PART ONE
January 6th He woke up disoriented, not because of the time, but because of the feeling. That heavy, low hum in the chest that usually means something is wrong before the mind catches up.
January 6th. The date landed differently than the others. It always had. Five years ago, the day America showed itself on live television. A day everyone remembers without needing to explain why.
For a moment, he honestly believed he’d missed something. That while he slept, the nightmare had finally resolved itself. Wait. Is this still January 6th? Am I dreaming? Who’s president?
In the version of reality his mind reached for first, accountability had already happened. The people who broke the country were gone. Locked away. Reduced to history lessons and cautionary tales.
Then he checked the world. Same voices. Same faces. Same confidence. Still free. Still talking. Still shaping the story like nothing ever burned. That’s when the unease sharpened.
This wasn’t a nightmare. This was worse. This was waking up and realizing the nightmare had been normalized.
He sat on the edge of the bed and let that sink in. January 6th hadn’t returned as chaos. It returned as amnesia. As collective agreement to move forward without actually dealing with what broke. The country was functioning. But something fundamental was missing. Like a house with fresh paint and a cracked foundation everyone agreed not to mention.
He felt it in his body. That sense of unreality. That subtle dread of living inside a story that refuses to acknowledge its own turning point.
Nothing exploded today. Nothing needed to. The damage had already learned how to blend in. He knew, sitting there, that whatever came next wouldn’t be public or dramatic.
It would be private. Internal. Unavoidable.
My name is William Rochelle, but you can call me Bill.
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