Bima was still standing in the same spot, clutching the brown envelope. The area in front of the school was much quieter than it had been a few minutes earlier. Only a few students waiting for a ride remained, along with the occasional sound of vehicles passing on the main road. The elderly woman who had handed him the envelope had already returned to her car.
“Wait!”
Bima ran a few steps.
The woman turned around.
“Who gave me this letter?”
The woman did not answer right away. She only looked at Bima with an unreadable expression.
“You’ll find out after you read it.”
“But who?”
“His name shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you.”
Bima grew even more confused.
The woman opened the car door.
“Don’t spend too long looking for answers in the past, Bima. Sometimes the answer comes when we’ve stopped looking for it.”
Before Bima could ask anything else, the car pulled away from the school grounds.
Bima looked down at the envelope in his hand again.
The writing on the back still left his mind in turmoil.
He recognized it.
He recognized it very well.
It belonged to Arga.
Back then, Arga always wrote his name in large letters at the top of his notebooks. The G he drew had a distinctive shape because it always slanted to the right. Even when he wrote quickly, the shape of his letters was still easy to recognize.
Bima put the envelope in his bag.
He decided to read it at home.
All the way home, he couldn’t calm his thoughts. He walked along a narrow street lined with food vendors. The smell of freshly fried snacks drifted from one of the food stalls. Usually, Bima would stop to buy stuffed fried tofu or vegetable fritters, but this time he wasn’t interested at all.
When he arrived home, his mother was preparing dinner in the kitchen.
“Why are you home so late?” she asked.
“I had to take care of something.”
“A school matter?”
“Yeah.”
His mother studied his face for a moment.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“If something’s bothering you, tell me.”
Bima nodded.
“Yeah, Mom.”
He went straight to his room.
After closing the door, Bima set his bag on the table. His hand immediately reached for the envelope.
He sat on the edge of the bed.
For several seconds, he only stared at it.
“What do you really want, Ga?”
Bima carefully opened the top of the envelope.
Inside were several sheets of paper and an old photograph.
Bima took the photograph first.
His chest felt heavy.
In the photograph, two boys stood beneath a mango tree, grinning widely. One of them was Bima. The boy standing beside him was, of course, Arga.
The photograph had been taken that same afternoon, when they made their promise.
Bima turned the photograph over.
There was a date written on the back.
The date left Bima speechless.
He still remembered that day.
The last day before everything changed.
Bima then picked up the first sheet of paper.
Arga’s handwriting filled the page.
“Bim, if you’re reading this letter, it means someone managed to find you.”
Bima stopped reading.
His hand trembled slightly.
He continued.
“I don’t know when you’ll receive this letter. Maybe you’re still angry. Maybe you’ve already forgotten me. Or maybe you’ve started a new life and don’t want to remember everything that happened.”
Bima rubbed his face.
“If you really have forgotten me, I won’t blame you.”
Bima lowered his head.
He wanted to stop reading, but curiosity drove him onward.
“I just want you to know one thing. I never forgot our promise.”
Bima held his breath.
“I used to think we’d stay together until we grew up. I thought we’d keep seeing each other every day, joking around like we used to, and telling each other everything. But life didn’t turn out the way we imagined.”
Tears began to well in Bima’s eyes.
He quickly wiped them away.
“If you’re wondering why I left without explaining anything, I had my reasons. But I can’t write all of them in this letter.”
Bima furrowed his brow.
“Meet someone named Mr. Surya.”
Bima read the sentence twice.
“He knows everything.”
Bima stopped reading at once.
“Mr. Surya?”
He tried to remember the name.
Not a single memory came to him.
Bima continued reading.
“Find him at the first place we ever met. You must still remember where it is.”
The sheet ended with one sentence.
“And Bim, if you still remember our promise, don’t come alone.”
Bima fell silent.
He looked at the next sheet.
That page was blank.
There wasn’t a single word on it.
Bima turned it over.
Still blank.
He picked up the photograph and studied it again.
The first place they had met.
Bima finally remembered.
A small field near the city park.
Back then, Bima and Arga had met because Bima was looking for a ball that had rolled into some bushes. Arga found it first. They had even argued because each of them claimed it belonged to him.
Bima smiled as he remembered.
“Stubborn as ever.”
He set the photograph on the table.
Then his eyes returned to the letter.
Something didn’t make sense.
If Arga really wanted Bima to find Mr. Surya, why hadn’t he explained who the man was?
And why wasn’t Bima allowed to come alone?
Suddenly, there was a knock at the door.
“Bim?”
His mother’s voice.
“Yeah, Mom?”
“Come eat.”
“In a minute.”
“You’ve been in your room this whole time.”
Bima looked at the clock.
He hadn’t realized nearly an hour had passed.
“Yeah, Mom. Just a little longer.”
His mother’s footsteps faded away.
Bima looked at the letter again.
He took out his phone and searched online for Mr. Surya’s name. Several results appeared, but none of them seemed connected to Arga.
Bima then opened his contacts.
