I slept for an entire day – twenty-four straight hours, without waking up to pee even once. Pain wasn't a strong enough word for my head's current state of affairs – it was like someone had lit a ghost pepper on fire in my skull and let two wolverines fight over it.

The rest of me wasn't feeling too hot, but at least I could move. Something hard and crusty was all over my face, and I shuddered to think exactly what it was – knowing full well it was dried streams of blood, snot, and tears. If the love of my life strode through my front door just then, it would have to be love at second sight because I probably looked like grim death.

I think I had missed an entire shift – I didn't even know where my phone was to check for messages – but Foodsave was the least of my worries. Now that I thought of it, I wasn't even sure what my worries were. Covered in my own blood was maybe a pretty damn good reason to head to the hospital, but I couldn't handle the idea of waiting in triage. All those sick people, half of them there because they had nothing better to do, staring at each other, trying to figure out what each other had – fuck that, there was only one place I needed to go.

Del's place. I could clean myself up there and see if my King of the Nerds friend could help me figure out any of this shit. I was still stuck on 'what the fuck happened in my closet' and hadn't even processed the fact that I thought I'd moved a mug with my mind.

I stumbled to my feet, my head throbbing with every move. It didn't hurt as much, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that everything was all peaches and cream just yet. I looked down at my shirt, and it was a gory mess. Whatever hadn't ended up on my face had dribbled down onto my chest, and 'dribbled' was putting it mildly. I needed to change, but before I could dig through my heap of clothing (a dresser was a luxury I couldn't afford), a tingle at the base of my skull got my hackles up.

Without a scrap of doubt in my mind, I knew I wasn't alone. Something or somebody was in the apartment with me. Before another thought trickled through my panicking skull, I was out the door. I wondered if I would ever see the apartment again, but didn't stop to say goodbye. I wanted to put as much distance between myself and whatever the fuck was waiting for me in there – if anything.

Del didn't live crazy far away, but it was far enough to be a serious jog – and I was no runner. I had no money for a cab, no car of my own, and my last three bikes had been stolen from Foodsave. I was hoofing it – my lungs already ached just thinking about it. Gym class in high school had been a sweat-soaked hell, strapped under a sports bra and wishing I – no, wishing everyone else was dead – every single day. Jogging laps and 3K runs were my idea of what Hell might be like – just endless running, sweating, chafing, pinching off farts if someone was running right behind me.

I started jogging, keeping to the streetlights as much as I could. I had a pretty good pace going, but that wouldn't last long. Soon enough, I'd pant and wheeze like a thousand-year-old smoker with one lung.

But I just kept running. My lungs took good, clean breaths, and my legs didn't feel like two useless logs strapped to the bottom of my torso. Could I run like this forever? Probably not, and if I went any faster, I might just pass out, but if I kept this pace going, I would get to Del's quicker than walking.

This was the first time I'd ever had to run anywhere. Nothing else had ever been urgent like this. Dad took care of Mum's death, and after Dad left, Del and his family took me in without a moment's thought. Now, with dried nosebleed still crusted on my face and something or someone skulking around my shitty apartment, I needed help – now.

Del must have known something was wrong as I leaned against the intercom to his apartment building. Sure, I got there, but it had taken it out of me.

"Mac?" Del's voice was groggy. I'd woken him up. I had no idea what time it was. It was dark, and there was no moon.

"Del...can I come in?" Okay, maybe I wasn't feeling so good anymore. Running that long might not have been the best idea. Sweat poured down my back, each breath was a gasp, and my legs felt like rubber. This all should have happened nine-and-a-half kilometres ago – hell, before I even left my street – but my body was going into full shutdown on Del's front step. "Del...please...you have to come get me...Del..."

I slid down to the floor, everything shuddering and shaking as my body rejected the hard work. My heart pounded in my chest, and I could hear the blood rushing through my veins. Del burst through his front door and put my arm around his shoulders as he helped me up to his apartment.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Del huffed. "Did you fucking run all the way here?"

"I have...I think...it's been a weird night...day...what the fuck day is it?" I wheezed.

Del got us into his place and plopped me down on the couch. He bustled around for a few minutes, getting me comfortable and handing me a glass of water. I guzzled it back like my life depended on it (which ultimately it did – I never drink enough water) and slowly caught my breath.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Del didn't have an angry bone in his body, but he looked plenty pissed off. "What's so important you couldn't wait until morning?"

"Like I said, Del, it's been a weird night." I downed the last of the water and briefly entertained the idea of asking for more.

"Why's your face all covered in blood?" Del disappeared for a second and came back with a towel.

