After meeting the psychiatrist.

You hadn’t slept in two nights.

Not because you weren’t tired—your body ached for rest—but because you feared what waited behind your eyelids. The garden. The bruised stranger. That terrifying tenderness.

But tonight, exhaustion won.

You blinked—and the room was gone. The air was damp, filled with the scent of earth and roses. The same garden unfolded beneath the moon’s watchful eye, but it felt closer now. Realer. The petals beneath your fingertips were dewy. The cold reached your bones. You could feel him coming before he appeared.

And then… he did.

He emerged from the mist like always, tall, pale, his half-bruised face shimmering with sweat and shadow. But this time, he didn’t kneel beside you. He stood still, watching.

"Why are you doing this to me?" you asked, your voice more breath than words.

He tilted his head, slowly, like a curious animal. His lips twitched—not into a smile this time, but into something darker. Sadder. As if you had asked the wrong question.

Then he moved.

In a heartbeat, he was kneeling again. His hand ghosted over your arm—cold, as always—but firm now. Possessive. He leaned in, and his whisper was a rasp in your ear:

“Because you dreamed of me first.”

You recoiled, heart thudding, but you didn’t wake. Why wasn’t it ending? The dream never lasted this long. You tried to pull away, but he caught your wrist, his grip tightening just enough to steal your breath.

“Do you know what happens,” he murmured, “when a dream is fed every night for weeks?”

You shook your head, your voice lost.

“It blooms.” His thumb brushed your lower lip. “It grows roots. And then…” His smile returned, cracked and gleaming in the moonlight. “…it finds a way into the waking world.”

Suddenly, the garden around you shifted. The roses turned black. The moonlight paled to gray. You felt thorns beneath your hands, invisible ones pricking your skin, and in the distance, something moved. Something not him. Something worse.

He looked over his shoulder and whispered like a lover afraid to be heard: “Don’t leave me tonight. If you wake now… I won’t be the one who follows you out.”

Your blood ran cold.

The dream was no longer just a dream.

It was a door. And something had just found the handle.