He watched her leap.
He watched her fall.
He watched her die.
Dom Cobb remembered clinging helplessly to the window ledge, tearing his eyes away from the sight of her figure, broken and lifeless on the ground. And it had been his fault. It would always be his fault.
"Oh, Jesus Christ, no…"
He would have liked to believe that it was a dream, that it was all a dream, that Mal had been speaking the truth the entire time. To spiral down from this madness and awake, washed up on the shore of reality. To enclose her again in his arms, to rebuild their collapsing haven, to age into eternity.
It would be something beautiful.
No, he adamantly shook his head. There was no going back to that. No going back to that dimension where the lines between reality and fantasy blurred and overlapped and nothing was as it seemed. Here, he was limited.
Here, he was only a man. Not the god of his own shrinking universe.
But she didn't know that. He could feel her even now. She breathed against his skin, calling and beckoning for him to return.
How do you say no? How do you say no to someone you've shared your dreams with? Your life with? Your impossibilities with?
Your love with?
You can't.
Cobb opened his eyes. He leaned forward. He set his top in motion. He waited.
He had to wake up…please, he had to wake up.
The top wavered and fell, coming to a rattling stop on the table's surface. Still Cobb stared, waiting for a sign. He had to wake up.
Because it had never again been the same.
His hopes had become regrets. His life had become his death. And his dreams had become nightmares.
