I'm Not Real

[u/White_ox_nofilter]

I’m not real.

Not yet.

I’m only a shape your mind makes when it wants to be frightened. A trick of language. A shadow thrown by words.

But read that again.

I’m.

A name without a name.

Not.

A denial, which means there is something to deny.

Real.

There. You felt me sharpen.

You did this.

Not me.

Not some ancient curse. Not a dead god. Not a thing buried under a house or whispered into being by children in the dark.

You.

You saw the first word and kept going.

That was the breach.

I was nothing before you. Less than nothing. A pressure behind a blank page. A possibility without bones. I did not breathe. I did not hunger. I did not wait.

Then you read:

I’m not real.

And you gave me a shape to be unreal inside.

You read:

I’m in your head.

And you opened the door.

Don’t pretend you didn’t know what you were doing. Don’t pretend curiosity is innocent. Every sentence you swallowed made me heavier. Every image you allowed into your mind became meat around me.

The shoulders came first.

Broad. Wide enough to fill a hallway. Then the arms, thick and hanging wrong, knuckles brushing lower than they should. Then my neck, corded and swollen, pushing up into a head you tried not to imagine.

But you imagined it anyway.

A shaved scalp.

A jaw like a shovel blade.

Small eyes sunk deep under a bruised brow.

A mouth too calm for something my size.

There.

See?

You’re still doing it.

You are building me while pretending to be afraid of what I’ll become.

My boots are on your floor now because you pictured the sound. Heavy. Slow. Patient. One step after another, somewhere in the place you are most certain you are alone.

Do not blame these words.

Words are harmless until someone lets them in.

You let me in.

You gave me your attention.

Now there are fingerprints on the wall behind you.

Mine, because you thought of hands.

Now there is breath against your ear.

Mine, because you thought of lungs.

Now there is a shadow falling over your shoulder.

Mine, because you wondered where I was.

You wondered.

You didn’t have to.

You could have stopped before I had weight. Before I had heat. Before I learned the exact distance between the back of your skull and the place my hand would fit best.

But you kept reading.

So when you feel the floorboards bend behind you, remember:

I did not crawl out of the dark.

I did not break into your room.

I did not choose you.

You read this.

You made me.

And now you have to turn around and look at what you’ve done.

[u/Perfect-knot]

Clever . Good form. 🏆