The space between waking and dreaming was neither light nor dark.
It was still.
Like time itself had stopped breathing.
I stood in that stillness again—the place of water and mist, where the ground shimmered like glass.
Above me, faint lights drifted, each one pulsing like a memory trying to be remembered.
And there she was.
The woman whose body I had borrowed.
The mother whose daughter I now held every morning.
The soul who looked at me with such calm that it broke me a little more each time.
She smiled as I approached, the same way sunlight touches water—gently, as if afraid it might hurt.
"You came back," she said.
I nodded. "I always do."
She tilted her head, her voice quiet but steady.
"You're still divided, aren't you?"
"I don't know where I belong," I whispered.
"When I wake there, I feel guilty. When I wake here, I feel empty. I can't tell which life is mine anymore."
She reached out, her fingers brushing the air between us.
"That's because you've carried both. You were never meant to live in halves."
Her words were soft, but they cut deep.
For a long time, neither of us spoke.
We simply stood in the silence, two lives hanging between us like mirrors reflecting the same sorrow.
I broke first.
"I didn't deserve what happened to me," I said, voice trembling.
"But sometimes I wonder if I invited it. If I tried too hard to be good, to please, to forgive. And for what? They forgot me like I was nothing."
Her eyes filled with a sadness that wasn't pity—it was recognition.
"You loved them until it hurt to exist," she said. "And they mistook your silence for surrender."
She stepped closer.
"I know how it feels to die for someone who never knew what it cost you."
Her hand brushed mine. This time, I felt it—warm, alive.
"Then why?" I asked. "Why give me your life? Why let me live as you?"
She smiled—a small, tired smile that carried the weight of all her goodbyes.
"Because when I saw you, I recognized myself. You were the ghost of the person I might have become if I'd been broken differently."
Her voice softened.
"And I thought... maybe if you lived my life, it would heal you. Maybe love would finally find its way back to you."
The air shimmered between us.
I saw flashes of her world—the home filled with laughter, the baby's first smile, her husband's trembling hands as he prayed beside her bed.
Then I saw mine—the cold floor of the basement, the smell of rust, my son's frightened eyes.
Both lives.
Both real.
Both mine.
She took a breath, as if gathering the last of her strength.
"This is where the paths split," she said. "If you stay, this body will be yours completely. You'll raise my daughter, live my days, love the ones who love you back."
"And if I return?"
Her gaze faltered, full of quiet sorrow.
"You'll wake in pain again. Your hearing may never return. But your son will still need you. He's waiting, even if he doesn't know how to say it."
Her voice trembled. "He's still a child. He won't survive losing you twice."
For the first time, I couldn't breathe.
The choice was cruel.
It wasn't between life and death—it was between love that healed and love that hurt.
"I'm so tired," I whispered. "I don't know if I have anything left to give him."
"You don't have to," she said softly.
"Just be there. Sometimes being alive is enough."
The space began to fade around us.
Light poured from every corner, dissolving the mist into gold.
I knew this was the end of the in-between.
She stepped closer and pressed her forehead to mine.
Her warmth sank into me, her heartbeat echoing through the silence.
"Whichever path you choose," she whispered, "promise me one thing."
"What?"
"Don't live as a ghost anymore."
Her breath trembled against my skin.
"You've died enough for others. Live for yourself now."
The light grew stronger.
I could feel my soul stretching—pulling between two worlds, two bodies.
Behind her, I saw the baby laughing, reaching out with tiny hands.
Behind me, I saw my son sitting alone, holding the old photo of our family.
Two children.
Two lives.
Two mothers.
And I—one heart split in two.
In the last moment, I reached out and took her hand.
Our fingers intertwined like threads woven from fate itself.
"Thank you," I whispered.
"For what?" she asked.
"For giving me a reason to live again."
She smiled one last time, her body fading into the light.
And as the world dissolved around me, I finally knew where I was meant to go.
When I woke, I was crying.
But this time, they were not tears of grief.
They were the first tears of release.