"Few days ago, I tried to catch any gossip from the vine about this old mob boss of mine. I tried using the internet like what you taught, to browse for any old news items. And I found . . . and I found him . . . dead five years ago," his voice faltered.
"How could the universe be so gentle on him, dying of an illness, of old age, without a bullet from his old enemies or a dagger from his advisors stabbing his heart? How could life allow him to die like any normal person would? At the end of his long journey on earth, surrounded by family members, fucking peacefully?" His trembling voice laced with hoarseness, as if he wanted to shout his lungs dry.
"You don't know that. You can't be sure of that," Stephanie spoke after a pregnant silence that descended upon them. Outside, the night birds started to fill the sky with their cawing.
He whipped his head quickly to face her. The distance between the skin of their forearms existed no more.
"You only derived your imagination from a limited source in a news outlet. I doubt the news really enclosed the personal and emotional facts like what you think."
"But he wasn't killed, it wasn't a murder," he gritted through his teeth.
Stephanie tried to placate him, she used her gentlest tone and faced him bodily. "People could still die in misery even when they're not murdered. Dying in loneliness, perhaps, just like us one day in this pandemic world; dying in misunderstanding, when you fail to clear up the problems even at your very last breath. Point is, there are many painful, sordid ways to die. Just because they die of old age or natural cause it doesn't mean the death is peaceful."
Mark shut his mouth that was about to shoot her opinion down with a few nasty words.
"Now, your life is open in front of you. It's not an ideal world, it's unlike in Shawshank Redemption where you get all the money you need to start your life anew. Heck, we don't even have a proper society now. But the way to gain peace in this battered world, is to slowly let go of all the past twenty years. Forgive yourself for having taken the wrong step in your youth, and start living, okay?"
Based on her experience talking to people these years, she could sense the meaning of the silent gaze, or the derisive sneers. She felt Mark was about to cry, and she was unsure whether to give him privacy or stand with him on this spot.
She opted to lay a gentle pat on his shoulder, rubbing it softly.
"Thanks," his cracked voice succinctly told her that he was starting the process to uproot the old resentment.
"By the way," he quickly changed the topic. Stephanie still wouldn't dare to raise her face to stare directly at Mark's eyes, so she paid attention by nodding.
"Do many other people just live on wherever they find empty?"
A good question to describe how problematic and uncaring their society was, she thought.
"There are many workers who seized empty houses or units to stay, especially those coming outside of the town. However, I rarely visited those empty properties to browse as my routine trips consisted only to visit clients, Protected people living in their accommodation. It's also unpractical to move all my possessions away, with the lack of workers to help me move."
Council members, on the other hand, were either rich from before time, or managed to grab the assets during the crumbling sovereignty. Stephanie didn't say this out loud for fear of microphones.
"Ah, I see, sometimes I'm thinking about the remaining prisoners. Just like Sandi, the one who replaced me when I was out."
Stephanie still remembered the day she arrived at the penitentiary. On a larger area where the dulling white ceramic tiles were not covered by parcels, a wooden desk, painted in the most eye-soring green possible, stood.
" The new guy still has a couple of years to serve time, by the way," Mark supplied.
What could be the world when that guy is out later? Will Stephanie and Mark still be alive? Would Val and Gema still be alive? Would Annisa and Lila still be confined at home? Would Pak Maryono finally find his son?
She chose a light reply. "He could grab any empty property, too, I guess," she smiled.
"I think so. But in the case of empty houses, how about the property deeds?" he scrunched his nose when thinking. Stephanie found it adorable.
"Physical assets no longer concerned the dead. And that was how life was fragile and fleeting."
~*~
The glinting sunlight peeked through the closed blinds of her darkish room. Almost eight, but she still hadn't come to. It usually crept in little by little from a distant dream till poking her awake.
No alarm this morning, no. No morning clients on the weekends, so Saturdays were for herself to wake up at any time she pleased. The low humming of the AC compressor filled the background, continuing to lull her to sleep. And why were the blanket and pillowcases the softest the minutes when she started waking up? Oh, the irony to the obscene amount of hours she took tossing in bed before sleep took her.
What a traitor her mind was. Rejecting falling asleep, but once done it was difficult to make it to wake up.
She cracked open one eye. With that, came one notification on her phone. Wh—
Lila.
Four words.
One session today, please?
Stephanie let that sink in her grappling mind. Out of habit to have her current clients' schedule on top of her mind, she counted that Lila had three sessions remaining. Based on this request, it meant they'd have to meet only two more times after today.
The only reason why she was allowed to continue the sessions with a Council member's wife was probably petty enough. The Department of Commerce would not like to be the receiving end of the complaint if this wife reported this to the husband that her consensual visits were terminated early. A leeway for Stephanie to keep investigating, then.
But Stephanie had emphasised she'd be there for her, so if Lila wanted it to be today, then today it was.
She proceeded with pouring her overnight cold brew into her drinking jar. Ice cubes clinked when she stocked it up to the brim. Some soy milk—because similar to pastry sheets, almond was nowhere to be found let alone processed—came next to finish her morning coffee ensemble.
She grabbed her outfit for today—always had an outfit planned for the day to reduce the cognitive load because mornings were times to quietly prepare not rush—then showered quickly. Somehow it was nice to dress up occasionally on the weekends so she wouldn't have to be clad in loungewear for the whole day.
