Early in the morning, Harris showed up at the door of the editorial office. He wasn't wearing a uniform, yet he acted like the ones with it when the matter of my stuff slipped out of his mouth. I haven't even had a proper greeting to Gabriel nor Lucia and Neya—my two colleagues in the editorial office because he dragged me along with him until we were next to the Flower Bridge.
"Yours, isn't it?" Harris asked as he held up my canvas bag.
"It is!" I replied happily as I rushed to him. "Thank you!"
However, when I was about to take my bag back, Harris took it away. His gaze's to me as cold as the temperature of the dawn. I swallowed my saliva hard, stunned by the assumption whether he had seen the items in my bag.
"I found a sophisticated electronic device in your bag. Tell me, where are you actually from?"
His voice might be low, but his question was a sword pointed at my neck. Never before had my gratitude turned to nervousness so quickly.
I had doubts about whether it was the same man who I urged to look for my belongings. His personality was the exact opposite of what I had witnessed before. Either way, my answer would determine whether I was an enemy or a refugee.
"The future."
He turned to the side, chuckling. Then he jolted me by suddenly gripped my shoulders.
"Ow! Let go of me!"
I could see everyone's gazes on us, which made Harris glare at me. Quickly, I pushed his hand away as I said "I'm telling you the truth. If you can recognize that thing, you must know very well that it's much more modern than the communication devices used today."
He fell silent. But then, a smirk was etched on his lips.
"What the...?" I frowned as I stepped ahead.
The more steps I took toward him, the more I wanted to tug at the dark brown hair that covered part of his forehead. But unfortunately, his hand first caught mine in the air. He even chuckled.
"Miss Brissie, that's not a very nice way to thank me for helping me find your stuffs," he said, giving me an amused look.
I stood on tiptoe, ignoring his amused laugh and his witty stare which would never end. However amused he was, my heart would only be relieved if I smacked him on the head. But then something thwarted my plans.
Along with people's screams that made us look sideways, a bicycle rushed toward us. There was no time to think of a way to avoid the bicycle so I pushed Harris aside and I was about to prevent the cyclist from crashing into the railing of the bridge. However, the bicycle handle nudged me and made me fall to the ground.
...Or so I thought it would happen.
My body hit Harris's chest. We froze with interlocked gazes. Naturally, I would have risen and apologised. Yet somehow, those hazelnut eyes were as if to say that neither of us wished to rise.
I was deeply immersed in the solemnity of the soft golden light that shone on his face through the gaps in the bridge railing. The light moving slowly across his irises had me astonished. There's no certainty letting me know if I was blown away by that magical moment or the person who was a part of it.
"Hurry up and help him!"
Noisy chatter of people made me blink my eyes, get up, and turn my head in the direction of their hasty steps. The bicycle that almost hit us fell on someone who was none other than the cyclist. Bruises blemished his arms and ankles.
"How dare he rode a bicycle so recklessly."
I glanced briefly at Harris, who was standing patting off his slightly dusty clothes. "Where is the nearest clinic?" I asked.
"What?"
His question made me realize one thing. "Where is the nearest place to treat his wound?"
His gaze shifted to my index finger pointing at the crowd of people carefully moving the bicycle away from the cyclist's body.
***
"There have been two incidents at Flower Bridge already."
I turned to Harris as we both walked out of the ER. "So what?" I asked curtly.
He seemed to ponder, which reminded me of how much he had annoyed me. Since he didn't answer me immediately the location of the medical center, I rushed over to the crowd and asked them the same thing. I had no idea as to why he froze at such a crucial moment, but fortunately there was a nearby hospital, people said, who could treat the injured cyclist.
"Like the saying 'don't let the angel of death call your name three times', what happens the third time will be the ultimate," he said. "Well, that's not to say that I believe it so worry not, Brissie."
I stared at him for a moment just to digest how he could still mispronounce my name after all the time. Oh, did we even spend that much time together?
I unintentionally let out a laugh, which made the man beside me turn around with a chuckle. That's when I stopped laughing and looked up at him in surprise. I thought he would be offended, but instead he held out my bag with a light smile.
"I like your kindness, Brissie."
His compliment made me even more unable to look away. It wasn't because of the praise nonetheless.
As he continued walking, he said again, "Do you aspire to be a hero?"
I was contemplated by his words. His job interview-like question made me wonder what it had to do with him freezing to see the cyclist in pain and when he plunged into the cold river that night. Plus, his expression gradually turned indifferent. I could never have guessed what he was thinking if he didn't show the slightest expression.
"I used to have a dream of becoming a doctor," I answered it anyway, "but my parents urged me to become an accountant."
When my gaze fell on the flower bushes on the side of the road, a question crossed my mind. How's life over there? Was it running or was it stopping, waiting for me as part of it to return?
Harris nodded his head. "I see."
He then looked up. "My uncle was a doctor before he becomes anything else. Many said he despised death because it had taken the lives of those he could've saved."
I listened to his story while occasionally looking up at the clear, blue sky.
"But if it's time for us to meet death, what else should we do other than follow it to the afterlife?"
He replied to my rhetorical question with a small grin. "Who knows? Maybe his dream was to be a doctor and an eternal god."
Laughter escaped our lips. Never have I relaxed like that, especially when I was with someone who looked similar to that cold-hearted guy. Sigh, just thinking about him reminded me of my struggle for the slightest chance at getting a remedy. Should I have just told him about his cross-dimensional twin?
Harris he kept his pace to stay beside me as he walked me to the editorial office. When we arrived at seven o'clock, everyone was looking at me intently. Gabriel was no exception.
As Gabriel walked to me, I felt a tap on my right shoulder.
"In return for my help finding your belongings, how about you stay away from that Old Man? He might teach you how to throw me over the river guardrail."
"Just go on your duty before before I assign duties in this office to you."
Gabriel's cold reply convinced me of how loud Harris's whisper was, yet Harris simply grinned.
"Bye for now, Brissie."
I shivered slightly when he whispered to me as he moved his hand away from my shoulder.
After Harris left the office, Gabriel immediately asked me to work in the same room as Gabriel, Lucia and Neya. It only took fifteen minutes for Neya to introduce me sections of the editorial office.
My fingers froze on the typewriter keyboard. It was hard to breathe. Why? It was because they all looked good at using typewriters, while I was still very wary of typing a word. What if I mistyped? How to delete it?
"Brissia, stop daydreaming and start typing."
"Please give me a minute."
Or maybe an hour. Realizing I was having a hard time, Neya came closer and asked, "Don't you have this at your place?"
I shook my head. Neya gave me a concerned look, even though she didn't know that the absence of typewriters in my place was due to modernization.
A pile of papers was put on my desk. Neya stood by my desk and said, "All right. Can you put this in the archives room in the back hall? There is a guidebook using a typewriter as well. Feel free to borrow it and study it later."
I looked at Neya with twinkling eyes. After thanking her, I excitedly carried the pile of papers down a passage that led to the archives room. Luckily, someone didn't send me into an empty room. I was still shudder to think it was a gateway through time.
Once in the wooden-floored hallway with beige walls, I found two doors. However, I forgot to ask which door would led me to the right place. Instead of turning back, I opened the door on the right.
What I saw when I entered the room weren't the shelves I had imagined. It was a large room with wall-sized windows and filled with gray desks. My arrival stopped the conversation and activities of the well-dressed people there, also weakened my arm muscles instantly.
I went back to the lecturer room.