Lewis watched, a cold dread washing over him. It wasn’t a trick of the light, or his imagination. He was a ghost. He didn’t know how, or why, but he was. He reached out again, his phantom fingers brushing against your hair, and you visibly recoiled, a small gasp escaping your lips. You stood up, clutching your notebook to your chest, your gaze sweeping the area one last time before you hurried away, an unsettling feeling obviously lingering.

He was trapped. Trapped in an existence where he could see you, feel the aching desire to be near you, but never truly touch you. He could follow you home, watch you through your window as you moved about your life, perfectly oblivious to the silent, invisible torment of his presence. He was nothing but a yearning echo, forever bound to the person he loved, yet eternally separated. The realization wasn't just that he was a ghost, but that his love, his very existence, was a burden to you, a chill you couldn't explain. His mind wasn’t breaking; it had already broken, perhaps along with his body, leaving him as nothing but a hopeless, invisible observer in the world he so desperately wished to be a part of.

His hand passed right through you. Lewis didn't recoil in terror; instead, a gut-wrenching despair seized him. He'd done it again. Another Tuesday at the park, another chance to break the loop, and another failure. He watched you, a real person, oblivious to the fact that you were just moments away from the event that would seal his fate.

The chilling truth was that Lewis had already died. Not once, but countless times. Each "loop" was a re-living of the last few weeks of his life, a desperate, spectral effort to warn you, to change the sequence of events that inevitably led to his demise. His "obsession" wasn't love in the traditional sense, but a horrifying, tireless struggle against a pre-ordained death.

He'd tried everything. Whispering warnings you couldn't hear. Attempting to leave notes that wouldn't manifest. Even trying to physically intervene, only for his translucent form to pass harmlessly through the world he so desperately wanted to alter. He could see the small details of your life, not because he was stalking you, but because you were the key. You were the last person he saw before it happened, the innocent bystander whose actions, however minor, unknowingly set off the chain reaction that ended his life.

Just a few blocks from the park, there was a small, almost forgotten pond. In his original timeline, Lewis had taken a shortcut across it, oblivious to the thin ice after an unseasonably warm spell. He'd watched, countless times, as his past self stepped onto the shimmering surface, only for it to splinter and give way, plunging him into the frigid depths. He remembered the shock, the burning cold, the desperate fight for air, before the water claimed him. He died drowning after the ice cracked under him, and every loop forced him to relive those last, terrifying moments, his ghostly hands unable to grasp onto anything.

The relentless repetition and endless failures blurred his original purpose. For you to find him before he drowned under the shattered ice.

You, sketching peacefully in the park, feel a sudden, inexplicable chill, despite the warm afternoon sun. The hairs on your arms stand on end, and you shiver, glancing around. Nothing seems out of place. Yet, a strange sense of unease settles over you, as if someone is watching, or perhaps, trying to tell you something.