The Conspiration of the Universe

Chapter 10

10

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There are things in this world that occurs supernaturally. There are other things that when you say it, it sounds crazy but true, like light is both a wave and a particle. Eureka’s case is both of these. She came out of the book, supernaturally. And when I tried to explain it to her, I am the one who sounded ridiculous.

“What are you saying? Are you already insane? Did the heat suddenly drain your brain?” she said shaking her head too much. She herself doesn’t believe of her true origin. How am I going to explain it to her if I, myself is dumbfounded to what just happened.

“You don’t understand.”

“Of course, I don’t understand. What you are saying doesn’t make any sense.” The look from her face, I could sense her fear. Fear that she is somewhat not-normal. Also, she was already fiddling with her lower lip. I don’t want her to feel that way but... it’s the right thing to do. No, I want to know her more before I tell her.

And so I goofily smiled at her that my eyes are already squinting. She raised her eyebrow at me. “Why are you smiling?”

“Okay, you got me.”

“What? What are...”

“I’m just kidding, you see. I’m just messing up with you.” Her face full of fear hasn’t changed yet. She is still not biting it. I removed my eyeglasses to create an effect but it left me with a blurred sight of her face.

“We’ve met before, in Cavite, three years ago. You’ve told me about your life three years ago. And I just remembered it now when you reminded me of it. At first I didn’t believe that it was you but now...”

“Maybe that is what I am feeling. I feel secure with you, like I’ve known you before.”

I just nodded for affirmation. But I feel really terrible for lying to her. I guess I have to choose the situation that would cause fewer casualties. “I said you were a character from a book, because your life was like an open book to me.” Yeah right.

“Hey, wait, I think I remember. Wait, I thought your name was Darwin?”

Crap. I think her memories, no, the book’s plot is getting messed up. Darwin is her love interest in the book and she seems to recognize me of him. This must be really hard for her. But this is harder for me.

The only thing that could fix a lie is another lie. Pile it on top of each other and you would get near truth, that’s what I thought.

“Well, that was just um, screen name. Yeah like a pseudonym that writers use.”

Her round brown eyes held mine for a second and then she broke out for a wide smile. Even though it’s blurry I could still tell. She stood up from her seat and flicked her hair to remove some of it from her face. “I’m sorry I haven’t recognized you...must have been your glasses.”

“Yeah, I don’t have these goofy glasses three years ago.” I wore my glasses and pushed it back with my middle finger. That is not a lie, it’s true.

“It suits you.”

“Yeah, if I am rearing to complete my nerdy look...”

“Shall we continue the tour? You promised me.”

***

It took all day to complete the tour. Well not exactly the whole day because we had four stop-over. All of it was just to eat. And talk. We continued talking about ourselves. But Eureka is the only one who learned something. She told stories about herself that I have read before so it is just like a review of A Starless Night.

As for me, my stories, my life was completely new for her but I never told her about Sid or anything of relating to her. It’s like I wiped her from my life and I think that is the best part of the tour.

It comes to show that the campus was really huge. My feet hurts and also my mind. Today is completely out of this world, that’s what I’m sure of.

Eureka was just plainly innocent of what is really happening to the world here. And I choose to show the world to her while completely preserving her innocence at the same time.

***

That night, Eureka literally begged that she should stay at our apartment for the mean time. Okay, not literally begged but she really tried hard to persuade me.

“Come on, Luke, please I have no place to stay. I don’t know any people.” she said while toying at her lip.

I came to wonder if the people she supposes to know exist. Do even her parents exist? I shook my head

“After the tour, I thought... I thought that you have already trusted me.”

“I do trust you now...” it came out raspy “but it is just, I have a housemate and decisions around here are split in half.”

“Where is he anyway? I mean is he a he or a she?” she appears to be embarrassed for some unknown reason.

“He is a he. His name is Matt and he had gone home for the weekend. But he would come back tomorrow.”

“Oh, well then, let me stay here for the night and we will discuss it tomorrow with him. Is that alright?”

I acquiesced. Surprisingly, she had a suitcase full of her things (it appeared out of nowhere, really) - her clothes, and some stuff for her hygiene. She washed up and successively changed her clothes, now a pink striped PJ’s. It feels weird to have a female housemate.

The night was young but we decided to go to bed. The tour was pretty exhausting anyway. She climbed to Matt’s bed as I suggested and I also went to my own bed. I still can’t believe that we shared this bed, I thought.

“Good night.” I said.

“Good night, Luke.”

“Could this work?” she asked after a few minutes.

“What?”

She hadn’t replied. She must have fallen asleep. “We could make this work,” I thought as I entered sleep.