He found himself in a state of confusion. One moment, he was at the CSE department, and the next, he was seated in a café, slouching with indifference and staring out the window.
Penelope and Alicia were in front of him. Penelope was rambling incessantly about trivial and nonsensical topics, while Alicia, having succumbed to Penelope's persistence, feigned interest, her eyes wandering aimlessly.
He inwardly criticized himself for his momentary lapse of judgment and emotional vulnerability. It seemed he still held onto a semblance of trust and friendship with Penelope. She had taken advantage of this and brought him to a café near the university.
Initially, he believed there might be something important to discuss, but as time passed, Penelope had yet to broach any significant topic. Realizing that staying here was a pointless waste of time, he contemplated getting up to leave when Penelope finally spoke up.
"Oh! That reminds me! I don't know if you guys are aware already, but Max is also here."
There was a clatter, followed by the crashing sound of falling utensils from their table. Penelope didn't even bat an eye at the other two's abnormal reaction. She merely crouched to pick up the plates and forks that had fallen and looked deeply at Alicia, who evidently had the biggest reaction. Alicia, though, avoided her gaze as best as she could. She picked up the utensils alongside Penelope, albeit quivering in her actions.
Since her hands were shaking so much, she kept dropping what she was picking. Unable to stand it any longer, Penelope pushed her back onto her seat after carefully observing her palms for any visible injuries and then cleaned the place up by herself.
Fortunately, they were made of plastic, so they hadn't been damaged. She apologized to the other customers before turning to Alicia with a concentrated gaze.
"That was one over-the-top reaction. I may have expected an unsavory one from Ez, but Lisa, what's the matter with you?"
Alicia clasped her trembling palms tightly near her chest. With a pained and scrunched-up expression, she spoke softly,
"Are there-- Is-is there... anyone else here beside him...?"
Penelope sighed, bringing the girl into a tight embrace,
"I only know of Max... But what are the chances of everyone converging on this university? Now, Lisa, why are you so worked up, darling? This is a brand new chapter in your life. You don't know how happy I was when I saw both of you here. You were the most passionate about this field back then. Just focus on the now, am I right?"
Alicia remained unresponsive to Penelope's words, seemingly lost in her own thoughts. Gently pushing Penelope away, she spoke with a dazed tone,
"Let me go, Penelope. I'll... I'll see you around, okay..."
"But, Lisa, listen-"
"I'll be going now. I'll settle the bill at the counter, so don't worry."
"Wait, Lisa-"
Alicia stood up resolutely, not allowing any further discussion on the matter.
Penelope sighed helplessly at the sight. She turned back to Ezra, who was looking at her with a complicated expression.
"I might have been too forceful, wasn't I?"
Ezra hummed in reply. Penelope pursed her lips, and her eyebrows drew together, creating a slightly comical expression of irritation.
"Ezra, look. I understand you might not want to hear this, and I risk being hated for saying it. But please, don't put all the blame on her. Can't you see she's reaching her breaking point?"
"I haven't done anything like that in front of you. Why are you singling me out?"
"I don't trust your character enough to believe you won't do so behind my back."
Ezra grew annoyed and almost livid at hearing that. Not at Penelope's request, nor at Alicia. He didn't even care about Max. He was frustrated because Alicia seemed more broken, even though he was the one who couldn't bring Micaela back despite everything. He had made Alicia lie one last time. Though he claimed he didn't hold any hope, the truth remained that he was desperate.
Desperate because he had promised himself that he would give up entirely if the lie failed to work this time. So he really wanted it to work. But it didn't. 'You could kill people with a lie. But the dead can never be revived, no matter the effort put in.'
In his decision to completely let go, the sight of Alicia looking even worse than their last meeting fueled his anger. The hung-up expression on her face didn't offer any relief from the heavy, burdensome emotions he carried.
The incident kept replaying in his mind, and Penelope mentioning Max only added to the turmoil. If Alicia were to endure more, she might end up like him—trapped in an endless abyss of torment.
Despite convincing himself that he hated Alicia, the truth was that he still considered her a close friend, someone he cared deeply about. Deep down, he understood it wasn't her fault; it had been an honest mistake on her part. Yet, he sought an outlet for the pain he faced and the emotional turmoil he was going through.
He found himself caught in the grip of his emotions, lashing out despite his earnest desire to stop. Forgiveness and forgetting felt like elusive ideals, with his heart emerging as his greatest adversary. Unredeemable mistakes cast a long shadow, and the prospect of losing her was something he couldn't bear.
