Borrowed LivesChapter 1 — The Morning of Becoming
Elias had always preferred the quiet—his room lit only by a softly glowing monitor, days blending into one another without the need to be seen. At eighteen, solitude felt safer than connection.
So when he woke one morning in a room washed in warm sunlight and the faint scent of lavender, panic caught sharply in his throat.
This wasn't his bed. This wasn't his room.
His legs felt longer. His hands smaller. His breath steadier.
He walked to the mirror.
The woman who stared back was Luna.
Jasper's aunt. Thirty-two. Kind-eyed. Warm. Gracefully lived-in.
And he knew her. Not from memory alone—but from inside.
Her laughter. Her regrets. Her hopes. All threaded into his mind like pages already turned.
He pressed a trembling palm to the glass.
"I… can't tell anyone."
And so he didn't.
He stepped into her life with careful, uncertain courage.