"Sean, I need you to speak to me."

I must have uttered several variations of that phrase for at least half an hour.

"Please, buddy. You can talk to me, okay? I promise you can talk to papa."

No matter how many times I repeated these words to him, he simply wouldn't answer. I desperately needed to know that he could speak. I... I needed to know that he was real.

The truth is, the constant barrage of delusions had taken a toll on my psyche. Distinguishing between what was real and what was merely a figment of my imagination had become difficult. I had to know Sean was real. I wanted to believe he was, and I would know he was real if only he would speak. Could he not see the anguish in my eyes? Why wouldn't he just utter a single word?

I gripped his shoulders tightly, begging him to even part his lips once. He never obliged my only wish. No amount of bribery or pleading could elicit a response from him. All he did was grab my arm, turn towards his room, and march towards it.

As I followed him, an overbearing sense of dread began to brew within me. I felt my heart intensely pounding in my throat as we entered the room together. There the entity sat. My head hung low as Sean released me from his grasp and trekked towards the Being ahead. I too approached it, once again attempting to touch the thing. Preparing to suddenly awake from what I had assumed was another nightmare, I placed my hand on the figure. Only, I didn't wake in my bedroom once again. Instead, it too placed its hand on me, and we felt each other's papery frames.

Slowly but surely, the details of the Being's face were revealed to me. As I looked upon it, I recognized its features, for they were my features, too. I stumbled backward, watching as the thing with my appearance leaned towards my son, gently kissing his forehead. I ogled the creature, swallowing the oceans of saliva that had built up in my mouth in a single swift gulp.

The creature locked eyes with me, and I locked eyes with it. As this occurred, a sense of familiarity washed over me. My mind darted back and forth, unsure of what to make of the situation. That is until my thoughts inexplicably settled on the memory of the accident on that fateful night. I recalled the blinding lights, the shrill cries of fear and suffering... no, there was more. The overhead traffic light, from which a soft, red hue shone in the night sky. My vehicle had passed underneath the light, and then the impact happened. The doctors...had they truly told me my son had survived?

"They say that there are some moments in our life that we’ll remember for an eternity."

It was a quote that I wrote back towards the beginning of this text. So then, why couldn't I recall the words of the doctor who told me that Sean was still alive...? Could I truly have forgotten?