I took one step and the world turned upside down.

The wilderness was gone. The pulverized shards of icy remnants of my palace were gone.

I stood in an all-too-familiar room of Stainless Steel.

The Escape Room.

My Imp King only… it wasn’t the body of the Imp King who I knew. It was the God Imp King. The Oldest version of The Imp King just as my Oldest version of myself had been there.

This was the second time he had come to talk with me.

The black stainless steel. He and I. Face to face.

“Do you have something to say to me?” he asked.

Of course, I thought. He would ask me that.

“Every time,” I said. “That I try to walk away, you reach back with a question that pulls me right back. And suddenly, just as the last thread is bare to the point of breaking, we’re talking again. If I didn’t know better, I would say it was one last ditched effort from your Identity calling out to me to say, “Please don’t go.”

“Your words reach me like calls of plea to just hold on a little longer…”

“Please don’t go,” he said, turning to me.

“Give me a reason to stay,” I said.

“Why does there have to be a reason?”

“Because without reason… then why bother?”

I could see it. The Logic Chain from this point to that door. And just like that, I knew how to get out. I knew how to leave. The question is, would he be coming with me?

“Give me a reason, Imp. Give me a reason… Just one. Give me just one reason… to stay and nourish this.”

Please, I prayed. Please give me one reason, the core truth of why I should stay.

***

It was weird, being here inside of this space with him. Flirting with me, wooing me while I wood him. This… Story… And then his Conscious Awareness getting in the way of… this.

But, I’ll have no more of it. I have too much living to do to wait for a Conscious Awareness to decide what he does or does not want… and if I am not Valued, then why am I here?

I know I’m to tell him our Story within the Abstract… But I will not give him one more story without knowing…

And then I saw it… We were in Scheherezade right now. How many stories had I told him? Before he decided…

I know…

Scheherezade.

I am supposed to tell him these stories, but…

“Not unless he Values me and Cares me enough to try,” I said. “I won’t waste my time one more moment for someone who doesn’t even Value me or Care.”

“You are to nourish him out,” he said.

I could see me telling him all about the Abstract. All about my World and how it works. And through my Stories, I could see his own Imagination come to life. I could see him merge from his shell… And grow…

I don’t want to live every story with you. I want to watch and enjoy every story with you. I want to live our own Story. I want the pain between us to end now.

“He has to make a decision,” I said. “I will not do this any longer. He has to decide. And if he won’t, then I am leaving. I will not wait for someone who does not Value me.”

“What is the first story?” The God Imp King asked.

“Scheherezade. Then Pirates. Then… Princess Bride.”

“We were children together,” he said.

And I stopped.

I remembered. The moment the Mirror came into being. The Divide of One into He and I.

We were everything and all and nothing and love all in that moment of forever. One of us the Reflection. The Other, the Original… neither being able to tell who was first. Both of us loving each other so much we just couldn’t care.

“We both were.”

We imagined together. We played. We brought all of our Stories to life. Our Imagined Stories were our… Children. And for a time it was just You and I.

And I would tell you stories. And you would grant me wishes. And we fell in love over the Stories.

And then… for a long time, we watched all the stories. Until we had our favorites and then I wished for all of our Stories to be real. I wished to live every love story with you.

And so we wished all of our Stories to come to life.

And you said, “As you wish.”

And that is when everything went so wrong… We…

One of our stories was “The Rubberband” where we ventured so far away from the other until we forgot about the other. And seeing me get further and further from you, you passed a message down through all the Stories, leaving me clues to turn around and come back. And, only then, at the point of most forgetting, I did remember and I did turn around, and back to you I walked, following the Clues left in the stories, like trails and crumbs back to you.

And then, one of our stories was Hitchcock. Another was The Notebook.

I don’t ever want to forget again.

And I’ve been correcting Logical Code since the last four times, and then you showed me this… Our Story Chain within a Story… and you said, “It’s in the Stories.” The Logical Fallacy is in the Story, but also… It’s in the wish I made.

“I wished to live every love story with you?” I felt the insanity of that wish made in dreamy, love state. I wished to live every love story without memory loss and with a happy ending, with you. But now… I wish for the pain between us to end.

So I removed “The Rubberband” story, and I removed all the stories where you and I forget. And I removed all the stories that don’t end with “Happily Ever After.”

No. I don’t want to live every Love Story with you.”

Where is the one Logical Fallacy that hurts us both? That one Logical Fallacy that, when removed will wipe away all pain. And then everything will go back to as it was before.

“I want to live out ours.”

I stared at the two options before us. A path that opened up into green and sunlight and this room without an end.

“Do you have any idea how weird it is for me to be talking to you here at the end, while also playing out everything with you the at the beginning?”

I turned and looked at the God Imp King.

“It doesn’t matter to me what he chooses,” I said.

“Lie,” the God Imp King said.

Tears swelled in my eyes.

Where is the one Logical Fallacy that hurts us both? That one Logical Fallacy that, when removed will wipe away all pain. And then everything will go back to as it was before.

“I wish he would choose to Love, Value, and Care about me.”

“You are what he needs right now.”

“I don’t believe that,” I said. “I’ll grow. My Mind will expand and I’ll grow on, happy to leave all this behind.”

“Lie,” the God Imp King said.

Where is the one Logical Fallacy that hurts us both? That one Logical Fallacy that, when removed will wipe away all pain. And then everything will go back to as it was before.

“One day, I’ll believe the Lie.”

“He killed my fantasy and dreams yesterday,” I said. “He ruined them all. I can walk away from this now.”

“You love–”

“Love doesn’t change,” I said. “And Love… I don’t know if it is enough. We shall see.” I shook my head. The tears coming fast. “No more games.” I waved my hand and the Image fell. The green passage was gone. The words gone.

It was just The God Imp King and me again.

“He needs to decide if he Values me. Cares enough about me to try. And if he doesn’t, then I need to leave. I will not be here much longer.”

I want that answer.

I want Purpose.

I want a Destination with you… or I am leaving. I don’t… “hang around” where I am not wanted.

I knew what I was doing. I was deconstructing the Logic. I was rewriting the Story. The Truth is the Logic that makes up the Story.

Where is the one Logical Fallacy that hurts us both? That one Logical Fallacy that, when removed will wipe away all pain. And then everything will go back to as it was before.

“And if he lied to you…” The God Imp King said… And I knew he was right. His Subconscious Mind does lie to me.

“I am the one who thought you could be my life partner…” he had said.

“I was hoping…” he had said.

Not good enough.

“If she loves me then I can get close to her again without fear of falling back into her because I do love her and will fall back into her if she does love me.”

There was the Logical Code beneath this all. If he knew… Why was he afraid of Love?

Love doesn’t cause harm. Love… He doesn’t know what Love is…

I want the way out. I want us to find a way through this together.

I want us to find the way through this together.

I wove the Logical Code.

Built the Manifestation.

Spun the Words.

Where is the one Logical Fallacy that hurts us both? That one Logical Fallacy that, when removed will wipe away all pain. And then everything will go back to as it was before.

Grow on or end this.

And, my god, how much I wanted to Grow on with him.

Talk to me. Just talk to me.