Abstraction
The college seemed deserted with its minute student count that remained to participate in the night study programme in preparation for the upcoming Promotional exams. Isaac was one of the few who decided to utilize this duration in an attempt to clinch the monetary reward for good progress in his academics. He strolled briskly towards his locker with a thick stack of books that he carried with both hands. Isaac was a rather short male to begin with and that the weight of the books had caused him to hunch his back to such an extent – one would almost recognize Isaac as his disabled classmate.
‘29, 10, 24,’ Isaac thought loudly to himself as he unlocked the combination lock on his locker.
The locker was a metal niche that looked very much like those in the columbarium. The only difference was that the hinged locker door had a tinge of chrome and was secured to the niche itself by a PROSPEC™ combination lock.
‘Hey, Isaac!’ A voice had called out to him from behind, ‘having trouble unlocking your locker again?’
His classmate, Julian, had approached with a steady pace from the central stairs and finally reached him before chattering on, ‘now, seriously, looks can be deceiving – these combination locks look really new and lustrous on the outside, yet probably rusty and clink-ish on the inside, don’t you think so? Now about today… …’ Julian went on with his usual ‘naggery’ while Isaac had politely feigned ignorance to his words. He had already tried to unlock his lock for the third time before it sprung open with ease.
‘Thank goodness,’ Isaac muttered under his breath, hoping that his classmate would not hear his words, ‘I could’ve been stranded here with all these “cruel” texts.’
With that, he unloaded his weight within the locker, which was now neatly filled with textbooks and files from the lessons before. Isaac closed the door of his locker gently and replaced the lock. He heaved a long and woeful sigh before treading towards the cafeteria for a short “tea break”. As usual, Julian followed on with his jittering until they sat down on the polished plastic stools that surrounded a similarly coloured table. He then enquired, ‘Isaac, whacha drinking? Are you gonna remain in school for the night study thingy tonight? Well, if you are, take care dude, things aren’t what they seem in the dark…’
A solemn look had taken over the smile upon Julian’s face, he seemed serious with his words, even through his undying light-hearted tone of speech, ‘I’ve heard many supernatural occurrences in this compound during our term here in this college…’
Isaac had no qualms in taking his advice, he had never believed in the existence of ethereal beings. He quickly finished the ice blended mocha before leaving the table to collect his books yet again from the locker. He had decided to start work earlier than usual today.
***
He had worked diligently in an empty classroom before leaving to deposit his books back into the locker. The college appeared to be rather creepy at nightfall. The moon emitted a yellowish glow, thus causing the unlit corridors to be darker than usual on bright moonlit nights.
Isaac walked alone along the lonely corridor. The college had so little students that it seemed almost possible to hear the tinkling of a needle when it would be dropped onto the floor. As he had done so, he could hear his footsteps echo towards the ends of the corridor as well as some other minor disturbances – he hastened his pace; his only wish was to get out of that corridor as soon as possible before his insecurity gets the better of him.
After emerging from the corridor to a now well-lit cafeteria, he dragged his lifeless feet to his locker.
’29, 10, 24, darn, not again!’
The lock had failed to click open once again. With much frustration, he tried to force it open with his fingernails, of which the tissue beneath his pressured nails had started tearing apart, hence bleeding had ensued. Strangely, at the same instance, the lock had clicked itself open magically. Isaac stared at the unusual phenomenon with disbelief as he endured the intense pain that now took over his senses. Dark and red, his blood had dripped from both of his thumbs and index fingers, which landed on the well-dozed cement floor silently.
Without further ado, Isaac rushed himself to the nearest toilet while leaving his locker open. He knew the risk of leaving it unlocked, however, he could not bear the fact that he would have to re-open the lock if it were locked.
‘What troublesome locks! Totally inhumane… well, it’s not human to begin with,’ with a slight grin, he stared at his reflection in the mirror. He looked pretty much like a geek, just that he was not equipped with a pair of spectacles. He had a fringe that hung lifelessly to his nose if left uncombed, not quite an acceptable hairdo in an esteemed college. His college uniform was neatly tucked into his black trousers, with a college badge that was pinned up smartly on his left collar.
Suddenly, the door had swung open violently and hit the wall with a thump. Julian stood at the doorway with his spectacles undone and his shirt tucked out.
‘Oh hello, Julian, you startled me,’ Isaac swerved about just in time to notice his classmate, ‘I thought you weren’t supportive of the night study programme?’
‘I was worried…’
Existence
Julian and I left the college as soon as I dumped my books into that wretched locker. He did not say a word about what he did during the night study programme; he just kept quiet as we walked the stretch of road out to the bus stop together. For the sake of curiosity, I initiated the conversation, ‘hey, Julian, why the sudden silence? You don’t seem very well at the moment…’
Julian let out a controlled sob, tears were present in his eyes, yet he continued to remain silent. He started to increase his pace now, it seemed apparent that he was determined to reach the bus stop as fast as his legs could carry him. I felt a light breeze coming our way as we both picked up speed -- the breeze was a cold one, it was one that could send the chills down one’s spine – without much doubt, the night outside our college was certainly uninviting.
We reached the bus stop within minutes and Julian had already boarded the first bus that arrived. He did not even bother to bid me goodbye – he just left without a word – leaving me to ponder if I had done anything wrong to incur any wrath to our 6-year friendship.
I made my way home on the usual bus service that I took from school. Well, due to my inherent laziness, I had refused to flag for the bus as there was always someone who would take the same bus as I would. Everything seemed wrong that day though, the RFID scanner on the bus did not seem to work at all, regardless of how I had tried to place my RFID tagged student pass on the reader.
