Since, A Novel

iii. THE SISTERS

iii.
THE SISTERS

              October 2023—the present. How could people be forced to contend with such consuming emotions—all impassioned, almost inhumane—that cause something in them to twist: their words misconstruing, their faces derforming, and eventually, their souls unmaking slowly but surely straight to utter namelessness and nullity that cannot help but pull back and damage the victim, all because of just purely fictional things and beings? What power is it that the mind possesses whenever it feeds and spits out every kind of lore—people, thoughts, experiences, motives, taste, appetite, hate, adoration—that instead of beholding these, the mind couldn't help but project their semblances: a trap, which would soon drive anyone (or everyone, possibly) to an uncomfortable episode. Regression. Relapse. All those serious things nobody has ever been ready enough, not open enough to talk about. Then, there is devastation to it, from the origins of these emotions. People: consume or be consumed. It is them and the things they do that lead to eventual death.

But it would look and sound unfairly easy if the mind didn't do what it does. If death had eyes it would be like their mother's. But living that way, carrying around the 'if' everywhere, the older sister's had always known of death as being the second to something more vile which she couldn't put her finger to. All that wanting to name death for so long that she had forgotten what their mother had sounded—but she had watched her back as it turned without the face ever looking back, which had cut the might of both her eyes and mind to remember what the woman had looked like. She had believed that the woman's presence wasn't of this world but of somewhere else more rightful, more macabre. There was nothing in the older sister's world that could convince her that the woman was less than fiction. If time could hear everything it would tell everyone everything, it would give a sign, it would give anything, but so far it has been quiet. A bit odd, because the paradox of fiction is never quiet.

Which is fair. Because the older sister didn't have to know the woman had gone there—a fictional place—or maybe she had truly gone home, which is nowhere near them. The older sister has learned so much from herself; she had thought that death is something final, but it was wrong; it was the quiet.

"Sir, have you ever wondered what worms think of us?" A kid aged between six or eight asks, looking down on the nineteen-year-old Yūn Mago now on the knees, treating the wound on the boy's right knee.

Leaves were falling, dried and green, as the wind made sounds and the sunlight was blocked by a mass of gray cloud, casting a shadow on half of the playground. With earphones in her ears all afternoon, Yūn sat on one of the benches, a notepad and pen in her hands, killing the whiles trying to think of something to write. Her sight on the trees; they all looked imperfect and old, having stood strong, having danced, and she'd known, those 'trees are probably the ribs of someone's childhood'. She'd looked at the playground, its sand, and she'd thought it must've been someone's psyche crushed into smithereens—the sand had belonged only on the playground to exist as salvation. They were still. The page was white, still blank, she had been there for a while. Someone's waiting for her back home, probably. She was about to leave when she saw one of the kids stumble and fell on the sand over a lump of rock. Was he okay? The boy only sobbed, nearly cried, but didn't. And then she's been asked by all sorts of strange questions by the kid before her.

          "No. It never crossed my mind." was her reply to the kid. "And I'm not a sir."
          "Not a sir? But you look like a boy, Sir."
Only a muscle twitched in Yūn's jaw, getting amused.
          "But what if the planets were really just the siblings of Jesus and all of them became like that, or like, got trapped inside 'cause they were bad? Or did bad things? Like smoking and drinking?"
          "I. . . " Yūn stops for a second. What if? Then laughs. "I'm not too sure, kid. Could be. But nope," she says as she continues treating the wound, now putting alcohol.
          "Ah!" the kid hisses. "But you sound like a boy, Sir, like a beast,"
She laughs, briefly looking up at the kid.
          "A beast, huh,"
          "Yeah. Do you know Raizo? From Ninja Assassin? He's so cool. He killed the bad guys in the dark—didn't even see him going here, then here, you know?" the boy goes on, with his aggressive hand movements, the sand from his hands almost blinding Yūn. She shrugs, but that was one of her favorite movies. "No? But you kinda sound like him, but a girl."
"You could handle gore scenes, kid?"
"Gore scenes?"
"Bloody scenes, brutal scenes,"
"Psh! I can watch those. They're not real, anyways. Dad told me they used jelly blood for it and it's edible." the kid says, proudly.
"You must be stronger than me, then." she says.
A while after.
          "Is it done, Sir?"
          "Done. Be careful now. Wash it, even if it stings. Unless you want a beast smell your blood and eat—"
          "No! Beasts are monsters and monsters aren't real!" the kid exclaims, quickly striding off.