Jimin lives his life separating things into two categories:
what he knows and what he doesn't.

Jimin knows that when he wakes up in the morning, he needs to wake up at 7:30 AM, and he needs to brush his teeth. He knows he needs to make his bed, pour himself a bowl of cereal, and watch cartoons in his pajamas until 9:00 AM. After that, he knows he needs to take his medicine. He knows he needs to remember to take two of the blue pills, one of the big white ones, and three of the little white ones.

He doesn't know what the medicine does, but he tries not to think about that. The more Jimin thinks about what he doesn't know, the more stressed and confused he gets. Because, the truth of the matter is, he doesn't know a lot. He doesn't know how old he is, and he doesn't know his favorite color. He doesn't know his parents or if he has any siblings. Sometimes, he forgets what his own face looks like, and it startles him each time he passes by a mirror.

He doesn't know about anything before he woke up in a sterile white room eight months ago, hardly able to move his limbs, skinny and malnourished and bruised all over. He couldn't remember how to speak or how to count to ten or how to eat with chopsticks. It had taken six months in the hospital, which his caretaker, Hoseok, tells him is unheard of. He's smart, apparently, but Jimin doesn't feel very smart. He's very forgetful, and the only reason he remembers anything important is from the words on the purple Post-It Notes Hoseok writes and sticks on practically every available surface. At first, Hoseok stayed with him, but Jimin recovered so quickly that now he only needs to stop by once a day to make sure Jimin is okay and to help him with his physical therapy.

A miracle. That's what they call Jimin's recovery, but quite frankly, Jimin doesn't see what's so miraculous about it. His hands still shake, and they spasm, making him drop things out of nowhere. His knees randomly give out, and he has to use a cane. He spontaneously blanks on simple words when he speaks, and sometimes, the letters on Hoseok's sticky notes get all jumbled up in his brain and it takes him five minutes to read a simple sentence. He gets migraines so bad he sees vibrant greens and purples behind his eyelids.

But the worst thing, the thing that makes Jimin wonder if his recovery should even be considered a recovery at all, is what happens when Jimin hears the ocean. The only time he can really hear it is at night, when the coastal city traffic comes to a lull between three and four in the morning. The drunk people make their way off the streets and out of casinos back home, the cars get parked in their respective driveways and the city falls into a dozing state somewhere between slumber and consciousness, in the gray area that blurs the line between dream and reality.

Then, and only then, can Jimin hear the waves crash on the shore.

And that is when insanity breaks loose in his brain.

Hoseok calls them night terrors. Jimin calls them his own personal hell. The sound of the rise and fall of the tides fill his ears, and suddenly, his lungs feel waterlogged yet on fire all at the same time, his salty tears soak his cheeks, but when he sits up pin straight in bed, gasping for breath and in a state of panic, he doesn't see the plain gray walls plastered with purple Post-It Notes. He sees a dank, dark room, the bottom of which is filling with water. Jimin coughs, and he sees water come out of his mouth, he tastes salt on his tongue, and the briney stench of ocean burning his nostrils. The room sways and shifts under his bed, and he hangs onto the headboard for dear life so he doesn't fall into the growing pool of water.

Sometimes, Hoseok hears his screams and cries and wheezing and rushes in, shaking his shoulders and shouting his name and wiping the tears off his cheeks until he snaps back to the real world, his room perfectly still and undisturbed. But sometimes, he doesn't, and the water fills up to the very top of the room, and Jimin is surviving off pure instinct. He is treading water despite not really knowing how to, and he is desperately sucking in what little oxygen is left at the top of the room. The swaying of his whole atmosphere makes miniature waves that splash him in the face, and then he's choking on water and the screams that get lodged in his throat.

And then the water reaches the top, and Jimin hits his head on the ceiling as he tries to reach the air that used to be there. He holds his breath, praying that someone will save him, that someone will unplug the hidden drain in the room and all the water will disappear into oblivion. But it doesn't, no matter how hard he prays—one thing he does know is that if he's going through this, God can't be real. He wouldn't just let Jimin suffer like this...would he?

His head feels like it's going to explode, and his chest feels tight, until finally, finally, he lets go. He gives in and he breathes out, the pressure in his head immediately diminishing, watching the bubbles float to the top and pop. And he shuts his eyes, and he lets the saltwater fill his lungs, lets the swaying room turn into a gentle, easy lulling that makes him drowsy. If Jimin remembered his mother, he assumed that this is what being held by her would feel like—warm, comfortable, safe.

Seconds before he lets himself fall into a sleep he'll never wake up from, he feels something. He feels something clasp around his hand, something warm. And then he opens his tired eyes, his eyelids that weigh a trillion tons, and there, through the haze and the dark vignette around the edges of his vision, is a silhouette. Jimin squints, but can't see any facial features or defining traits, only a head surrounded by a wild mane of hair, suspended in the water. One arm is at her side and one is reached out, hand grasping Jimin's tightly. The person squeezes once, twice, three times.

And then Jimin is alone in a dry room, his perfectly normal room with gray walls and purple Post-It Notes.

His sheets are drenched, but not with saltwater, rather, his own sweat. The residue of salt is on his skin, but from his tears and perspiration. And instead of his head hurting or his throat being raw from screaming and crying, his heart aches. Not a pain medicine can fix, Jimin thinks. He knows that's not what his pills are for. Rather, a substantial pain that spawns from the insubstantial: a pain from the fact that something isn't where it's supposed to be. A vacant hole, a missing piece in his puzzle, a lost star in his constellation. His heart aches for something that is not there, but Jimin can't quite figure out what—or rather, who, it is for the life of him.

And that's the end of that. A simple night terror, nothing more. But why does it recur?  Why does the ocean trigger it? As far as Jimin knows, he's lived at the beach all his life. So, why now? Why is all of this happening to him now?

Jimin doesn't really know. All he knows is his purple Post-It Notes, his cartoons, his pills, his physical therapy, and Hoseok. He knows that his night terrors are terrifying, and he knows that they hurt even though they aren't real. He doesn't know why, but Jimin tries not to think about that. He doesn't try not to think about it for the same reasons as he tries not to think about most things, though. It doesn't make him confused or stressed.

Thinking about the ocean makes him feel empty.

Jimin would a million times rather think of the other anxiety inducing things he doesn't know than about the ocean.

Because emptiness is worse than confusion or stress. Emptiness consumes him. And to make it even worse—he has no idea why.