Chapter 102

• The only certainty in the maelstrom of my recollections was the overwhelming horror that had seized me and the undeniable sense of urgency that had ignited within me, as if I were meant to act on something—something that had been necessary to address... yesterday! But what was it exactly? If I could somehow reconstruct the sequence of events, perhaps I could decipher their meaning and, ultimately, what the dream had been trying to convey. If it truly had a meaning at all. Yet, the aftertaste of imperative gravity it had left behind led me to believe otherwise.
• "Tell me what happened," Xavier prompted soothingly.
• He must have sensed that I was trying to reason my way through the turmoil, or perhaps he simply recognized that talking about dreams was a well-known method for clarifying and making sense of them. Taking a moment, I engaged in some calming exercises—breathing deeply and holding my breath for a few seconds before slowly releasing the air from my lungs, visualizing my worries and anxieties being expelled with the exhalation. It worked; I felt more equipped to tackle the task of organizing the images that continued to flicker in my mind like a film cutting rapidly between disjointed scenes.