WALKING HOURS

CHAPTER 13

The ceiling above me was too white.

Too quiet.

Too clean.

I blinked up at the fluorescent panels, the hum of hospital machines cutting through the fog in my head. My throat was dry, raw, like I hadn’t spoken in days.

“Jasmine?”

The voice was soft, cautious. A nurse stood beside me, middle-aged, kind eyes, clipboard in hand.

“You’re awake.” She smiled gently, like she’d been hoping for this moment.

My lips moved before any sound came. “Where am I?”

“General hospital. You’ve been unconscious for a while.” She leaned forward, brushing my hair away from my forehead. “Do you remember what happened?”

I didn’t answer.

Because I didn’t know.

The last thing I remembered with certainty was the hidden passage. The wall closing behind us. The darkness swallowing everything.

But that memory felt distant. Dreamlike.

“Don’t worry,” the nurse said kindly. “That’s normal. You’ll feel better with rest. I’ll get the doctor.”

She left, the door whispering shut behind her.

I lay there, staring at the ceiling, trying to feel real. My body ached like it had been stitched back together. There were IV lines in my arm, monitors beeping steadily beside me. Everything clinical, ordered, sterile.

But inside, something buzzed.

Not fear. Not confusion.

Just… absence.

Like a film had been peeled away from my thoughts.

When the doctor came in, I played along—nodded when he asked if I knew my name, blinked when he explained I’d suffered severe fatigue, dehydration, and shock. Apparently, I’d collapsed on the street. A neighbor found me, called an ambulance.

Beverly. That name shot through me like a flare.

“Is there someone named Beverly?” I asked.

He checked the chart. “No one by that name on your emergency contact list.”

“She might’ve been with me.”

He shook his head. “You were alone.”

The doctor smiled—professional, practiced. “You’re lucky, Jasmine. Whatever stress you were under, your body’s recovering well. We just need to monitor you a little longer.”

I stayed in the hospital for three more days.

No nightmares. No visions. No static in strangers’ faces.

Just dreams about ordinary things—water running, sunlight on skin, the touch of someone’s hands.

By the time I was discharged, the memory of the tapes felt like something I’d read in a book. A bad one. The kind you forget on purpose.

I returned to my apartment first. Everything was where I’d left it. Except the mirror—shattered now. A spiderweb of cracks splitting my reflection into fragments.

I didn’t replace it.

Instead, I went back to school. Started attending classes again, smiling when people asked where I’d been. Some thought I’d taken a spontaneous break. Some didn’t notice I was gone at all.

The city hadn’t changed. But something inside me had.

And yet… I let myself slip into the old rhythm.

I let it seduce me.

Mornings were lectures and coffee and scribbled notes in the margins of textbooks. Evenings were bodies. Parties. Laughter too loud to be real. I let men kiss me, touch me, whisper things against my skin they didn’t mean. I let myself be warm again. I let myself be filthy.

It felt good to be wanted. Even better to not care.

One night I found myself in someone’s bed—his name was Kene, or Kenzo, I wasn’t sure. He had kind hands, sharp cheekbones, and a forgettable smile. He made me forget myself for a while. I liked that about him.

After, I lay in his sheets, staring at the ceiling, thinking how quiet the world had become.

Too quiet.

I sat up, suddenly craving air, craving light. Craving the sound of my own name said by someone who knew me.

Because I didn’t think anyone did anymore.

Not even me.

I stepped out onto the city streets, the hum of life wrapping around me like a second skin. The sun was warm on my face, the air smelled like rain and exhaust and fried plantain from a nearby vendor. I breathed it in deep, feeling something loosen inside me.

School had never felt this easy before. Classes passed in a blur of words and faces, but none of it stuck—like I was moving through a film set, where nothing mattered beyond the next scene.

Friends greeted me, some surprised to see me back. I smiled, shrugged, and let their questions fall away unanswered. They didn’t need the messy truth. I didn’t need it either.

Kene found me again that night, waiting outside a bar. His grin was lazy, full of promises I didn’t care to keep.

We danced, we drank, and later he led me back to his cramped apartment. The bed was stiff, the sheets cold at first, but soon warmth spread between us. I closed my eyes and let myself fall—into his arms, into the music, into the darkness.

For a moment, it was enough.

But later, lying awake in the silence after, the doubt crept in. The same question throbbed in my mind like a pulse.

Is this really over?

I wanted to believe it was. I wanted to believe I’d escaped the loop. The voices, the girl, the tapes—all of it gone.

But sometimes, when the city’s noise softened and the night pressed close, I felt a flicker. A shadow shifting in the corner of my eye. A whisper that wasn’t quite there.

I told myself it was nothing. That I was healing.

But deep down, I knew.

This peace was just the calm before the storm.

The days slipped by in a haze of routine and distraction. I buried myself in schoolwork, catching up on lectures and assignments with a mechanical precision that surprised even me. The laughter of classmates sounded distant—like echoes from another world.

I started meeting people again, familiar faces and new ones. Sometimes, it was just a drink and a dance. Other nights, I let the city pull me into its underbelly—dark clubs with flashing lights, whispered deals, and promises that came cheap. I told myself it was just living, just being young, but part of me was searching for something I couldn’t name.

Kene stayed around longer than I expected. He was easy company, and I liked how he didn’t ask questions. His hands on my skin felt like a lifeline, anchoring me in a reality I sometimes feared slipping away.

Sex became a way to forget. Not just the past few weeks, but all the times my mind had betrayed me, the moments I’d lost in shadow. With him, I was just Jasmine—no tapes, no shadows, no warning voices. Just skin and breath and heat.

But when the dawn came, the quiet was unbearable. I’d lie in bed, staring at the ceiling, heart pounding. The memories didn’t come in nightmares anymore. They came in whispers, like a half-remembered song I couldn’t quite recall.

I told Beverly I was fine. She smiled, relieved, but I could see the worry behind her eyes.

One afternoon, as I sat in the library pretending to study, a strange sensation crept over me—like the walls were breathing, like the pages in the book I held fluttered though there was no wind. I blinked hard and looked around. No one else seemed to notice.

I shoved the feeling away, forcing myself to focus on the words. But I knew—deep down—this peace was fragile. And whatever waited in the dark was still watching.