Harold was frozen. He felt frozen. It was so cold as if the icy wind found itself under his skin. Too shocked to budge or move his lips, he looked at Ru who was dusting off her blouse.

She had an angelic face but she wore a devil's smile. "Hihi. Can you imagine the things I can do to you? You frozen like that, you can't even mutter a sound, let alone scream for help." She chuckled.

Harold realized he wasn't scared. Not anymore, not after how the day made him tired, inside and out. Still, he could not rebut her so she went on babbling.

"Here are the rules, Harold, listen well."

*********

"Tiriring! Tiriring!"

"Oh shut up!" Harold shifted in his bed and covered both of his ears.

"Tiriring! Tiriring! I'm not stopping until you get that butt off the bed and start preparing for school."

Ru jarred him with her foot.

"Fuck off. I'm not going anywhere."

Then she did her thing again.

He peered through drowsy eyes. And what he saw were pebbles. And a railway that crawled on the ground where he also was lying. A railway in the middle of nowhere!

No more warm comfy bed. All he felt under him were rocks and sand. No more quiet. The ground started to tremble. The beginning of a train's honking loomed from afar.

A train. Shit!

He rolled over and prepped himself up on two arms. There it was. A slithering machine. It was coming for him. And it was not planning on stopping.

Shit! Shit! Shit! He hurriedly got up and began to run out of the way, only to suddenly trip and fall off. He hit the hard floor facefirst. He was back in his room.

"What the fuck was that?" He screamed at her, getting to his feet, his forehead hurting not by a little.

"I told you rule one, didn't I? Obey everything I say because no matter what, I'll make sure that you do." She smirked.

His uniform was at the bottom of the drawer, covered by things he also didn't need. He fumbled around and wondered, did he misplace it?

'Where is it?'

"Looking for something?" In her hand were his clothes, impressively ironed and neat like they were fresh from the laundry shop. The smell of the fabric conditioner reminded him greatly of his mother. She always took care of the laundry.

"Is this an illusion too?"

"Save the thanks Harold Vasquez," she said, shoving them to his chest.

Lazily, he showered. He just let the water rain down on his body. He was still half-asleep, and even as he went back to his room, his senses shut off his surroundings. That was why as he stripped off his towel, it was a moment too late that he noticed something was moving in his periphery. Ru sat near the door, fiddling with her curly tresses.

"Fuck!" He yelled so loud that even the neighbor should have heard. His hands could not have reached more quickly for the towel. "Why are you here?" He asked, helplessly.

She regarded him, eyes listless and fingers playing with her hair, totally unembarassed. "Duh, I've been here the whole time, remember?"

"This is my room, out!" He dragged her by the hand. "Out! Don't come inside my room ever again!" He slammed the door close on her face. His head was about to burst. Why was he even going to school now?

He had donned his uniform. His bag was in his hand. But he found that he could not move any farther.

Harold never really intended to quit school, as a matter of fact. He could not even recall exactly when it started. All he could remember was the feeling of having everything spiraling out of his control and he figured he needed some fresh air.

A break from everyone - he hoped for that. He began to take school lightly, arriving late, skipping classes. Simply small things. He thought there's no way they could ever hurt his studies. He had an excuse. The perfect excuse. Then he started to retire home early. Then he took a day off. Then the next, two days was barely enough rest. Then suddenly he was behind on everything.

It was akin to riding a train. He knew where it was headed and yet he zoomed right through. Now everything's barreling at a momentum he could not stop.

It had been over two weeks now since he came to school.

All his friends, all his teachers, what were they gonna say? They'd just look at him with pity. No one would reprimand him. They'd say they understood. They'd tell him to take his time.

But he was tired of all that. He was tired.

There was no halting this train for him. With his mind made up, he dropped his bag but the second he did so, he began dropping too!

"NOOOO!"

The pull of gravity was real. The sick feeling in his stomach was real. The wind brushing past his face was real. And the earth a thousand feet beneath him... Everything seemed like he had never felt before.

The wind roared in his ears as he himself screamed back.

He fell.

And he kept falling.

And

all

there

was

to

catch

him

was

a

solid

unforgiving

ground.

As the earth rushed up to meet Harold, he found himself lying on the cold floor of his room, sweat beading and out of breath.

No words could come out of his lips. Somewhere along the fall, he had lost his voice.

A pair of bare feet shuffled toward him.

"And that Harold is free fall," she said in her innocent tone, playful yet deceivingly innocent.

***************

"I hate this uniform, it's so plain and boring," Ru complained. She chose to wore the girl's uniform, to blend in, she reasoned.

"Can't you just turn invisible? You're a goddess."

There was no doubting it now. She was either a goddess or a demon. Either way, she truly possessed powers that could mess up even the sanest person. And it's all that mattered - that and her undue interest in Harold.

In the street where people walked by, she twirled around, the unreservedly short skirts fluttering up. "That wouldn't be fun now, would it?" She giggled.

Nothing about today was fun for Harold. He almost got run over by a train and almost splattered on the ground like a bug crushed flat. Now he was almost at the school gate and he had met a few familiar eyes.

He got lost in the sea of people. Among them he was indistinguishable. It gave him relief.

He had reached his homeroom when he noticed that Ru was gone. She could be flirting with a schoolboy for all he knew.

As he entered, he steeled his mind to ignore their stares but he couldn't help it.

