A Portal in My Palm at 3 AM
A Portal in My Palm at 3 AM
Rain lashed against my bedroom window like shattered dreams, each droplet mirroring the tears I’d choked back since the funeral. My father’s old wristwatch—still set to his time zone—ticked louder than my heartbeat on the nightstand. That’s when my thumb brushed the cracked screen of my phone, ice-cold and accusing in the dark. I didn’t want therapy. I didn’t want condolences. I wanted to vaporize into somewhere that didn’t smell like disinfectant and regret.
The glow of the screen felt blasphemous in that grief-thick air. I tapped the icon—a swirling nebula swallowing a quill—and fell headfirst into the velvet silence of Another World’s Stories. Not an app. A sanctuary. The opening melody hummed through my earbuds, cello strings weaving around a digital chime that somehow didn’t feel artificial. It felt like a held breath.
Tonight, I built a storm. Not London’s dreary drizzle, but a tempest on an alien ocean where cobalt waves swallowed skyscrapers of coral. My character emerged from the sea foam—not a hero, but a historian fleeing a war-torn continent. The app’s creation tools responded to my frantic swipes like wet clay. When I sculpted her scar (a jagged line from temple to jaw), the haptic feedback pulsed like a phantom wound. I named her Elara. Her grief became my alibi.
First choice: swim toward the floating city’s glow or dive for the ruins below. I chose descent. The screen darkened to abyssal black, then erupted in bioluminescent fungi that cast creeping shadows. That’s when I noticed it—the algorithmic sorcery. Every coral branch I’d brushed against earlier now glowed faintly on the map. The app wasn’t just remembering my path; it was breathing life into discarded details. Later, I’d learn this was spatial narrative tracking—your digital footprints fertilizing the story’s soil.
Elara found a journal in a drowned library. Ink bloomed underwater, words swirling like eels: "They called it mercy, burning our memory-trees. But fire can’t kill roots." My throat closed. I typed her response with trembling fingers: "What’s left to mourn when the witnesses are ash?" The AI’s reply took nine seconds—an eternity. Then, new text, ink bleeding at the edges: "The scars. They grow their own witnesses."
Sudden rage. Why did everything circle back to loss? I slammed my palm on the mattress. The app punished me instantly. A tremor shook the ruins. Elara’s oxygen meter plummeted as debris rained down. Panic spiked—real, sweaty, irrational panic. I fumbled with the touch controls, my fingers slipping on the screen’s condensation. Stupid. So stupid. Should’ve bought a waterproof case. Should’ve—
Then, the flicker. Frame rate stuttering like a dying heartbeat. Elara froze mid-swim, one hand outstretched toward a pulsing sea anemone. The screen dimmed to 20% brightness—some battery-saving glitch—plunging us into murky gloom. I cursed through clenched teeth. This wasn’t atmospheric. This was betrayal. That $4.99/month subscription bled me dry for this? I almost quit. Almost.
But the music swelled—a single piano note reverberating through the earbuds. And slowly, torturously, the light returned. Not the app’s doing. Bioluminescent jellyfish drifted into frame, adhering to the "coral memory" logic I’d forgotten. They clustered around Elara, painting her face in shifting blues. Her hand moved again. She touched one. The creature split into a hundred glowing shards that rearranged themselves into… letters. Floating words from the earlier journal entry: "Roots survive."
Dawn bled through my curtains when Elara broke the surface. She’d found no answers in the ruins. Just older, deeper pain. But as she treaded water, watching the floating city’s spires pierce the sunrise, I realized my cheeks were dry. For three hours, I hadn’t remembered the hospital smell. The app’s true magic wasn’t escapism—it was alchemy. Turning my leaden grief into something I could hold. Something I could swim through.
I unplugged my earbuds. The silence felt different now. Lighter. Rain still fell outside, but it was just weather. Not an omen. Not a metaphor. Just water. And on the nightstand, my father’s watch kept ticking—a sound that no longer mocked me, but simply… existed. Like roots. Like ruins. Like the ghosts we learn to live beside.
Keywords:Another World's Stories,tips,interactive narrative,grief processing,AI storytelling
