My day started like any other day. My alarm goes off and I slam my fist into it. I inspect it carefully to make sure I didn't break it. After breathing a sigh of relief I get ready for school like normal. My life was pretty average. My parents didn't die in a horrific accident, I was never really bullied, and my grades were never above or below average.
I went around my kitchen casually as I prepared my coffee. I liked to drink it black, I always believed it would give me a bigger kick if it was bitter. I sit down at the table and slowly drink it.
"Bitter." I said quietly as I continued to sip it. I may have hated the bitter taste, but coffee's purpose is to wake a person up, so I guess you could say the bitterness helped. I groaned with annoyance as I yawned.
I had recently been having weird dreams. The dreams themselves weren't really the problem. No, the problem was how real they felt. They always ended the same way. Darkness consuming the world around me, until I'm covered in it. Once that happens, a voice starts speaking to me. They say something in a language I can't understand. I decide to ignore it, but after ignoring it my hand starts to hurt. I look down at it, and it's on fire.
The flame dances in my hand, almost as if it's alive, but I know that isn't the case. Fire can't be controlled. Flames can't be manipulated. It's all just a dream, a stupid dream I've been having every night. I look over at the clock nearby to get a look at the time. 7:59 AM. I counted down from three in my head….and then I heard someone scream.
"AHHHHHHHHH! AH FUCK!" Said the voice of my brother Jay. He's a year older than me, and he has a tendency to sleep in. Not like it would matter if he did or not. He's a super genius, a bunch of colleges are already scouting for him, hard to believe my brother is actually a super smart guy, but his grades don't lie.
Jay runs down the halls and begins to bang on my door.
"Ruben! Ruben! We're going to be late! We're going to be late on the first day of the second semester!" Jay shouted. I laughed quietly as Jay proceeded to bang on my door and shout. Little did he know he was shouting to an empty room filled with nothing but a bed and a broken light. He ran into the kitchen and tried his hardest to prepare his breakfast.
I casually sipped my coffee and he turned his head to me quickly. His expression showed his surprise, and he was clearly confused.
"W-When did you get there!? I just knocked on your door!" Jay told me as he prepared a bowl of cereal.
"I've been here. I wake up at six, remember?" I told him with a sigh. His memory wasn't the best, and yet he always got 100's on tests. It truly was odd.
Jay groaned as he sat down at the table and proceeded to eat his cereal without milk, and without a spoon. I glared at him.
"Seriously?" I asked.
"What?"
"Cereal without milk is a sin!"
"You're just mad because your mouth gets too dry for you handle whenever you eat without milk." Jay said as he shoved his cereal into his mouth. I cringed. How could he eat that stuff? It wasn't any special cereal with marshmallows, or fruit, it was just bran. It looked so dry and gross. I gave up on trying to get Jay to eat his cereal with milk and I just continued to sip my coffee.
"I can't believe you didn't wake me up! I'll remember this!" Jay said with a frown. I just laughed a bit.
"I don't remember being your personal alarm clock." I said with a sigh as I continued to sip my coffee. Jay snorts, and I can only assume he wasn't too happy with what I had said. As he finished eating his disgusting cereal he sat up and grabbed his school bag. I made sure to do the same and placed my cup in the sink.
"You get on me for eating my 'disgusting' cereal, and yet you drink your coffee black!"
"At least my coffee being black has a purpose! We have milk in the fridge you know!?"
I just groaned. Convincing Jay to eat cereal with milk is like trying to convince a bear not to eat fish or hibernate. You could drill into them all of the benefits of the task, but to them, it would be like you were speaking a different language. I gave up and made my way to the front door and Jay followed me.
As we walked outside I turned around and locked the door. The sun was so bright today. I shielded my eyes with my arm and walked down the side road to our school.
"Oh yeah, I have club today, so you can just head home without me."
Jay gave the usual everyday comment. I always had to walk home by myself whether it be because of schoolwork, club work, or heck even tutoring. Jay seemed to notice my expression change and he gave a heavy sigh.
"I have to do well this year, no college will accept a slacker ya know?"