He saw Dika’s name.
His finger nearly pressed the call button, but he changed his mind.
Dika would definitely ask too many questions.
In the end, Bima decided to contact Rani.
His message was brief.
Ran, do you know someone named Mr. Surya?
Less than a minute later, a reply appeared.
Which Mr. Surya?
Bima typed again.
I don’t know. Just Mr. Surya.
The next reply came a few moments later.
Why?
Bima stared at the screen.
He didn’t know where to begin explaining.
I’ll tell you tomorrow.
Rani replied with a confused emoji.
Okay, but don’t leave me hanging.
Bima set his phone down.
The night grew later.
After eating, he returned to his room and put the letter in his desk drawer. He placed Arga’s photograph on the desk so he could find it easily.
Bima tried to sleep.
But his eyes remained open.
His mind was filled with questions.
Why had Arga written that letter?
Was Arga still in the same city?
Why had he never contacted Bima directly?
And who exactly was Mr. Surya?
Around eleven that night, Bima’s phone vibrated.
A message came in from an unknown number.
If you’ve received that letter, don’t believe everything written in it.
Bima sat up immediately.
He read the message again.
Then a second message arrived.
Arga never sent that letter.
The back of Bima’s neck prickled.
His fingers moved quickly as he typed a reply.
Who are you?
There was no answer.
Bima waited.
Five minutes passed.
Ten minutes.
Still no reply.
He tried calling the number.
The number was no longer in service.
Bima stood and paced around the room.
“What is this supposed to be?”
He opened the drawer and took out the letter.
Bima examined each item one by one.
The envelope.
The photograph.
The paper.
Nothing looked suspicious.
He examined the writing on the back of the envelope.
Arga’s handwriting.
Or at least, it looked like Arga’s handwriting.
Suddenly, Bima remembered something.
Back then, Arga had once said he never liked using white paper because it was easy to lose. He always used lightly lined paper with a yellowish tint.
Bima looked at the letter.
The paper used really was yellowish.
His heart began to pound harder.
If the letter wasn’t from Arga, who knew about that little habit?
Bima sat down again.
He tried to think calmly.
Maybe someone who knew Arga.
Maybe that person wanted to help him.
Or maybe someone was deliberately playing with him.
The next morning, Bima arrived at school looking sleep-deprived.
Dika noticed immediately.
“Bim, were you up all night?”
“A little.”
“Playing games?”
“No.”
“Watching a movie?”
“No.”
“Texting someone?”
Bima looked at him.
“Why do you always think that?”
Dika chuckled.
“Because you look like someone who just got himself into trouble.”
Rani, who was arranging her books, turned toward them.
“Are you ready to tell us about Mr. Surya?”
Bima immediately fell silent.
Dika raised an eyebrow.
“Who’s Mr. Surya?”
Rani looked at Bima.
“Wait, you haven’t told Dika?”
“Not yet.”
“Tell us now,” Dika said.
Bima pulled out a chair.
“Let’s talk behind the classroom.”
The three of them moved to a quieter corner of the hallway.
Bima took the letter out of his bag.
Dika read it with a serious expression.
“Whose handwriting is this?”
“Arga’s.”
“The Arga you told us about yesterday?”
Bima nodded.
Rani read the end of the letter.
“He told you to find Mr. Surya?”
“Yeah.”
Dika handed the letter back.
“Then why do you look like you’re about to see a ghost?”
Bima showed him the messages from the unknown number.
Dika read them slowly.
When he finished, his expression changed.
“This isn’t funny.”
“I know.”
Rani took Bima’s phone.
“The number’s no longer in service?”
“Yeah.”
Dika leaned against the wall.
“Then don’t go alone.”
Bima looked at him.
“I wasn’t planning to go alone.”
Dika nodded.
“Good. I’m coming with you.”
Rani immediately spoke up.
“Me too.”
Bima looked at both of them.
“You’re serious?”
Dika smiled.
“If this has something to do with the old friend you’ve been telling us about, I’m not going to let you face it all by yourself.”
Rani nodded.
“We’ll figure it out together.”
Bima fell silent.
It had been a long time since he’d felt like he had people who truly wanted to stand by his side.
He gave a small smile.
“Thank you.”
Dika patted him on the shoulder.
“Don’t get emotional yet. We don’t even know who Mr. Surya is.”
Rani laughed.
Bima smiled along with her.
But the smile lasted only a moment.
At the end of the hallway, a man stood watching them.
Bima didn’t recognize him.
When their eyes met, the man immediately turned and walked away.
“Who is he?” Rani asked.
Bima shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Dika looked in the man’s direction.
“He looked like he was watching us.”
Bima put the letter in his bag.
“If he’s really connected to all this, sooner or later we’ll find out.”
He had yet to realize that the stranger was holding the exact same old photograph he had just received.
There was different writing on the back of that photograph.
Bima must not find Mr. Surya.
And for the first time in years, an old promise had begun to unlock a secret far greater than anything Bima had ever imagined.