I wiped the towel across my face and grimaced once I caught a look at it. There was more blood on there than I thought there would be. No wonder I was a bit dizzy. All the blood in my head had drained out through my nostrils.

"Okay," I said. "You know how I said I had a weird night?"

"Yeah, you said it like three minutes ago." Del paced back and forth in front of the couch.

"Right. Sorry. Sorry," I said, apologizing for apologizing. "Fuck. Sorry. Shit. Right. Okay. My weird night. Okay. So, I got mugged last night. Two nights ago. That part you knew."

"That part I knew."

"Yes. So, there was something weird in my closet."

Del paused his pacing and stopped to stare at me for a while. I saw a hundred thoughts cloud his eyes as he processed what 'weird in my closet' could mean.

"Tell me you didn't go to see what the weird thing was."

"I can't, Del. If I said that, I'd be lying, and you're the only person in the world I've never lied to."

Del resumed his pacing and waited for me to continue. I took that to mean he knew I was telling the truth.

"I checked out the weird thing. It's impossible to describe, except it felt like my heartbeat was on the outside. Like the universe had my pulse and was trying to tell me, 'go check out the weird thing.' I know that doesn't make any sense."

"Don't worry about making sense, Mac. Just keep telling me what happened. We'll try to work out what the fuck is going on after."

What a good friend. You tell anyone else you could 'feel your pulse' in your apartment, they're kicking you to the curb and blocking you from their phone.

"Okay. Closet. Pulse. Right. I opened the closet, and there was a big-ass hole in the floor."

Del shook his head. "This is when I say, 'you didn't check out the hole, did you?' And this is when you say – "

"It more pulled me in than I checked it out – like it had a whole 'nother gravitational pull above what the Earth was doing. Stronger. I don't think I could have not gone in. It had decided to take me down."

Del paused his pacing and just stared at me. "You make it sound like it knew what it was doing. Like it was alive."

"I'm not saying it was alive, Del." I sucked back the rest of my water. "But I'm not saying it wasn't alive, either. It pulled me in, and I wasn't there anymore. I was in this whole different world. It was like being born, maybe. My body was broken down, pulled apart down to my cells."

"What do you mean?" Del asked. He sat down on the couch and put a hand on my shoulder. "That sounds awful."

"It was, dude. I can't even describe how much it hurt – like every cell was pulled off, scrubbed with something, and then put back all at once. I could have been in there forever or three seconds. That place had no time, nothing to let you know where or when the hell you were. I slept for a whole day once it let me out."

Del leaned back and took a deep breath. "At least it let you out."

I can't tell you how much I appreciated this man believing me. It helped me realize that what had happened was real, that I had actually experienced what I thought I experienced. Was it his D&D-trained mind, or was he more like me than he realized – and knew there were layers to this world that nobody ever talked about – and we were finally peeling back the curtain to see what the fuck was actually going on?

"What about all the blood?" Del asked. "Was that from the closet?"

I shook my head. "No. That was after. I woke up and..."

Moving the mug with my mind was still almost too unbelievable for me, and I had gone through it. Was it real? Had that happened? Why else would I have blood caked onto my face? Was it a nosebleed from the mugging – a very delayed reaction nosebleed? I looked at Del, and something in his eyes told me to just keep talking – telling him the truth, even if I wasn't quite sure what to make of it myself.

"Yeah?" Del said.

"I felt weird. I didn't know what to believe at first, but there was something different about me. Something...powerful."

I took a deep breath and gathered my thoughts.

"I moved a mug without touching it."

Del stared at me for a long, long time.

"Like with your mind?" he asked.

I just nodded.

"Okay, here's the thing." Del got up and took another turn pacing. "My logical brain is firing on overload. It thinks this is crazy. It's telling me you're nuts, I'm nuts for even listening to you, and that we should both just tuck in for the night and see how we are in the morning."

"Right there with you, Del," I said. "But this happened."

"That's the other thing. I believe you. I don't know why, I don't know how, but I believe you. Probably has a lot to do with the fact that you're my best friend, but I believe you. I believe that something weird is the fuck going on, and you've had the last couple of days from Hell."

I could have kissed him right then, in a non-sexual, sensory-overload kind of way.

"But I need proof."

I pointed to my face. "That wasn't proof enough?"

Del laughed. "We'll call that Exhibit A, like in a trial. We need real, in-the-moment proof."

"How?" I shrugged. "I didn't record it or anything."

Del grinned. "We need to see it in action. Test it out."

"How?" I asked. "Where?"

Del headed for the door and marched out. "Come on! I know just the place!"

And for some insane reason, I followed him.