Tic tac
The clock began ticking in that suffocating silence.
「I…」
He was now inside another classroom, similar to the previous one.
Filled with silhouettes. All staring at him.
Rain? No, it wasn't water: post-it notes. Illegible words were written on each of them.
Mike — "I remember… the post-it notes stuck on my back every morning: Trash, Failure, Die. I… I pretended not to notice, not to feel anything. That people laughed when I walked by, that teachers looked away, that no one stopped them. What haunted me wasn't the words. It was that macabre silence. Everyone's silence…"
The silhouettes didn't move an inch. The one in front of the board merely turned its head, beginning to call them one by one.
A post-it fell into Mike's hand, with red pen writing on it:
[Those post-it notes were meant for you, why did you pretend not to see them? You didn't like it? Then why did you stay silent? I could have at least REMOVED THEM!]
The post-it flew away again, joining the others. A massive pile had formed, like a mountain. Filling the room… Growing… Suffocating…
Mike — "No… it wouldn't have changed anything… Stop it…"
Tic tac
The room distorted. The walls receded, the tables grew larger to make space for four chairs under each of them. More tables were attached at each end, forming endless rows.
On each table, there was a tray. On each tray, a different dish.
Mike — "The cafeteria… lunchtime…"
He looked at the plate in front of him.
Mike — "Every day… my bread tasted different. Sometimes bitter, sometimes like nothing. Then I understood. They spat in it. They crushed it. They soaked it… I'd find it wet… One time, it was glue. I threw up for hours and hours after lunch… But I didn't say anything. Bread was all I had to eat. It was easier to keep chewing than hope to find out who it was. Then I'd go back to class on an empty stomach…"
A wave of nausea came over him. His stomach tightened, ready to eject everything it contained. He barely held it back.
Right in the center of his tray, on his plate, was a misshapen piece of bread. It crumbled. The crumbs moved and turned red, forming words.
[That bread was disgusting! Vile! Enough to puke! Yet you made us endure it… You kept eating it! If you had let me find the ones who dared do that to you… you wouldn't have had to EAT IT ANYMORE!!]
Mike — "Hrkk-BLRRAA-Glip"
A violent spasm seized him, his throat contracted, and a burst of vomit splashed everything in his tray.
Mike — "Stop! It was that or nothing…"
Tic tac
The room shrank. The walls tightened, now covered with twisted, oozing lockers. The tables vanished. The chairs widened, becoming benches.
A cold mist filled the room. A strong smell of humidity rose from the floor.
「That's my uniform…」
A middle-school uniform hung from a hook, soaked, riddled with dark stains.
He stared at it for a long time.
Mike — "The locker rooms… They took my clothes. Dunked them in the shower water. Left me with just my underwear. The door closed behind them. I waited. The bell had rung. The lights went off. I was still there, curled up in a corner. I didn't want to go into the locker rooms anymore… but the teachers didn't give me a choice."
A harsh whistle sounded from the neon above.
The locker in front of him slowly opened.
Inside, on a torn label, words were scribbled:
[You never said anything. You never called for help! You were ashamed, weren't you? Why didn't you scream? I could have STOPPED THEM!!]
Mike — "It… wasn't your job to deal with it… Shut up."
Tic tac
The benches rearranged once more. This time, simple desks appeared—cold, rigid. All facing forward. All occupied. Except one. The desk next to Mike. Always empty. Never used.
Mike — "There was always that empty seat… beside me. Even when the class was full. Even when others fought over where to sit together. I was… the obstacle. The one they avoided. The one they fled from. The one they ignored."
A small scribble appeared on the surface of the empty desk. Letters carved with a fingernail, trembling.
[You looked at it every day. You hoped someone would sit there, didn't you? Huh?! You didn't want to be alone. Even though I was right here. But you never said anything. You should've TALKED TO ME!]
Mike — "I didn't want to talk to the one who held the knife… The one who killed her…"
Tic tac
A low vibration pulsed through the entire room.
Brr-brr
An old flip phone slid out from the locker beneath the desk. Cracked screen, glowing faintly. One single notification blinked on repeat.
[We know what you did! You should've died with her.]
He recoiled sharply, hesitant to touch it.
Mike — "Always at night… Always the same words. Unknown accounts. Blurry threats. They even followed me in my dreams. At first, I replied. Tried to deny it. Tried to explain. Tried… Then I understood they enjoyed it. No matter what, they'd keep going… I ended up throwing it far away…"
The screen displayed a series of messages typing themselves, red on black.
Water trickled down the phone.
[You read them crying, MIKE. But you didn't let me answer. Why? Instead, you chose to drown it, but even then, you kept having nightmares. I COULD HAVE SILENCED THEM! FOR YOU! FOR US!]
Mike — "No… I didn't know what you were capable of…"
Tic tac
A bell rang in the distance.
Ding-Dooong
The walls became covered with boards, torn pages, ripped presentation sheets, burned, crumpled.
A podium appeared in the center of the room, covered in papier-mâché.
He sighed, recognizing it.
