Chapter 4: Professional Feelings (1)
El's eyes snapped open.
No alarm.
No sound.
No reason.
Just... awake.
He stared at the ceiling, heart pounding for no reason he could identify.
The dream was still fresh in his mind—Kaye's face, her voice, the impossible garden, the cliff by the ocean.
He could still feel the warmth of her fingers on his skin.
Why am I awake?
He turned his head slowly.
The room was dark, lit only by the faint glow of streetlights filtering through his cheap curtains.
Oreo was a warm lump at the foot of the bed, completely unconscious, her tiny chest rising and falling in peaceful rhythm.
3:00 AM.
His phone screen glowed the numbers at him like an accusation.
El blinked.
Tried to get himself back to sleep.
Nothing.
His mind was too alive.
Too full.
Kaye's words echoed in his head, bouncing off walls he didn't know existed.
You're the puzzle, El. You always have been.
"What does that mean?" he whispered to the darkness.
The darkness didn't answer.
Oreo twitched in her sleep, probably dreaming of tuna.
El sighed—a quiet, controlled exhale—and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes.
He could feel the fatigue in his bones, the weight of another workday waiting just a few hours away.
But sleep refused to come.
Think about something else, he told himself.
Anything else.
He thought about spreadsheets.
About quarterly reports.
About the perfect alignment of pens on his desk.
It didn't work.
Kaye's face kept floating back.
Her smile.
Her laugh.
The way she'd said his name like she'd known it forever.
"I don't even know you," he muttered.
But some part of him felt like he did.
That was the strangest part.
The most confusing part.
He'd just met her—in a dream, no less—and yet something in his chest recognized her.
Like meeting an old friend you'd forgotten you had.
Time is weird in here, she'd said.
El stared at the ceiling.
In here.
The dream.
The garden.
The cliff.
That impossible place where the sky melted into gold and flowers bloomed in colors that didn't exist.
If time was weird there, did that mean... what?
That he'd known her longer than he thought?
That they'd met before, in some way he couldn't remember?
Or was he just losing his mind?
That was the other possibility.
The one he kept pushing away.
Maybe the dreams weren't special.
Maybe they weren't magical.
Maybe he was just cracking under the pressure of a life that felt like unseasoned porridge, day after day after day.
And what did she mean by "Demi talks about them constantly"?
El's eyes narrowed at the ceiling, his mind latching onto the question like a lifeline.
How did she know Demi?
He replayed the moment in the dream.
Kaye's teasing smile.
The way she'd leaned forward with obvious delight.
"Demi talks about them constantly. 'El almost smiled today. It was a religious experience.'"
She'd said it so casually.
So naturally.
Like she'd known Demi for years.
Like she'd sat in a room with him, listening to him ramble about El's non-existent love life and his almost-smiles.
But that was impossible.
El had never mentioned Demi in any dream.
He was sure of it.
The other woman—the one who looked like Aletheia—had never spoken about his best friend.
Never even hinted that anyone else existed outside the garden.
So how?
How did Kaye know about Demi?
How did she know about his almost-smiles, a thing only Demi noticed and commented on?
How did she know the exact way Demi talked—the dramatic phrasing, the religious experience line, all of it?
El's chest tightened.
She knows him.
She actually knows him.
But that didn't make sense.
None of this made sense.
Unless...
Unless Kaye wasn't just a dream.
Unless she was real.
Somewhere.
Somehow.
Unless the dreams weren't just dreams.
El pressed his palms harder against his eyes, watching the colors bloom behind his lids.
His heart was doing that thing again—the complicated thing that felt too big for his chest.
How does my best friend know someone who appears in my dreams?
Someone I've never met?
Someone I've never even mentioned?
The question circled in his mind like a bird looking for a place to land.
He thought about Demi.
About the way his friend talked constantly—about everything, about nothing, about the weather and the office gossip and the suspicious banana from 2022.
If Demi knew someone interesting, someone like Kaye, he would have mentioned her.
He would have talked about her non-stop until El's ears bled.
But he hadn't.
Not once.
Which meant either Demi was keeping secrets—unlikely, since Demi couldn't keep a secret if his life depended on it—or something else was happening.
Something El couldn't explain.
Something that made his skin prickle even now, lying safely in his own bed, with his judgmental cat at his feet and the familiar glow of streetlights outside his window.
Time is weird in here, Kaye had said.
But time wasn't the only thing that was weird.
Somehow, impossibly, the woman in his dreams knew his best friend.
And El had no idea how.
—
He lowered his hands from his eyes and stared at the ceiling again.
3:07 AM now.
Seven minutes had passed, and he was no closer to sleep.
No closer to understanding.
