8:43 AM
Claire stood outside the faculty room, her fingers tightening around the spine of their hardbound thesis.
The weight of it wasn't just physical.
The glue on it is still warm, the ink is still fragrant, but the pride she was told she'd feel never came. Instead, her arms ached like she'd been carrying a coffin.
The glass door gleamed with sterile polish. She watched her distorted reflection waver on its surface, unsure if the girl staring back was still her.
She finally decides to step in. The room brushed off cool air with the smell of paper, old coffee, and exhaustion. Desks were a scattered shrine to burnout, coffee-stained syllabus, crumpled feedback sheets, half-dead plants in chipped mugs. Even the walls looked like they'd given up.
Claire approached the desks, her voice barely audible.
"Good morning, ma'am."
She placed the approval sheet carefully on the table, as though it might shatter. The staff barely glanced. A nod here. A distracted grunt there. No eye contact. No warmth.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket.
Claire, please pa sign if naa na ka sa faculty.
Dai, ikaw lang usa muadto ha. Dili jud ko maka ara.
Ay thanks kaayo, Claire. Grabe ka naning!
They always responded when it was convenient. When things were already done. A cold chuckle slipped into her chest but didn't escape. She bit down on it and sent her reply.
Okay. I'm already here.
One of the professors finally looked up, furrowing his brow.
"Why were you late in submitting this?"
Her smile felt like a mask left out in the sun, dry and cracked.
"The printing shop was full, sir. I had to wait."
A pause. He tapped his pen, a clear sign of disapproval.
"You should've planned better. That's not an excuse."
Still, he signed. The scrawl was quick and pitiful in how impersonal it felt. It was permission without acknowledgment. She should've felt relief. Instead, it left her hollow, like a space had opened inside her where joy was supposed to be.
She sat down, the metal chair creaking under her. Her spine refused to rest. Her eyes floated toward the wall clock. It ticked with uneven rhythm, like a failing heartbeat.
9:26 AM
Time slowed, syrup-thick. Her body was present, but her mind wandered. To the moon, to pages filled with scribbled prayers disguised as data, to nights when the world didn't quite feel real.
The door creaked open.
Lian.
He walked in like a breeze slipping through a crack, careless and unaware of the pressure he carried with him. He held a paper cup and a folder, but his eyes locked on her the moment he stepped in.
"Your research? You really did all the work yourself again, huh?"
Claire didn't answer.
He pulled up a chair beside her without asking. His tone was light, teasing. But his gaze lingered.
Then, softly: "You know, I heard someone talking to the moon the other night. Real poetic stuff."
Her breath caught.
"...What?"
He shrugged. "Maybe it was a dream. Or maybe I just imagined it. You know how stress gets weird. Makes the mind do strange things."
"You? Stressed? You always look happy..."
He leaned in even more, a playful smile on his face.
"So you've had your eyes on me all along? That explains the strange but pleasant feeling I'd get on my back whenever I see you at the library."
Claire looked slightly confused, flustered even, though she dismissed it like it was just another one of his usual jokes. Still, she couldn't shake the thought...
Did he really know about her talking to the moon the other night?
He sipped his drink, utterly unfazed.
But before she could respond-- before she could even begin to form a defense-- he stood.
"Anyway. It seems that Doctor Ignacio is still not around. I'll probably come back here this afternoon. See you around then, Claire!"
He left her with that hanging in the air. A single thread yanked loose from her carefully tied sanity.
She stared at the door long after it closed.
10:02 AM
The clock still ticked, but something about it felt off. As if the seconds were too far apart. Her thoughts, frayed and curling at the edges, folded back into themselves.
Had she really spoken aloud that night? Had she whispered things to the sky, to the clouds, to something behind them?
Or had the night spoken to her?
The door opened again.
"Claire?"
Of course. That thick scarf was draped around her neck, oddly heavy for the heat outside. Her eyes are tired, rimmed with dark circles, yet her features remained unshakably elegant. A beauty within her exhaustion.
No doubt, it is Selena. Her faculty professor.
Her voice broke through like warm light filtering through closed blinds. She entered gently, in contrast to the sterility of the room. Her scarf was thick and knitted, oddly heavy for the heat outside.
"I saw your message, I apologize, I had something to submit to the Administrator Office." She looked at her, her tone polite but brisk. "So you're here for the approval sheet?"
Claire stood, half-there.
"Yes, ma'am. For your signature."
"Alright, come with me."
Something about the weight of this moment felt heavier than it should. Maybe it was the silence that followed, or the way Selena's voice felt slightly colder than usual.
As they reached her desk, Claire handed over the manuscript, fingers brushing the paper with a hesitance she didn't quite understand.
