4
The dark broke down. The light replaced it.
Eyes opened slowly. Blurred colors twinkled in front of the eyes. The thick mist that covered reality became thinner, revealing the familiar place.
I felt confused. Reality and dream had merged together until I couldn’t tell the differences. I shook my head a bit before looked around.
This is my room with the same piano, the same mirror, and the same me, but something had changed.
I couldn’t remember what had happened before.
I tried to swim in the river of memory. Images of the past floated down the fierce tide before crumbled down in front of me. The more I tried to think, the more memories were destroyed.
I tried to recall further. After I’d got home, I came into my room and then I…
The images crashed into my mind. The scream resonated inside my chest. The pain was so intense as if my body was tearing apart. Red blood bathed every inch of the room. The raw smell reeked in the air whispered to the soul that…
I was about to die.
I’d screamed before I knew it. A tear ran down my face. The only thing I could feel from the crust of memory was fear. It didn’t matter how clear the image was, I couldn’t tell what it was.
I tried to deny something.
I took off my shirt in a hurry, trying to find the wound on my body. From memory, I faintly recalled that blood poured down from my stomach, but I couldn’t tell the exact spot.
I got up and walked in front of the mirror. A petite figure reflected in it. I roamed my eyes throughout my body, seeking the wound I saw in the dream.
Nothing… No wound was there.
Fear was replaced with curiosity. My heart might deny it. It knew that something dangerous was waiting ahead, but my intuition was telling me that the truth was also hidden there.
I needed to find the answer.
At night, I went into the kitchen to prepare dinner. Dad worked so hard. He should take some rest.
Dad still obsessed with the photo albums. He kept telling me that it didn’t matter how bad your past was, it was what make us the one we were. Every memory was beautiful.
After the dinner was made, I placed them on the table neatly and went to call Dad.
The atmosphere at the dinner table was the same. I talked about Bill and my study, discussed the news and what was going on recently. It didn’t matter what I had talking about, Dad was ready to listen to me.
“Bill is following you again?” He shook his head.
“Not just wait for me like the last time. This time he actually chasing after me.” I said and put the dinner into my mouth.
“That’s terrible.” He looked upset. “Well, but at least someone takes a fancy to you.”
“Come on, Dad.” I adjusted my glasses. “Someone likes me doesn’t need Bill to clinging around. I’m quite popular, you know?”
The conversation went smoothly as usual. However, I couldn’t shake off the uncomfortable feeling. The faint memory still haunted me. My thirst for truth was screeching loudly.
I would never be free if this won’t end.
While Dad was laughing at his joke, I gathered up my courage and asked.
“Dad.”
“Yes, darling.” He looked at me in confusion before showing his seriousness. Dad might realize that I was about to say something important.
“Dad, have you seen this photo before?” I took the house’s photo from my pocket and handed it to him.
He took the photo and looked at it carefully. The seriousness on his face changed into confusion.
“I remember this photo, but I forgot why I’d taken it.” Dad scratched his head. “Where did you find it?”
“I found it in a frame in my room. You put it there?”
“I can’t remember.” He replied. “But what’s wrong with this photo?”
“I just feel strange.” I looked down. “Had a burglar broke into our old house before?”
“A burglar broke into our old house, huh?” His eyes moved around. “I don’t think so.”
“And what about the electric lines in the photo? They were cut.”
“The electric lines? Let me think.” Dad stared at the photo while rubbing his chin. “Ah! I remember now. There were some times we had a storm that torn out these electric lines down. I took this photo and sent to the officers and had them to come and dealt with it. I had to go way back to take the whole shot. In case there was more damage elsewhere.”
“Oh.” I wasn’t really convinced with that. “But you’re really sure that no one broke into our home?” Even I was confident that Dad wouldn’t lie to me, I had to ask again. It made me feel better.
“No.” Dad raised his eyebrows. “Why do you ask that?”
“Well…” I hesitated. “I feel weird.”
“Weird?” He asked. “How?”
“I can’t explain it myself. It’s just a feeling that… I don’t know. I don’t know how to put it.”
“If you're worried about something, you can tell me. Don’t be shy.”
“I know but… but this is different…” I shook my head.
“It’s fine. It doesn’t matter how embarrassing it is, I’m ready to listen.”
“Well… okay.” I smiled and took a deep breath. “When I saw that photo, I… ah… I had a weird dream.”
“Dream?” He raised his eyebrows. “Can you tell me what had you dream about?”
“I tried to remember but… it’s like something is stopping me from thinking about it as if I'm forbidden to talk about it.”
