The Wanderer felt the eyes.Not metaphorical, not imagined — real. Watching. Always watching. Not with love. Not with care. But with a quiet intent to disturb.
He didn't fear being seen.He feared being right about what they saw.That maybe he was an interruption to the world — not through crime or violence, but through a dissonance. A wrong note in a song already playing.
He had taken the pills. They worked.The hunger was gone — not just for the drug, but for everything.What remained was memory: the buildings on the way to get it, the sidewalk cracks, the windows he stared into. Not the feeling of the high, but the ritual of decay.
Now, life was quieter.But that quiet wasn't peace. It was absence.He didn't crave anymore — but he didn't want, either.
A small thread of structure. A glimpse of maybe.He hoped it worked out. Really hoped.But even that hope was wrapped in shadow.Nothing shined.Not even dreams.
He thought: Maybe life really doesn't have meaning. Maybe it's just a choice we keep making until we stop making it.
He thought: If I vanished, it would be more disruption. More mess. More whispers.And that felt like the final failure — to become someone whose end was an inconvenience.
So he stayed.Not because he wanted to.But because he still could.
And that was something.
"I've wasted half my life — don't throw it away," the Wanderer said.
He kept in his mind: "Every day should be a new day."Still, he had always spent his time lost — out of his own mind, and running out of time.
"You need to get out of these woods — to share the view," said Laura.