Oreo shifted at the foot of the bed, letting out a small, contented sigh.
"Lucky cat,"
El muttered.
"No existential crises for you."
Oreo didn't respond.
Typical.
El thought about waking Demi.
Texting him at 3 AM with a question like
"Hey, do you know a girl named Kaye?"
But he could already imagine the response—a flood of messages demanding to know who she was, why El was asking, whether this was romantic, whether he needed help crafting an opening line.
Demi would be insufferable.
And El was too tired to be insufferable with.
Besides, what would he even say?
I had a dream about a woman who knows you, even though I've never mentioned you to her.
That sounded crazy.
Even for him.
So El lay there, alone with his thoughts, as the minutes crawled toward dawn.
Kaye.
The name echoed in his mind.
Who are you?
How do you know Demi?
Why do you feel so familiar?
The darkness didn't answer.
But somewhere, in the back of his mind, he could almost hear her voice:
You're the puzzle, El. You always have been.
He closed his eyes.
And finally, finally, sleep pulled him under.
—
6:00 AM
It was exactly 6:00 AM when El woke again.
No gradual drift into consciousness this time.
No slow surfacing from deep sleep.
Just... awake.
Like a switch had been flipped.
He blinked at the ceiling, his mind immediately—impossibly—clear.
The fog of sleep that usually clung to him for the first few minutes of morning was completely absent.
Instead, his thoughts were sharp, focused, already circling the same questions that had kept him awake at 3 AM.
Kaye.
The name was there, waiting for him.
Like it had been sitting in his mind all night, patient and unmoving.
El turned his head slowly.
The room was brighter now—pale gray light filtering through his cheap curtains, painting soft shadows on the walls.
Outside, the city was beginning to stir.
A distant car.
The faint rumble of a train.
The first birds testing their voices.
And just like at 3 AM, Oreo was a warm lump at the foot of the bed, completely unconscious, her tiny chest rising and falling in peaceful rhythm.
She hadn't moved.
Hadn't been disturbed by his midnight wakefulness or his early morning return to consciousness.
Some guard cat, El thought flatly.
A burglar could rob us blind and she'd sleep through it.
But the thought was automatic.
Distant.
His mind was already elsewhere.
His gaze drifted to the nightstand.
The card was still there.
Same as always.
Same gold lettering.
Same minimalist logo.
Same elegant handwriting on the back.
Stop looking for the exit.
And beneath it, in that same careful script:
Sweet dreams, El.
El stared at it for a long moment, waiting for... something.
A new message.
A new symbol.
A new clue that the dream had bled into reality again.
Nothing.
The card was exactly as he'd left it.
No new words.
No mysterious additions.
No feathers or flowers or impossible colors.
Just the card.
Just the warning.
Just the promise.
Sweet dreams, El.
He'd had sweet dreams.
The sweetest in a long time.
And all he'd brought back from them was a name.
Kaye.
El let out a slow breath and pressed his palm against his forehead.
His skin was warm.
Normal.
Human.
One name.
That was all.
Not a physical object like the card.
Not a tangible mystery he could hold in his hands and examine.
Just... a word.
A sound.
A collection of letters that had lodged itself in his chest like a splinter.
Kaye.
He'd never heard it before.
At least, he didn't think so.
But it felt right in his mouth.
Felt important.
Felt like something he should have known all along.
And she knew Demi.
That was the part that wouldn't let go.
That was the hook in his mind, tugging at him every time he tried to push the dream away.
She knew Demi.
Knew about his almost-smiles.
Knew the exact way Demi talked—the dramatic flair, the religious experience line, the absolute certainty that El's rare smiles were events worth noting.
How?
How?
El sat up slowly, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.
The movement disturbed Oreo, who cracked one eye open, judged him thoroughly, and immediately went back to sleep.
"Sorry for existing,"
El muttered.
No response.
Typical.
He reached for his phone.
6:03 AM.
He had time before work.
Time to think.
Time to try to make sense of something that made no sense.
His thumb hovered over Demi's contact.
Hey, do you know someone named Kaye?
Too direct.
Too weird.
Random question: ever talked to a stranger about my almost-smiles?
Even weirder.
I had a dream about a woman who claims to know you. Ring any bells?
That sounded insane.
Absolutely, completely insane.
El set the phone down.
He couldn't ask Demi.
Not yet.
Not without more information.
Not without understanding what he was even asking.
Because what if Demi said no?
What if he'd never heard of Kaye, never met her, never spoken to anyone about El's almost-smiles?
Then El would be left with two impossible possibilities:
Either his dreams were so powerful they could create people who shouldn't know things but somehow did…
Or Kaye was real.
Somewhere.
Somehow.
And she actually knew Demi.
Both options made his head hurt.