“So it makes you worry about the old house?” He asked with concern. “I want you to calm down and tell me about your dream again. I promise I’ll take it seriously.”
“You promise.” I waved my finger.
“Promise.” He nodded.
“Well, I saw myself… I… I lied down and couldn’t move. Blood was all over my body, and I heard someone screamed from afar. After that, I realized that the scream was from my throat.”
“That’s all?” Dad raised his eyebrows.
“Yes. That’s all.”
Suddenly, Dad roared out laughing. He slapped his leg and shredded his tear at the same time.
“That reminds me of when you were young, you used to dream of strange things like this and came begging to sleep with me. Ah, a child is still a child.”
“This is not funny, Dad.” My face was bright red. “You promised to be serious.”
“I’m serious. I am.” He smiled. “But what you’d seen isn’t something you should be worried about. We all have weird dreams from time to time, especially when we’re stress. Tell me, what your stress really is?”
“It’s obvious that you don’t take it seriously.” I raised my voice. “What make me feel stress is this dream. If you don't take it seriously, I’m so out of here.”
“Dream, calm down. I know that you…”
“Do you know why you see this amusing?” I asked. “You have something hidden from me, haven’t you?”
“I think that doesn’t matter.”
“It does! If you don’t have anything hidden from me, you’ll tell me everything!”
“Why do you think like that? Why do you think I have something hidden from you?” Dad raised his voice in response. “I don’t have anything hidden from you! Ask your friend or your ex. I just don’t think that your dream has anything wrong as you think. It’s just a nonsense dream everyone has!”
My mind snapped. My chest was burning like there was some hellish fire within. I cursed at my Dad loudly before ran to my room. I couldn’t even remember what I’d said to my Dad. The last sound I heard was the sound of the door crashing close.
That movement… That voice… It was as if… as if our relationship went back to where it used to be.
I leaned on the door before slipped down on the floor. No matter how hard I tried to forget, the wound still left a scar. The conflict between my Dad and me ended a long time ago, but a small gap between us was still there. Memory was the thing that bid us to the painful past. Dad might say memory was beautiful, but that beauty was hurting us now.
I looked up at the ceiling. The complete white reminded me of something Ton said. Sometimes I wanted to go back to the nothingness, leaving everything behind. I didn’t want to hurt anyone because I was still hurt from a small wound from the past. I wanted it to disappear and forgot about the bad time that still haunted me.
I pulled up my knees, put my face on them, and cried silently.
After today class had ended, Ton and I met at the library as usual.
Ton took out a new Milk Jigsaw from his bag. He poured out the pieces and placed the board on the table. It was a signal that the time to solve some puzzle had started.
I fumbled around a while before picked up a piece and placed it into the position at the left side of the board.
“You become faster.” Ton smiled and took a piece. “Already get the idea, huh?”
“What idea?” I said “I just start from the side. Anyone can think of that.”
“Yes. Anyone can think of that.” He laughed. “But don’t forget that such simple principle is critical.”
“Maybe.” I took another piece and placed it down on the board.
“Have another problem today?” Ton asked. “Bill chased you again?”
“Nah.” I shook my head. “Bill wasn’t here today. I’m just not feeling well.”
“You’re a bad liar.” Ton smirked.
“I’m not a bad liar.” I stepped back a bit. “You’re too sharp.”
“Okay, fine. What’s the matter?” Ton asked. “Let me guess. It’s about that dream again.”
I nodded in acceptance before took the photo from my bag and handed it to Ton.
“What’s this?”
“I found this photo hidden in a frame. After I saw it, I…”
“You can’t remember again?”
“Not that I can’t remember but… It’s like something was blocking my thought. I felt it. I touched it. I remembered it. But when I have to talk about it, I can’t recall it.”
“You mean…” Ton tilted his head.
“I was… scared of something but I can’t tell what it is.”
“I understand.” Ton nodded. “You don’t have to say. Do you realize that your hands are shaking?”
Suddenly, I lost my strength. The photo fell from my hand and flew to the next table. I tried to grab it, but someone reached it first.
“O-- old house? I miss it too.” Max smiled before returned the photo to me.
“Thanks.” I forced out a smile.
Max gave me a puzzled look. He nodded before returned to his seat.
I was a bit surprised that he missed the house he used to live. Max used to play with me when we were young. However, whenever we had good times, Max’s mom would come to berate him and dragged him away. After that, I would hear him fighting with his mom. That might be a reason for Max to run away from home. From my point, I didn’t think that that place has anything good left for him.
“You’re sure you are okay, Dream?” Ton asked.
“I don’t know.” I lowered my head. “At first, I thought what I saw was nonsense, but I start to not so sure about that.”
