The Circle in Escapism

Chapter 2

"Oi! Are you alive?"

Just as I was opening my eyelids to look at the person asking, the immense brightness forced me to close them back before trying again. With a groan, I slowly sat up and looked at the direction where the voice came from. A slit-eyed lad around my age sat on a bicycle as he observed my figure curiously. When his face didn't register as someone familiar, my eyes immediately darted around my surroundings, trying to grasp the situation. In front of me, a grassland extended as far as the eye could see, while a forest towered behind. I was sitting under the shade of an outlier tree.

"You okay?" he asked once again.

"I...don't know where I am," I muttered, more as a declaration than an answer. "Can you tell me where I am?" I was getting more and more anxious at how lost I was.

He looked at me with an incredulous look on his face. "Well, for starters, you're just outside my village."

"Village?"

"Yeah, village. And you seem to be...a merchant? No, wait, you don't look like it," he uttered his assumptions as his eyes roamed my figure. "Anyway, you seem to have been in some kind of trouble. Remember anything?"

"I remember walking home from school and—"

"Woah, you go to school?" he exclaimed in disbelief, earning a questioning look from me. His forehead then scrunched in focus as he observed me yet again. "But you don't seem to look...how do I say it, polished enough to be one of them." My attention shifted to my blouse and skirt as well as my hair, which looked okay – a little disheveled, but still presentable. What did he mean by 'polished' exactly?

"Why, is it unusual that I am a student?"

"Well, yeah, at least for people around my age. They don't allow us in there, you know," he explained, taking a short pause as he looked into the distance. I wanted to ask him the questions piling up inside my mind, but decided not to. "Anyway, you seem to be fine. It's best you go back to Gloria before dark," he suggested, already turning his bicycle towards a narrow dirt path just a few meters away.

"Gloria?" I thought out loud. My obliviousness to the place had further alarmed me. He said it as if it were a place anyone would know, and I'm usually one to know more about geography than anyone I've ever met. I could've at least heard of it.

Hearing this, the guy halted in his tracks and looked at me in a matter-of-factly manner. "You live there, don't you?" I shook my head in denial. Immediately, his eyes narrowed in suspicion and he began to ask further, "Is your head alright? Did you hurt it or something?"

"I think it's okay...?"

"Then are you lying to me?" I flinched at the sharpness in his tone.

"No, why would I?"

"Because there's no way you can be a student without being from Gloria. That's just not a possible thing at all," he said in all seriousness. I couldn't speak; that's it, I really was in a strange place and no matter what I say, I doubt he'll believe me. At the very least, all I could do was look at him and hope that he will, as he did the same in trying to read if I was telling the truth.

In the end, it was him who broke the stillness. Sighing, he relented, "Maybe you did hurt your head after all."

As I sat on the grass outside of his humble hut, Jay went over and gave me a cup of water. I took it with gratitude and downed it in a few mouthfuls. He then sat beside me and out of vigilance, I scooted a little to the side until the space between us was comfortable enough for me; after all, he was still a stranger despite being nice enough to take me in for the night.

"Okay, so what else do you remember?"

"I remember walking into the grove towards this river behind my home. After that, it's all fuzzy, really..." I took a short pause, trying to squeeze out as much memory as I can. "I think...there was this pavilion? I'm not really sure."

Jay took his time in absorbing what I had just told him. After a while, he started to share what he was thinking. "First of all, let me just say that you're an idiot for walking into the woods after dark." I looked at him in an accusing manner, disbelief written all over my face. "Second, a pavilion? In the middle of a grove? You really did hurt your head after all."

"Okay, perhaps it really doesn't make any sense," I trailed off.

"Well duh."

Hours had passed since Jay called it a night but I was still wide awake after spending at least an hour of 'finding the right position.' Though I did have a history – a long one – of restlessness whenever I would spend the night in an unfamiliar place, it still annoys me how my brain would just jolt awake at the squeaking of a bat flying hundreds of meters away. Falling asleep when I needed to be awake, yet failing to sleep when I needed rest. How ironic.

As if on cue, a distant scream echoed through the stillness of the night. It was so faint that the first thing I did was second guess what I just heard. However, my doubts were put to rest when Jay, who had his back to me as he slumbered about a meter away, suddenly turned to face me. He held a finger to his mouth, signaling for me to stay quiet. Even in the dark, I could see his guarded expression traced with fear, which made one thing certain: there was trouble and I sure as hell better prepare for it.