He had been awake for thirty-six hours.
The last traces of the evening sun had long vanished. Shadows hung heavy in his room, even though the bulb above still flickered weakly, casting uncertain light on everything it touched — much like his own consciousness.
The migraine had taken hold again.
Not like it used to. Not a passing storm. This was something deeper. A siege. A silent beast that lived behind his eyes, curling into his skull and tightening with every breath, with every heartbeat.
He sat at the edge of his bed, unmoving, his hand pressed gently to his temple — not to soothe it, but simply to acknowledge it.
There’s a certain kind of pain that doesn’t scream. It just waits.
And in that waiting, it teaches you the full meaning of helplessness.
He had taken his chamomile tea. Had soaked his feet in warm water. Had turned off all lights.
Still — the ache persisted. Like the whisper of an old betrayal.
He no longer cried during these spells. There were no tears left. Pain, after a point, becomes beyond emotion. It is simply presence. You don’t react to it. You become with it.
He had stopped thinking of himself as a man during such moments. He became just breath. Just flesh. Just the quiet sound of blood navigating its way through the architecture of the skull.
But even then… a thought crept in.
The memory of that college fest night again — the dancing, the laughter, the smoke and chaos — drifted like incense through the migraine haze.
He remembered how light his head had felt that night.
Like the world had no ceiling.
Like he could fly through gravity and out of time if only he ran fast enough.
The contrast was cruel. And yet… somehow comforting.
To know that both those realities had existed — within the same lifetime, the same body.
It was proof that life had been. That joy had been.
And even if joy did not live here anymore, it had once rented this room.
He lay down slowly.
Pillows arranged just so. Fan turned to its lowest hum. The curtains, half drawn, revealed a sky drained of stars.
And he stared up. At the nothing.
He didn’t pray.
He didn’t hope.
He simply… let go.
For the first time in days, his breath began to slow. Not because the pain had passed — it hadn’t — but because he had passed through it.
The war had not been won. But it had been accepted.
And with that, sleep — long awaited, long delayed — came not like a wave, but like a hand placed gently over the eyes.
In that moment, just before surrender, he smiled. Not from memory. Not from joy. But from a place that had no name — the deep, calm silence one finds only after wrestling the void.
And as sleep took him, the boy he once was didn’t appear in mirrors or memories.
No.
He simply lay beside him — shoulder to shoulder — like a long-lost twin finally returned.
No more reflections.
No more stories.
Only peace.
Only quiet.
Only this.
~THE END~