A Spine-Chilling Dawn

NARRATIVE ESSAY

          Life can be like a paradox sometimes because we humans are bound to experience a strange mixture of joys and sorrows. There are times when you feel happy and wish it will last forever, there are also some moments that upset you and suck all joy and peace out of you. But what most people tend to overlook is the experience of having a bad day in their lifetime. Everyone has bad days. The ones that make you want to curl up in a tiny ball and cry about nothing and absolutely everything until you fall asleep on a pile of blankets in the corner of a pitch-black room. The worst part of those days is that you can’t do that. All you can do is keep your head up and try your best to get through the rest of the day with a smile. Also, it is unequivocally that everyone has experienced a mystery or been a somewhat strange day at a certain point in their days. Some may say they have felt the presence of someone in their room, watching them sleeping or probably someone who is standing behind them many times. These scenarios might sound odd and ridiculous to you, and even to me as well honestly. This kind of thinking can stem from the wild imagination that we have created in our head, then project them to make it feel real. Nevertheless, I’m also one of those people who have been through something thrills that can almost cause me a heart attack and that moment was an experience that I cannot completely disregard. 

          It was 5 o’clock in the morning. With a dropped jaw, buggy eyes, and sweaty palms, my salty head abruptly popped up from my warm pillow. I found myself panting on my bed, my body could not stop trembling, and my heart was thumping hard at my chest. I could feel my adrenaline was gushing overdrive in my blood. After a second of massively intense panic, it suddenly just dawned on me that I was jolted awake from a bizarre dream. I was not acutely aware of what happened in the dream, but when I tried collecting myself, this one peculiar fragment of the dream began to flow freely in my head. It was so jarring as if I had seen that facial expression somewhere, or rather, someone. Then, I took a deep breath and let the thought loose. I got out of my bed, removed the mattress and pillow covers that were soaked in sweat, and put them in a laundry basket. As I opened the door, it was dark outside as all the lights were off. All I could see was the hallway to the kitchen with the moonlight that streamed into a room through the glass window. With a basket in my hand, I slowly headed to the kitchen where the laundry machine was. As I was approaching the kitchen, my feet felt wet as if there was water on the floor. I glanced up to the ceiling, but there were no water leaks. Suddenly, I heard something falling in the kitchen, like the sound of a glass shattering. I rushed there almost like a flashlight and immediately switched on the lights only to find my cat was on the counter. I looked at him with my forehead furrowed. I shut my eyes and sighed heavily because now I had to do two jobs. 

          After I sorted out the laundry, I took out a broom and a dustpan from the utility storage cabinet, and a pair of gloves from the drawer near the sink to clean up the mess. I carefully picked up the biggest pieces, placed them in several sheets of newspaper, wrapped them, and stored them in a double-layered plastic bag. While I was vacuuming underneath the counter, my eyes caught on the muddy footprints on the tiled floor, and they seemed to be heading from the kitchen’s door to the toilet. I turned off the vacuum and looked thoroughly into those dirty footprints. Hundreds of wild and peculiar thoughts leaped into my mind. The more I squinted my eyes, the more I felt paralyzed with fear. Out of nowhere, the sound from the flickering lights broke the silence, and I shivered feverishly from the subtle chill of the wind that brushed over my heated skin. Nervously, I lifted my head to gaze in that one particular direction. From outside I could see the toilet’s lights were on, but I didn’t hear any sounds from it. Then I grabbed a hard metal stick vacuum and silently began tiptoeing towards the wooden door. As I stood only a few feet away from the doorknob, I slowly laid my quivering fingers on it and twisted it. The door glided open with a creak, and I was indubitably ready to swing this metal stick to whatever I might run into. Unfortunately,  all I saw was nothing, but a pair of dirty leather boots sitting inside the sink. I felt relieved and overwhelmed, at the same time having shortness of breath from prior anxiety. My cat came closer to me and rubbed his head against my legs to offer a comfy consolation in which I desperately needed. I could not imagine what I would encounter if there was really something or somebody here. Only God knew what I felt inside. Holding my chest, I took a deep breath and approached the toilet sink to check whose leather boots they were. Judging from the pattern and design of the boots, they didn’t look like my father’s or even my mom’s; hence, I just let them be. My hunch said dad might have set his eyes on something new. Then I inferred that those footprints on the kitchen floor were my dad’s, as he came home late from work. 

