Ray

I sit, hunched, staring down into the lint-filled carpet, in an empty study. 

The orange lights above me shine dimly, humming faintly and discreetly in the background. Surrounding me is the rustic embrace of wooden furniture. Mahogany bookshelves line the walls, while ornate tables and chairs that appear to come straight into the Victorian era blend seamlessly into the background. 

Why am I here…?

I haven’t been able to let up since the incident a few weeks ago. I can’t remember anymore if I’ve always been this way, or if I were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Whatever it is, it’s pretty much assimilated into being a part of me. 

It was just a few weeks ago, and it all happened…so fast. There was no time to react, nowhere to run. It was so sudden, so instantaneous. It was an ordinary morning in a busy hallway, and then…

Pandemonium. One word, enough to encapsulate everything that unfolded.

I’ve lately been breaking into a cold sweat more often, making cursory scans of hallways to make sure the coast is clear, and overall being more tense and cautious and estranged from everything and everyone around me. Even leaving the house is a struggle now. I can’t walk through hallways anymore without my mind still being flooded with all the different alternate timelines and other possibilities, what could have been if I were just a little more to the right, a little less lucky. It’s so hard to keep on living without thinking about…

Why? Why him? Why not me? He didn’t deserve this. No one did. How could it be that such a bright, bubbly guy who brightened up the worlds of whoever he brushed, could get caught in the crossfire of such a senseless act of ruthlessness? 

…

The door swings open, revealing a man with a tall, commanding stature. My therapist. But his facial expressions were anything but. They exuded intrigue and genuinity, signalling a real desire to make an attempt to connect somehow. 

He lays eyes on me, immediately opening up like a flower, waving a hand at me and greeting me warmly. “Hey! I’m Dr Denver! Pleasure to meet you.” He flips his notes, taking a cursory scan at the same location with each page he flips to. “You’re Ray, right?”

Dr Denver plops himself right onto the couch, making himself comfortable. Then, he props himself up, leaning slightly forward, his eyes awash with a familiar sympathy. “First of all, I would like to offer my condolences for the…unfortunate situation that took place in your school. I can only imagine what it must have felt to be in the thick of it all.”

I turn my eyes away from him. 

Dr Denver leans in to look me level in the eye. “Ray, I know it’s hard to voice these things out loud, especially given the…extraordinary circumstances, but…” He reaches a hand out, signalling at his palm. “I think it would be really helpful for us to be on the same page. Would you…be okay to open up to me?”

“Um…” I hesitate for a bit, closing my eyes as I take a moment to think. Up until now I’ve managed to avoid having to talk to anyone about this. I’ve been hiding for so long now that I’ve forgotten what it’s like to stop running. How do I start now? 

But on the other hand, Mr Denver seems really nice. I don’t know him at all yet, but maybe that could be for the better. He wouldn’t need to know everything, least of all the most gruesome details. I can just tell him what he needs to know. And I’ll still keep my own fair share of secrets.

Urghhhhh…what am I supposed to do?!

I didn’t exactly come here by choice. From what she told me, my mom received a very worrying phone call from the school regarding my academic performance and attendance. It seems to have hit her like a whiplash, as the conversation that resulted over breakfast the next day was the first long conversation I’d had with her in a while. As she was getting ready to leave, she mentioned that she’d arranged a therapy session a week from that day, while scribbling down the rest of the details onto a slip of paper from her pocket.

That’s today. 

I had to come here all on my own. She’s working late today, like always. I could have simply gone back home and she probably wouldn’t notice. And now that I think about it, that’s what I probably should have done.

I take a long, hard look at the room around me again, in search of answers. The faintly humming orange lights. The wooden furniture. I’m here now. And, like it or not, I’m stuck here until this session’s over… 

Out of the blue…something clicks within me. It’s as if everything comes together to form an orchestra, something where the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts.

Here, there is no judgement. Here, there is no social pressure. There is only an undeservedly cozy atmosphere and the presence of Dr Denver, who is for the duration of this session the closest thing I currently have to a friend. And more than that, this space also confirms something for me…

I don’t think I want to live like this anymore. 

Maybe…we can make this work. “Okay.”

Dr Denver cracks a smile. “Great! Well then…” He grabs his clipboard and puts it on his lap. “Tell me what you can. From the beginning…”

Mrs. Kono (Kit’s mom)

I stare right into his bedroom, deep into the heart of where he used to reside. It’s all the same as it was before, but…different somehow. It’s all untouched from how it’d been left, except I’d tried to pimp and tidy it up a little bit, removing his clothes from the floor, making his bed, gluing back the posters that were starting to fall off, continually vacuuming the floor, if not for anyone else, then only for myself. 

Everything here remains very still, locked into position, frozen in time. The air itself is calm, yet breathless, almost suffocating. Here, in this vivid time capsule, there is no past, there is no present, there is no future. Just the perpetuity of memory itself, a memory now gone, but still lingers tightly. Nothing changes here. And nothing here will ever change again.

How?

How did such cruel, unrelenting circumstances so violently rend everything I had—my beacon of hope, my force for pride…

How did everything get ripped apart from me, so quickly, so forcefully? And who would do something so inhuman, so beneath the love and dignity that everyone, much less him, should have been granted?

The police were roaming the streets until about a week ago, knocking on people’s doors for testimonials. One of the nearby houses was also meticulously searched for any evidence they could find…if I had to guess, probably to find a motive. They already have the guy. They arrested him at the scene. 

There’ve been people knocking on my door every day, from police seeking to inundate me with questions, to next-door neighbours giving me gifts and showering me in sympathy in droves. My policy, even from that fateful day, has been to turn them away. I know they mean well. It’s just…I can’t help it. Between everything that’s happened and all this sudden support…I’m tired. Does it make me feel better, shutting everyone out? No. Either way, I’m still drowning. But I really need that alone time. It’s a luxury that I haven’t had much of, ever since…

What would it take for me to be given the chance to wake up and turn back time, equipped with the knowledge I have seared into my mind now? Or better yet, to just wake up  from this timeline and dismiss all the events of the past few weeks as one big nightmare?

I glance at the posters lining the walls. Drawings of the Solar System, mockups of the Voyager space probe, an image of the Challenger space shuttle. He was really enamoured with space and interstellar travel. He could talk a great deal about Curiosity and Perseverance, about gravitational forces and how they worked, about the speed of light and how people have worked to get as close as they possibly could to it. 

I turned to look at the now pitch-black monitor on his desk. I can almost hear the echoes of chatter and buzz, or of loud action music at near full volume, as he conversed about life and school and video games…

I looked at his shelf filled to the brim with books, ranging from introspection to science fiction to slice-of-life graphic novels. I could even see the one he’d started that fateful day, still slightly open, bookmarked…

Eventually, I collapse onto his bed, staring dazed into the ceiling lights.