The air is thicker now.
Not warmer — heavier, like a fog that clings and never lets go.
It presses against my skin, a slow, damp weight that sinks into my bones. Breathing feels like drawing in cotton, dense and muffling. Each inhale is a struggle, and each exhale a surrender.
Somewhere to my left, someone shifts in their seat.
The scrape of shoe against linoleum breaks the silence — sharp, too loud in this room that devours sound.
Eyes flick toward the noise, and for a moment, we're no longer just shadows waiting.
We're all here.
Five figures — worn and frayed like the edges of a forgotten photograph.
The woman in green crosses her legs, the soft rustle of fabric like leaves brushing together. She looks at me with eyes that hold years of unspoken stories. "We're unraveling," she says softly.
Her voice slips through the heavy air, fragile but certain.
The old man with trembling hands nods slowly, his gaze fixed on some point far beyond these walls. "I can feel it," he says. "Threads pulling loose, fraying at the edges of our waiting."
The man with the threadbare coat lets out a dry laugh — the sound brittle, like cracking ice. "Maybe it's time to stop waiting."
I want to believe him. I want to believe that this waiting, this endless pause, is not forever.
But fear claws at me, sharp and cold.
"What if the waiting is all we are now?" I say quietly. "What if the door we seek is just another lie?"
The boy—the restless one—taps his fingers faster, like a staccato heartbeat. "I don't care," he snaps. "Anything's better than this. Even if it's the wrong way."
His words hang between us, a spark in the suffocating dark.
The woman in green leans forward, her face soft but fierce. "We need to try. We need to do something. Even if it means breaking the silence, breaking the walls… breaking ourselves."
I swallow the lump rising in my throat.
The clock above the doors remains motionless, its silent face watching.
The room feels alive now, like it's breathing just beneath the surface—waiting, watching.
I can feel eyes on me that aren't ours.
Not human.
Not kind.
The old man's hands tremble more violently now, the cracks in his voice widening. "There's something here," he whispers. "Something that doesn't want us to leave."
A cold wind snakes through the room — or maybe it's just the breath of waiting, curling around us, tightening its grip.
We're fraying.
Unraveling.
Falling apart thread by thread.
But still, somewhere deep inside, a flicker of something remains.
Hope.
Desperation.
A silent scream.
I close my eyes and listen.
The room hums with a terrible patience.
The clock does not tick.
But maybe — just maybe — it's waiting for us to move.