This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Aggravating_Road2692 on 2025-01-14 22:15:25+00:00.

Part 1

My hair is no longer silky, now wirey and grey. The blue in my eyes is covered in a milky haze. The struggles of a life I never lived mark my identity with deep ruts. I'm an old man, when yesterday, I was only nineteen. I felt sick, the acid rising up my chest, burning my insides. I tried holding it back, but it filled my mouth and I puked into the sink. The vomit was dark, the white porcelain speckled in dots of red. I never liked the sight of blood. The man in the reflection looked scared, his bushy brows slanted, an eleven between his eyes. He lifted a hand and caressed the side of his face, the skin stretched but took too long to bounce back. His hand trailed down to his long filthy beard, it felt exactly like it looked, rough, rugged, ugly. I started to sob, but when the sadness left my throat, the thickness of my own voice startled me. That was when the bathroom door pushed open.

I hardly noticed him come in, the store clerk. His reflection stepping into the mirror's frame, he looked irritated.

"Sir, this is the women's bathroom. You can't be in here."

'Sir?' The word sent an icy shiver across my skin and I felt the fear trail down my leg. It was hot and it soaked into the fabric of my pants. It trickled onto the laminate floor, pooling under my boots. The stench of fresh ammonia filled my nose.

The store clerk's eyes dropped towards the sudden leak festering from the tiles, before realizing. He threw his hands up,

"Come on man. Who the hell is going to clean that shit up. I told them that we shouldn't let homeless people in here, the shit that I deal with on a daily basis. Come on... out."

He snapped his fingers, tolerance fleeting, but I was frozen, unable to move, to speak. It was only when the moister covering my legs started to cool, that I started trembling. I mouthed a quiet plea for help, but the muscles of my neck spasmed. The only thing that came up was a quiet croak. The clerk massaged his forehead.

"Great, another junky. Come on we can't have you shooting your veins in the woman's bathroom, out."

He hesitated when grabbing the sleeve of my jacket, that was about the time he saw what I'd done to the sink.

"Aww, the fuck is wrong with you old man."

He never touched me, a disgusted look washed across his face as if I was riddled with leprosy.

"That's it, I'm calling the cops."

His feet clattered across the floor and he thrust the door aside, storming out. I started coughing, my hand reaching for my face, covering my mouth. When the coughing fit stopped, I looked at my hand, finding a wad of coagulated red. I felt hot and the room started to spin. Obvious affliction aside, I felt sick, I was sick. Further confirmation of that fact squirted out of my lungs and coated my clothes. The room swayed and I found myself propped up by the strength of the wall.

I started toward the door and walked out into the store. The clerk was punching a number into the phone but stopped when he saw me, bloody, weakening. The woman that was in the bathroom before me, rounded a shelf, screaming at the horror, the cheap bottle of wine in her hands shattering at her feet.

The clerk slammed the phone and pointed to the door.

"Out!"

I stammered in his direction, outstreaching a hand, quietly begging for mercy. There was no mercy given that day.

With the fibers of a broom, he swatted me away, careful not to touch the urine and blood on my clothes. I tripped through the threshold of the door, landing on my face. The clerk tossed the luggage I had with me onto my back and the zipper opened. The concrete was decorated with my clothes, women's clothes. Once again the clerk looked disgusted. With the handle of the broom, he lifted a frilly pink piece of underwear, holding it up to the light.

"What kind of twisted shit are you into old man?"

He flicked the garment away, it fell on my face.

"Get the hell out of her you freak."

I tried explaining.

"You don't understand," I said while showing him my palms.

The voice that rose from my chest didn't make the statement sound too convincing, not even to me. I was guilty of being in possession of my own belongings, a crime I never thought possible.

The store's automated bell dinged and the clerk's image warped by the shimmer of the glass's reflection. That was when I caught a glimpse of the pathetic pervert on the ground. I felt sorry for him, for myself. The woman that was inside the store pushed the glass door open, stepping around me, her trajectory exaggerated.