El pressed his fingers to his temples and breathed.
One name, he told himself.
That's all you have.
One name and a thousand questions.
He looked at the card again.
Sweet dreams, El.
He'd had sweet dreams.
And now he had a name to go with them.
Kaye.
The word echoed in his mind as he stood, as he stretched, as he began the automatic motions of his morning routine.
Shower.
Coffee.
Clothes.
Oreo's food (despite her earlier judgment, she was suddenly very interested in his presence once the can opener appeared).
But beneath the routine, beneath the familiar motions of another ordinary day, the name stayed with him.
Kaye.
---
EL'S APARTMENT – 7:15 AM
So he'd showered, dressed, fed Oreo (who finally acknowledged his existence with a grudging purr), and made the familiar walk to the train station.
The morning air was cool against his skin—not cold enough for a jacket, but enough to make him grateful for the warmth waiting inside the crowded train.
Landsburge was waking up around him, the streets filling with people who moved with the same tired rhythm, the same resigned shuffle toward another day of fluorescent lights and spreadsheets.
El fit right in.
He bought his usual ticket from the automated machine—the same machine he'd used every weekday for the past three years—and joined the stream of bodies flowing toward the platform.
No one made eye contact.
No one spoke.
Just the scuff of shoes on concrete and the distant rumble of an approaching train.
The train arrived with a whoosh of recycled air and the smell of someone's leftover breakfast sandwich.
El found a spot near the door, wedged between a woman reading something on her phone and a man who looked like he was already mentally checked out for the day.
He pulled out his own phone.
47 unread messages from: DEMI
El winced.
He'd deal with that later.
For now, he needed something boring.
Something normal.
Something that would distract him from
Kaye.
The name surfaced immediately, bobbing up from the depths of his mind like it owned the place.
No.
Not now.
Work thoughts.
Professional thoughts.
Thoughts about spreadsheets and deadlines and the satisfying click of perfectly aligned pens.
El opened his work chat.
TATE ASSOCIATION MARKETING DEPARTMENT
Mira Castillo: Good morning everyone.
Quick reminder that the quarterly reports are due this Friday.
Please have them submitted to me by 4:00 PM no exceptions.
If you have questions about formatting refer to the template I posted last week.
If you have questions after referring to the template schedule time with me during office hours.
Mira Castillo: Yes Demi that means you.
Demi De Cruz: I DIDN'T EVEN SAY ANYTHING YET
Mira Castillo: You were thinking it.
Demi De Cruz: I WAS THINKING IT BUT THAT'S NOT FAIR
Demi De Cruz: YOU CAN'T PUNISH ME FOR THOUGHTS
Mira Castillo: Watch me.
Janet from Accounting: Does the template include the new expense categorization system?
Mira Castillo: Yes Janet. It's in section 4.
Janet from Accounting: Thank you Mira you're a lifesaver
Demi De Cruz: Janet from Accounting always so polite. Janet from Accounting why can't you be my mentor
Janet from Accounting: Because you once put a banana in the break room fridge and forgot about it for 8 months Demi.
Demi De Cruz: IT WAS 7 MONTHS
Janet from Accounting: That's not the flex you think it is.
Mira Castillo: Focus please. Friday 4:00 PM. No exceptions. Have a good day everyone.
El scrolled through the messages, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
Friday, he thought.
Three days.
For most people in the department, three days would be a frantic scramble of late nights and stress-induced snacking.
For El, it was plenty of time.
He knew the patterns.
He knew the formatting.
He could probably finish his reports in one focused afternoon if he wanted to.
The thought was comforting. Familiar. Normal.
He scrolled back up and reread Mira's messages.
If you have questions about formatting, refer to the template.
He'd already memorized the template.
Not because he was trying to be impressive—he just... noticed things.
Patterns.
Structures.
The way things fit together.
You notice patterns.
Mira's voice echoed in his head—the soft way she'd said it in the break room yesterday.
Or was it the day before?
Time was blurring.
He shook his head and kept scrolling.
More messages.
More work talk.
Someone asking about printer access.
Someone else complaining about the coffee machine.
Janet from Accounting reminding everyone that the coffee machine hadn't been cleaned since 2019 and that was probably a health hazard.
Normal.
Boring.
Perfect.
El read every single message.
Not because he needed to—most of them were irrelevant to his actual work.
But because reading them filled the space in his head.
Pushed out the questions.
Silenced the whispers.
Kaye.
The name tried to surface again.
El read three more messages in rapid succession.
Kaye.
He focused on a detailed explanation about the new expense categorization system.
Kaye.
He counted the number of emojis Demi had used in his last five messages.
(Seventeen. The answer was seventeen.)
Nothing worked.
