POV Elian
"Come back to me, my son. Come back to your family."
While I slept, I heard a woman's voice calling me — gentle, yet heavy with despair.
I recognized it immediately: it was the voice of the one I had called "Mother" in my dream.
But this time, it wasn't a dream. Her voice didn't come from a haze of sleep; it was real, near, brushing against my ears.
I felt a warm touch envelop my right hand — comforting, almost human. Then a damp sensation followed, like droplets running down my skin.
I woke with a pain in my chest — not physical, but deep, as though part of me were dissolving into air. It felt like losing something that should never be lost.
"What's happening to me?" I murmured, my voice hoarse as I sat at the edge of the bed.
I got up and dressed in simple clothes: shorts that reached just below the knees and a navy-blue shirt — a gift from my mother. On the right sleeve, a golden ribbon sewn into the fabric shimmered faintly under the morning light.
As I stared at that color, a sharp memory cut through me — the navy blue of the woman's eyes from my dreams.
"Rodrigo, breakfast is ready!" my mother called from the kitchen.
I finished dressing and ran to her. The familiar scent of fresh bread and black coffee filled the air, mingling with the smoke of the cigarette between her fingers.
On the table, breakfast awaited me: French rolls with mortadella and a glass of milk. Simple, but perfect.
My mother, as always, drank her bitter coffee, her gaze distant, exhaling smoke with ritualistic calm.
"It's really cold today, son," she said, watching me eat. "Why didn't you put on a jacket?"
"I'm not cold," I answered, distracted.
Luciana, sitting beside me, crossed her arms and glared at me with the bossy air only younger sisters have.
"It is cold, big brother! You have to wear something warm or you'll get sick!"
"Alright, Lu, I'll put on a jacket," I replied, laughing softly at her improvised authority.
The day outside was gray. The sky was heavy with dense clouds, spilling a thin, steady rain. The wind beat against the windows, making the house creak as if struggling to stay standing.
And yet, strangely, I didn't feel cold at all. No shiver, no goosebumps. The air was freezing, but inside me there was only a burning warmth — the same I'd felt the moment I heard that voice calling me from the dark.
"Brother, aren't you forgetting something?" Luciana asked — her voice calm, yet carrying something I couldn't quite identify at first.
We were watching TV in the living room. The cold light from the screen flickered across the peeling walls, and the familiar sounds of the cartoon filled the air. It was one of her favorites — Winx Club. Luciana always said she looked like one of the characters, Flora, if I remembered right.
I turned from the television and looked at my sister lying beside me on the couch, her legs swinging back and forth idly.
"What do you mean, Lu?" I asked, frowning.
She turned her head slowly toward me. For a second, I caught a shadow in her eyes — a blend of sadness and awareness. But in the blink of an eye, it was gone, replaced by her usual neutral expression, almost indifferent.
"Nothing, brother," she said, turning her gaze back to the TV and switching the channel.
Silence stretched between us, filled only by the artificial voices from the screen. We both pretended to be focused, but something in the air felt wrong — thicker, heavier. It was as if the entire room were breathing differently.
We stayed like that until lunchtime.
My mother had cooked something simple, as always: rice, beans, and a fried egg. But there was something new on the table — a bowl of vegetable soup, still steaming.
I froze, staring at it for a few seconds. It was such a small thing, yet completely out of place. My mother never liked vegetables. Never. She was the kind of woman who would make a face just seeing someone eat zucchini.
Funny, isn't it? Most mothers force their kids to eat vegetables "for their own good." Mine did the opposite — she said it was "food without a soul."
And yet there it was, that bowl of soup, steaming, colorful, with the sweet smell of carrots and potatoes.
I picked up the spoon. The aroma made my mouth water. The taste, when I tried it, was comforting — familiar in a way that scared me.
"When did I start liking this?" I wondered, and the silence inside my head was deafening.
With every spoonful of that soup, memories surfaced… only to dissolve just as quickly, swallowed by the hot broth. Faces, voices, fragments — they came and went so fast I couldn't tell if they were memories or something my mind was inventing.
I glanced at my mother, sitting across from me. She was eating the soup she'd made, calm and focused, a plate of rice beside her. The steam rising between us blurred her face for a brief moment — and for an instant, she looked like someone else.
I blinked, and everything was back to normal.
I turned my gaze down to the soup again. The sweet, earthy flavor spread across my tongue. Each spoonful felt like it was pulling me deeper into something I couldn't understand.
"Is it good, Elian?" a voice whispered.
The spoon stopped midair.
My heart lurched. I scanned the kitchen — the cupboard, the sink, the narrow corridor leading to the living room. Nothing. Only my mother, serene, and Luciana, idly stirring her plate.
"Elian…"
The sound echoed inside my head, and that single word split open the ground of my mind.
That was my name — in the other world.
My throat went dry. I turned slowly toward my mother, my voice barely above a whisper.
"Mom… what's my name?"
