To interrupt

(Rorim's POV)

"I have a lot to write." But I didn't want to write it. I really didn't.

I currently sat on my desk chair, in front of my computer, as I stared at the blank document that was supposed to be about the last person I wanted to write about.

"Aaaargh!"

What should I write? What? Should I just write a lie instead? Ms. Lee wouldn't mind it anyway right? But I don't want to write anything about him! That's the fatal point here, I don't want to think about him, what more to write about him? Why is this even so complicated?! This is just a paper, nothing personal. Yeah. It's not like Ms. Lee would make us read it by Monday, we just need to submit it.

"I can d—"

knock knock knock knock

"Rorim?" Great..

"Zen. What's the matter?"

"You alright there? I heard your cry from my room, I thought something happened."

"Did I disturb you? I'm sorry."

"No, no. I just wanted to check if you were alright, just in case."

"I'm alright, thank you for checking." I'm not really that alright though.

"Okay.. I'm just next door if you need anything."

"I know, thank you." Please leave already.

The faint footsteps creaked on the corridor and then stopped, and then continued.

"Actually, I'm the one who's in need." Oh, please.

I stared at the door. It won't hurt to help this guy for a bit, right?

I stood up and opened the door. "Come in."

"N-no, I don't want to intrude. We can do it in my ro—"

"It's okay." I pulled him in and closed the door. Sat to my chair, I faced him. "I'm all ears."

He just stood there awkwardly in the middle of the room. His eyes traced the corners and furnitures, observing. "Uhmm, okay. It's just a small matter, something I left back home." He spoke the word like it was somewhere away and distant, which, in fact, was.

"Can you sit first? I feel bad for being the only one sitting." It then occured to me that I didn't have many chairs in my room so I moved to my bed. I motioned him to the chair I just left and he obeyed.

"So, please elaborate." If he was this concerned or bothered, it must be a person, a story left unfinished.

He cleared his throat, his gesture resembling Gilbert's before he starts talking. "I, I have this person" - hah! - "I used to get along with and I'm regretting not saying goodbye or atleast informing that I was gonna leave." - called it - "So uhmm, I don't know what to d— oh this is embarrassing. You're already thinking I'm being silly." He hid his face in his palms.

I chuckled, unable to hold my amusement any longer. This might actually be what I needed more. "No! Please continue, I don't find you silly at all. Well, I am but please don't mind me, I'm just thinking to myself. You were saying that you don't know what to do, yes?"

He exhaled and composed himself. "I want to reconnect with this person but I don't know how."

"Do they have a phone? Email? You can send them a text or email. Unless you're the one who does—"

"I have them. They do too. That's not really my problem, it's more like how to start it. How should I approach it?"

I pursed my lips. Would it be possible that this person he might be talking about is the same person I knew when I was him?

"Do you mind if I ask questions?"

He shook his head and fiddled his fingers, slouching.

Facing the ceiling, I hoped that he couldn't see my face. "Are you good friends with this person?"

"They were my only friend."

"Do you like this person?"

"Uhmm, I like them as a friend and I don't wish for them to hate me now that I haven't told them beforehand that I was moving."

For a moment, it was no longer the ceiling I was seeing. And I smiled at a distant memory. If this was the same person we spoke about, I wouldn't know exactly how to feel. The curiosity that was growing inside might bloom into something misleading, and that's the last thing I would do for them. Despite that, a pang of selfishness seeped from within me, the kind that I have recently kept hidden after an eternity of striving for it to no avail. The human part in me.

"I'm sorry that I was bothering you with this. I wish I didn't say anything."

"No, it's really okay. I'm just thinking of the questions but I worry that I might ask something personal or intimate and it might be awkward for you." I might ask you every detail about them that I already knew just to unearth their buried fragments from my deserted memories.

"It's already awkward for me, how much worse can it go?"

Smirking, I sat up. "Well then if you say it like that then—"

"No, I was half-kidding. Please spare me from the worse."

I cackled, half-jeering. I wished I could say the same and have it come true. "Okay, just two. Do you imagine this person treating another like how they treat you? Have you ever considered the possibility that this person might like you more than you do?"

His eyes were fixed on me. If I didn't consider that he was thinking about his answers, I would have assumed that he was seeing me and all of my secrets.

"I-" I scowled to the floor and then shook his head. "I might have to think a-about uhmm that." He stood, somewhat unstable.

