Sweeter than Cake [MxM] [English Version]

14 / Exhausted from Thinking

I tried to open my eyes to end my nightmare. The inhale and exhale were catching up with each other as if they were racing. Cold sweat dripped from the temples to the chin. The pulse became very fast. And what I saw for the first time when I opened my eyes this morning made my adrenaline go up even more.

"Oh, s**t!" My head hit the wall trying to avoid what I was looking at.

With his innocent face, Lynx joined in positioning his body to sit.

"Since when do you sleep with your eyes open?!" I half shouted with wide eyes.

"Calm down.... I won't try to touch you. My hand is still there, right?"

Lynx's slit-eyes lead to our limbs on the blanket. When my breath calmed down, I realized that my right hand was still pinched by Lynx's hands. I was glad that Lynx was not looking for profit, like touching my face or somewhat when I was sleeping. But seeing his expressionless face annoyed me.

How can I calm down when I'm struggling to get out of a nightmare and someone is staring at me less than an inch away?

Still, with his sleepy face, Lynx got out of bed, took a glass of mineral water that I usually put on the nightstand, and gave it to me.

"Thanks.”

"It's still three in the morning…."

I was taking a quick sip of the water when Lynx pulled his favorite blanket back to sleep without hesitation. The sleeping baby's face in front of me became blurred and my mind took over my sight. With the glass still in my right hand, I tried to remember the dream, which was quite different than before.

In a dream this morning, I could see a boy wearing a Johnson Middle School uniform. The boy was walking toward me in a rush. I couldn't see his face because the extra scene looked like a low-resolution movie.

And when I wanted to focus my mind on studying the vague figure in my dream, the scene changed to the incident of yesterday afternoon. Anesthesia Injection on the neck. Weird feeling in the body. And all of the sensation from the drug when that “thing” happened. A horrific incident that I can't forget quickly.

I touched my neck with my left hand and then moved to my arm. Those two parts were left numb and with a little pain sensation. Although the injection of drugs, one for making me faint and the other for making me crave for touching, had been injected only into my neck and arm, my whole body was feeling in pain right now.

"Sleep..."

Lynx leaned closer to me. He pulled my right shoulder until my whole body lay down on the bed. Then he patted my shoulder with his eyes almost closed. It wasn't long before the light patting from Lynx disappeared. I turned and saw that Lynx's eyes were completely closed.

I chuckled at Lynx’s behavior and then looked up at the dark ceiling of the room. My mind hasn't been able to fall back asleep yet. Still questioning what the meaning of my dream was, which had appeared for three years. Even the question about Lynx’s feelings has been erased from my list and replaced with this dream.

All of my thoughts suddenly disappeared when I heard the sound of the door opening from downstairs. Which meant my mom was awake. Which meant, that soon, I had to get up and get ready to go to school.

I chose to leave bed. I carefully lowered the blanket that covered part of my body. Crawled to the edge of the bed. Stepped over Lynx's feet that were in the blanket. Finally, I could stand on the wooden floor of my room without waking Lynx.

Even though September hasn't entered winter yet, I could already feel the cold chill on my skin this early in the morning. My body shivered slightly when I opened the bedroom door due to the wind coming in from the sidelines of the corridor window on the second floor of the house. With minimal lighting, I gripped the banister with my left hand and slowly descended the stairs.

On the first floor, the room at the back of the house was already bright. Apart from the light from the garden lamp that managed to enter through the glass vent, the light from the kitchen had already provided a guide for me to walk, so I didn't have to bother turning on the other lights.

"Can't sleep?" asked Mom, who had just closed the refrigerator door when I got to the kitchen.

I approached Mother who was holding cabbage in her hand, then kissed her forehead.

"I was asleep but woke up and couldn't go back to sleep."

"Is it because of that strange creature?" Mom asked with her eyes pointed upwards.

I nodded, laughing at the name Lynx from Mom. The term strange creature fits the facts I received yesterday.

I picked up the apron hanging by the side of the closet and put it on. Took two cloves of onions with both hands and pointed them at Mom to ask the amount needed. Mom answered one, so I lowered one of them back into the cooking pot beside the stove. Then I prepared the tools needed to cut the onions.

For a few moments, the morning silence in our house was disturbed by the knock of a knife on the cutting board and the sound of water from the tap.

"Looks like he doesn't bother you anymore.” Mom was washing the vegetables she was going to cook one by one while occasionally looking at my condition.

Mom’s words referred to my dire condition two days ago. She knew perfectly well that I wasn't sick and was just giddy thinking about Lynx.

I couldn't help but smile at Mom. There were so many things I couldn't tell my mother. How could I tell Mom about yesterday’s incident? Except for making her cry and more possessive of her child, it was so useless.

