Chapter Text
It was a day like any other. The sun streamed through the thin curtains of my window, reminding me that the world outside kept turning, even if I wasn't sure I wanted to keep turning with it. I got up slowly, my feet touching the cold floor, and began what should have been just another ordinary morning.
I brushed my teeth, showered, and donned my daily armor: tailored pants, a dress shirt, a blazer, and mid-heels. Everything was perfectly aligned, the necklace straight across the center of my collarbone. I grabbed my purse and keys and left.
Living close to work has its advantages; in theory, you can sleep more. In practice, insomnia has never let me take advantage of this privilege. Four or five hours of sleep is the maximum my brain allows before I remember all the emails I haven't responded to yet.
The routine followed the same script: same sidewalk, same crosswalk, the same wave to Mr. Charles, the newspaper vendor who insists on calling megirl in the red coat, even when the coat is black. Five minutes later, I was already walking through the office doors.
I greeted the receptionist, out of politeness, not desire, and stepped into the elevator. 8:53 a.m. Seventh floor, room 71, table 3, next to the window. A good spot, away from the killer air conditioning near the table 4 and the overly friendly coworker at table 2.
It was supposed to be just another day. So why this tightness in my chest? This unbearable feeling that something is about to happen, but I don't know what? It's not anxiety, nor OCD; I'm medicated enough to know the difference. But the discomfort grows, nudges, insists.
I try to ignore it. I open my emails, check my calendar. Labor lawsuit, contract review, meeting at ten. Everything's normal until my mind decides to sabotage me with unwanted memories.
Eric Miller. The college bastard. Daddy's boy, arrogant, who thought scholarships were synonymous with handouts. He found out I was a foreigner and an orphan and thought that gave him the right to make my life hell. He said I was "doomed to misery." I remember thinking how freeing it would have felt to wipe that cynical smirk off his face with my fist..
I'm pulled out of my reverie by Theodore's cheerful voice. "Good morning, Attorney Ochoa! Have you seen the email about the case of the month?"
I roll my eyes, but smile as I look at him. "Yes, I did. Review the documentation for case 1325. We need to submit everything by noon. Oh, and I want you with me at the hearing; you need more practice if you want to become a relevant figure in this field."
His eyes shine as if I had given him a prize. "Of course! Thank you, Attorney!"
He's a good kid. Unusual these days.
I open the email again and see a new notification:San Elías Medical Center — Results available. My annual checkups. The least I can do for myself. I schedule a follow-up appointment for 1:45 p.m., during my lunch break.
The strange feeling returns, stronger. A heavy, almost physical premonition. I try to laugh at myself:"Great, now I'm the protagonist of Final Destination. I just hope my death is quick."
I shake my head and get back to work.
The hours pass quickly. Boring routines have this knack: they make time disappear. Before I know it, it's already 1:15 p.m. I grab my bag and head to the appointment.
I didn't die on the way, which, considering my morbid mood, is a relief. I sit in front of the doctor, outwardly whole, but on the verge of falling apart when he starts talking.
"Maia, I've been your doctor for over seven years. In all that time, I've never seen anything like this. I want to schedule more tests, but…" he hesitates, his eyes darting away from mine. "We have serious changes. You're young and healthy, but something's wrong, and we need to find out as soon as possible."
The words become noise. Only fragments reach me:“I’ve never seen a result like this”… “there’s no cure if we don’t know what we’re treating”… “it may be too rare”.
My throat tightens. The world blurs.
And it's at that moment, in the middle of the office, that the premonition finally makes sense. The end I felt upon waking wasn't just another day, it was my own.
I left the office with my heart racing. Each step seemed to echo inside my head, repeating the same sound three, four, five times, until I was sure I wasn't imagining it. Three doors. Four windows. Breathe... breathe... I recounted what I saw, trying to keep myself grounded in reality, even as everything inside me began to crumble.
The hallway seemed to stretch on forever. The fluorescent lights flickered erratically, and every sound, the clink of a tray, the click of shoes on the floor, the sound of doors closing, became amplified, deafening. I tried to focus on my breathing, counting each inhale, each exhale, but the air felt heavier, colder. Something was wrong, and I knew it.
When I finally reached the exit, the world outside seemed normal. People crossing the street, cars passing by, the wind rustling the leaves. But none of it felt real. The world continued on, indifferent, while I felt like I was on the edge of a precipice no one else could see. I craved order, routine, safety. And in that moment, none of it existed.
The following days became a blur. Test after test, appointments, medical reports, hours in corridors filled with strange smells, insistent sounds, lights that burned the eyes. Each doctor had a different look, but they all shared the same phrase: "We'll investigate further." Deep down, I knew nothing would resolve the matter. The days were numbered, and I didn't yet know how much.
I spent a long time reflecting, immersed in thoughts that repeated themselves like waves, each more painful than the last. I came to a conclusion that left me dizzy with despair: I had never truly lived. I had always worked, studied, and organized my life with obsessive precision, as if someday it would save me. But for what? For whom? For me, never. All the effort, all the routine, all the planning, and in the end, none of what I had built belonged to me.
