Chapter 1
The air in the cramped, dimly lit apartment felt thick with the scent of unwashed clothes and the stale metallic tang of despair.
Remy stood on a rickety wooden chair, his heavy breath hitching in his throat. His hands, calloused not from work but from the nervous habit of picking at his skin
They trembled as he gripped the rough hemp of the rope hanging from the ceiling fan mount.
"Is this it?" he whispered to the empty room, his voice barely audible above the hum of the flickering fluorescent bulb.
"Just another headline no one reads? Another statistic in some counsellor's presentation?"
He laughed bitterly, the sound hollow and broken. The walls of his studio apartment seemed to close in around him, decorated with nothing but water stains and the ghosts of better days.
A single poster, torn at the corner, hung crookedly on the wall, some motivational quote about perseverance that now felt like a cruel joke.
The memories of the past year at college flooded back like a relentless tide of bile.
He could still hear the shrill laughter of the girls in the hallway as he walked past, their voices dripping with contempt.
"Oh my God, is that the guy from Econ?" one had said, not even bothering to lower her voice. "He's like... aggressively ugly."
The whispers of "ugly" and "fat" echoed in the corridors of his mind, a constant soundtrack to his existence.
He remembered the sting of being tripped in the cafeteria last month, the sound of his tray clattering to the floor while the "popular" kids watched with smirks on their faces.
His lunch, a pathetic sandwich and an apple, had scattered across the grimy tiles while laughter erupted around him.
"Oops, didn't see you there, big guy," Jake Morrison had said, his perfect teeth gleaming in a smile that never reached his eyes. "Maybe you should watch where you're going."
The cafeteria worker had barely looked at him as she'd handed him a mop. "Clean it up," she'd said, already turning away.
He was an orphan with no one to call, no one to vent to, and no reason to believe tomorrow would be any different from today.
His parents had died in a car crash when he was fourteen, leaving him to bounce between foster homes until he'd aged out of the system at eighteen.
The small inheritance they'd left had paid for one year of community college, one year that had proven to be a masterclass in humiliation.
He tightened the noose around his neck, his fingers fumbling with the knot.
The wood of the chair groaned under his weight, a final protest from a world that had never wanted him. He closed his eyes, ready to kick the chair away and end the relentless mockery.
"One... two..."
His foot tensed, preparing to push off.
As he prepared to jump, a sudden, violent heat erupted from his chest. It wasn't the heat of a heart attack or the fire of a dying mind.
It was a blinding, incandescent gold that filled the room, brighter than any sun. The light was so intense that Remy could see it through his closed eyelids, searing into his consciousness.
"What the" he gasped.
The rope snapped as if sliced by a searing blade, the severed ends glowing with residual golden fire.
Remy crashed to the floor with a bone-jarring thud. The chair splintered beneath him, wood fragments scattering across the stained carpet.
A sharp, jabbing pain shot through his hip, but it was nothing compared to the shock of still being alive.
He gasped for air, clutching his neck where the rope had burned away, staring up at the ceiling in disbelief.
"Am I... am I dead?" he wheezed, his lungs burning.
The golden light didn't fade. Instead, it condensed, swirling in the centre of the room like a miniature galaxy until it formed the translucent figure of a man dressed in the high-collared coat and waistcoat
The apparition wore polished boots and carried himself with an air of refined dignity that seemed impossibly out of place in the squalid apartment.
"You always were a bit too heavy for that chair, boy," the figure spoke, his lips curving into a sad smile.
His voice sounded like the rustle of old parchment, ancient yet vibrantly clear, with the hint of a Southern accent that had long since faded from the American lexicon.
Remy scrambled backwards, his heart hammering against his ribs like a prisoner desperate to escape. "W-who... what are you? Am I dead? Is this... is this hell?"
"Hardly," the ghost said, his expression a mixture of profound sadness and stern resolve.
He moved closer, his form casting no shadow despite the golden glow emanating from within.
"I am Silas Beaumont, your great-great-granduncle. And I've travelled from the year 1850 through the mercy of a Power you aren't ready to understand to make sure you don't repeat my greatest mistake."
Remy stared at the spectre, his mind reeling. The man looked remarkably like a thinner, more elegant version of the face Remy saw in the mirror—the same broad forehead, the same deep-set eyes, even the same slightly crooked nose.