Also, I still need time to start telling the events and secrets about Lynx. At least, that was what I thought at the beginning of my conversation with Mom.

"I was chatting with that kid while you were in the shower last night." Mom turned off the tap and eliminated the noise from the thing that dominated the room. So Mom’s sentence was heard by me. Clearly. And my thought was clear enough to know that kid was meant Lynx, no other.

I stopped slicing onions and turned to Mom. Mom's face looked serious at that time. I couldn't help but put the knife on the cutting board to hear the next sentence.

"He knocked on my door saying 'I know Rui's mother is listening to our conversation'. Really… their hearings are much more sensitive than normal humans."

I gasped. The words spoken sounded so mundane that I almost missed the most important part: Mother already knew Lynx wasn't a normal human being.

"Mom... Do you already know? Since when?"

Seeing Mom's seemingly relaxed response made me suspect that I was way too late for Mom in knowing that Lynx wasn't a normal human.

"Lynx Olivine asked me for permission to involve you with the Olivine family. It's like having a daughter to be proposed to by a boyfriend."

Mom didn't answer my question. Reminds me of Lynx's behavior, which often withholds answers just to hold my curiosity.

"So I'm the only one who knows all the secrets about Lynx Olivine?"

"I've known their big secret since becoming friends with Charlotte Amethyst."

Don’t know if I should feel relief that there was no need to explain so many things about "god things", or if I should feel so pitiful because the two closest people were hiding something from me for a long time.

“Rui… You know that you’re the only person I have...”

The sentence gave a lot of burden on my shoulders. Mom never said that with a very serious face like that. It was as if she wanted to give some of her anxiety to me regarding my relationship with Lynx.

I was waiting for the next sentence but it had been stopped for a while. Mom squeezed my arms with both her hands and her sight was looking down to the floor. After some anxiety, somehow Mom gave me some guilty conditions which cannot be explained right now.

“If you’ve chosen to get involved with him… please don’t suffer because of it. I don’t want to see you suffering because they are different from us.”

Mom’s expression made my chest tight. Anxiety. Fear. Pain. All of them became one. The last thing that I wanted to do was tell her about yesterday’s incident.

I hugged Mom with my hands clenched because I didn’t want to mark Mom’s clothes with an onion smell. And it was Mom's thought also, so she pushed my body suddenly. My left hand was bent and clenched as if I was a surgeon who had arrived in the surgery room.

“Don’t touch my hair with that hand. I don’t want to wash my hair this morning because it was too cold.”

With a burst of laughter, Mom and I succeeded in melting the tense situation before. No wonder we shared some blood because our thinking was so similar. Just like when I had a complaint about tiring kissing with Lynx in a situation which should be romantic.

My conversation with Mom didn't last long because we had to prepare breakfast. It was not only Lynx's secret that Mother had known, even this woman had known that Lynx had liked her child for a long time. Just by the way that Lynx looked at me.

At first, I found it annoying because Mom had always known Lynx better than I, the only friend Lynx had. But on the other hand, I understand Mom’s reasoning. Mom had to keep all these secrets so that I could act more freely towards Lynx.

The sun started to rise. The dishes at our house have started to be one by one. I also asked my Mom’s permission to check on the condition of the guests who have stayed overnight at our house.

When I arrived in front of my bedroom door, I pulled the doorknob slowly so as not to startle the people inside.

A creature with short black hair was still blanketed on my bed. His body position was still the same, still facing the empty part of the blanket where I had slept last night. The big blanket had been bought by Lynx because he couldn't sleep with my smaller blanket before.

I walked slowly and approached Lynx, who was still fast asleep.

How could this creature on my bed not be human?

Why can a non-human being fall asleep with such a peaceful face?

Why are beings other than humans able to say absurd things and joke with me all this time?

I was busy asking a lot of things while watching Lynx's very calm breathing movements. I put my index finger to Lynx's face slowly. A dimple made by my finger was etched into Lynx's cheek.

"Hey, expressionless creature," I was trying to press Lynx's soft cheek to wake him up.

The irritated-sleepy Lynx let out growling sounds. He changed his sleeping position without opening his eyes, then seemed to be fast asleep again.

Mischievously, I put my index finger under his nose, so Lynx woke up and had trouble breathing. It wasn't long before Lynx waved my hand with a troubled expression on his face, then turned his back against me.

I chuckled at Lynx's behavior, which was the complete opposite of when he woke up. The young master who had been so cold became very colorful in his micro-expressions while being disturbed by his sleep. Don’t want to ruin Lynx’s innocence, I let him sleep a little more while I get ready for a shower.

This morning felt very normal to me. Breakfast with Mom and Lynx. Ride the same car as Lynx to go to school. Even today there was no Vanilla in the car because Lynx has convinced Reinhard that I was innocent.

