My head continued to swim for what felt like hours. The man's arms holding me up seemed to vanish, and his face slowly melted into nothing.

The pain continued for some time before fading away. I looked around me and saw that I was no longer in my hollow house and the man who was with me no longer was. The world around me was shimmery and shallow, and I knew it was all fake. It occurred to me that is was rather inconvenient that I should be plagued to have a vision the first time I had a visitor, but it couldn't be helped. 

I stepped forward in my false world and saw that I was standing in the small cottage north of my walls. A man and woman were arguing; rather, a woman was yelling at a man, who wept in his armchair as he took the abuse. I recognised this man as the one who was probably attempting to wake me at this moment, and the woman must have been his wife. Several times I saw her swing some weapon at her husband, and not once did he retaliate or even lift his arm to stop her. It seemed she was upset that he had allowed himself to be caught, and half the words I could hear were so vulgar she might as well be a sailor. I was appalled that a man who shows so much love for his wife should come home and receive such treatment from the woman. I was tempted to mute the old hag when suddenly, my head began to hurt again.

This time, when I looked around myself I was inside the humble cottage, and the woman whose face was red with fury just a minute ago was now red with what was only moments before incredible pain. She held a beautiful baby girl in her arms, and somehow she seemed displeased. The husband was overjoyed, however, as the child was handed off to him. His eyes were full of love for his daughter, and he held her as if she was more valuable than all the diamonds in the world. 

My surroundings began to swim once more, and I found the sweet child, perhaps five years of age, playing in my garden, her father standing near, weeding the plants. His wife was sitting inside her own house, looking out at us through her little window with disdain in her eyes. I could see that she was eating vegetables from my own garden.

I was standing near an apple tree with some planks of wood and some rope. It was apparent I was constructing a swing, if a very simple one. With some troubles I managed to get the rope around a branch and pulled down, ensuring it was strong enough to hold a child. 

After I got the swing to work, I sat down to tend to my garden while the father pushed his daughter on the plank of wood. By the end of the day, the little girl ran over to me and gave me a hug. She even called me mother, but her father laughed and corrected his child. 

Again, I was dragged away from the precious memory to another, more horrifying one. I could hear yelling come from inside the little cottage, the mother, no doubt, and even worse, I could hear someone crying in pain and complete silence from the father. I felt my feet move towards the commotion as horrible things passed through my head. Upon opening the door I immediately saw... 

And then it had dawned on me that there was nothing to see. My vision blurred and an icepick was hammering its way into my skull. When I opened my eyes, I saw the worried face of the young man, who was trying to pour brandy into my mouth to revive me.