Whims of a Quiet Dreamer

Chapter 4: Lost in the Dream

Sithu sat at her kitchen table, staring at the screen of her laptop. It had been two days since the layoff, and every time she thought about job hunting, her chest tightened. The long list of job postings, the dreaded interviews, the questions she'd have to answer—it all felt unbearable. She clicked through a few more pages, half-heartedly saving job ads, but her mind was already retreating somewhere else.

She reached for her headphones, slipping them on like a protective shield, blocking out the world around her. Music swirled in her ears, soft and comforting, carrying her far away from the present moment. Sithu let her eyes drift closed, surrendering to the pull of her imagination.

In her mind, she was nine again.

She stood in a field of tall grass, the sun warm on her skin, the air filled with the scent of summer. The world was vast, open, and untouched by the heaviness of adult life. There were no jobs, no interviews, no pressures here—just the endless possibilities of a child's mind. She wore a simple dress, her bare feet sinking into the soft earth as she ran through the meadow, laughing, free from the weight of expectations.

Her imaginary world was one of adventure and magic. She could see the outline of a castle in the distance, its spires reaching for the clouds. She imagined herself as a brave explorer, venturing into unknown lands, where anything was possible and nothing was too hard. Here, she wasn't the strange, quiet woman everyone misunderstood. She wasn't trapped by responsibilities or haunted by the fear of letting her parents down.

She was free.

The shrill ring of her phone shattered the dream. Sithu jolted upright, the vision of the meadow and the castle dissolving instantly. She pulled off her headphones, staring at the phone's screen. It was her mother.

A knot formed in her stomach as she hesitated, then answered.

"Hi, Mom."

Her mother's warm voice flowed through the line. "Sithu, how are you? What's going on?"

She opened her mouth to respond, but the words caught in her throat. How could she explain? How could she make her mother understand the weight of it all—the layoff, the job search, the crushing feeling that she wasn't enough?

"I... I got laid off," Sithu finally said, the words small and heavy.

There was a pause on the other end. "Oh, sweetheart. I'm so sorry. But don't worry, you'll find another job. You always do."

Sithu bit her lip, staring down at the table. She wanted to tell her mother that it wasn't that simple, that looking for a job wasn't something she could just do like everyone else. It took everything out of her—the small talk, the interviews, pretending to be someone she wasn't just to fit in. But her mother had never quite understood that.

"You'll be fine, love," her mother continued, her voice gentle but distant, like she was speaking from a place far removed from Sithu's reality. "You're smart, you'll find something soon. You know, your brother and sister are doing so well. They've both settled into their careers. Maybe this is a sign for you to find something better."

Sithu's heart sank. Her siblings—always so put together, so capable—seemed to breeze through life in ways she never could. They had their careers, their families, their grown-up lives all mapped out. And then there was Sithu, still stumbling, still stuck in a world that never felt quite right.

"Yeah," Sithu replied, forcing a small smile even though her mother couldn't see it. "I'll figure it out."

She sighed as the conversation went on, the same reassurances, the same well-meaning advice. But as much as she loved her mother, there was always a gap between them. Her mom wanted the best for her, but she didn't understand how hard it was for Sithu to navigate adulthood. The expectations, the constant comparing, the questions she never had answers for—why wasn't she more like her siblings? Why couldn't she just "get it together"?

Sithu ended the call with a tired, "Okay, Mom. I'll let you know if something comes up." She set the phone down on the table and stared at it for a long moment, the weight of the conversation settling heavily on her shoulders.

She was no longer in that sunny meadow, no longer free from the pressures that pressed in from all sides. She couldn't go back to that dream, no matter how hard she wished. She needed a job, no matter how much the thought of it overwhelmed her.

For all her efforts to ignore the opinions of others, they lingered, unshakable. She didn't want to disappoint her parents. She didn't want to fail at being what everyone expected her to be.

But even as she stared at the job listings again, the weight of it all felt heavier than she could bear.