His actions, however shameless and unscrupulous, concealed a pathetic longing to shield her from profound pain. In an attempt to rein in his tumultuous emotions, he engaged in a dialogue with himself. Recognizing that Alicia couldn't dictate her own feelings, he acknowledged that her actions were unintentional provocations.
Releasing a sigh that carried the weight of weariness, he confessed, "I don't intend to continue down this path. In fact, I want to minimize my presence in her life. Every encounter between us leads to mutual hurt, pushing us beyond the bounds of reason. If this persists, we might inflict substantial harm upon each other."
Penelope was taken aback by Ezra's words. Sensing an underlying turmoil in his behavior, she cautiously inquired, "Ezra, you returned recently, didn't you? But... forgive me if I'm mistaken, this doesn't feel like the first meeting between the two of you since your return."
Ezra nonchalantly shrugged, shedding his usual arrogance to expose a vulnerability rarely glimpsed in the tough exterior he typically presented. A tight, almost forced smile adorned his face, reflecting a pain and helplessness that left Penelope at a loss for words. Speaking slowly, he voiced his frustrations, "Why won't she just die already... that Micaela. This is getting tiring and ridiculous."
"She is dead, Ez." Penelope replied solemnly.
"Why do you and Lisa- Alicia- Heathers. Yes, Heathers. Why do the two of you feel the need to remind me of that at every opportunity? Yeah. I know she is dead. No need to treat me like a kid. I was being symbolic, okay? Poetic, if you may. It's her memory I was referring to. M E M O R Y. Get it. Her memory is not dying."
Penelope almost snorted upon hearing those words.
"Why not refer to her as just Alicia."
"We are not close anymore. I plan to keep it that way, okay. Clearly, we are not at all gonna be healthy for each other's mental state if we continue to come across each other."
Ezra, the one playing the character, was looking at the text over Penelope's head the entire time. He then felt his head move upwards until his face faced the ceiling, his eyes fixed on a speck of nothingness in space, his expression contorting into one of nostalgia.
"Darn that Micaela... She's like that one permanent memory that just sticks to your brain, even if you want to forget her. I kid you not when I tell you that I thought of asking Alicia to make me forget that year more than a few times... But pathetic little me is still a major coward in the end and did not want to forget..."
After roughly running his hand through his hair in annoyance, he stood up and left the café. Penelope was somewhat too baffled to react. She blankly stared at the money Ezra had left on the table, paying for his order as well as Penelope's before he had left. Something in her mind clicked, and she sighed. Her expression held a semblance of pain and sympathy as she muttered to no one in particular,
"Ah... It was Micaela's birthday a few days ago, wasn't it? I suppose a lie was spoken that day."
Ezra stood outside the café, hands tucked into his pockets as he stared at the sky, reflecting on some seemingly fond memories. But the real Ezra was not reminiscing about anything.
He was shocked and surprised the whole time. Now that his body didn't have to be under much emotional distress due to his character facing unpredictable mood swings, he could think clearly for once,
'My body... It was able to move around freely for a little bit earlier, wasn't it?' This discovery was truly significant for him. He had suspected something a little while ago about why some of his body parts were under his control at times and completely out of his control at others.
He had a tentative guess, although uncertainty lingered. The recent incident offered some clues.
During the altercation with the fallen utensils, Penelope and Alicia were the central figures in the conflict. Initially, he remained motionless, seemingly uninvolved. However, as he was neither mentioned in the text nor required to facilitate the storyboard at that particular moment, he regained control over his body.
Yet, his autonomy was short-lived, as external control resumed when Penelope turned her attention to him.
Reflecting on these events, he considered various possibilities. It occurred to him that his ability to move might be linked to whether he was actively mentioned in the ongoing narrative. Another hypothesis was that, when his character wasn't pivotal to the unfolding plot, he could exercise control over his own movements again.
However, there was another conjecture lingering in his mind.
What if this world truly functioned like that of a novel? Perhaps, during that brief moment, the orchestrator behind this surreal narrative momentarily overlooked or neglected his character.
People tended to forget about peripheral matters when engrossed in something of significant interest or importance. It was a speculative thought, but considering the peculiar nature of his experiences, it wasn't entirely implausible.
Before delving deeper into this line of thinking, his surroundings blurred, and in the blink of an eye, he found himself back in his house.
Although the microwave's chime indicated that his food was ready, he remained seated on the sofa, enveloped in a daze of contemplation and introspection.