"Yeah you might want to take those in consi— wa-wait! Y-yo—"

Everything happened so fast. My eyes widened as I focused on him. My lips mummed. My body was trapped under his frame. My hands stopped him from falling, fixed to his chest. My feet strained from supporting both of us. What exactly is this situation?

"You alright?" I asked, worried as I noticed the beads of sweat on his forehead. From my palm, I could feel his heartbeat thumping faster than normal. Carefully, I pushed him to the side, making sure he wouldn't fall to the floor or hit his head on my bed frame.

His breathing sounded heavy when I rested him properly on my bed. Escaped from that awkward position, I checked on his forehead and pulse. His pulse thumped faster than before, a hundred ten beats per minute. His body temperature was dropping, his neck feeling cooler under my touch. Was he getting hypothermia? Tachycardia? Does he drink? Does he take any potassium supplements? Does Gilbert know anything about this?

"This is not good, Zen." His heavy, short breaths grew my worry. I lightly slapped his face a bit. "Jensen." I swallowed, his name leaving a bitter taste to my mouth.

I didn't know what to do. I knew how to induce something like this, not to treat it. I just stared at him while he laid there steady in cold sweat, pale.

Wait.. If he dies here, what will happen? Not that witnessing different people die before me in my lifetime was ever new. Seeing my own ghost lie on bed, unconscious and probably on the death doors was. It has been long since I would ever feel worried about someone dying that's not even related to me. It'll be safer and more practical to call Gilbert.

"Hang in there, Zen." I glanced at him and turned to the door.

Before I could run, I was caught into something.

"Zen?" His hand gripped my wrist, weak and shaking but he didn't let go.

"Don't tell." He whispered, his brows scrunching as if in pain.

"Zen, I need to go to Gilbert. You're dying."

His lids opened a bit and he exhaled with such difficulty. "I'll be fine. Don't tell Gilbert, please."

"If you die here I'm literally the one to blame." I joked. This will be an accident, not murder.

He winced. "Stay please?" His voice was scratchy and frail, I needed bend down and lean into his lips to hear.

Hesitant, I squeezed his hand twice. I didn't know when or if he would, but I waited until he felt better.

......…..

When I opened my eyes, Zen appeared, inches from my face. I sat up, discombobulated until I was struck by last night's memory. I glanced at him and found his hand on mine. Right then, I thought about the conversation we shared last night and the change of pace ever since he moved here. And I sympathized. Because despite holding an opaque glass of reality between us to blur his existence, I could never deny that there was a connection between us. A part of him has always been mine too, and that will never change.

I pulled my hand and felt his pulse on his wrist. After all those shenanigans, he was alive. "Zen."

From my shake, he opened his eyes. And I watched him sit, like looking at a recording of me when I woke up earlier. I knew everything was coming back to him when he put his face to palm, his ear reddening.

"This is so embarrassing." He groaned in his pair of hands.

"Oh you should be. I really thought you were dying."

"I thought I was too! It was so bizarre!" I wondered why.

"Are you fine now though? Or am I talking to a conscious ghost?"

He inched to the corner and left my bed. "I'm fairly alive, much thanks to you." And he started tidying my little-to-no-wrinkle bed.

I followed him and helped. "Does it always happen? Like that last night?"

Shaking his head, he crossed his arms. "I have no idea what came to me. I thought I'd pass. And I was suffocating inside, like being drowned."

"Being drowned? Not drowning? Like someone's pushing you under water?"

"Yeah. Or like I'm being sucked in the depths of nothing."

"That's unsettling."

"It is. But more than that, I'm really sorry. I took all of your time, even taking care of me." Looking at him like this, I felt reassured. Zen and I were completely different as people. He was far from who I was - kinder, gentler, lovelier. Maybe I have nothing to worry about anymore.

For the first time, I gave him a sincere smile. "We're a family now. Of course I'd take care of you."

His lips curled, returning the same sincerity.

"Just don't make me do it often. You're not five. No, actually that's offensive because five year olds might be more capable than you." I teased.

"Oh okay. We're at that level now, huh?" He raised an eyebrow, hiding his smirk in his lips.

"Only I can do that of course, it's my house." I rolled my eyes and laughed.

"Wow, the winds change so fast. Okay, Ms. Hourglass."

"Call me that again and I'll tell Gilbert about la—"

He reached out quick and I felt his palm rough on my lips. My eyes widened as he grinned at me. "Rorim. Yes. Please don't tell him that ever. I have been enough of a burden."