She stood there, watching Selena take the document and began flipping the pages, and while reading their manuscript, she squinted slightly, brows knitting together.
"How are you feeling? You look... you look like you're not here."
Claire hesitated, the truth trembling just beneath her tongue.
"I'm… I don't know. I wake up and things feel slightly wrong. Like the walls breathe. Like the air folds in places it shouldn't. I think I'm stressed."
Selena didn't flinch. She leaned in closer, placing a hand on Claire's hand-- gentle, steady.
"Stress distorts things,"
Claire swallowed the lump in her throat.
"It makes you feel like reality has seams," she whispered.
"And they're starting to come apart."
Selena held her gaze longer this time.
"I believe you," she said quietly.
"Sometimes, when we're close to burning out… we see the things that don't want to be seen. But promise me. If it gets worse, or if the world bends too far, please talk to someone. Me, even."
Claire nodded, her eyes shimmering.
Selena signed without hesitation.
10:19 AM
The second Selena's pen touched paper, the air changed.
A flicker. Then another.
There are others in the building, she knew that. Hers and the others' footsteps that had echoed down the hall earlier. The cold and distant chatter that had hummed through the thin walls. But in that moment, she felt like she and Selena were the only ones left.
The only ones caught in whatever this was.
A silence had settled, not from absence, but from withdrawal. Like the world had quietly stepped back to let something else through.
The electric fan's hum slowed, deeper and labored, as if time itself was resisting movement. Pages on the nearby table fluttered, stirred by no breeze. The windows were sealed. The room was closed. Still, something moved.
Claire's pulse quickened.
The clock on the wall ticked once. Then froze. The second hand stilled mid-air, frozen, like its mechanical aspect had forgotten how it was designed to move.
Selena looked up.
"That's odd. I thought Sir Josh just changed the battery..."
Claire didn't answer. She couldn't. Something pressed against the edges of her perception, like a shadow waiting to step forward and bold enough to be felt.
The window beside the room shimmered like heat rising off pavement, only this came from cold glass. An illusion. A trick of the eye. Except Claire knew better.
It was watching.
She didn't know what, but it was.
Selena looked at her again, slower this time. She opened her mouth, then closed it, like she was deciding how much of her concern to share.
"Sometimes... stress isn't the only thing that sees us. Take care, Claire. And please be careful."
Claire blinked, startled. Those words lingered like a whisper not meant to be heard.
Outside, as she walks in the hallway heading to the school grounds.
She looked up, the sunlight reflecting in the glass panels above the roof began to hit her with strange intensity. White and clean and hollow.
She looked down. Her shadow stretched behind her-- off-beat, just a fraction too slow.
Claire didn't turn around. If she did, she feared something would be there. Or worse, that nothing would be.
The sky above was too still. And somehow, she felt like the world was beginning to blink.
Then--
A voice, smooth and sudden, cut through the silence behind her.
"You always walk like you're being followed by ghosts."
Claire froze.
She turned, slowly.
There he was again. Lian.
Leaning lazily against the wall like he'd been there for hours, arms crossed, his bag slung carelessly over one shoulder. His usual smirk played at the corners of his lips, but something in his eyes is telling her like he knew exactly what had just happened inside.
She tried to find her voice.
"How long have you been there?"
"Long enough to see you almost trip over your own shadow," he said, pushing off the wall with a stretch.
"You okay? You look like you just saw the sky blink."
She stared at him.
"What? Too poetic?"
He took a few steps toward her, then offered his hand like he was offering her to the moon.
"Come on, let's get lunch together! You look like you need something fried, greasy, and probably illegal in three countries.
She blinked, caught off guard.
He leaned in, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
"Also, I heard from that one auntie from the canteen that deep-fried foods can realign your chakras. Super scientific. But don't take it by heart, as she's one of Quiboloy's fanatics."
A laugh slipped from her lips. It was something unexpected, small, and real.
Lian grinned, seemingly victorious.
"There it is. I knew you still had a laugh under that tired face"
She rolled her eyes, but something inside her softened. The weight didn't vanish, but it has shifted.
"Alright, but you're paying."
Lian gasped dramatically, placing a hand over his chest.
"Ouch. No thank you for rescuing you from the spectral weight of academia?"
"You didn't rescue me. You stalked me."
"And yet, you're still walking beside me. Interesting." he said, falling in step beside her
They walked in tandem beneath the late morning sun.
Two shadows, no longer out of sync, finally moving at the same rhythm.
The strange shimmer in the air faded. The school ground became vibrant and warmer. The dog sitting in the guard house at the nearby parking lot barked in the distance, a student sneezed nearby, people suddenly flocking in her eyes, and the world slowly slipped back into its regular rhythm.
10:19 AM
She was not alone anymore.
Just for a little while
Everything felt normal again.