Chapter Text
Someone who tries to end it all shouldn’t have to face the next morning.
Yet here you are, eyelids fluttering open to a light far harsher than you remembered. Sunlight used to feel distant and pale. Now it burned.
With unfocused eyes, you looked around the room. It resembled a hospital, but something felt deeply wrong. The wooden floors, the old-fashioned furniture, and the heavy window frame pulled you out of your haze. This place didn’t belong to your world. It felt out of place. Out of time.
Where are you? Is this hell?
The echo of old sermons rang in your skull, cold and unforgiving: stealing your own life was a one-way ticket to eternal fire.
“You’ve woken up.”
A soft, feminine voice drew your attention. A woman in a nurse’s uniform stood beside the bed, offering a kind but professional smile.
“Do you remember what happened to you?” she asked while gently checking the bandage wrapped around your head.
You blinked in pure confusion. The last thing you remembered was the cut on your wrist. When you glanced down, there was nothing. No wound. No blood. Just pale, skeletal skin stretched tightly over fragile bones. For the first time, the sight of your own arms didn’t make you want to recoil in disgust.
“I suppose that’s a no,” the nurse said calmly. She checked your temperature and pulse, wrote something on her report, then left the room for a moment.
You sat up with difficulty, wincing as a sharp headache pulsed through your skull. Your hands moved on their own, pulling the blanket away to reveal the white hospital pajamas. Shaky fingers traced your thighs—thin, almost delicate. The muscles beneath your skin felt alarmingly light.
This is heaven, you thought. It has to be. Being this thin had been your first and last wish for as long as you could remember.
The nurse returned with two pills and a cup of water. “Here, these are for your head.”
You stared at the water, throat burning with thirst, but hesitation gripped you. What if it’s drugged? You had never seen medicine tablets like these before. Still, you took the pills and drank. The cool water sliding down your throat felt almost too real.
“Where am I…?” you asked, voice hoarse and uncertain.
“Hospital,” the nurse replied. “You were found unconscious near the river. It looks like you hit your head and lost a lot of blood.” She studied your face carefully. “How are you feeling?”
You stared at her with an unreadable expression as doubts flooded your mind. After a long silence, you finally spoke.
“I don’t remember anything.”
The nurse sighed, not with annoyance but with sympathy. “That’s normal after a head injury. The doctor will evaluate you properly. Try not to give up, alright?” She gave you a small smile and left the room.
Don’t give up.
Don’t give up.
Don’t give up.
But you had given up. So why were you still here?
A knock on the door interrupted your thoughts. A man in a white coat entered. He wasn’t old, but his glasses were oddly fastened to his face with what looked like a rubber band.
“Hello, I’m Doctor Muller. I’m going to check on your injury, then we’ll talk about your situation.”
You stayed still as he examined your head, two nurses standing behind him. After changing the bandage, he began asking questions:
“Where is your home?”
“Do you remember your parents?”
“What’s your name?”
“Do you have any friends or siblings?”
“Do you know where you are right now?”
Your answer to every question was the same: no. Because this wasn’t your world. Nothing felt familiar.
Doctor Muller sighed and took notes. “Just a few simple tests. You’re responsive and cooperative—that’s a good sign.”
Your eyes followed his pen as he wrote. The letters looked completely alien. You understood every word he spoke, yet you couldn’t read a single thing he was writing. The contradiction made your stomach twist.
“Tell me, can you tell what time it is?” he asked.
“Morning… almost afternoon, I think.”
He nodded and continued the examination, holding up one finger. “How many fingers do you see?”
“One.”
His eyes softened slightly as he wrote down your answer.
Dark thoughts began to spiral. Were you kidnapped? But you were supposed to be dead. Is this rebirth? Some kind of twisted second chance? Or maybe magic? No—magic was evil. The sermons had made that very clear.
“Do you hear anything unusual?” the doctor asked.
“No… nothing unusual,” you lied, cold sweat forming on your skin. The voices in your head didn’t count.
“Are you alright?” the first nurse asked, placing a gentle hand on your shoulder.
The other nurse offered you another cup of water. You stared at it with wide eyes. Poison? Everything felt suspicious. Why were you still alive?
“Come on, drink slowly,” the nurse said softly, helping you.
The water helped. You took deep breaths as she guided you back down onto the bed.
If they wanted you dead, they would have done it already, you told yourself before consciousness slipped away again.
When you opened your eyes once more, the room was quiet and empty. Only faint afternoon light filtered through the heavy window. On the small wooden table beside the bed sat a few medicine bottles. A few steps away, a simple sink with a mirror waited under the dim glow of a wall lantern.
You pushed yourself up slowly, one hand pressed against the cold wall for support. Your head still throbbed with every movement, but the pain felt distant now—overpowered by something stronger. Curiosity. Fear. Hunger.
You needed to see.
Step by shaky step, you made your way to the mirror. The floorboards creaked softly under your bare feet. When you finally stood in front of it and lifted your gaze…
The world stopped.
It was your face staring back. The same face you had despised for years. But it was different. Better.
Your fingers rose, trembling, and traced the sharp line of your cheekbones. They continued downward, brushing over the smooth slope of your neck — no double chin, no heavy flesh spilling over.
You kept going, pulling at the collar of the hospital shirt until your collarbones appeared clearly under the light, delicate and defined.
You had spent countless nights staring at other people’s bodies with painful envy. Now they were yours.
A broken sound — half sob, half laugh — escaped your throat. Tears streamed down your cheeks, warm and endless, but your lips kept stretching into a wide, obsessive smile. Your eyes shone with something dangerous. Something almost feral.
You couldn’t look away.
This body was everything you had prayed for in your darkest moments. Everything you had starved and cried and hated yourself for. And now it was real.
You leaned closer to the mirror, breath fogging the glass, fingers still desperately tracing every new angle of your face as if it might vanish at any second.
Maybe…
Maybe life isn’t that bad after all.