She lifted her gaze, confused, and laughed softly. "What are you talking about, silly? Your name's Rodrigo." She went back to eating as if nothing had happened.
I looked at Luciana. She was staring at me — still, too still — her smile too gentle to be real. For an instant, I knew she understood. Her smile wasn't innocent; it was the smile of someone who mourns before the end.
The rest of lunch passed in silence.
When we finished, I helped my mother wash the dishes.
The cold water ran over my fingers, and the clinking of metal against the plates sounded distant, muffled — as if I were underwater.
With every splash, the same question echoed in my mind: Who am I now?
Rodrigo… or Elian?
Luciana and I went back to watching TV. We flipped through the channels until we landed on one of those late-night shows about aliens and conspiracies — the kind my father always called "nonsense for insomniacs."
But that day, the theme was different.
They were talking about reincarnation.
The narrator told the story of a British woman named Dorothy Eady, who claimed to be the reincarnation of an ancient priestess of Isis. To prove it, she became an archaeologist and pointed out tombs that had never been recorded in any official documents — and, mysteriously, every one of them was found exactly where she said it would be.
The presenter spoke with that solemn, hypnotic tone while old footage of Egypt flickered across the screen — temples, pyramids, hieroglyphs.
"Lu…" I called softly.
"Yes, big brother?" she answered, turning her gaze from the TV to me.
"Do you believe in that?" I asked, hesitant. "That someone can… come back after dying?"
For a moment, she was silent — not a distracted silence, but a conscious one.
Her eyes were fixed on me, and the television light reflected in them a strange glow — a fleeting gold, like candlelight.
I stared at her, unsure why I was even asking. Luciana was just a child; she shouldn't have thoughts like that.
Then again, so was I — and yet…
"But why do I feel like I need to hear her answer?" I thought, an uneasy chill crawling up my neck.
"Forget it," I began, trying to laugh it off, to smother the unease in my voice. "You don't have to answer."
But before I could finish, Luciana spoke — and her tone wasn't that of a little girl. It was calm, cold, frighteningly lucid.
"Before I answer, brother… what's that ribbon on your shirt?" she asked, tilting her head slightly, her eyes fixed on my right sleeve.
I looked where she pointed. The golden ribbon gleamed faintly in the dim light. The same one I had noticed that morning when I got dressed.
"Isn't it just a ribbon?" I asked, trying to sound casual.
"Are you sure?" she countered, her eyes never leaving mine.
Am I sure? The thought echoed in my mind. Why was she asking that? It was just a ribbon… wasn't it? Still, my hands had begun to sweat.
"Yeah… I'm sure," I said, forcing a smile even as my voice trembled.
Luciana nodded slowly, as if she already knew what I'd say.
"Alright." She paused briefly before continuing. "And those letters on your collar?"
"Letters?" I frowned, pulling at the neckline to look. Curiosity won out, and I ended up taking the shirt off completely.
That's when I saw them.
Four crooked letters, stitched with uneven hands — almost childlike: M. A. A. E.
The embroidery was fresh; the thread still shimmered under the flickering light of the TV. And yet, I knew — it hadn't been there before.
"These letters… they weren't here this morning," I whispered, my heartbeat quickening.
Luciana smiled faintly — the kind of smile devoid of joy.
"Are you sure?" she asked again, her voice calm, almost compassionate, as if watching me fall into a trap whose end she already knew.
A shiver crawled up my spine. For the first time, I realized her gaze wasn't that of a child. It was… the gaze of someone testing me.
"I'm sure," I replied — but the word shook. Even I didn't believe it.
Luciana stood up slowly. The flicker of the television cast dancing shadows across her face, and for a brief moment, the eyes staring back at me were no longer a child's. They were gentle, yes — but behind them hid something ancient, unknowable.
"You don't have it anymore, brother," she said, stepping closer until she stood right before me. Her small hands rose and rested on my face. Her touch was cold — but a comforting cold, like a soft breeze in suffocating heat.
"What do those letters represent?"
The words echoed inside my head — spoken by more than one voice at once.
What do they represent? I thought, too afraid to answer aloud.
But before I could even open my mouth, Luciana spoke again — repeating the same question.
"Yes… what do they represent?"
A chill ran through me. I hadn't said a word.
While I tried to understand, a sharp pain struck my chest. The air fled my lungs, and for an instant, I thought my heart would stop.
Her hand still touched my face — now colder than before, but somehow keeping me alive.
I looked up at her… and she was no longer Luciana.
Standing before me was a tall woman, shrouded in a pale veil that draped over long, golden hair like strands of light. The translucent fabric hid part of her face, yet her eyes — deep, silver-blue — pierced straight through my soul.
A faint murmur came from the television behind her, distorted, almost unintelligible… until one word emerged, clear as a divine whisper:
"God Seth."
My heart raced. I looked down at my shirt — but it was no longer a shirt.
The navy-blue fabric stretched and shifted between my hands, becoming a gray tunic — the very same one Maria had sewn… the same that rested upon my altar.