the good stuff.”
Lego sat up straighter. “Dude. Are you trying to give us all heart attacks?”
Hong said nothing, but his brow creased and his eyes flicked quickly to the remote in Eli’s hand.
Eli looked around at the three faces staring at him like he’d just suggested Russian roulette as a bonding activity.
“I’m fine now,” he said, a little defensive. “It’s been over a year. I’ve seen clips. I didn’t even flinch.”
Punch leaned forward, gently prying the remote from his fingers. “You flinched at a loud blender last time we visit.”
“That’s because Lego plugged it in while I was sleeping!”
“It was seven-thirty in the morning ,” Lego argued.
“You used the smoothie setting,” Eli deadpanned.
“Okay, valid.”
“Guys,” Eli sighed, pushing his hair back. “Seriously. I’m not going to break over a movie scene.”
“No,” Hong said calmly, speaking for the first time in minutes. “But we’re not taking that chance.”
Eli stared at them.
Three years ago, he wouldn’t have fought this. Would’ve just nodded and shrunk back into silence. But now… now he wanted to argue. Not because he was angry, but because he was tired of the glass wall between him and the world. Tired of being treated like he still couldn’t stand upright without someone holding him steady.
Still, one look at Punch’s concerned face, Lego’s wary frown, and Hong’s stillness—and he knew.
They weren’t trying to control him.
They were afraid.
For him.
And maybe a little for themselves, too.
Eli sighed, reaching back for the remote. “Fine. Brave it is.”
Punch relaxed instantly. “Yes! Bow and arrow feminism!”
Lego flopped backward with a groan. “That movie made me cry.”
“No one tell Jason,” Hong muttered.
The room dimmed as Hong hit play. The familiar Disney castle shimmered onto the screen, and within minutes, Merida was galloping through the forest, hair bouncing like it had its own fan club.
Punch curled up beside Eli. Lego dumped half the popcorn on himself and didn’t notice. Hong ended up sitting on the floor with his arms crossed, pretending not to smile.
Eli leaned back into the beanbag, his mug warming his hands.
About halfway through the movie, just after Merida stormed out of the castle and rode off into the woods, Eli spoke up, his voice soft but curious.
“Do you guys know anyone who actually has a mother like that?”
The screen continued glowing across their faces—orange light flickering as the animated fire crackled on screen—but for a few seconds, none of them answered.
Then Lego, mouth full of popcorn, said offhandedly, “Yeah. I know one.”
The room went still again—but not like before. This time it was sharp. Immediate.
Punch’s shoulders stiffened beside Eli. Hong didn’t move, but his fingers curled slightly at the hem of his blanket.
Lego realized it too late.
He glanced sideways, catching Punch’s glare and Hong’s subtle, unmistakable stillness.
“…I mean,” Lego said, suddenly careful, “not exactly like that. But, you know. Controlling parents. Happens.”
Eli turned to look at him. “Who?”
Lego smiled too wide. “Old classmate. Not important.”
No one said anything else.
On the screen, Merida shot arrows through the forest like she was trying to outrun everything she couldn’t fix.
Eli watched her for a moment longer, then quietly turned his attention back to the movie.
He didn’t press.
But something in the room had shifted.
***
Eli fell asleep sometime after the credits rolled.
Punch was curled against one side of him, already breathing deep. Lego had knocked out cold mid-popcorn refill and was snoring into the cushions. Hong stayed awake longest, as usual, watching the flickering screen even after it dimmed to black. Eventually, he stretched out on the rug and drifted off too, silent as ever.
The room had gone still.
And in the quiet, Eli’s dream began.
It wasn’t the faceless dream this time. Not exactly. It was warmer.
He was lying on a bed—not his own, not the guesthouse either. Somewhere dim, with pale sheets and soft shadows dancing across the walls. His head rested back against a pillow that smelled faintly like fabric softener and something familiar he couldn’t name.
A body pressed into his side.
There was weight on him. Not heavy, but definite. Someone was half-draped over him, their arm snug around his waist, head tucked just below his chin. He couldn’t see their face—not because it was blurred out, but because it was buried against his chest.
But it didn’t scare him.
He didn’t panic. Didn’t feel lost.
Instead, he felt steady. Anchored.
The way you feel when someone you love is real in your arms. The way you breathe easier because they’re breathing too.
He didn’t know the name. But his arms were already wrapped around this person, like they belonged there.
In the dream, Eli heard himself whisper.
“It’s okay. Your mother can’t hurt me. Or you. Not anymore.”
His voice wasn’t loud, but it was sure. Solid. Like it had been said a thousand times before. Like a promise he had made once—and meant.
The body in his arms didn’t speak. But it shifted slightly, the way people do when they’re asleep and safe.
And that was it.
That was the entire dream.
No panic. No crashing sound. No waking with a start.
Just the strange, unshakable weight of comfort.
And a voice—his own—that spoke like it remembered a truth he couldn’t explain.