It was then that I decided. In a thoughtless gesture, yet profound in its freedom, I resigned on a random Friday. I announced that I wouldn't be returning on Monday. It was the least I could do to feel in control of my own life, even if only for a short time. If I were to die, let it be with my hands full of choices, however small, however superficial.
I left the building and said goodbye to my colleagues with a restrained smile. I didn't need to explain anything, and no one asked. There was no need; we were never really close enough to care. My next step was decided with the coldness of someone obsessively planning every move: sell everything, box up the life I'd built so far, transform every penny into a ticket, every decision into freedom.
I broke the lease on the apartment, sold all the furniture, every book, every detail that reminded me of who I was. I bought a ticket to France and began my journey. In Europe, every city was a blank canvas. Short days, long walks, silent cafes where no one knew me, nights where I counted stars that existed for no one but me.
I spent ten months exploring Europe, losing myself in the alleys of Paris, the icy streets of Prague, and the suffocating heat of Rome in the summer. Then, seven months in the Americas, from Canada to Argentina, collecting landscapes, foods, ruins, stories no one would tell but myself. Each day brought me closer to something I couldn't name, a sense of urgency growing inside my chest, a silent pressure that told me everything was about to change.
Now I was in Malaysia, four months in Asia, sitting in my hotel room staring at maps spread out on the bed. Indonesia or the Philippines? The next destination seemed irrelevant compared to the heaviness I felt. It was as if every step I took, every choice, was futile compared to what awaited me.
And then, my body began to tire in a way that wasn't physical. A slow weakness, as if my bones were dissolving from the inside out. That feeling wasn't new; it had been with me for months, maybe years. Sudden dizziness, sharp pains that shot up my spine like an electric current and left me breathless, nausea that came out of nowhere, and an exhaustion that no amount of rest seemed to cure.
The medications my doctors prescribed to ease my symptoms no longer had the same effect. At first, they helped for a few hours, giving me a false sense of control. Now, it was like swallowing nothing, empty capsules, dead promises. I still took them, of course, more out of habit than hope. It was part of my routine. Three pills a day, at the same time, with a glass of water up to the exact center line. Even if they didn't help, I had to follow the ritual.
My mind tried to grasp every detail of reality—the paper on the table, the light streaming through the window, the rough texture of the sheet against my fingers—but everything began to blur, to blur. The real world began to fade around me; I could no longer hold my ground. Everything that had once been concrete began to lose form, as if I were slowly being erased from within my own body.
I lay in bed, waiting for the feeling to pass. For a moment, I thought, "Is this the end for me?" And the thought came with a frightening serenity. There was no panic, just exhaustion. Exhaustion from fighting something I didn't understand. Closing my eyes once more, I couldn't find the strength to open them again.
I was trapped in a kind of limbo, a space without light, without sound, without time. Aware of my own existence, but without truly existing. It was like floating in a nameless void, where body and mind were no longer two, but neither were they one. There was no pain, there was no fear. In fact, there was nothing. I just… was.
Gradually, a gentle pressure began to build, as if the nothingness around me were beginning to pulse. A subtle, almost maternal presence was pushing me toward something. The darkness dissolved into a blinding flash, and consciousness returned in fragments. The sound came first, muffled, distant, but real. Cries. Footsteps. Voices that mingled like echoes underwater.
I opened my eyes with effort, and the world seemed… wrong. Everything was a blur of warm and cool colors merging together, as if someone had painted reality with trembling hands. I tried to move my arms, but they felt small and fragile. The air was thick and hot, and a scent of herbs and smoke filled the room.
The voices began to become clearer, though disjointed. A woman was crying. Another was saying something about the baby. Aboutme. My chest tightened. My body trembled, but I couldn't understand why. I tried to speak, but the sound that came out wasn't my voice, it was a faint cry, the cry of a newborn.
It was then that dread struck me. I wasn't dreaming. I wasn't dying. I was… being born?
What the hell? Didn't this happen in fiction? This... this had to be a dream, a crazy, senseless dream. My God, had they drugged me and I was hallucinating all this?
The first few days of this dream… or hallucination, were confusing, shrouded in voices I didn't recognize, strange smells, and constant heat. My vision was blurry, my arms too weak to move on their own, but little by little I began to notice patterns. The soft voice that soothed me, the delicate movements that rocked me, the small gestures that mimicked human care… everything began to fall into place. It wasn't a dream. It was real.
Over time, I realized I wasn't in my own world. Something about the air, the objects, the way people dressed—everything hinted at a distant, primitive past, perhaps centuries ago. The reality I'd been reborn into had nothing to do with the modernity I knew.
And then, slowly, my vision improved. Blurred shapes began to take shape, shadows became faces, figures became people. At first, everything seemed distant, as if I were watching a dream from underwater. Until reality, or whatever it was, hit me full-on. I saw, dumbfounded, the magic that seemed routine in that house. Small gestures of the woman's hands cradling me made the impossible happen: glasses moved on their own, fabrics sewed themselves in the air, sparks danced above the candles as if they had a life of their own. Sounds ceased when she lifted a finger, as if even the air bowed before her.