Her maroon turtleneck wrapped her body nicely but the jeans could do with some tugs at the waist. Cooking at home served its best perk for her slimmer body. She looped a narrow-width belt around it to finish her looks. Checking her reflection in the mirror, she gave a final nod to the ensemble then headed out.
Her eyes caught onto the graveyard of the buses that she just passed on her way to this bus stop before picking up the last chapter on her e-book reader. A civilisation so advanced, designed to sustain over seven billion people, and the only way to destroy it was just by dropping its supporters to almost a quarter. A civilisation that had excelled way past its dependency on nature, and yet replaced it with the dependency on humans. A self-feedback loop. Thus, when they were gone, so was the structure.
Amidst the initial terror and steady adjustment to its new normal, or what some people rather called it 'post-apocalyptic era', darkness still found a crack to pervade the heart of humanity. The lack of people, the craving for social contact, the global crisis that put everyone on different boats, didn't put the ego and evil tendency of a human's heart to rest.
They all thought that with the only two hundred million citizens in the world, humankind will curb their destructive appetite, leaving it wayside. But, honestly, whoever said that to be true might never have read history properly.
There was a sense of urgency she felt seeping out of those Lila's four words. This time, she wouldn't leave it to assumptions.
Stephanie scrunched her nose knowing all devil works were still at large even when they were humbled by the virus. Wars never ceased, they only evolved with technological advancement.
She then closed a chapter in her e-book reader with one motivation before the bus driver hit the break.
The bus door opened. Only Stephanie got on while nobody hopped off. She set out with the expectation of understanding what Lila's problem was by the end of the session.
When Stephanie reached Lila's house, the air smelled of disinfectant scent, probably from Damar's trip. The health protocol still required the Immune to sanitise their belongings and change their clothes when they reached home if they lived with Protected people.
"Nice blouse," Lila commented. "It must feel nice to wear something for other people to see."
"Thank you. You did inspire me to wear more flowery outfits. Your husband's in?" Stephanie asked, removing her light jacket to drape it on her forearm.
Lila rolled her lower lip between her teeth. "He was. Now he's out again. Why?"
"No, I just . . . Probably your husband just arrived, by the disinfectant smell."
Lila gulped, her eyes rounded. She quickly regained her cheery composure and forced out a soothing tone. "Nothing, it's totally nothing. You don't smell anything here. I've got an old woodsy vanilla candle, it will do."
She rushed to an antic cabinet with wrought iron as the handles. Her subtly shaking grip forced it to move outwards. It was jammed.
The calm facade dropped quickly "What's wrong with this shelf? It shouldn't be."
She rocked the handle up and down in hope of shaking the stuck rusty part to finally unlatch. Stephanie watched this unroll before her eyes for a few seconds. Why did Lila only use her right hand? Surely using both hands should exert more force. She couldn't hold her tongue anymore.
"Stop," she implored.
"No, this damn shelf must be unlocked," Lila answered with a steadily increasing voice.
"There's no lock on it, Lila. Let's talk about something else," Stephanie said calmly, unaffected by the bleeding panic from her hostess.
"But the candle. The candle is still inside, Steph. I must get the candle," she insisted. A sheen watery layer formed on her eyeballs.
If Stephanie were an animal that could exude soothing hormones by smell alone she would do that to calm Lila down. Her scent glands would be firing on all cylinders. But she ended up lilting, "You don't need to mask the odour."
Stephanie knew. The uneasiness feeling deep in her heart, what some people called intuition, pointed her in the right direction. This time, she couldn't shake it loose. When her client started acting dramatically against a simple scent that was completely normal in a household, she couldn't wave the suspicion away.
She lurched across the distance and tapped her finger pads on the lady's forearm. "Lila."
A weird reflex caused her left shoulder to flinch, an opposite side of the forearm Stephanie touched. She scrunched her nose but didn't comment on it.
Lila still fought her way to open the stuck shelf. Her shoulders shook. Stephanie thought it was due to the physical effort to joggle that piece of wood, until she caught a drop of tear creating a meandering rivulet on Lila's cheek.
"Lila," her tone became more soothing yet still urgent. "Let go. Let's talk."
"No, I'm fine," her tone raised to the point that contradicted the message. "I'm okay, Steph, I just need this to open and I'm good."
She wasn't anywhere good. Her choked breath evidenced the bottled up feelings that were now on the loose. For Stephanie to view, but not to comment.
"Hey," she whispered to bring the overall tension down. Her wrist moved toward Lila's back, rubbing small circles over the denim blouse Lila wore.
"Shall we talk?" Stephanie coaxed her again softly.
Glimmering mucus threatened to drop from Lila's nostrils. Stephanie saw an opportunity to unclench Lila's death grip over the iron. She carefully uncurled Lila's fingers and clamped her hand around Lila's wrist to slowly bring her to the tissue box. It lay on the foyer table.
She waited for Lila to finish blowing her nose and throwing the balls of tissue into the rubbish bin.
"Are you alright?"
The lady shook her head and shot her a pleading glance, which Stephanie couldn't resist. "Help me." Her voice was almost inaudible.
"Is there any place we can talk safely?" Stephanie darted her eyes around. Was this related to the spying devices that might be installed everywhere in this room?
Lila made a gesture to follow her. She walked to the back door. Then, she ushered Stephanie to the sliding door half-covered by grey curtains over white lace.
"We should talk outside."