The name was stubborn.
Patient.
It sat at the back of his mind like a cat waiting to be fed, and no amount of spreadsheets or work chat drama could make it leave.
You're the puzzle, El. You always have been.
El pressed his phone a little harder against his palm and stared out the train window.
The city blurred past—buildings and streets and people living their ordinary lives.
None of them had mysterious dream women who knew their best friends.
None of them had cards with cryptic warnings and symbols from their childhood.
None of them were puzzles waiting to be solved.
Lucky them.
---
TRAIN STATION – 8:05 AM
The train shuddered to a stop, and El followed the crowd onto the platform.
The station was busy—rush hour in full swing—but he moved through it automatically, his feet knowing the way even when his mind was elsewhere.
Up the stairs.
Through the turnstile.
Out onto the street.
He raised his hand for a taxi.
One stopped immediately—the one advantage of commuting during peak hours.
El slid into the back seat, gave the driver the address, and settled against the worn fabric as the cab pulled back into traffic.
The city unfolded outside his window.
More buildings.
More people.
More ordinary lives.
El's phone buzzed.
DEMI: YOU'RE IGNORING ME AREN'T YOU
DEMI: I CAN FEEL IT
DEMI:THE IGNORING
DEMI:IT'S LIKE A SIXTH SENSE
DEMI: MY IGNORING SENSE IS TINGLING
DEMI: AND IT SAYS YOU'RE AVOIDING MY QUESTIONS
DEMI: I'LL GET ANSWERS WHEN YOU GET HERE
DEMI : THIS ISN'T OVER
DEMI: IT WILL NEVER BE OVER
DEMI: LOVE CONQUERS ALL AND BY LOVE I MEAN MY CURIOSITY
El stared at the messages.
Demi. Of course. The human megaphone. The one person who could make him forget his own name with sheer volume alone.
But even Demi couldn't distract him from—
Kaye.
The name surfaced again, relentless.
She knows him.
El looked at Demi's messages with new eyes.
Somewhere, impossibly, the woman from his dreams knew his best friend.
Knew about his almost-smiles. Knew the exact way Demi talked.
How?
How?
The taxi crawled through traffic.
El watched the buildings pass, but he wasn't really seeing them.
He was seeing Kaye's face.
Her smile.
The way she'd said his name like it mattered.
And then—
His phone buzzed again.
Work chat this time.
Mira Castillo: Correction: The template link was broken. Here's the working version.
Mira Castillo: [link]
Mira Castillo: Please confirm you've accessed it.
El clicked the link automatically.
The document opened.
Spreadsheets.
Formulas.
Deadlines.
Normal.
Boring.
Safe.
He started reading.
Section 1. Section 2. Section 3. The familiar structure settled over him like a blanket, quieting the chaos in his mind. This he understood. This he could control.
Section 4. Expense categorization. Janet from Accounting's favorite part.
Section 5. Submission guidelines.
Section 6. Formatting examples.
By the time he reached Section 7, El had forgotten about Kaye.
Forgotten about the dream.
Forgotten about the impossible questions that had kept him awake at 3 AM.
There was only the template.
Only the patterns.
Only the comfortable, predictable structure of work.
---
TATE ASSOCIATION MARKETING DEPARTMENT– 8:45 AM
The taxi pulled up to Sterling Tower.
El paid the driver, stepped out, and walked toward the building with the calm, measured pace of someone who had everything under control.
The revolving doors swallowed him whole.
The elevator carried him upward.
And by the time he stepped onto the 9th floor, his phone vibrated loudly in his pocket.
BRRRRRT. BRRRRRT. BRRRRRT.
El froze.
47 messages.
Demi.
The café girl.
The update.
He'd forgotten.
In the taxi, reading the template, he'd actually forgotten.
But now it all came rushing back—the card, the warning, the symbol, the dream, Kaye—and El stood in the middle of the empty hallway, phone buzzing in his pocket, and wondered how his life had become so complicated.
He pulled out the phone.
DEMI: I'M IN THE ELEVATOR
DEMI: PREPARE YOURSELF
DEMI :THE INTERROGATION BEGINS IN T-MINUS 30 SECONDS
El sighed.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could almost hear Kaye laughing.
After a while of reading Demi's texts, El pocketed his phone and walked through the hallway toward their office.
The corridor was quiet—most people hadn't arrived yet—and his footsteps echoed softly against the beige walls.
Thirty seconds, Demi had said.
The interrogation begins in T-minus 30 seconds.
El mentally prepared himself for the onslaught.
Demi at full volume before 9 AM was a lot to handle.
He'd need caffeine.
And patience.
And possibly earplugs.
He reached the door.
His hand closed around the handle.
And then—