"Grandpops?" he stammered, the name slipping out instinctively, pulled from some half-remembered story his mother had told him about their family history.
"Grandpops? I suppose that'll do," Silas sighed, his form flickering like a candle in the wind. "Though I died long before I had the privilege of grandchildren." He moved to the window, gazing out at the city lights with eyes that seemed to see far beyond the present moment.
"I died just like you were planning to, Remy. I let the bullies and the insults of a cruel world drive me to a cold grave in Charleston.
I was twenty-three years old, mocked for my appearance, scorned for my lack of social graces, and dismissed as nothing more than an embarrassment to my family name."
"Why... why are you here now?" Remy asked, his voice cracking. He pulled himself up to sit against the wall, still shaking.
"Because a Goddess took pity on my soul," Silas explained, turning back to face him. His translucent form seemed to solidify slightly, becoming more real.
"She saw my regret, one hundred and seventy-six years of regret, and allowed me to return to my bloodline when the need was most dire.
She gave me a gift, a second chance that I squandered in life. A gift I am now passing to you." He extended his hand, palm up, and a sphere of golden light materialized above it. "The power of Foresight. The ability to see twenty-four hours into the future."
Remy shook his head violently. "This is a dream. I'm hallucinating from the lack of oxygen. I'm probably brain-damaged right now, dying on the floor while my mind creates this... this fantasy."
"Look into my eyes, boy," Silas commanded, his voice suddenly carrying the weight of ages. "Look, and know the truth."
Despite every rational instinct screaming at him to look away, Remy looked. The ghost's eyes became swirling vortexes of gold, spinning galaxies of possibility and potential.
Suddenly, Remy's own eyes ignited with the same brilliance, burning with a heat that was strangely painless. Information flooded his brain, not memories, but possibilities, futures, certainties.
He saw the sun rising tomorrow at exactly 6:47 AM, painting his dirty window with shades of amber and rose.
He saw the exact numbers on his digital clock: 6:47:23. He saw a specific green candle on a trading chart, the EUR/USD pair moving to 1.0934 at 2:15 PM.
He saw a car accident that hadn't happened yet—a blue Honda Civic running a red light at the intersection of Fifth and Marshall at 11:23 AM, narrowly missing a woman in a yellow coat.
He saw Jake Morrison slipping on a wet floor in the gym at 3:45 PM, his ankle twisting at an unnatural angle.
The vision faded, leaving Remy gasping on the floor like a drowning man finally breaking the surface.
For the first time in years, the crushing weight in his chest was gone, replaced by a spark of pure, unadulterated hope.
His hands were steady. His breath came easier. The fog of depression that had clouded his mind for months suddenly lifted.
"Tomorrow," Silas said, his figure growing faint, the golden light beginning to dissolve into motes that drifted like fireflies.
"The world changes. But only if you have the discipline to change yourself first.
The gift shows you the future, but you must have the courage to act on what you see. Knowledge without action is just another form of death."
"Wait!" Remy called out, struggling to his feet. "How do I... what do I do? How does this work?"
But Silas was already fading, his final words echoing through the apartment: "Trust what you see. Act with wisdom. And remember, the future is not set in stone.
You can change it and shape it, but only if you first change yourself. Tomorrow, you begin again."
Then he was gone, and Remy was alone once more.
But this time, the solitude felt different. The apartment, with all its stains and smells and broken furniture, suddenly seemed less like a tomb and more like a starting point.
Remy stood up, kicking the broken chair aside. He looked at the rope, now just a piece of frayed cord lying harmless on the floor and then at his hands, which no longer trembled.
He walked to the bathroom and stared at himself in the cracked mirror. The same face stared back, unremarkable, scarred by acne, and marked by years of poor self-care.
But something in his eyes had changed. They still glowed faintly with golden light.
"I'm not going to die today," he whispered to his reflection, his voice gaining strength with each word.
"I'm not going to die tomorrow. I'm going to win. I'm going to survive. And then... then I'm going to make them all see."
He didn't know exactly what that meant yet. But for the first time since he could remember, Remy had a future worth living for, a future he could literally see unfolding before him.
Outside his window, the city continued its endless motion, unaware that one of its broken children had just been given the most precious gift of all: a second chance.