‘Well, if the driver did not notice that I haven’t paid for the fee, I could possibly sneak past him and take a free ride home!’ I thought gleefully to myself and made my way to the back of the bus where most of the empty seats were located.
Not long after, I had finally disembarked from the bus, and made my way home – only to realize that the main door was left open and that everyone was asleep already. I checked my watch for the time – 01 33 hrs. Plagued by fatigue, I immediately made a beeline for the shower and prepared for bed.
I slept only to believe that the next day would be a better one.
Abstraction
Isaac had been awoken in the middle of the night by a familiar noise of scribbling in the main toilet. He was still in his state of grogginess; his eyes were still rather sore from all that late night studying at college. He checked his bedside clock for the time – 04 13 hrs. Scrambling for his lamp that sat on his bedside desk, Isaac fumbled and swept several of his ornamental displays onto the wood-tiled floor. He hurriedly turned on his lamp and gawked with disbelief at what he had just seen.
All of his books that stacked upon his table had been removed, the only things that were left upon it were a pathetically dirty pen holder as well as a dusty calendar. He then realized that his mattress no longer donned on the bed sheet that he had slept on. What that had been a navy blue sheet dotted with yellow stars had now been changed to a pistachio green sheet with many cutesy sheep that pranced around the field as depicted.
However, his curiosity towards the scribbling had still bugged him more than the astonishing change that he had witnessed in his room. Isaac tiptoed stealthily towards his bedroom door and twisted its knob as gently as he could so as to prevent and interruption to what he was about to discover.
As he inched his way to the common toilet, of which the light had remained on to ensure that one would still be able to find one’s way to the toilet during the night, he could hear the tap running at full blast. The toilet door appeared to be ajar and hot steam had billowed out into the area around it. Isaac plucked up his courage and pushed the toilet door open.
To his surprise and utter disgust, he saw a woman sitting on the toilet bowl in her pajamas, and that she was scribbling with all her might onto a pad of writing paper with a purple Pilot™ mechanical pencil. Her hair was unkempt with eyes that were lifeless and bloodshot. Tears had ran down her now pale cheeks and dripped onto the writing pad, causing further wear and tear in the soggy script she had held in her arm. The floor was strewn with all of Isaac’s books as well as research materials. The mirror was now completely covered with condensed water vapor from the vaporized hot water that ran from the tap. Just by taking a glimpse at the mirror, Isaac noticed that there were lines of words written by a bloodied fingertip. It read: “IT’S HIM! IT’S HIM! IT’S HIM! …”
On the glass that separated the rest of the toilet from the shower cubicle, 8 numbers were written yet again, in huge font, by the same bloodied finger: “6522 9836”. Isaac was confused; he felt the heat from the steam as he stepped into the toilet to examine the mysterious writings. It was then, when he stared at the bloodied words, that he realized that he could not see his reflection in the foggy mirror that stood before him. All he could make out was his mother, who was now seated on the toilet bowl, scribbling away with a mechanical pencil that was held by the fingers that were stained with blood.
Isaac was stunned by what he had seen. He merely stood rooted to the mat in the toilet, unable to digest whatever he had just recognized. He spun around once again to stare at his physical mom who was frantically flipping through one of his research journals. Just then, something at the corner of his eye had caught his attention. The interactive clock-calendar displayed a foreign date that stated “29-10-2009”.
‘MOMMY! WAKE UP FROM THIS MADNESS! DON’T SCARE ME, WHERE’S DADDY? WHY?’
Isaac called out in vain, no one heard him, and all of a sudden, it all made perfect sense to him.
Existence
I need to recount what happened that day, on the 28th of October, 2007. I decided to stay with my mother, instead of leaving the toilet to think of what happened that night during the night study programme. I closed my eyes, hoping that it would remind me of the events that had taken place when Julian entered the toilet back then.
I was washing my hands to rid off the blood that stained my hands from that cursed lock. Julian came busting into the toilet with a rather punk-ish look. He told me he was worried and started to limp towards my direction. I showed him some concern and asked, ‘what happened to your leg? You look rather shaken…’
He stopped moving and moaned in pain, ‘you, I warned you not to remain here!’
Julian moved closer to my location; I edged backwards towards the white-tiled walls of the toilet and stuttered in reply, ‘W-What are y-you try-ying to do?’
‘I have come to claim your life for being such a smug and arrogant brat! You’ve always been the teachers’ favourite student, everyone’s been so neglected and yet, you have not shown any compassion to any of us, and now you’re asking me if I’m all right? CUT THIS HYPOCRISY OF YOURS!’
I edged further back, hoping to find something for self-defence, and I found it; it was a short wooden pole with a sharpened end in the janitor’s closet. I waved the pole at the attacker, hoping to deter his offense. At the same instance, out of sheer clumsiness, I had accidentally hit the fluorescent lamp case that was half-decapitated, as such, it came collapsing down on me and my lights went out.
***
I opened my eyes and I was back in the common toilet at home. I saw how much my mom loved me. So much that she had wanted to fulfill my lifelong dream to write about my ideals.
I saw the guilt of a classmate who made the mistake of playing a prank on me just because I’ve failed to believe his gossips about the supernatural occurrences at college.
I saw me, in peace, being pronounced brain dead for a eminent blood clot in my brain that had sealed off all of the functions of my nervous system. I had died then, but my body still lies in the cold room of the ICU, waiting to rot away.
But of course, I didn’t recognize those numbers… were they yours?