I wobbled to my feet, feeling a shutter through my chest when the ground was once again under my shoes. The asphalt rolled across the ground, it was as if I was on a ship, in the middle of a stormy sea. I used the luggage to prop myself up and started walking down the street. The plastic handle barely held my weight, it bowed, struggling to keep me upright, a task that would've been easier only a day ago. The wheels under the bag thunked on the sidewalk's cracks, the sound unrhythmic, a product of my fleeting ability to walk a straight line.

I felt embarrassed to be out here like this, but no one paid me any mind, just another bum in the city. All of a sudden I wished they were looking at me, if they'd seen the nineteen-year-old version of me, people would be rushing to aid the tiny girl fighting to reach the street corner. But now burly and unsightly, people refused to look my way, a minor inconvenience in an otherwise normal day. I felt lonely, alone, scared.

I walked passed an alley, looking down its length, the two walls on either side shrowding the corridor in darkness. It was a good enough place as any to lay my head down and die. When I walked into the shadow of the day, the temperature dropped drastically, but at least I was hidden from the winter winds, from the cold cruel world. I leaned my back on the brick siding, hugging my bag, holding on to the remnants of a life that was no longer here. I closed my eyes and started slowly drifting away. The anguished thoughts muted in the warmth of the thickening veil until... nothing.

The gentle hum of fire gently stirred my eyes open. There was a barrel directly in front of me, the logs crackling in the heat. I thought I was dead, but the radiating warmth of the flames told me otherwise. The sky was dark, it was night. I had been asleep for who knows how long, not long enough if you ask me.

"You're lucky I found you when I did."

There was a pair of eyes looking at me from the other side of the fire, the flickering lashings of orange glistening in his gaze.

'Who are you?' I thought of saying, but the cough in my chest stifled the question, though it wasn't necessary, the look on my face said it all.

"You were freezing to death out here. Had a friend of mine go like that last winter."

He took a stick and repositioned the logs, angry sparks sprinkled into the air, and I sat upright. It was about that time I noticed that I was wrapped in a heavy wool blanket. I was puzzled at its sudden appearance.

"That's not a gift. I'm going to need that back after you're done. I was just getting tired of hearing your teeth rattle."

He was shuffling something in his hands. It wasn't till I looked at the ground that I realized what it was. My wallet was on the ground, he was rummaging through my credit cards, my I.D. He held the little square up to the light, reading aloud.

"Maya."

He laughed a smoker's laugh while eyeing me over the picture.

"What do we have here? Maya, Maya, Maya. You steal these?"

He flipped the card in my direction, letting me see the picture. Turning it back, he looked at it through a tired squint.

"Not a bad-looking girl." His words were accompanied by an astonished whistle.

"Wouldn't mind spending some time with Maya if you know what I mean."

Lust filled his eyes, anger boiled in my chest.

"Give those back."

My voice was throaty, rusty.

"Well, well it speaks." Patrinazation engulfed his tone.

"She your kin?" He said pointing at the I.D. with his eyes.

I didn't say anything, measuring my words, hesitating to say the truth.

"Well if she ain't you kin..." His brows were suggestive, hungry, the vile thoughts racing through his mind.

"Maya, Maya, Maya. Man oh man. My Maya..."

"Maya." Someone else said. I turned my head searching for the familiar voice that called my name. For a second I thought someone had finally recognized me, that maybe I was saved. But my heart dropped when I saw the figure that was walking past the entrance to the alley. It was me.

Her blond, silky hair shimmered under the street lamp, her petite frame dwarfed by the scale of the buildings. It was uncanny, to see myself as others did.

"Maya wait up." The voice echoed through the street, down the alley. My mom and dad stepped between the gap at the end of the corridor. They looked dressed up, as if ready for a fancy dinner. When my parents caught up to her, my dad put his hand around the girl and they walked out of view. I shot to my feet, the ground still unsteady, I hurried after them.

"Wait, where are you going?" The homeless man shouted, but his voice never registered. I stumbled into the street to see the happy family making its way down the sidewalk. I hurried after them. Hiding behind parked cars, still wary of the way my dad had...

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