many_dreams

Did I steal someone’s life?

 The thought arrives not at ten years old, not at five — but the moment she opens her eyes as a newborn in a Haicheng hospital.

 She remembers who she was: Anya, a quiet dreamer from Country B, with her nose buried in novels and her heart tied to the idea of freedom. She longed to be unbound — to drift like the characters in her stories, free of expectations, free of rules. But reality clipped her wings. Strict parents. Financial limits. A life of quiet resignation.

 Then came the end she never saw coming — and a beginning she never asked for.

Now, she is Li Anqi, born into a world of lantern festivals, lullabies in a language she couldn’t name, and quiet luxury. Her new parents are kind. Her new life is peaceful. And yet, she carries within her the ache of a caged bird that once longed to fly.

 Every step forward as Li Anqi feels like a betrayal of Anya.

 But what does it mean to be “someone” when your soul has lived more than one life?

----
“Touch her and you will never know what happened to you,” he declared.
Who is this man? What is his connection to her? An admirer? A lover? Or... a villain in disguise?

Fragments of a Stolen Life

The second week passed in a haze of milk, mewling cries, and muffled yawns.

Li Anqi, cradled in the warmth of her new life, had not yet cried from hunger, but from questions. From the terrible itch of confusion that filled her small chest and made her fists clench for no reason.

She didn't understand how her memories lived in this body.

She didn't understand why this world smelled of herbs instead of diesel, or why everything... voices, touches, emotions reached her like echoes in a deep cave.

But the strangest thing was the hunger.

Not for milk, though she gulped it dutifully, despite the taste making her nose scrunch.

It was a hunger… for something else.

She didn't have a word for it. Maybe no one did. But it was there. A pulse under her skin. A hollow place behind her ribs. A whisper that seemed to come not from around her, but from within.

It called to her sometimes, especially at night when her tiny lungs were quiet, and Lin Shuang was asleep beside her.

On one such night, Anqi blinked slowly, her baby eyes adjusting to the moonlight streaking through the nursery curtains. Shadows played across the crib slats like long fingers.

She was wide awake, but her body would not move. Not yet.

She didn't cry. She didn't scream. But the question hung heavy, deep inside, rattling in a place no infant should be able to reach.

Across the room, Lin Shuang stirred and let out a soft sigh in her sleep. Li Zixuan was sleeping on the tiny couch with a baby rattle clutched in one hand .

Not just with her new eyes, but with something older.

Like a light turning on behind her eyes.

She could feel… a space. That same strange door from before. She didn't open it. But it pulsed. Once. Like a heartbeat, but not hers.

Nothing changed in the room. The curtains still swayed. The clock still ticked.

The next morning, the house was anything but magical.

Li Zixuan had tried heroically to make porridge. It tasted like warm disappointment.

"I used the organic rice!" he protested as Lin Shuang coughed dramatically into her hand.

"You used detergent water to soak it."

"I.… I thought it smelled extra clean."

Li Anqi would have laughed if her mouth could. She simply blinked at her father, who was now searching for a cooking tutorial with one hand and bouncing her awkwardly in the other.

"You'll learn," Lin Shuang teased. "Eventually."

He sighed. "I used to run a tech department with thirty engineers. Now I can't even hold a baby right."

"That's because your engineers didn't spit up on your shirt mid-presentation."

Li Anqi rested quietly in his arms. They felt solid. Real.

And yet, in the still moments, when neither of them was watching — she would feel it again.

A Quiet Hunger