Willow Creek was quiet in the way that made people nostalgic — birdsong in the morning, creaking porch swings in the evening, and neighbors who waved just enough to keep you at a distance. For Erick, it was less a town and more a purgatory disguised in soft sunlight.
At nineteen, he had no dreams left. Only the silence that came after they'd all been crushed. The bridge — old, wooden, and forgotten — stretched over the river like a tired sigh. It groaned under his weight as he stepped onto it, one boot after the other, slow and deliberate.
His backpack thudded against his side. Useless junk inside. A dead phone. A sketchbook no one had ever seen. A candy bar he hadn't eaten because the bullying would've been worse. Everything about his life felt like that: a buildup to nothing.
He reached the middle of the bridge. The water below shimmered in gold and blood red as the sun dipped beneath the hills. It was beautiful. Sickeningly beautiful.
"They'll pretend to care after," he thought, gripping the railing. "That's what they do. Light a candle. Post something vague on social media. And then forget me again."
His fingers trembled.
"Do it before you chicken out."
He took a step back. Then he ran.
Mid-air, he braced for the impact — the cold, crushing finality of water, bones, silence.
But instead, the world screamed.
Light exploded around him in colors he couldn't name. His stomach lurched as if someone had yanked the planet out from beneath him. Wind ripped past his ears. Time twisted into something elastic and snapping.
"What the hell is—"Then, darkness.
He woke with a gasp.
The sky above him was black velvet, scattered with stars far too bright and too many. The moon was massive, a silver coin hanging low over jagged tree branches.
Grass prickled against his neck. The air was sharp and clean, scented with pine and earth.
He blinked.
Then blinked again.
Sat up.
"No," he whispered. "No no no."
His voice was hoarse, alien in his own ears. His hands scrambled over the ground, fingers digging into dirt and moss. The stars didn't look right. The trees were too tall. The silence was too deep.
He looked down at himself — the clothes were all wrong. A rough tunic. Stiff, scratchy pants. A dagger — an actual dagger — strapped to his side.
His breathing turned shallow.
"I jumped. I jumped off the bridge. This... this has to be the afterlife."
He stood up too fast and stumbled, heart racing. He spun in circles, taking in the forest that now surrounded him, chest rising and falling in uneven bursts.
"Okay. Okay. Maybe this is Heaven. Or... something like it. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe there's peace after all."
Then he looked at his stomach.
Still round. Heavy. Still there.
His hands gripped his midsection as if it might vanish under his touch.
"Are you serious?" he muttered. "I'm still fat?"
He barked a laugh. It came out ragged and wild. The kind of laugh you make when you're trying not to scream.
"If this is Heaven, it's got a real shitty sense of humor."
His pulse thundered in his ears.
"No. No, this isn't right. People don't stay fat in the afterlife. You die and — I don't know — you get reset. You come back hot, right? Wings? Halo? Something?"
Nothing answered but the wind.
His knees buckled and he dropped into the grass, trembling. His thoughts splintered: Is this a test? A dream? Did I survive? Am I in a coma?
He clutched his hair. "God. If this is hell, just say it. Say it! Don't make me guess!"
The dagger gleamed in the moonlight.
He looked at it. Then at the trees.
And for the first time, a different thought crept in.
"What if this is... somewhere else?"