15
Both shadows faded away, the reality remained in front of my eyes.
I stood still for a while before fell down. Even though this time I wasn’t frightened by the illusion, my feeling toward it was far stronger than it’d ever be.
I could feel the sorrow and the loneliness…
As if the crying shadow was… me.
Ton rushed to support me. He brought me to the sofa in front of the kitchen and sat down beside me.
I looked at him tiredly. Ton shook his head before whispered into my ear.
“Don’t say anything. Just rest…”
I breathed in greedily before let it out and leaned back a bit, trying to put the images I saw together.
But everything was the same.
I still refused the reality…
“Don’t force yourself.” Ton said. “Rest first. Don’t overdo it.”
“I'm all right,” I said with a raspy voice. “If I don’t think of it now, I might forget it again.”
“Stop it.” Ton lifted his hand to stop me. “I know you won’t listen to me but this time I have to force you. You’re not looking good.”
“It’s really fine…”
“It’s obvious you aren’t.” Ton unbuttoned my jacket slowly. “Let me take your jacket off, so you can breathe easier.”
He took off my jacket and put in on the sofa on the opposite side.
“Why do you always wear long sleeve?” Ton raised his brows.
“That jacket…?” I paused a while. “Since I broke up with Bill… I feel… I don’t feel comfortable around men.”
Ton looked at me as if finding an answer.
“When I went out with him, I was… beaten up.”
“Bill hit you?” Ton shook his head before walked back to sit beside me.
“At first, Bill was a good boyfriend.” I forced a smile. “Not long after we went out, he became to be the person he is now.”
“Oh.” Ton nodded understandingly. “So, you dress up to cover yourself so that men can’t touch you directly?”
I nodded slowly. Ton rubbed his chin before asked again.
“Then, why do you seem to be fine with Max and me?”
“I won’t feel good only with men I don’t know.” I paused. “If they don’t touch me or pressure me, I’ll be fine, too.”
I supported myself up and leaned on the sofa, looking through the window absent-mindedly.
“You don’t have to do it now.” Ton said gently. I shook my head.
“I’m fine, really.” I smiled before looked at the window again. “When I looked out through the window, it was at the same time that the moon was aligned with the broken glass.”
I swayed to the right a little. My head rested on Ton’s arm.
“After that… I saw two shadows. One was laid on the ground. The other… was crying.”
“You… can remember what you saw?”
I shook my head. “I can only remember it but like every time… I can’t put the images together.”
Ton nodded in reply, so I continued.
“But this time, something changed.” I looked up. “I remained in the reality when I saw the illusion. I could see you, and I didn’t fear of the image. I didn’t feel that I was rejecting the image I saw, but I felt…”
I coughed lightly before continued.
“I feel uncontrollably sad… I don’t know whose shadows were there, but I felt that I was the crying shadow. I feel that it was me.”
“You think you are one of the shadows?”
I nodded. Ton rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“Strange.” Ton said. “Normally, you would see exactly where you were but this time you didn’t. Moreover, the reality didn’t disappear when you saw the illusion as well.”
Ton took out his notebook and wrote something down.
“But I don’t understand. Why didn’t you see this earlier?”
“I think… it’s because of the moon.”
“The moon?”
“Yes,” I replied. “When I saw the illusion, the moonlight fell on both shadows. After the moon had moved passed the window, everything disappeared.”
“Umm.” Ton mumbled. “I understand that, but it’s still strange.”
“Why?”
“You said… the crying shadow might be you?”
I nodded. Ton lowered his head and scratched it.
“When you look at the house’s photo, you said you were lying on the floor and was stabbed.” Ton knocked the pencil rhythmically. “But this time you were crying and sat beside someone lying on the floor.”
Ton wrote something more in the notebook before torn off the page.
“Do you think it’s possible that both images were from the same event?”
“I don’t know,” I answered. “But I think that’s impossible. When I saw myself stabbed, I lay down, soaking in blood, in my Dad’s room. The image I saw the moment ago happened in the kitchen.”
“If that’s true,” Ton said. “It means that you were stabbed later. You were crying for someone, but why did you run back to your father’s room?”
“I don’t know.”
“Another question.” Ton spun the pencil in his hand thoughtfully. “When you sat there crying, did you have a knife in your hand?”
I moved my eyes around, trying to remember the illusion earlier, then shook my head.
“Hmm.” Ton mumbled. “This is getting stranger and stranger.”
Ton leaned back on the sofa. He looked around the house before got up and went into the kitchen. He brought his phone put and took a photo of the window reflecting the moonlight into the room.
He looked out the house thoughtfully. The moonlight bathed on his face. I looked at him silently. It was obvious that he was worried.
Suddenly, his eyes went wide. He turned to look at me briefly before ran back to put everything in his bag.
“This is impossible.” He mumbled.
“What’s the matter?”
Ton raised his head to look at me as if trying to find an answer before looked down and continued to pack his things.
After he finished, he pulled me off the house.
On our way back, he didn’t say anything.