Caden’s nightmare came crashing back with a sudden force, the coldness of Moscow enveloping him again, just like before. The snow started to fall heavier, faster, until it wasn’t just falling—it was crashing down on him. He could feel it piling up, smothering him, dragging him under with each freezing flake. The air was thick with the weight of it, suffocating, choking him as he struggled to breathe. His limbs felt heavy, the cold seeping through his skin, freezing him from the inside out.
“Isma!” he screamed, the sound lost in the howling wind. He tried to move, but the snow pulled him deeper, as if the earth itself was reaching out to swallow him whole. His legs buckled beneath him, sinking into the snow with no way to escape. He couldn’t see anything but the endless white, couldn’t hear anything but the deafening roar of the storm. He was trapped—lost.
The ground beneath him cracked, sending sharp, icy shards into his skin. He tried to claw his way out, but the snow kept dragging him down. Please… he begged silently, please, I don’t want this. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be alone.
His breath came in ragged gasps as the weight of the snow crushed him, pinning him to the ground. His fingers scraped uselessly at the snow, his body trembling with the cold, the panic rising like a tidal wave. And then, he saw her—his mother—through the blur of snow, walking away from him. Her figure was distant, fading into the white abyss as if the storm itself was swallowing her up.
“No!” Caden’s voice was raw, breaking with desperation. “Hey, please! Don’t leave me!”
But she didn’t hear him. She kept walking, her back turned to him, her form growing smaller, vanishing into the storm. He reached for her, his hand outstretched, but the snow closed in around him, dragging him down further. His vision blurred, his body numb from the cold. He was sinking deeper, the weight of it all—the guilt, the emptiness, the feeling of being unworthy—pressing in on him, suffocating him.
“Please,” he pleaded, his voice barely more than a whisper, his chest constricting with the weight of the words. “Please, I can’t lose you. Don’t leave me.”
But she was already gone, lost to the storm, lost to him.
The snow piled higher, filling his mouth, his lungs, drowning him in it. And for a moment, he felt the icy grip of disgrace—the deep, gnawing emptiness of everything he had done, everything he had failed to save. His mother, his past, the boy he used to be—gone, slipping through his fingers like the snow that buried him alive.
It was too much.
“I’m sorry…” he whispered through the storm, his voice lost, his body giving in to the crushing cold. “I’m so sorry…”
And then, everything went still.
Caden’s eyes shot open, the room around him spinning in the aftermath of the nightmare. His breath came in jagged bursts, heart pounding in his chest as if the nightmare had leached into his waking reality. For a moment, it was as if the walls of his mansion, his carefully curated world of marble and glass, had closed in around him, suffocating him under their weight. But it wasn’t the house that felt like a prison—it was him. He was still trapped.
The remnants of the nightmare clung to him. Moscow. The snow. The suffocating cold. He could still feel it, creeping under his skin, dragging him back into the past. He was 20 now—too old for this, too old for the kind of nightmares that still left him shaking, gasping for breath in the dead of night.
His hands, slick with sweat, fumbled for the glass on the table in front of him. He hadn’t meant to drink so much tonight, but the bottle of whiskey had already been half-empty when the darkness closed in. It was easier, in some ways, to face the cold, empty spaces inside him when he was numb. Easier to drown out the memories with something strong. He grabbed the bottle, shaking his head as he poured more into the glass—his fingers trembling, but not from the cold.
The warmth of the liquor burned as it slid down his throat, but it did nothing to erase the icy grip of the nightmare. The feeling of being dragged under, the weight of his mother’s absence, the overwhelming sensation of not being enough, not even at 20 with everything he had. The mansion was too quiet. Too empty. The alcohol didn’t fill the void—it just kept it at bay for a little longer.
He leaned back against the couch, staring at the ceiling, trying to steady his breathing. His head was starting to swim from the whiskey, but he wasn’t going to let himself get that drunk. Not tonight. He’d learned the hard way not to let the numbness take over completely. The withdrawal after the hangovers wasn’t worth it. He could feel the sharp edges of the emptiness creeping in, but this time, he had to keep it together.
Not like last time, he thought bitterly. He gripped the glass harder, his knuckles white. The alcohol didn’t erase anything—it just kept him from feeling everything at once.
"Please," he muttered softly, wiping his face with his sleeve, the words raw and vulnerable in the quiet of the room. "I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep feeling this way."
But it wasn’t just the nightmare. It was the guilt. The regret. The memory of losing his mother, of never being able to save her, never being enough. He’d been 16 when she passed, and in the years since, his wealth, his success—it had only felt like a way to keep the world at arm’s length, to hide. The mansion, the cars, the private jets—none of it changed what he’d lost, and none of it stopped the nightmares.
As he sat there, still clutching the whiskey glass in one hand, Caden couldn’t shake the image of his mother’s fading figure in the snow, her back turned, walking away from him as the storm closed in. He tried to drown it out with another sip of whiskey, but the memory wouldn’t fade.
He stood abruptly, the glass nearly slipping from his fingers as he set it back on the table. What am I doing? He had everything—everything—and yet there was still this hole inside him, something so deep he didn’t know how to fill it. He walked to the window, staring out at the vast desert below, but the view that had once been so soothing now felt like a reminder of just how alone he really was.
It wasn’t the cold of Moscow anymore. It was the heat of the Arizona desert, but it felt just as empty. His eyes caught sight of the sleek sports cars parked in his garage, the luxury of his world, and for the first time, he didn’t feel proud. He just felt... disconnected.
“Why does it still hurt?” he whispered into the silence, his voice cracking in a way it never used to. At 20, he was supposed to have it all figured out. He had the money, the power, the freedom, but he was still that scared, powerless kid, just trying to survive the next day. Still running from the ghosts of his past, from the weight of the choices he had made. From the person he thought he was.
The silence of the mansion pressed in on him like a weight, the luxury, the wealth, the success, all so utterly meaningless in the face of the gnawing emptiness inside. He could feel his pulse in his throat, his hands trembling again as he dragged his fingers through his hair.
This wasn’t him. This wasn’t the life he was supposed to be living.
"Get it together, Caden," he muttered, rubbing his temples. Focus. He took another deep breath, willing himself to calm down. He had built this life. He had created this empire, and no matter how much it hurt, no matter how much he wanted to scream, he couldn’t just let it crumble.
His eyes flicked back to the whiskey, the bottle, the glass, and he knew—he knew—that no matter how much he drank, no matter how much he numbed himself, it wasn’t enough. It wouldn’t ever be enough.
“I need to stop running,” he whispered, barely able to hear the words over the thudding of his heart. But in his soul, he knew it was true.
And yet... even as the words left his mouth, Caden’s fingers lingered on the bottle. It was easier to run, he thought. It was easier to stay numb.
But as the night stretched on, and the silence filled the room, Caden couldn’t shake the feeling that this time—this time—he couldn’t keep running forever.