I entered the house but there’s a trap somewhere I can’t see. I don’t know how to solve this but I’m grateful I can see her steps. Five large steps from the door, a jump near the chair, then spins. I don’t know how many spins but hopefully it would not matter. After that is a jump to the other chair and voila… her mark is gone. I don’t know if I can solve the rest of the puzzle in time to catch up with her but I’ll try my very best.

I’m still distracted. Still hurt that Nikay was gone. But at least there’s Ivy, I wonder where she is now? Could she have came earlier to this house than her and I? Then she must’ve solved the puzzle already. Then so where is her presence? I can’t feel any. I used to feel up where she has gone too but there’s nothing here. I can’t feel her. Only a choking and restricting presence is here from that girl.

I finally readied myself and took the first step, then the next. There are a bunch of memories I can feel a deja vu in seeing. I’ve seen this all before, this is her past. Every time a path is completed or accomplished, a fragment of a memory from the person will be revealed to me such that as many paths are collected, as much will I know the depths of the person and all her impressions as if I’ve known her all along.

This is why I keep on referring to her as that girl. I haven’t yet seen a memory of her where someone calls her by her name. It’s a pitiable thing, to grow up unrecognized but such is her life.

I will reveal to you her memory that I’m seeing right now.

She stands by the playground. Crying and crying. A wind blew by and took her tears away. There she  is now. Calm. Collected. Like how she is always expected to be. Only that, she is broken, truly broken inside. She’s just 5 still to young to shoulder her family but she’s doing all that willingly. She sacrificed her youth and naiveness.

She lived amongst wolves and crocodiles, all were ready to bite her. Had she let down her guard there won’t be enough from the clan for herself, her siblings and her parents. She’s the one who took charge and she persevered until it came to the point where she has to final say in every final decision of the clan.

That’s how I viewed her also calm and collected yet ruthless ambition-driven in her youth. As days go by and I spend more time with her in my past her ruthlessness is replaced by a tenderness I don’t know if I will see again.

That’s my fear. The her that I used to know is so unlike the her now. I fear getting close to her because I might be disappointed that I will not see her as how I left her.

She’s been my only companion for so many years, I can’t help but be used to her presence. But the her that I’m following now is a side of her still unknown to me. It’s her but at the same time it’s not.

This is why I haven’t yet reconnected with her in the past week since I returned. The current her does not speak and is always indifferent to anything. The her that I knew was sweet and soft-spoken.

As the memory finishes so does my recollection of her. Once again I’m in an unknown space. It is no longer the house but a cave. There’s no lights but the bats around is enough to confirm that this is a cave.

I don’t know why I’m here but I know she hasn’t been here.