Mike — "That was my presentation. I think it was about my favorite heroine. I worked on it for an entire week. Without a phone… I searched through every book I could find, copied every line by hand. That very morning… it disappeared from my bag. And I found it… soaked in the bathroom."
One of the papers on the floor trembled, then floated up before him.
[You knew who did it! But you said nothing. You just picked up the pieces and started again. WHY? I could have done the same to them. I COULD HAVE BROKEN THEM.]
He turned his eyes away, tears threatening to fall.
Mike — "No… You only wanted revenge. I only wanted… them to stop."
Tic tac
The room darkened. Muffled laughs echoed between the walls. Footsteps, bags thudding, blows landing.
Mike lifted his eyes.
In front of him, a younger Mike, curled up on the floor, arms over his head.
Mike — "I got used to the pain. The hits weren't the worst part. It was the fact that they didn't even look at me. Even while hitting me… I was invisible."
The silhouette of a student leaned over the younger Mike. Holding a ruler, stained with blood. And droplets floated in the air, trembling.
[You clenched your teeth. You didn't scream. You didn't move. You accepted it. WHY DIDN'T YOU LET ME AT LEAST TAKE THE BLOWS FOR YOU.]
He exhaled, as if the words rang false.
Mike — "Take them for me? You would've attacked them…"
Tic tac
The lights shifted. A cold, frozen room.
An adult silhouette stood before the board, back turned, motionless. A teacher.
The chalk fell from his hand and rolled to Mike's feet.
Mike — "I raised my hand. All the time. I had the right answers. But he never called on me. Even when I was the only one wanting to answer."
The silhouette turned around slowly.
Its face was empty. Flat. Smooth. No mouth, no eyes.
Mike — "He always said: 'Maybe another time.' But there was never 'another time.'"
A small notebook fell from the board, open at a single page.
[He knew. He knew what they were doing to you. But he preferred to stay quiet. Preferred avoiding trouble. Preferred letting it continue. You knew that too. And you let him. Why? WHY DID YOU STAY SILENT?]
Mike — "I wasn't worth the trouble. That's what they said between teachers. And eventually… I believed it."
Tic tac
The classroom walls stretched endlessly.
All the boards displayed photos… From the school festival… The hot-dog stand… The first day of the year… The past years…
But in none of them did Mike appear.
Mike — "They always took the pictures without telling me. Or they said I was blocking the light. So I stopped showing up. Because even when I was there… they erased me."
There was an empty space where he should have been. A blur, as if he had been digitally erased.
One of the frames fell and shattered on the floor.
In the shards, words:
[You didn't need to exist for them… You didn't want to exist… So let me exist IN YOUR PLACE!]
Mike — "No you… I won't let you…"
Tic tac
The room twisted. A long corridor appeared, endless.
「My legs? Why?」
He was running, but always stayed in front of the same door.
Mike — "That corridor. I walked through it every day. Ran through it every day. Others passed beside me. Almost through me. Sometimes I wondered: 'If I fell… would anyone stop?'"
Footsteps echoed, multiplying.
Faceless silhouettes ran toward him, then through him, continuing on. Again and again.
Words were scribbled repeatedly where their faces should have been:
[What were you waiting for to disappear? I would've run for you. I would've tripped them for you! They would've seen us!]
Mike — "No… no… Shut up!"
Tic tac
The room returned to a classroom.
Silhouettes — "HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH"
But this time, all the silhouettes were laughing. Faceless, voiceless… just open mouths laughing until they bled. Stuck in that endless laughter.
Mike — "They laughed… even when I cried. Sometimes I wondered if my tears fed them? HEHEHEHEHEHEHEH"
「No, I don't want to laugh!」
A laugh escaped Mike's throat against his will.
A sharp, slow laugh… one that wasn't his.
Mike ? — "See? We can laugh too. With them."
Words spilled from his mouth by themselves.
Mike ? — "It's easy. You just have to forget yourself. Your skin… Your shape… Let me speak for you."
Mike — "No… leave me alone, Gekidō!"
Mike regained control as best he could. He clenched his fists.
Tic tac
A person resembling him appeared at the end of the room.
Then another. And another.
「That's me?」
Versions of Mike performing different gestures: screaming, collapsing, smiling, writing, hitting.
They said nothing, but their eyes were crying.
One approached, holding a broken mirror.
Mike — "In the end… which one… am I?"
The mirror reflected an eye… but not his. Red, piercing.
Gekidō — "The one you refuse to be. The one you locked up, suffocated, drowned. You let me scream in that black world… the one you refused to fill. So now it's my turn! I'll be waiting for you on the next floor!"
The voice emerging from his own mouth vanished after speaking those words.
In an instant, the room returned to the simple classroom it had been at the start.
In a simple silence, the silhouettes were gone.
Only Mike remained, sitting behind his desk.
He swayed a little before regaining clarity.
Mike — "It's exhausting…"
He laid his head on his arms. The cold surface of the desk slid against his skin, the empty room—frozen memory—vibrating with too much silence. His eyelids grew heavy, so heavy that even trying to lift them seemed pointless.
Mike — "I could sleep a little…"
The world softened around him, as if someone had turned down the sharpness of everything that existed.