A Universe Away
This is my first story here! 🌌 A short romance/sci-fi series, 9 episodes, posting one at a time. This is just the beginning for Callum and Iris... stay tuned for episode 2! :)
Episode 5
A Ceremony for No One
They invented something half-joking, completely sincere — two voices making promises the dream world had no priest to bless and no law to hold them to.
It didn't matter.
It was theirs.
The only thing that ever was only theirs.
For a while, things were simple.
Good.
Callum stopped dreading sleep and started living for it.
Then one night, he noticed something wrong.
A gap in the sky overhead — a star missing where one had always been.
He didn't say anything.
He told himself he imagined it.
But the next night, there was another gap.
And the lighthouse paint, peeling in patches that didn't heal by morning the way the dream always used to fix itself.
Iris noticed him noticing.
She didn't explain.
She just reached for his hand — and for once, just once, didn't pull away when it slowed before touching hers.
That was the moment Callum knew, somewhere under his ribs, that something was ending.
Until tomorrow's dream.
They invented something half-joking, completely sincere — two voices making promises the dream world had no priest to bless and no law to hold them to.
It didn't matter.
It was theirs.
The only thing that ever was only theirs.
For a while, things were simple.
Good.
Callum stopped dreading sleep and started living for it.
Then one night, he noticed something wrong.
A gap in the sky overhead — a star missing where one had always been.
He didn't say anything.
He told himself he imagined it.
But the next night, there was another gap.
And the lighthouse paint, peeling in patches that didn't heal by morning the way the dream always used to fix itself.
Iris noticed him noticing.
She didn't explain.
She just reached for his hand — and for once, just once, didn't pull away when it slowed before touching hers.
That was the moment Callum knew, somewhere under his ribs, that something was ending.
Until tomorrow's dream.
Chapter 5
— Episode 5 of 9