My relatives are watching me compete among the players in the Bean's Can's Spelling Bee on Roblox at its Extreme level. Random technical—and mostly scientific—words are being thrown for us to "spell" via typing the word in the provided rectangular box located at the bottom-middle of the screen.
"Pneumo... ence... phalo... graphy..." I muttered while typing the pronounced word on my keyboard with my eyes glued on the specific part of the screen, watching the font size go slightly smaller to fit inside the rectangular box. When my mind instantly detected no typographic error on my spelled word, I immediately hit the Enter key using my right pinky finger, hearing a positive ting! sound, earning eight stars for spelling it right.
My laptop is experiencing bad latency towards the server via our home Wi-Fi because it's yet to be connected via Ethernet cable, but that doesn't stop me from getting all of the given words right. I persisted until I won the match, putting an end to a 23-streak game between me and a random player that is as good as me. Heck, he actually might be better than me. It's just the shortened time that got him eliminated, because as the streak go on, the time becomes shorter and shorter.
I may be a slow typist in this difficulty, but the fact alone that I learned most of these words in the span of just 2 days is already an achievement for me. The typing speed is the natural next step to excel in this game. As of now, I can pull off a a hundred and twenty words per minute in basic Extreme words like "prognostication" and "pulchritudinous."
However, despite all of this, some players I met along the way are impressed to my skills. Maybe them being suspicious of my capabilities—that is, having a suspicion that I am logged into my alternative account or that I am using a script, in which I highly prohibit myself from doing so—is the best compliment I could receive yet.
Despite all of this, I continue thinking about something. Specifically, what will happen in this upcoming academic year...
"Oh shoot. It's already one-thirty six." I bid farewell to the chat, in which the players there returned it well, quit Roblox, shut my gaming laptop down, and went inside the air-conditioned bedroom carefully so my mom wouldn't wake up of my entry. The bedroom is your typical Asian one and nothing fancy—bed on the floor. I checked on my phone for a while before drifting myself to sleep...
Then, everything is pitch black for a good while...
...
My eyes slowly open. When I adjusted my vision, everything seems to be grainy and lacking of light. Then, when my vision is... I mimick my two fingers on both hands with the gesture of a quotation sign... clear, I realized the position I am at: sitting on the floor with my knees in front of me and my arms wrapping my legs with my slouched back almost touching the wall behind me.
I secretly looked around and noticed that I'm in a classroom. A classroom entirely new to me. Fresh white paint on the walls, neatly arranged seats with their chairs properly and almost perfectly laid upside down to the table, books complete and are clean to look at, everything is so clean... so good to be true.
But then, a surge of feeling suddenly came right through me from the ground up, making my body and spine shiver from head to toe. I'm worrying about something, making my eyes portray of sorrow as they slowly avert down and look on the floor, but it was cut short by someone walking towards and sits in front of me.
It was a shadow of a woman. She starts to speak to me, but all I can hear is gibberish. I can only hear a hum of a centralized air-conditioning unit on my far right corner. But suddenly...
"I don't know..." I suddenly spoke, as if I understood her, while slightly shaking my head in an evidently worrying manner. What's going on? Why did I suddenly respond? is what my thought came rushing in my mind.
Then, she put her soft, delicate hand on my chin and lifts my head to face her. It's a woman having such right figure, of medium complexion, wearing a school uniform, her face blurred for some reason... except for her lips, which is the sharpest and clearest to see.
I tried to recognize her blurred face just by the evident details available by squinting my eyes and trying to get my eyes focused, but I couldn't. Who is this? I thought.
She says something to me. Again, still gibberish. But when I try to read her mouth, something clicks. It's as if I understood it and, at the same time, can't decipher it for now. I don't get it. In such situations like this, I can translate it in no time, but at this moment, I just simply can't comprehend it, as if I am in an auto-pilot mode.
When I felt that my mouth is about to open, my breath ready, my vocals on cue, about to answer... when she pulled me all of a sudden and... kissed me. My eyes are shocked for a second... but I slowly fell in on her kiss.
This kiss... it felt so real. I can feel her lips touching mine. It's a kiss so genuine that I am enjoying this. When we pulled out, one statement became suddenly clear to me...
"I'm waiting."
"Reign... gumising ka na riyan." I slowly opened my eyes after I hear my mother's soft voice from outside the bedroom. I checked the time on my phone and I realized that I have overslept. "Shit," I whispered to myself before getting up on my bed.
As I gather our sleeping materials back into their place, I continue to think about what she said...
What do you mean by that?