My mind, still rational and accustomed to logic and science, rejected what it saw. Magic. Real, tangible, everyday. What once inhabited the pages of books now pulsed before my eyes, and the most disturbing thing was how banal it seemed. The woman I believed to be my mother used magic as if she were breathing. She was the one who fed me, who rocked me to sleep, who cared for me and the other two children who shared that dark space.
As the days passed, as my eyes learned to see and my consciousness adapted to this new body, I began to notice my true surroundings. The house, cold and damp, exuded a constant tension. Something was wrong there. The air felt heavy, as if the very wood of the walls held echoes of ancient screams. The man, my supposed father, had a look that chilled the blood. His every step on the floor sounded like a threat. When he spoke, it was meant to scream; when he touched, it was meant to hurt.
I watched my mother being pushed, humiliated, silenced. I saw her eyes fill with unshed tears, the trembling in her hands, the way she cowered in his presence. Even without understanding every word they exchanged, I understood the fear. It was in everything: in the averted glances, the half-hearted whispers, the forced silence that fell whenever the man entered the room.
My sister, perhaps one or two years old, was always withdrawn, her gaze always lowered, as if invisibility were her only means of survival. Fragile, delicate, and completely erased by the brutality that surrounded her. My brother, a boy of five or six, already displayed the same cold gleam in his father's eyes, the same precocious cruelty in his gestures. It was like watching the seed of monstrosity germinate before my eyes.
And I, trapped inside a tiny, powerless body, could only watch. An adult consciousness imprisoned in childish fragility, feeling every nuance of that domestic hell without being able to react. It was a cruel punishment, understanding too much and having too little power.
It was then, between spells and pain, between screams and silences, that I understood.
I had not been reborn in a fairy tale.
The following months dragged on in a cycle that blended routine and torment. With each day, my vision became clearer, my senses more acute, and along with them, a cruel understanding of the life around me. I began to distinguish seasons by the cold that crept through the cracks in the house, by the leaves that accumulated on the dirt floor. Time passed, even though, trapped in a small body, I had almost no way to mark it.
The woman who welcomed me, my mother, seemed to wither a little more with each dawn. Her gestures, once firm and filled with an almost instinctive magic, began to falter. The sparkle in her eyes was swallowed by something that resembled resignation. I saw the weariness in her shoulders, the constant fear in her steps, the heavy silence she cultivated as a means of survival.
The man, my father, was a specter of violence. He didn't need to raise his voice to wound; his gaze was enough. His words were hard as steel, and his presence was enough to silence any joy that might have arisen within that house. The boy followed his steps like a faithful dog, learning from every gesture, every cry, every cruelty. And my sister... was the picture of helplessness. Fragile, shy, always hidden behind doors or curtains, trying to disappear.
I watched it all—the love that was gone, the faith that was lost, my mother's body slowly ailing, perhaps more from sadness than from any real illness. When the cough started, I thought it would pass. When the blood appeared, I realized there was no turning back. She didn't seek help. Nor could she. And deep down, she didn't seem to want to. As if each new day were just another burden.
I don't know exactly how much time passed—maybe a year, maybe a little more—until she was gone. Silently, on a cold morning, her body simply stopped. And with it, the last flame of tenderness that existed in that home was extinguished.
At the funeral, the air was thick with dust and murmurs. The simple coffin lay on the muddy ground of the small local cemetery. I, on a neighbor's lap, watched, not understanding everything, but feeling a strange pain, not of loss, but of compassion. A bitter sorrow for that woman who never had a chance to live, only to endure.
I heard the conversations around me, the low voices of the village women:
“Poor Mary... always so miserable. They say her husband has gone completely mad.”
“Marvolo Gaunt, that brute? No one has ever been able to talk to him without hearing a scream.”
“And the children? Morfin is just like him, and the girl... Merope, poor thing, lives with her head in the clouds.”
Each word echoed inside my head like a spell being revealed. Mary Gaunt. Marvolo Gaunt. Morfin Gaunt. Merope… Gaunt.
My heart raced. My hands, small and fragile, trembled in the lap of the woman holding me. The world around me seemed to freeze. I connected the dots with an almost cruel clarity, as if a light bulb had switched on inside my chest, revealing what had always been there, in the shadow of my ignorance.
The Gaunt family. The origin of the Dark Lord's bloodline. I was there, within the story I knew so well, but at its darkest beginnings. Long before Harry Potter, before Hogwarts, before Voldemort even had a name. I was surrounded by the misery, madness, and eugenics fanaticism that would mark the fate of one of the most cursed families in the wizarding world.
And in that instant, something inside me broke, and at the same time, something ignited. I understood that death hadn't been my end. It had been my new beginning. And that, somehow, I would have to find the strength to exist, and survive, in that world that wasn't mine, but that was now all I had left.