POV: First-person (Silas)
Location: Detroit, Belmont District
Time: Late Evening
I don't remember the crash. Not the actual moment. Just a flicker—a smear of headlights, metal bending like it was made of cloth, and Micah's voice cutting off mid-laugh.
Then nothing.
Next thing I know, I'm choking on plastic air and drowning in machines. My chest felt like someone had buried a furnace inside me. Nurses were yelling, the lights were too bright, and everything smelled like bleach and metal.
They told me I'd flatlined twice. Told me I had a donor heart. That it was a miracle I'd survived at all.
But what they didn't tell me—what no one could tell me—was who the donor really was. Not until later.
It wasn't a stranger. It was Micah.
My close friend. My dormmate. The guy who made impossible things feel doable. The guy who always showed up when it counted.
Gone.
They broke the news while I was still hooked up to half a dozen machines. My parents were there. So was Micah's dad. None of them could look me in the eye.
I didn't speak. I didn't ask how. I didn't have to. The images came anyway: shattered glass, twisted metal, Micah's arm flung across the seat like he was reaching for me one last time.
I spent the next few days drifting in and out. Painkillers dulled the fire in my chest but couldn't numb the guilt crawling through my skin. Nurses came and went, checking vitals, adjusting tubes. I barely registered them. I barely registered anything.
A social worker came in once to ask if I needed to speak with someone. I said no. I wasn't ready. What would I even say?
Eventually, the machines started coming off. First the IVs, then the monitors. I could sit up on my own, shuffle to the bathroom, sip water without help. They called it progress. I called it a countdown.
When I was discharged, Micah's funeral was already scheduled. I went straight from the hospital to the service, walking stiffly in a borrowed suit that felt three sizes too big. My parents dropped me off and waited in the car.
The chapel was packed. Former classmates. Professors. Neighbors. Even strangers. People spoke in hushed tones about how bright Micah's future had been. How kind he was. How he'd once stood up to a guy twice his size to protect someone he didn't even know.
I stood in the back, silent, barely breathing. His parents sat in the front row, faces carved from stone. His little sister clutched a folded Belmont hoodie to her chest like it was the only thing keeping her anchored.
I wanted to say something. To go up to the podium. But what would I say? "Sorry I survived"? "Sorry he's dead and I'm not"?
So I stayed quiet.
After the service, I lingered behind as people filed out. A few offered nods or brief hugs, but most gave me space. I guess grief makes people awkward.
Days passed.
I returned to my apartment, alone. My parents hovered for a while, but eventually work and responsibility called them back. I was left with the silence of an apartment haunted by memories and half-drunk mugs Micah had forgotten to clean.
It was a week after the funeral when Micah's father came by. He didn't say much. Just handed me a box—Micah's belongings from his dorm, things his parents didn't know what to do with.
"Maybe you'll find something in there that matters," he said, eyes red but dry.
I nodded, thanked him, and brought it inside. Set it on my desk. Stared at it for a long while before finally opening it.
Inside were books, notebooks, a few shirts, a cracked phone case, a USB stick, and tucked beneath it all... a belt.
Black. Metallic. Etched with strange lines and sigils I didn't recognize. It shimmered like oil under the light, shifting colors as I turned it over.
"Yo... the hell is this weird-looking belt?"
I held it up, squinting at the symbols. It didn't look like part of any cosplay or collector's item. Just weird. Weird and... oddly cool.
With a shrug, I slung it around my waist.
And the world dropped out from under me.
I didn't even have time to react. One second I was in my room, belt barely buckled. The next—
I was nowhere.
Weightless. Surrounded by endless black.
The air here wasn't air. It was thick and cold and alive. Shadows slithered like thoughts you didn't want to finish. The silence wasn't empty; it pressed against your eardrums like it was trying to whisper secrets you couldn't understand.
Shapes shifted in the dark. Twisting towers. Flickers of forgotten faces. A broken city skyline built from negative space. It was like standing inside a living bruise.
I tried to speak—couldn't. Tried to move—and found myself already somewhere else.
In the center of it all, there was a pulse. Not sound. Not light. Just... feeling. A hum in the chest. A call.
And just as quickly as I'd arrived—I was back.
Flat on the apartment floor. Breath ragged. Sweat coating my body like I'd run a marathon. Heart hammering—not from exertion, but something else.
Shock. Awe. Fear.
"What the hell was that?" I whispered, staring at my shaking hands.
The belt still pulsed faintly around my waist. Like it remembered the place. Like it belonged to it.
And now, maybe, so did I.
[Word Count: ~2,280]