“Miss? Miss, are you awake?”
Ria gasped when she saw several people gathered around her. She sat up from her position on the floor. Someone handed her a glass of water, which she drained in one go.
Her eyes scanned the room. She was in some kind of room, though she had no idea whose it was.
“Thank goodness you're awake. We found you passed out on the stairs,” said a middle-aged woman in the crowd. “Miss, had you not eaten yet? How did you end up fainting?”
Ria shook her head and rubbed her throbbing temples. She remembered what she had just experienced. Had Alia deliberately shown her the process of her death?
But why?
“Don't question her yet. Let her rest,” said a security guard whose hair was already partly gray. The old man had been the first to find Ria unconscious beneath the stairs.
“I'm fine now. I was just dizzy,” Ria finally said, making the people gathered around her look relieved.
“Which floor do you live on?”
“Four, ma'am.”
“Do you want us to walk you there?”
“No, ma'am. I can go by myself.”
“Oh, don't! You'd better let us take you,” another woman chimed in.
“Yeah, you might suddenly pass out again like you did just now,” someone else added.
Ria could only smile. The women and other residents of the apartment complex escorted her all the way to her door. She thanked those kind people repeatedly for putting them to so much trouble.
Whenever she thought about how she had fainted, Ria still couldn't make sense of it. How had that even been possible?
Especially after seeing Alia's memories. Did this mean that spirit was asking for her help?
Ria shook her head, then headed into her room. She tossed her bag aside and collapsed onto the bed.
She pulled her phone from her shirt pocket and started scrolling through social media to take her mind off what had happened. Her dizziness had eased somewhat.
As she scrolled through the blue-logoed social media site's home feed, she found a post that made her furrow her brow in confusion.
She had joined several writing groups to read some of her favorite stories, and she often bought their novels.
She had always loved reading and frequently collected novels, especially romance stories. She liked those kinds of stories best and stayed far away from horror.
Whenever she read horror stories, the spirits who realized they had been mentioned or appeared in the story would feel summoned and come to her room. It often left her terrified and made her stop reading stories in that genre.
But this one…
Ria truly couldn't pass it up. With all her heart, she clicked on the story and opened the full post to read it from beginning to end.
Slowly, she began to feel as though something was moving across the ceiling of her room. For a split second, she saw the terrifying figure that had revealed itself before she fainted earlier—the figure that had shown her the story of its death.
The spirit had come because it felt summoned by the story Ria was reading. The story she was reading now was very similar to Alia's. It described how the figure looked and revealed itself, as well as how the story of its death had been fabricated.
Ria tapped the profile of the writer, whose name was Randy P. His face and the university he attended were displayed on the profile.
There was no mistaking it. That was… Randy. The college student with the terrifying figure on his back—the one that was now following him.
After class, Randy didn't want to go back to his boarding house. Who knew? His courage, which was barely the size of a mustard seed, wasn't enough to overcome his own fear.
So as soon as class ended, he went straight to Ilyas. The accounting student had classes right next door to his. Ilyas's boarding house was also near his own, and Randy often spent the night there.
“Yas,” Randy called, making the man in the checkered shirt who had just left class turn around.
“Oh, it's you, Ran. What's up?”
Randy beamed. He put an arm around Ilyas's shoulders, and they started walking together.
“There's something I want to ask you.”
“Huh? What is it?”
“I want to crash at your place tonight. Is that okay?”
Ilyas stopped walking. The student from Medan looked at Randy apologetically.
“Sorry, it's not that I don't want to let you stay. But my mom's coming today, so she'll be staying at my place.”
“Oh. All right, then,” Randy said dejectedly, taking his arm off Ilyas's shoulders.
“Sorry, I can't help you. Besides, why do you want to stay at my place? Is your Wi-Fi acting up again?”
“No,” Randy answered quickly.
“Then what is it?”
Randy scratched his head even though it wasn't itchy. “How do I put this? It's hard to explain.”
“Man, you…”
Randy gave him a childish pout. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Putra passing by at the end of the corridor. Putra was a junior he was fairly close to.
“Never mind, Yas. I'm heading out first, then.”
“Okay, take care!”
Randy nodded and waved. Then he hurried toward Putra and put an arm around the bespectacled young man's shoulders.
“Put,” he called.
“Hey, Kak Randy. What's up?”
“Is your boarding house empty tonight? Let me stay over.”
“Ah, I'm going back home, Kak. My dad was suddenly hospitalized. But if you still want to stay over, I can give you the key.”
“Don't!” Randy stopped him quickly. He wanted to stay at someone else's place so he wouldn't be alone. If the owner wasn't there, it defeated the whole purpose.
“Huh? Why not? Is your boarding house being repaired? You can stay at my place, no problem.”
“No, it's not that, Put.”
“Then what?”
“Ah, forget it. Never mind. Thanks anyway!”
“Sure, no problem.”
Putra watched Randy walk away, shaking his head. Then he put the key back in his pants pocket.
Randy left campus looking completely lost. He scratched his head and stood there in a daze several times, remaining in the parking lot for quite a while.
“Hey, bro! If you're leaving, then leave! I can't get my motorcycle out!”
Randy jolted. “Oh, right. Sorry,” he said as he moved his motorcycle forward, allowing the person who had called out to him to leave the parking lot.
After giving it a lot of thought, he finally decided to go back to his boarding house. Who knew what would happen later? Maybe he would think about staying somewhere else after that.
Adi still hadn't come home. His room remained empty, dark, and locked. Randy steadied his pounding heart as he passed his friend's room.
He turned the key and entered his own room. Before heading home, he had decided to buy a lightbulb so his bathroom would be brightly lit, thinking that might lessen his fear.
But his nerve didn't stretch that far. After taking only five steps inside, he turned around and left his room. Even though he couldn't see anything, the memory of the terrifying events that morning and the night before scared him half to death.
Randy looked around the boarding house. Mas Eko, a man who worked at a private bank, was walking up the stairs and about to enter his room.
An idea occurred to Randy. He didn't care that he wasn't particularly close to the resident who had only moved in two days ago. He hurried over to Eko before the man could actually enter his room.
“Mas Eko,” he called with a sheepish grin.