I blinked and only blackness surrounded me. A feeling of surrealism encompassed me, like floating in an open space without boundaries. Yet my fingertips grazed solid ground, then my palm registered the cold tiles beneath me and pressed at my back. Only then I realized I had been lying on the floor. I pushed myself up, amazed but petrified at the utter confusion of it all.

I managed to get to my feet, an unsteadiness washed over me making me woozy. My eyes scanned the space and my surroundings for even a pinprick of light. Although a sweeping coldness made the area seem massive and never-ending, the utter darkness triggered my claustrophobia.

Soon, I would panic and hyperventilate, and I tried to combat that anxiety and prevent the loss of my sanity by finding a light source. In the distance, a tiniest of brightness caught my eye. And like a magnet, it drew me in. I moved toward the light steadily as if I were floating, yet the ground beneath my feet was the only solid thing around.

I tried looking ahead to make sure I wouldn't walk off an edge and fall into a crevice, but the darkness forced me to trust the ground would remain firm beneath me.

The light grew larger the closer I got and soon the lit room came into perfect view. Standing at the threshold of the bright room, I took in a medical bed with white railings. The bed rested in the center with a pristine tile floor and white walls that reminded me of the photography studio, yet the machinery attached to the person lying motionless in the bed reminded me of my last visit to a hospital where I had tubes in me measuring my blood pressure and oxygen.

The astringent smell of medicine entered my nostrils, further establishing I was indeed in a hospital room. That harsh smell was a reason I hated visiting hospitals, but this time I had no choice judging by what I saw.

The red-haired woman in the bed was me. She lay on her back, although her eyes were closed her bandaged head rested to the side facing me. The outline of her petite upper body and bronze skin of her arms that peeked from the white sheet was just as wispy as the doppelganger had been, prompting me to look down over myself to compare.

My own body seemed solid and not translucent as the women in bed. My heartbeat still raced through my body, causing it to thump with every rapid beat as I tried to figure out what was happening to me.

Was I dead?

I studied the bloodied bandage around the women's head and the machines monitoring her vitals and the realization hit me. That woman is me but why was I here observing her?

The tube going into her nose must've given her oxygen or liquid nutrients, I couldn't tell, but it didn't look right or comfortable. My heart sank at the condition she was in, but I still couldn't understand why she was there, and I was here.

I looked past her to the nothingness behind her. It was only when I focused on that emptiness, that more of the scene manifested. Dozens of posters, stuffed animals, and handwritten letters littered the room.

Drawings of Nolan and I with embracing caught my attention more than the others. Notes instructing me to wake up. Letters wishing me well. Prayers from fans from every area of the globe, judging by the variety of languages on the items.

One beautiful painting confused me as it depicted Nolan wrapping me in large wings that protruded from his back like an angel with the hashtag #RhelanForever written on his wing.

I shook my head, confused.

Nolan did this to me. He did that to her, putting that woman in the hospital. Didn't the fans or anyone know that? Why would they depict him as some sort of guardian angel? And why would they draw him with wings and not the other way around?

I tried to determine what I was looking at and why I was observing it. Was this a glimpse of the past, present, or future? Was I dreaming? Was all this a hallucination as a result of my injuries?

My mind flooded with confusion and as I tried to approach the woman in bed, the brightly lit area moved as I did, keeping me from stepping into the room. I wanted to touch her, to see if I could feel her warmth and determine she was alive or even real at all, but the more I tried to enter the space the more it moved further from me.

Out of frustration I pressed my hands to my head. What was happening?

The wet stickiness of blood from my temple marked my palm when I removed it. I stared at the spot reliving the moment that caused it.

The look in Nolan's eyes, the anger in his tone, the hatred in his actions. How could he do this to me?

I swiped my hand through my hair to examine the extent of the wound, feeling a large indentation in my skull. I gasped and pulled my hand away and waited until my courage had been restored to try it again.

I gently pressed my fingers to my scalp again, and although my head didn't feel normal there was no pain which I appreciated. Still, my hair seemed to float around me as if gravity didn't exist, and no matter how much I tried to slick it down and back it remained as if it had a mind of its own.

A sudden sound from far behind me took my attention and I pivoted to examine the distant click, click, click that chimed like the steady rhythm of a second hand as it moved around the face of a clock.

I stared into the blackness and the clicks became louder as if fast approaching, the closer it got the more familiar the sound became. A camera in action.

I glanced back to the hospital scene but was encompassed in blackness. I drew in a sharp breath of cold air as it hit me that the brightly lit room had disappeared. I turned back to clicking camera sounds, hoping to see the camera that caused it.

Yet the echoey sound of Nolan's instruction cut through the camera sounds. "Eyes wide open."

I stared ahead at the scene unfolding before my very eyes. The bright light prompted me to move forward to get a better look at another version of me standing before the camera topless in a pair of SSL yoga pants.

"Extend your elbow and arch your back," Nolan encouraged, his cheery British accent breaking through his acquired American one.

I watched as Joselyn captured the last of the shots and exited the room with the camera in hand. My eyes widened as I recognized this moment. I predicted what was to happen next by replaying the events in my memory while watching it play out before me.

"What's going on in that pretty little head of yours?" Nolan winked as he placed a terrycloth robe around the other Rhea's naked shoulders. "You seem a bit off today."

"Nope." She flashed a smile, and I could see the bullshit in her vacant eyes. "Everything's peachy."

"Peachy cobbler?" He raised an eyebrow, and I hated how attractive he looked at that moment. I hated that I had allow his charm and good looks to suck me in and keep me stuck for so long.

"Peachy cobbler," she lied.

I knew he would direct that Rhea to sit down at the laptop and summon Joselyn to show her how beautiful she was with a snap of his fingers.

While I anticipated the click-clack of Joselyn's high heels on the tile floors, I tapped my fingers on my knee. The rhythmic beat from the pads of my fingers kept me from losing my sanity as I tried to piece together what was happening and why. I had to keep it together.

I watched the scene as she finally approached with the camera, excitedly willing to show that Rhea the beautiful shots she had taken at Nolan's request.

"Oh yay! Pics." Joselyn crouched down before that Rhea as she sat at the desk, angling the camera for her to see the screen. But the other Rhea wasn't looking at the pictures or the camera, her eyes seemed to land on me!

I stood wide-eyed and paralyzed, realizing the moment. Realizing the facts. Realizing that I had just gone back in time and was indeed reliving the moment where I had seen the wispy, shadowy humanoid figure in the corner of the brightly lit studio.

But this time, the wispy, shadowy figure was me.

I gasped just as the camera crashed to the floor after the other Rhea jumped to stand and accidentally knocked it from Joselyn's grip. 

~~~

Things are getting crazier! Please share your thoughts or any feedback. I appreciate it all!