          As everything had tidied up and was back to normal, I switched on my phone to check the time; "The sunrise would set within an hour," I said to myself. So I thought it’d be good if I took some rest after this somewhat horrendous cleaning work. Maybe having a tiramisu cake with a hot cappuccino was a great idea to revitalize my calm heart that almost stopped beating twice. I took out a small red box from the fridge with a piece of paper saying “don’t eat - Haikal” on it. Ironically, when I opened the box one of the cakes was already gone. No words could utter from my mouth. My fists started to clench into tight balls, both my eyes shut tightly, and I grimly pursed my lips. Even the small voices inside of my head did not even help me to regain myself. I slowly breathe to control my composure and let the steam out of my ear. Dejectedly, I put it back inside the fridge as I no longer felt like eating the cake. Knowing someone had eaten my cake without telling me could ruin my mood. I whispered to myself, “what worse than having a missing cake could happen to me.” While I was waiting for my cappuccino to finish brewing, I pulled my right hand through my hair and lost in my thoughts for a moment. The beeping sound from the coffee machine awoke me. I brought my coffee to the living room and dumped myself into the egg chair with my legs propped on a footstool—imagining myself was in a therapeutic space with a psychologist next to me. I knew the real psychologist at the time was the hot cup of cappuccino in my hand. I took a sip from it, and I let a smile settle on my lips. A few moments later, my eyes opened and squinted, stemmed from the floor lights. I could feel the drowsiness embrace my whole thin body, and I felt drugged. I didn’t know what happened, but it seemed like I had fallen asleep. Again, I heard an unusual sound from the kitchen, but it came with a delicious smell this time. Egg drop soup. That's what I smelled. I hastily headed to where the smells came from and found my mom busily preparing breakfast.  

         She stared at me with a smile and asked, “What has happened to you, honey?” I giggled and replied, “It was a wild long night, mom” Then I stretched my hands out and hugged her tightly, expressing my weariness. She patted my head and told me to go upstairs to complete my obligation. I lazily looked at her and gave my pouted facial expression, but nobody could win whenever she raised her eyebrows. I groggily dragged myself upstairs until I heard another sound—like something rustling through stuff, nevertheless, I disregarded checking it out. With the incident that happened in the toilet, and my missing cake this early morning, I thought I had had enough. Probably there were some rodents from the attic, gnawing the lower part of the cabinet. After all, that room had been vacant for almost half a year now. Without having much thought, I hurried to my room and performed my Subuh prayer. Afterwards, I had an early morning shower since I planned to complete a science project with my school friends today. When everything was completed, I grabbed my bag ready to go downstairs. Upon approaching the staircase, I saw my dad look refreshingly in a white linen shirt with nude pants while climbing down the stairs. It was so unexpected to see him get dressed this early, especially on the weekends. After I dropped my things, I went to the kitchen helping my mom to serve meals. The portions that were prepared were bigger than what we all three normally had. Also, I noticed there was an extra plate on the table next to my seat. I guessed we would have a special guest coming this morning. While my mom was still at the back, I had a small conversation with my dad and praised how beautiful his new leather boots were. Then he gazed at me and sought an explanation, “What do you mean new boots? I haven’t purchased any yet” His question left me with confusion. If they weren’t his, then whose? Mom? Obviously not hers as the design was for man. I regained my consciousness when mom served the egg drop soup in the middle of the table.

          Mom would always make this significant food when all the family members are gathered. Perhaps, because we had a guest today, that may be the ground for making this special soup. After a few moments of contemplating on it, I remembered about my missing cake. I still had not figured out how exactly it could be gone and who ate it. In order to rest this case as soon as possible, I feel the urge to ask my mom if she knew about the cake. “Your tiramisu cakes? I don’t even know you have bought them”. Then we both turned our heads to the boss of this house, giving a disapproving expression. “Why? What’s with that look? Come on, out of anyone, you both know I dislike cake”. I sighed. Sadly to be true, my parents would never lie to me. Conversely, I still couldn’t wrap my head around and find any leads to unveil this mystery. I zoned out for a moment, struggling to connect the dots about the owner of the leather boots and the missing cake in my head, then suddenly mom poked me with her finger. I lifted my head and she asked me, “Have you asked your…” just before she could finish her sentence, another voice of someone from the back of my ear had interrupted our conversation. It was not foreign to my ear, yet had just not been heard in a long time as far as I could remember. My ears could not lie to me; in fact, I didn’t even need to double-confirm the owner of that husky voice. My eyes caught the movement of the silhouette. I was instantly confident with it. “Hello, brother,” he uttered. Just at once, I already knew it was my big brother. I rose from my seat and looked deeply into his eyes, and said “So you’re those rodents”, I giggled. I could see his face went empty-blank; so I pulled him in my embrace and whispered, “It’s good to see you, brother”. Taking his seat next to me, all of us were saturated in pure happiness, just until he brought up his dirty leather boots in the toilet. I paused myself and furrowed my forehead into a contemplative frown as I was about to take my first bite. Turning my face to him with an angry stare. I instantly snatched his clean spoon, then hit it to his right fingers. That was a reward for making me voluntarily clean up his mess. I somehow couldn’t resist a touch of schadenfreude when he was in pain as he absolutely deserved it. Another hit landed on his left fingers for stealing my cake; even without any confession, I already knew who the real culprit was.