"I know, you're thinking about your future. I understand"
I didn't sound too convincing. In fact I sounded even worse now. Jay sighed and decided to ignore my previous comment. As he got closer to the school gate I could hear Jay mutter something under his breath.
"What's up?" I ask him. He turns to me with an annoyed look and points to the school gate.
"Miss Suck-Up is there."
Jay pointed at a girl standing by the school gate. Watching students enter and calling out students not following dress code.
That student was the one and only Ruru Watanbe. She was my class representative, and was a total teacher's pet. I didn't really have anything against her, if anything I thought she was pretty cute, but Jay has gotten in trouble with her on more than one occasion.
She even contacted our parents and brought them to the school when she caught Jay skipping one of his classes. As we approached the school gate Ruru turned to face us. At first she saw Jay and she had a look of annoyance just the same as him, but then her eyes laid on me and her expression softened.
"On time for once I see?" Ruru said with a smirk to Jay.
I could hear Jay growl but watched him nod before walking past her and making his way into the school. I was about to follow him when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned to see Ruru was staring at me with an unreadable expression.
"You look like a mess, are you alright?"
"A mess? Me? Last I checked I felt fine."
Ruru stared at me for a second before shaking her head.
"I'm probably imagining things, I'll see you in class, but don't be afraid to talk to me if something is bothering you. As the class representative it's my job to make sure my classmates are healthy." Ruru said with a smile.
I felt my heart skip a beat as she smiled at me. Ruru was a fairly attractive girl. She seemed to be around my age too. Her hair was cut to only reach down to the top of her neck, but her most eye catching feature was her eyes themselves. They seemed to have a strange glow to them, it was almost as if she cast a spell on you with just one look.
Ruru cleared her throat and it broke me from my daydream. I realized I was staring at her and I shook my head.
"S-Sorry, I don't think I got enough sleep last night."
"I-It's fine."
Ruru was blushing and she looked away from me. I blushed too, but I quickly made my way into the school. This is usually the moment I run into some kind of bully and my life becomes some kind of sob story, but my life wasn't a sob story. It was just a normal average life. So I made my way to my class with no worries.
Mind you I didn't really have any friends in the class either. So I just sat at my desk and watched everyone converse and have fun. I wish I had people I could do that with, but I guess it's my own fault for not reaching out. I just sigh and lie my head on my desk. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night, I have a few minutes before class starts. I could get a few minutes to rest.
I closed my eyes and found myself drifting into the darkness of sleep.
***************
At first there was silence, a calming and serine silence. I let the darkness overwhelm me as I tried my best to enjoy the silence, but sadly it didn't last. Just like the other times.
I open my eyes and I'm met with a horde of flames surrounding me. I look around for a way to escape, but sadly there is no such thing. I sigh. Was there no way to stop the flames, was there no way to save myself. I watched as the flames closed in and I closed my eyes, ready to accept my inevitable defeat.
My hand starts to burn and I assume the flames have already surrounded me, but that wasn't the case. The palm on my hand was burning, but not like a flame was burning me. No, I was burning from the inside out. It wasn't painful, far from it. It felt as if my body was being given jolts of energy. I look around and notice the flames were behaving strangely. It was almost as if they were entranced by my hand.
I watched in awe as the flames flew into the air and quickly came back down. I used my hand as a way to protect myself and the flames entered my hand as if it was in another plane of existence.
I checked my hand, the burning had stopped but the remnants were still there. I wanted to learn more but a blinding light caught my attention. My time was up and I knew very well what that meant.
***************
"Ruben…..Ruben…..RUBEN!" Said a familiar voice.
I opened my eyes to see Ruru staring at me with a disapproving glare. I yawned and stretched my arms.
"Sorry, I was going to take a small nap before class started. I'll pay attention now."
"Are you being serious?"
"What?"
"Class started hours ago, we're on our lunch break now."
I stared at Ruru with disbelief and I sat up to get a good look at her. That was when Ruru gasped as she stared at my hand.
"What's wrong?" I ask her with concern.
"R-Ruben, what's wrong with your hand?"
Ruru stared at my hand with worry and I turn my hand around to get a good look at my palm. In the center of my palm was a mark that wasn't there before. I stared at it with confusion. What exactly did this mean?