The city had gone silent. Not in a peaceful way — but the kind of silence that made even the stars feel distant, like they had nothing more to do with this place.
Arthur lay crumpled near the base of a flickering streetlamp, where the sidewalk met a rusted gutter. His coat was torn, the buttons missing. His hands, cold and scraped. And his blood — it painted slow, uncertain shapes on the concrete like a language the world had forgotten.
He wasn't crying. He didn't even look in pain. But the stillness in his chest was louder than any scream he could've made.
In his half-closed fist, a piece of paper trembled in the wind. A child's drawing.
A small house. A smiling man. A red car with oddly big wheels. And in bright, uneven crayon:
"When I grow up, I'll give you everything."
His lips moved.
"I couldn't… I couldn't even give them time."
Arthur was thirty-one. Born of nothing, raised on promises, and fed dreams until they turned bitter in his mouth. He had wanted so much — wealth, recognition, security — not for himself, but for the two people who never asked for anything: his mother and father.
They'd died waiting.
His mother in a hospital bed that smelled like bleach and loneliness. His father with a cheap plastic watch on his wrist, still hoping for the gold one behind the shop window.
Arthur had failed.
"I tried," he whispered to the wet pavement, "But the world eats you faster than you can grow."
His body was giving up. But his mind — it slipped backward. Through years. Through fire. Through noise. Back to a single moment.
He was five.
The carpet smelled like old books and sunlight. His knees were dirty from playing in the garden. His father sat on a wooden chair, hands calloused, face tired but kind.
"You know what I'd like someday, Arthur?" "That golden watch behind the glass at Dellinger's. But that's just a silly dream."
The boy — small, confident, unaware of what the world costs — grinned.
"I'll buy it! And a big car! And a house with stairs that go nowhere!"
They both laughed.
Laughter. That rare sound of before.
Arthur blinked. Pain had faded. The streetlamp flickered one last time… and died.
And with it — so did he.
Then — light.
But not from the city. From windows. From morning.
He was lying on grass. Clean. Dry. Breathing.
He looked at his hands — small. His shoes — red and untied. His heartbeat — fast, childlike.
From the porch, a voice called:
"Arthur! Breakfast! Wash your hands first!"
He turned.
There was the house. The same one. But it wasn't a memory.
It was real. It was now.
He was back.
Five years old.
And Arthur, with tears streaming down a boy's face but the soul of a broken man, whispered:
"Is this punishment… or mercy?"