Chapter 23: The Silence Between Breaths
Ash sat cross-legged on the bare wooden floor of his apartment, the walls dimly lit by the flickering flame of a single candle. The world outside hummed with life—cars, voices, distant sirens—but within these four walls, there was only breath.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
Then—pause.
He had begun to notice something strange in those pauses. Not the inhale, not the exhale, but between them—an emptiness, a silence that was not just quiet but alive. It felt like a threshold.
His body disappeared first. Then time. Then even the thought I am meditating dissolved.
He was floating in a vast space that wasn't space at all—just a pulse. A rhythm. A knowing.
Suddenly, voices emerged—not from outside, but within.
Not one, but many.
A boy sobbing.
A woman screaming.
A warrior roaring.
A monk whispering.
A demon laughing.
They were all him.
He tried to speak—but who would speak? Which self? Each breath now summoned a different aspect. Inhale: the boy. Exhale: the monk. Pause: something greater.
A voice rose from the silence, not his, not anyone's.
It was the silence.
"You are not the breath. You are the stillness that watches it."
And in that moment, Ash remembered.
He remembered the rooftops. The mirrored selves. The monk's eyes. The vow to no longer feed on fear.
He remembered the fire—not of destruction, but of transformation.
His lungs ached.
He gasped.
And returned.
The candle was still burning.
But he was not the same.
From now on, he would live between the breaths.
Where no name could follow.
Where no fear could enter.
Where the self is not chosen, but remembered.