"Harold," a lad named Philip called, "It's so nice to see you."

"Are you okay?" Christin run up to him.

"How's your mother? I hope she's doing fine."

"Don't worry. Your mother's going to be alright. My uncle said his workmate entered into such a coma too..."

Christin said, "I'm just glad you're back."

And to all of these, all his answer was a smile. "Man, I've got a lot of catching up to do," he said, scratching the back of his head.

They crowded around Harold, spoke to him, consoled him, tapped his back. Christin even embraced him. It was warm and it was what he needed. So he couldn't help feeling mad at himself for being mad at them for caring about him.

It was a continuous loop of unresolvable feelings, like a mobius strip. He could not seem to untangle it.

There was this one girl in the room. By the scornful look in her eyes, she was not all that happy to see him. And Harold knew the reason why.

Her name was Sunshine and she came to meet him at lunchtime that very day. She had this stiff brisk walk that was uncharacteristic of women and a ponytail that rarely got untied. And in her hand was a book which she gently placed on the table as she sat opposite him.

For a moment, she only stared him in the eye. She had dark beady eyes that seemed to burn right through his facade to uncover the truth behind. Then slowly, she pushed the book towards him.

She said, "Thank you, but I don't need this."

He swallowed what food was in his mouth but held off on the drink for a second and instead answered, "No, that's not mine."

A grin crept to her lips. "Don't take me for a fool, Harold, please." Then in a whisper so that nobody could overhear, "But why leave it in my bag the day before you disappear for two weeks? Tell me, were you going to kill yourself?"

He was seldom late. And it was not today.

6:34 PM. He did not check his watch when he arrived but if he did, that's what he would have seen. The short arm and the long arm both past 6 and the second hand ticking just a few seconds after 12.

The streets were so full of people it was overwhelming, especially for him who mostly stayed at home. They spared him quick glances, regarded his coat and black slick pants with disinterest. But no one accosted him. And for that he was glad. He did not know what to say if they ever did. He wished he had learned how to talk to people.

It was hard finding a good bench to sit on. By good bench he meant a bench with no people. He found one near a bush and the only reason no one sat there was the coffee someone spilled and did not bother wiping, and the stench of the pile of thrash in the corner. Well he sat there now.

He had a phone to keep him company. For the times he clicked it open, he always went straight to the Inbox and read the texts there even though he had read them countless times.

He hoped he had better games on his phone. Nothing seemed to interest him now. Maybe it was the impatience. He hoped he brought water. He was going a little bit thirsty. And the more he thought about it, the thirstier he got.

He started counting cars. It astounded him how many orange cars there were. He thought nobody bought orange cars. Well, he won't buy an orange car.

Then he started looking at people. He studied the way they walked and wondered if it meant anything. He took note of the way they looked at the ground and how they avoided his gaze. He tried to take note who were tired and who were happy. At some point he could not tell. They looked the same.

He pulled on his coat. It had crumpled again. He admired those who could smoothen out the ends of their sleeves. He could not.

He wondered if the smell of his perfume was still on him . Maybe it had faded. He sniffed his collar and found that he could not tell.

He adjusted his watch because he had almost nothing left to do. But he did not look at it. But if he did, he would have seen that the shortest hand was past seven and the minute hand long past six.

He wondered how waiting was seeming more difficult in each passing second, especially that she promised to come.

From behind the dead bushes of blue

the cold shivering wind carries a sound

a piercing note of a woman’s scream

and the hollow growl of an animal;

But what do screams mean in a land of souls?

What do growls mean to the unliving?

Is it the fire of longing?

or the rapport of a predator and its prey?

From behind the dead bushes of blue

the cold shivering wind carries a sound

a piercing note of a woman's scream

and the hollow growl of an animal;

But what do screams mean in a land of souls?

What do growls mean to the unliving?

Is it the fire of longing?

or the rapport of a predator and its prey?

Low-Magic Fantasy fiction

Ideas for stories always start in my head as the mundane type. An everyday-life story that showcases a sensitivity to feelings and life in general. But the thing is, I choose to set it in an entirely ANOTHER WORLD.

So basically, it’s a mundane life in another world. And that’s the hardest thing, in order to make everything sound natural and non-extravagant, the world must be pre-existing in the story. It has existed thousands of years even before the start of the story I’m making. Details will have to be consistent and coherent.

And from there I build. There will be action. Romance. Thrill. But everything is grounded on a pre-built world that the character does NOT have to unfold.

And the most convincing thing about this, you DON’T NEED so much RESEARCH. No interviews. Not much googling. You only need your day-to-day experience. Change details consistently and you have a story. A story you can finish as long as the WORLD YOU BUILT IS COMPLETE.

It doesn't have to have castles or dragons or any magic at all. Although a little magic always adds a mystery. Just a little. Don't overuse it.

Just take for example, ADVENTURE TIME where the main elements are fire, ice, candy and slime. And GOT where they have their own gods. And STUDIO GHIBLI that takes you to wonders.

And one last thing, you can put mysteries that you don’t need to clarify. Because if your character who lives there doesn’t know it, why would anybody else know it?

Hope I helped.

The most priceless thing

more than coins,

more than blood

more than diamonds.

The most elusive thing

no map can tell

no legs can chase

no hand can reach.

The most fragile thing

a touch can break

a whisper can stir

a shadow can take.

A second or few

An hour or two

but please just enough, I need

some sleep.