Chapter Three: Lightfall
763 Words
That night, Eliot fell asleep clutching the photograph to his chest.
He wasn’t sure if he wanted answers or just company. Maybe both. The days felt slower now, like time had thickened somehow, and the only thing that moved easily was the sea.
When the dream found him, it didn’t hesitate.
He was already standing beneath the trees.
The forest glowed with its own quiet breath — pale trunks like marble, leaves translucent as moth wings, and a sky that shifted colorless above it all, empty of stars. Light drifted through the branches, though there was no sun, only a soft silver that shimmered like memory.
And then, across a narrow stream of glowing water, he saw him.
The boy stood barefoot, his clothes rippling with moonlight — long, layered fabric that looked like it had been woven from night itself. He didn’t speak at first. He just watched Eliot with a calm, unreadable expression.
Then: “You came back.”
His voice was low, clear, and unhurried — like water over stone.
“I didn’t mean to,” Eliot said, though he knew he was lying.
The boy smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “No one ever does. Not the first time.”
Eliot stepped forward. “Are you real?”
“I’m as real as you believe I am.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one that fits.”
They stood like that, river between them, silence folding in.
“Who are you?” Eliot asked.
The boy tilted his head, silver hair falling across his shoulder. “Noé,” he said simply. “Son of the Moon.”
Eliot blinked. “That’s… a name?”
“It’s what I’ve been called, here. In dreams. By those who still see me.” He glanced down at the water. “There are fewer of them now.”
“You said I came back. Have I been here before?”
Noé nodded, very slightly. “Last night. You found me. Or... I found you. It’s difficult to tell the difference.”
“I don’t remember.”
“That’s how dreams work,” Noé said, stepping lightly across the stream. He walked as if the ground barely held him. As if gravity was optional.
Eliot didn’t move.
Noé stopped a few feet away, searching his face. “You’re the first one in a long time who looked for me while awake.”
Eliot’s heart quickened. “You were on the beach. You were—”
“Not quite there,” Noé finished. “But enough to be seen. That’s rare.”
Eliot didn’t understand half of what was happening, but none of it felt wrong. Just strange. Like listening to music in another language — you couldn’t explain it, but you still felt it in your chest.
“Why me?”
Noé hesitated, as if the question hurt. “Because you’re someone who wants. Not just things — but more. Wonder. Meaning. You look at the world like it owes you magic, and you're still soft enough to believe it might give it.”
Eliot looked away, flushed. “That’s ridiculous.”
“It’s rare,” Noé said, and this time, the smile was real.
They walked after that — slowly, along a path of glowing stones. The world felt painted, everything edged in moonlight and blurred at the seams. Eliot asked questions, and Noé answered only some of them. He said he didn’t dream the way humans did. He didn’t age. He didn’t sleep. He remembered everything — but only inside other people’s dreams.
“I exist,” Noé said, brushing his fingers over a silverleaf fern, “because someone like you needs me to.”
Eliot didn’t know how to respond. He wasn’t sure if it was beautiful or terrifying. Maybe both.
They reached a clearing where pale flowers grew in spirals from the soil. The petals opened as they passed, releasing light instead of scent. Eliot crouched to photograph one out of habit — only to realize he didn’t have his camera.
“You don’t need it here,” Noé said, sitting in the grass. “This place remembers for you.”
Eliot sat beside him.
They didn’t speak for a while. It wasn’t uncomfortable. The quiet between them felt full — not empty.
“Why do I feel like I know you?” Eliot asked finally.
Noé looked up at the sky, the light in his eyes strange and unreadable.
“Because part of you has always been dreaming of me.”
- Writer
