Mirage (ON HOLD for revision)

Chapter 11: Mari

“Hey! The professor was calling you back, you know?" Cedric said as he caught up with Matt, feigning innocence and pretending he didn't say the last words he did to the professor. "What was that about?” 

“Don’t you have classes to attend?” Matt replied, not even bothering to hide that he was deliberately changing the topic. He buried his hands deep in his pockets and tried to keep his breathing steady and even.

Cedric was silent for a moment and Matt almost thought Cedric was finally going to listen to him for once. But Cedric only grabbed his shoulder and stopped him midstep.

“What’s going on?” Cedric asked seriously, staring at Matt’s eyes as if they would answer in his stead.

The fingers that dug in Matt's skin were too real, and it was the first time Cedric pressed him so determinedly to speak. Had he known how terrible it makes a person feel to be questioned so persistently, he never would have done it.

What’s wrong, Mari?

“Just shut up!” Matt blurted out, more to the voices in his head, but also at Cedric. “Just leave me alone, ok?”

“I can’t do that,” Cedric replied forlornly.

“Why, for chrissake?! All you have to do stay put while I walk away! How difficult is that?”

“You don’t understand, Matt.”

You don’t understand, Matt.

“Just fuck off for now, ok?” Matt begged and shoved Cedric out of the way.

“Sorry, Matt,” Cedric apologized as he put an arm around Matt’s shoulder, strong enough to prevent Matt from breaking away, “but I never really did listen to what you say, you know?”

Why won’t you leave me alone, Matt?

I’m sorry Mari, I’m just not capable of listening to what other people say, not even you.

 ----

Seven Years Ago

Mari has been staying in the hospital for exactly thirteen days now, Matt thought as he stood outside the hospital looking up at all seven floors, looking like he was challenging it to those who see. He walked in, said hello to the guard (one of five in a rotating group, all of whom already recognize him), and proceeded to the third floor, south wing, or to be exact, at the back

“Visiting again, Matt?” the nurse on duty asked, she looked up for a second distractedly looking at a wall clock hanging on one concrete support beam causing her hand to shift a little and smear nail polish over the tip of her index finger. The smell was out of place in the hospital. “Ah, shit—Right, go on in, she’s awake.”

The room reeks of disinfectant so strongly that even though he was still outside the door, Matt could already catch a faint trace of it. It bothered him to the point of wearing a face mask, but after coming every day for the past nine days, Matt already got used to it. The past nine days instead of thirteen because during that time, he was lying on the bed next to Mari.

He opened the door hesitantly. There was a new patient on the bed right next to the door. She was old, very old, Matt amended, with hair turned silver from traces of hair dye. She stared off into space, unmindful of the cast on her leg. She was alone. Matt gingerly walked past.

Aside from the new patient, there were two other people in the room. The first is a mother who held her month-old baby in her arms as the latter hungrily suckled on her left nipple. The mother was humming a song Matt found unfamiliar, in fact, it sounded nothing like any of the songs Matt heard before. It was a mother’s song, specifically composed for its child. They’ve been staying in the hospital for one month and one week all by themselves, unable to leave because they still haven’t paid the bills. The husband, Matt learned after hours of sitting by Mari’s bed, works day in and out to get enough money somehow. But being stuck in the hospital also means the charges keep piling up. It was ridiculous. But Matt hadn’t realized that yet.

The second patient is a young lady. Of all the people in the room, to Matt’s eyes, she seemed the most normal. She just sat on her bed talking animatedly with whomever of three people Matt has seen so far comes to visit. She didn’t appear to have any injuries, at least not on the outside. Sometimes, Matt would catch a phrase or two in their conversation. Apparently, she’s going through withdrawal. Matt couldn’t figure out specifically what it means.

That moment, the room was quiet save for the humming since patient number two was alone today, too. Mari, on the other hand, lied on the bed, looking out the window spanning the length of the room, minus half a meter on both ends. Matt walked up to her bed and sat on a stool which almost touched the window. None of the beds touched the walls.

“Hello, Mari,” Matt said, touching Mari’s hand, or her fingers to be more exact, so lightly that he himself even wonders if Mari could feel it at all.

Matt already knew Mari wouldn’t respond. After they were admitted to the hospital, save for the first couple of minutes when she first woke up, Mari hasn’t spoken a word to anyone. When she first woke up there was no one in the room save for the mother and her then two-week-old child. She looked around slowly, and then more frantically as she searched perhaps for a familiar face. She woke up two days after they were both admitted while Matt woke up on the first. Coincidentally, Matt was awake at that time. Mari saw him and sat up abruptly, almost falling off the bed as she grabbed Matt’s hand.

“Why?! Why are we still alive?!”