He stood in the room with the burnt dress for a long time.
The silence pressed on him from every side.
There was still no door behind him. Only a wall. A pale, blank wall that looked too smooth, too deliberate—like it had replaced something.
He turned back to the chair.
The dress was gone.
He didn't look away.He didn't blink.
But it was gone.
"I'm glad you made it this far," said a voice behind him.
He turned.
She was standing by the window.
The Girl in Red Shoes.
Her dress was clean now—no burns, no tears—and her hair glowed faintly in the dull light, as if the room had been waiting for her to step into it.
She looked at him with the calm confidence of someone who already knew the ending.
He tried to speak, but she only shook her head.
"Don't ask questions you don't want answers to," she said gently.
She walked toward him, her shoes making no sound on the floor.
"You're getting close," she whispered. "But not quite ready."
He didn't know what she meant. He didn't care. He just wanted to hold onto this—whatever it was—because something inside him knew it wouldn't last.
She smiled.
And the floor vanished beneath him.
He didn't fall down.
He fell out—like the world had flipped inside itself and let go.
There was no wind. No pull. Just a slow, soft drift through colorless space. Memories flickered past him like reflections on broken glass.
A swing set.
A locked door.
Smoke in his lungs.
A voice calling his name—but not the name he used now.
Then darkness again.
And light.
He landed softly, feet-first, on polished tile.
It took him a moment to realize he wasn't in the room anymore.
He was in a library.
But not one made by human hands.
The shelves were impossibly tall, climbing upward into shadow. Some bent inward. Some looped. Others moved when he wasn't looking.
And every shelf was filled with books. Endless rows of them—some thick, some impossibly thin, some still being written.
The air smelled like ink, paper, and dust that had never settled.
In the center of the room stood a figure.
Tall. Calm. Waiting.
The man wore a dark coat. Gloves without fingers. His spectacles caught the light, but the eyes behind them remained unreadable.
He looked up as the boy approached.
"You're early," he said.
"I didn't mean to be."
"No one ever does," the man replied.
"Who are you?"
The man closed the book he'd been reading and set it aside.
"I'm the Archivist."
Silence.
Not awkward.
Just inevitable.
The Archivist stepped out from behind the desk. His footsteps made no sound on the tile.
"You've been leaving pieces of yourself behind," he said. "Every time you forget, I collect what's left."
"Collect for what?"
"For when you're ready to remember."
The boy looked around again.
Most of the books had no titles.
A few had names he almost recognized.
One had his.
He took a step toward it.
The Archivist held up a hand. Not in warning. In patience.
"You don't want that one," he said.
"Why not?"
"Because you still believe the story you told yourself is the truth."
The lights dimmed slightly, as if the room had exhaled.
The Archivist gestured to the chair across from him.
"Sit. Ask your questions. I won't answer most of them."
"…Why not?"
The Archivist smiled faintly.
"Because you'll forget this part anyway."