EXIT

Félix stood at the edge of the street, head tilted back, eyes locked on the building before him.

Twelve stories of gray concrete loomed above, windows dark and cold. It wasn't the tallest building in the city, but it felt enormous. A quiet monolith. An invitation. A dare.

His hands trembled.

His throat tightened.

This is it.

No more wandering. No more hollow questions. No more waking up in places that felt stolen from someone else's memory.

He swallowed hard, trying to calm the storm inside his chest. The world around him—the traffic, the footsteps, the rustle of paper cups in the wind—faded into the background. Only his breath remained, shallow and ragged in the hush that followed.

He took a step forward.

The lobby of the building was deserted. The floor beneath his bare feet was cracked tile, coated with a thin layer of dust. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered faintly, casting a pale green hue across the walls.

No cameras. No security guard. Just a broken elevator and a stairwell door that groaned open with a tired creak.

The staircase stretched upward like a tunnel, the dim lighting giving way to shadow. Each step felt heavier than the last. His legs burned, not from the effort, but from the weight of the decision he was about to make.

Each creak of the stairs echoed like a heartbeat in a hollow chamber.

Ten steps.

Twenty.

A hundred.

His breath grew thin. His thoughts blurred.

Somewhere in his mind, a voice—small and childlike—whimpered.

Turn back.

But he didn't.

There was nothing to go back to.

Only forward. Only this.

He reached the twelfth floor.

The rooftop door resisted at first, stiff on rusted hinges. Then it gave way, and the wind hit him like a slap—cold and sharp, cutting through his shirt like needles of ice.

The city unfolded before him, sprawling and vast. A patchwork of lights and windows and smokestacks. But none of it felt real. None of it felt like it belonged to him.

He walked toward the edge.

Every cell in his body screamed in protest. His knees shook. His stomach twisted. He felt like puking.

But he kept walking.

He stopped just short of the ledge. The drop stretched down like a void, the sidewalk far below blurred by distance and the haze of tears rising in his eyes.

His heart thundered.

This was it.

This was the moment everything ended.

He took a breath. Deep. Shaky.

Then, in a voice no one could hear, he whispered to himself:

"I'm sorry."

And he leaned forward.

The fall was immediate.

Wind rushed past his ears, tearing at his clothes, screaming louder than anything he'd ever heard.

Time blurred.

The world spun.

There was no thought, no memory, no emotion. Just motion and the dark, roaring silence of the end.

Then—

Black.

He opened his eyes to pain.

Not sharp. Not searing. Just a deep, crushing ache in every part of his body. A dull throb that pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat.

He was lying flat.

On his back.

Concrete pressed against his fingertips. Cold and rough.

He blinked.

I'm not dead.

The realization crawled in slowly, like light breaking through fog. His breath caught in his throat. He moved his fingers. Then his arms. Then slowly, trembling, he sat up.

His shirt was rumpled, dust-streaked.

No blood.

No broken bones.

No visible wounds.

He looked down at himself in disbelief.

His legs shook as he tried to stand, and for a moment, he almost collapsed again. But he caught himself, bracing against a wall.

The building.

He turned—eyes scanning upward—and froze.

There it was.

All twelve stories of it.

He stared at the rooftop.

I was just up there. I jumped.

His hands trembled violently now. His breathing quickened, uneven and sharp.

His lips parted, but no sound came out.

I should be dead.

Panic surged in his chest. Not just panic—terror. A deep, primal dread that made his stomach twist and his vision blur again.

Because this wasn't relief.

This wasn't a miracle.

This wasn't right.

A long silence followed, broken only by the soft sound of wind brushing past buildings.

Then… a thought crept in.

A slow, slithering realization that chilled him more than the fall ever could.

What if I can't die?

The idea felt impossible. Ridiculous.

But so had waking up with no memory.

So had not being found in any system.

So had surviving a twelve-story fall without a scratch.

He reached up and touched his chest, expecting pain—broken ribs, bruises, something.

But there was nothing. Just a fast heartbeat and skin gone clammy with cold sweat.

He looked at his arms again, searching for cracks, blood, signs of injury. There weren't any.

It was like nothing had happened.

Like the world had simply decided to ignore the fact that he had tried to leave it.

Félix backed away from the wall slowly, step by step, as if the building itself might reach down and pull him back up.

His legs gave out near the edge of the street. He sat heavily on the curb, gasping. He sat there with no emotion.

His eyes were wide, fixed on nothing.

He didn't cry.

He couldn't.

There was no room for grief.

Only confusion.

Only fear.

Not the fear of death.

But the fear of its absence.

Minutes passed. Maybe hours.

The sky had darkened. The clouds above had thickened into bruises. Rain threatened at the edge of the horizon.

Still, Félix sat.

Still, the ache lingered in his chest—but not from the fall.

From something deeper.

He had made peace with dying. Had accepted it. Had chosen it.

And the world had simply…

Denied him.

Like it wasn't finished with him.

Like it had other plans.

But why?

Why keep someone who didn't want to stay?

Why force breath back into lungs that had already let go?

Félix looked up at the sky. His voice came out rough, cracked.

"Why?"

The sky said nothing.

Of course it didn't.

Whatever had happened wasn't a gift.

It felt like a curse.

That night, when he finally stood and walked away from the building, he didn't know where he was going.

He only knew one thing for certain:

He wasn't supposed to be alive.

And yet… he was.

The question wasn't why he survived.

It was what it meant.

And whether he would ever be allowed to leave.