Everything seemed normal until I got into class 10-C. Everyone in the class mentioned the word "accident". I just sat down in my seat and the student sitting in front of me turned around.

"Rui... You must hear the latest information. Three students from grade three died in an accident."

I pretended to be surprised. The information from this morning's conversation was the same as the information I got from Vanilla last night. While the student in front of me continued to talk, the corner of my eye caught Kai watching me but he looked back at the blackboard when I saw him. I just assumed Kai wanted to ask about why I had been in the class yesterday afternoon.

Accident news on social media. Announcement of sad news from school speakers. Condolences from the teachers. Information that was following reality or which has been given “a spice” of opinion to mere lies. In the classroom. In the corridor. In the canteen.

The residents of Johnson High School have been led on the same topic all day long. Until finally, my ears were too hot from hearing the same topic over and over, and needed a place to be alone.

I finished my lunch with Lynx and Vanilla, as usual, then headed to a fairly quiet room on the second floor. Lynx could catch my annoyed expression at all the information, so he had just let me go alone.

Besides the teacher's room, the second floor of the Johnson High School building was filled with extracurricular rooms. One of the places I frequented was the music room at the end of the corridor.

The music room door was a bit heavier than the other doors because the door needed full soundproofing. Inside, there was a grand piano in the middle of the room, measuring fifty square meters. Ceiling-high cabinets filled one side of the wall and there was a sofa on the other.

As soon as I entered the music room, I immediately turned on the air conditioner. If not, I would faint because there was no circulation of oxygen that would enter the soundproof room. Then I walked to the sofa while avoiding dozens of scores of stands and chairs arranged in a semi-circle.

This room would only be visited by people during recess after class ends, or under certain conditions during holidays. It was rare for students to dare to play truancy and come to the second-floor corridor where teachers could pass freely. But I was observant enough to pay attention to the teachers' schedules so I could sneak in without being caught.

I quickly settled myself on the sofa. Used the earphones on my cellphone to listen to classical songs. Then my eyes closed. The silence condition was so perfect for me. Like the imagination of becoming a hermit in the cave, this room gave me the same perception to me.

The information that flooded my brain was now replaced by the strains of the piano and violin that complemented each other's harmony in a song. The melody of the violin played at high speed was supported by chord variations from the piano. This enjoyment is one of the reasons for me why art cannot be replaced by technology.

The list of instruments that I compiled on my cellphone was not too heavy like an orchestra, but not too light to make me fall asleep. Right now, I just need a distraction while still enjoying the moment. So that I didn’t drown in a sea of ​​information and the various possibilities that would occur.

After all, I was still an ordinary person who could get tired of his thoughts.

*****

I should have gone out from my hiding place with the remainder of the alarm I had set myself. But it was not from the alarm. The sound of the notification repeatedly interfered with the song that crossed my ears.

Vanilla called me. Kai texted me. Both of them wanted to tell me that there was a commotion in the class at the change of class hours. Lynx was pelted with eggs and flour by students from another class.

I immediately put my earphones and cellphone in my pocket and then left the music room. From afar, several teachers were seen running from the teacher's room to the third floor. I tried to catch up with the speed of the teachers by climbing the stairs closest to my current position.

From the end of the third-floor corridor, it could be seen that the 10-C class was already filled with a crowd of students. Even one of Vanilla's bodyguards disguised as a cleaner got there.

When I reached my destination, I tried to push my way through the crowd and see what was happening. Lynx was standing at the back of class 10-C in a disheveled state. His hair, face, and blazer were covered in a white powder with some parts that looked sticky like dough.

Meanwhile, the two unknown students who were the source of the problem this afternoon were also in the same area as Lynx. One of them sat on the floor holding his leg and groaning in pain. Others were crawling and trying to take something out of Lynx's hands.

Lynx read the two cards in his hand very calmly while blocking the movement of one of the accused persons. It seemed that the card was the identity card of the two accused people.

Without hesitation, Lynx broke the two cards in his hand and then spread the pieces of cards in front of the two students, who could only be silent. For a second, all of the crowd was silent also because of seeing the show. After a moment, the crowd was making noisy statements from a different perspective. Some people thought Lynx was crazy enough to break others’ identity cards. But some people thought Lynx was very cool. And absolutely, the second one was from girl students.

"Even the Smiths haven't paid their debts. You guys are so ironic," said Lynx, looking down on the two people in front of him who seemed to have Smith as their last name.

While I was keeping silent about the condition, teachers barged in and carried the injured student. I was still careful to read the situation and not give a reaction in a rush. Then I saw a meaningful smile when I looked at Lynx.

The conclusion I had at that time was soon, I have to be on the second floor again because of those people.