We exchanged looks, his hand not leaving my face. Squinting my eyes on him, I raised my hand and flicked his forehead before he could blink. He flinched and released his grasp, bringing his hand to where I flicked him.

"That hurt!" A red line slowly got visible.

Satisfied, I turned. "Let's go down, Gilbert must have been waiting."

"Ey, don't tell him."

"Don't die on me and don't call me by my surname." I opened the door for him.

"Deal." Touching his forehead, he stepped out of my room.

Together, we grinned and headed down.

———————————

"Norman!"

We both looked back and saw Dennis with the few kids behind him.

All the five year olds started washing dishes this week, as per Ms. Hipher's learning sessions. She showed us how to do them last Monday and gave us the task, two children per day. We were assigned on Thursday and that day was today.

"Are you Norman? Why did you turn?" Chloe, the kid behind Dennis in braided hair, cried. She had a point.

"Why are you yelling? We can hear you just fine." Norman wiped the plates with a towel while I continued to wash the dishes.

"You don't play wid us anymore!" complained Dennis.

"Do you have new games?"

"No.."

"Tell me when you have new games then."

"But you don't care about dat before!"

"We want to play with you!"

"Yeah! Norman!"

"Come play wif uth!"

He turned to them. "I don't want to play with you anymore."

Silence ensued. Standing there beside him, I couldn't help but feel curious. Were they the one who planned to poke the nest with their sticks? How long has he not played with them? What does he do when he goes out then?

Footsteps echoed then faded from the room. I thought we were the only ones left until a voice spoke.

"It's because of that..That bird!"

At first I thought he was referring to the eggs. Then it came to me that he was talking about me. I was the bird.

"She's a person and she has a name."

"An ugly girl named after an ugly bird."

I looked down and saw my reflection from the water in the basin. For a second, his words struck me.

Five years and I never thought nor wondered about my appearance. What I looked like. I just knew I had annoyingly straight black hair that never stayed put, short arms and legs that helped me climb my tree and reach for things higher than me, plain clothes that kept me warmth and comfortable just like everyone else, a slouched back (or a back that slouches a lot), a body without any birthmark unlike Gale's or the other kids, and cleaner clothes (compared from the rest of the kids my age) that I maintained by just reading in one place or avoiding dusty things. With mirrors rarely seen in the house, the only way I could see myself was by looking at our reflection in the water or the glass in the windows. Ms. Hipher described ugly as an unsightly image, something you don't like to see. And for me, those things were our trash, my poop, other kids' unfinished plates, vomit and spoiled things. I didn't like the sight of those and I hated them whenever I saw them. Apart from those, everything else was either ordinary, boring or pretty.

"Ravens are not ugly." I murmured, putting the plate to the side.

"Yes dey are and so are you!"

"Hey!"

It was the first time Norman raised his voice like that. Not when we argued. Actually, not ever. That really was the first time and it surprised me.

"We were friends first."

"No. You never asked me if I wanted to be your friend. I just played with you and followed what you wanted. You never asked what I wanted to do." I looked at Norman, his brows furrowed.

I turned, finished with my chore and stepped down from the elevator. My eyes went to Dennis, tracing the frown on his face.

"What are you looking at, you ugly bird!"

"Don't call her that! She's Raven and she's my friend!" Norman stepped down as well, inching towards Dennis with his hands folded into knuckles.

Dennis met my eyes this time. They burned with fury. And also pain. They returned to Norman. He disappeared, not before pushing Norman to the ground. I went to Norman and helped him stand up. We met eyes and I poked his forehead. They relaxed, and he sighed.

"I don't like playing with them anymore. He was one of them."

"One of who?"

"The ones who planned to mess with the nest. I stopped playing with them after that." Makes sense.

"Don't mind them. You're not ugly." He tapped my shoulder.

"I know." I smirked.

"I think you're pretty. And as your friend, you should only listen to me." He went back to the sink and started wiping the remaining wet utensils.

I never thought I was pretty either. Pretty meant the opposite of ugly and I never thought of it whenever I saw my reflection. I just looked. Not pretty. Not ugly. Just looked. Maybe appearances depended on how someone else looked at them. And even though I couldn't care less, I decided to believe in him.

"Whatever you say." I sat on one of the dining chairs and waited for him to finish.