“Tell Felicity I want it back,” she said. “All of it.”

In that moment everything shifted, and the three-dimensional quality of the vision flattened then faded in a bloom of light. I was still squatting next to the bed, staring directly ahead as I had been at the beginning. I did notice, however, that I was holding my breath. I let it out with a heavy sigh. My eyes were itching and dry, so I closed them, but the moment I did so I feared I would regret the action. It seemed that blinking was getting me into a lot of trouble right now. Still, I knew that sitting here forever with my eyes closed wasn’t going to get me anywhere, so I steeled myself in preparation for the onslaught of another round and allowed them to flutter open.

The vision was still gone.

I stood up, rubbed my eyes, then turned and started back toward the small room housing the vanity. I had only made it two steps when I caught myself and came to a halt.

An unbelievably intense feeling of deja vu overwhelmed me as recent memories flooded in. Though the hollowness still ached deep inside, my rational brain pushed through the fog and assumed control once again. I decided not to bother with a repeat of the trip to the sink that I wasn’t even sure I had really made. I simply needed to get out of here before leaving became impossible.

Turning, I headed toward the front of the room, skirting around the end of the bed then reaching the door in two quick steps. Any sense of stealth and caution to which I had earlier subscribed was now depleted. I pulled the door open and stepped out into the night, almost forgetting to tug it closed behind me. Starting up the walk, I broke into a jog, trying to put distance between the scene and me as fast as I could.

I gave my watch a quick glance and figured that I’d only been in the room for a little over twenty minutes. It had seemed like much longer, but that was the way of things with ethereal visions. They seemed to run by a clock all their own.