Ton nodded, thinking hard. I felt good every time I saw him like that. Sometimes, what we wanted is someone who sees how important our problem is, no matter how the small the case is.
“I said that it might be caused by your stress. Not something big to be serious about it but I don’t think it’s like that now.” Ton said. “Hallucination won’t repeat easily. You haven’t got a lack of sleep recently, have you?”
I shook my head. He nodded in reply. “It seems… strange. Can you say about what you saw in the dream again?”
“I’ll try.” I took a deep breath and concentrated on my memory. Every bit of the broken images, I tried to collect it all.
I used all of my strength to pull the memory bits together to make a whole image, but the fear in my heart was so intense. The more I tried, the stronger the wall between my memory, and I became.
I imagined of a fierce tide. Both my arms pulled the chains that took hold of the images that floated in the tide of time. The chains got heavier and heavier. My tiny body was dragged down under the water gradually.
I put more strength in my arms until the tendons appeared on both of them. My feet scratched with the rough bottom under neat and torn off my flesh. I clenched my teeth, squeezed the rest of my strength out.
The tide became even fiercer, but I refused to give up. My arms and legs were tense. I bawled out from pain before snatched the images above the water.
Suddenly, every chain fused into one, forming the whole image, from the still image to the animated one. Colors and music were added in, creating the story from emotions and thought of the past.
I closed my eyes a bit before opened them again.
“You remember now, right?” Ton asked.
“Yes… I remember now.” I nodded. “After I saw the photo, I returned to the room I heard the clock ticking. This time was a bit different. No clock ticking sound. Instead, I heard someone scream from afar. I saw myself covered in blood. The strangest thing is that scream belonged to me.”
“It seems… confusing.” Ton raised his eyebrows.
“I don’t know what that means too.” I shook my head. “I can’t even remember facing something like that. At first, I think I was attacked, but there was no wound on my body. I already asked my Dad, but he said something like that had never happened.”
“It might be more than some ordinary stress.” Ton said. “You might face something far terrible than that. You were freaked out or so scared that it stuck in your mind.”
“My Dad said the same thing too, but I feel that there’s something in that place. I feel that what I saw was real. Something tells me that. My Dad just laughed it off and said that I over thinking it.”
“Your Dad wasn’t wrong. It can be like he said but there’re also other possibilities.” He leaned back. “You said that you’re scared of those photos?”
“Yeah. After I saw the first photo, I can’t remember it. No. I feel that it was blocked by something so I can’t reach it. I'm still scared, but I can’t tell what I’m scared of.”
Ton nodded before continued asking. “And had you experienced something similar to what you’d seen? It’s not necessary to be exactly the same. Maybe something like you cut yourself when you were young and hurt until you cried out. Maybe nobody was there to hurt you. The wound might not necessary be physical. It maybe what your memory use to compare with something similar happened in the past. For example, you were crying. The cut wound could mean that you heard someone said things that hurt you.”
“I don’t think so.”
“How about before you moved house?”
I tried to think of everything in the past, digging out the unusual events and the gaps between memories that could change my life. I came back empty hand.
“No.” I shook my head.
“Fine. In this case, I think you might really too stress. Normal worry shouldn’t trouble you this much. Sometimes dreams are from the stress. But the hallucination…” Ton covered his mouth with his hand. “It’s… too strange.”
I sat there to listen to his conclusion with depression. Everything was so contradicted. No memory. No wound. But what I saw and felt were so intense as if they were real. Should I stay with the fact or believe in my intuition now?
Suddenly, a thought appeared in my mind. I knew how I could solve this problem.
“If we can’t conclude now, how about we go to find the truth at my old house?”
“Hey! That’s not a good idea, Dream.” Ton lifted his hand, gestured the stop motion. “We don’t know whether what you saw is real. If it’s real, doesn’t it too risky? If the attacker is still around and you’re attacked there, the same thing might happen over again.”
“I know but...”
“Think it through.” He warned. “I don’t want this matter to harm you.”
I nodded even when I knew which path I would take.
“Well, how about we have you go to see a psychiatrist first? If the problem can’t be solved then, we can find another way later. Okay?” Ton smiled.
“I’m not crazy,” I said in a playful tone.
“I’m not saying that you're crazy, but it’ll be better than having nothing to confirm that the image you saw was real or not.” Ton smiled. “We can’t say that you don’t have a problem either. You’d better go to see a psychiatrist. We might learn something more.”
“But…”
“No buts.” Ton touched my lips with his finger.
I let out a big sigh before lifting my hands in surrender.
“You do that.” Ton smiled devilishly. “I’ll take it as a yes.”