I fell — but there was no bottom. Just endless black, stretching forever. My stomach twisted like I was plummeting, but there was no wind, no sound. Only the buzz of my phone, vibrating weakly in my hand.
I didn’t want to look. But I did.
"It’s almost over."
Over? My mind screamed. Over how?
The darkness thinned. Not into light — into faces.
They weren’t blurred anymore. They were clear. Hundreds. Thousands. All of them staring at me, floating in the void. Their eyes weren’t empty. They were terrified.
And I knew why.
They weren’t strangers. They were all me. Every version of me. Some older, some younger. One had a scar I didn’t recognize. One looked sick, too thin, bones jutting under his skin. Another was clean-shaven, his eyes hollow.
One looked happy. He stared at me with a calm, almost pitying expression. He was the only one who wasn’t afraid.
My phone buzzed again.
"Pick one."
I blinked hard, breath shaky. My voice came out broken, barely a whisper.
“Pick… one?”
The faces didn’t speak. But I felt them. A pull in my head, like something crawling behind my eyes.
The happy one — the calm one — his eyes flicked past me. I turned, slowly, and saw it.
The stranger.
He wasn’t me anymore. He wasn’t anyone. His face was smooth, featureless, shifting like smoke trying to form something familiar. He wasn’t smiling.
For the first time, he looked angry.
My phone buzzed so hard I nearly dropped it.
"Pick now."
The calm version of me stared harder, eyes pleading.
I didn’t think. I reached for him.
The stranger moved.
Too fast.
His hand closed around my wrist before I could touch the other me. His skin wasn’t cold or warm — it was wrong. Like touching something dead that didn’t know it was supposed to rot.
The faces screamed without sound.
My phone flickered, the screen glitching in and out. One last message forced its way through the static:
"Wrong choice."
The stranger’s face rippled, and this time, it settled.
The Stranger In My Photos 29 🤔🤔