This gave me the chills. I love the juxtaposition between his depth of study and the subject. And I find myself eagerly waiting more.

@Jessica, thank you so much, I really challenged myself to fit this all in one story, it was very difficult, your comment means a lot.

The effort shows. This is a compelling piece. Except for the first paragraph, which seems temporally out of place, it builds really well. It seems to me that mentioning his watch or why he’s not wearing it or his college research project should have been carried forward into the story itself in some way. Otherwise, the purpose of the first paragraph seems only to introduce Caleb himself for which the first paragraph isn’t really necessary since we learn a lot more about him in the subsequent paragraphs.

In the 3rd paragraph, the word ‘it’ in the 2nd sentence should be replaced with ‘the asylum.’ The referent for ‘it’ in the previous sentence is ‘his honors project’ but that clearly isn’t what you meant.

@August, thank you for your critique.

The prequel needs to be considered in regards to the opening paragraph; the watch is mentioned mid story. Caleb is a confused mess, him recognizing that something tangible is missing from him leaves the reader to believe that he may still have his hand rubbing his naked wrist, even as the prequel ends. Starting this sequel out with the watch makes it easy to envision Caleb still focused on the reality of his missing watch, is the perfect time for him to start remembering and coming back to reality after a severe trauma.

Thanks for your input. I did switch mention of the Asylum.

I completely missed that there was a prequel. Mea culpa.