Mason got surprised and called him. Usually that man would say 'we are not that close enough to call each other’s names,' but he didn’t respond. It looks like he can’t even hear Mason’s voice.
“….hugh.”
Actually Noah wasn’t himself even before he got on the elevator.
Mason is dead. He already knew it, but when he admitted that and came out of the house, something felt distant.
When Noah thought about how absurd it was to feel déjà vu from Haley, he thought, ‘Mason is actually dead.’ When he thought about that, he started to feel the relationship between Haley and Mason is not important anymore. Everything felt annoyed and futile. Who cares? Mason is dead already. He’s probably getting all his keepsakes. And who cares if it’s just a robbery?
After Noah came out from the house and walked towards the elevator, his head was definitely functioning reasonably. He couldn’t just cling on Mason forever, and whenever he hears Mason is going to that rubbish place like Afghan or Yemen, he prepared himself that this was going to happen. He thought of reasonable thoughts like, ‘So this is nothing, and since this happened, live light hearted.’ It’s fine. It is fine. I think I’m finer than I thought. Noah continuously murmured to himself. It’s fine. It’s fine. –If he kept thinking about it, he thought he will be fine. His body felt heavy like it’s drowning under the ocean, but he thought he’s fine.
But when the elevator stopped and the light turned off, his body started to shiver. It was like he went back to 7 year old self when he was shoved in the bag. He couldn’t breathe, it was hot and cold, and he felt like he’s going to go mad. His body was trembling, sweating cold sweat, and breathing was heavy.
He thought he wanted someone to rescue him, but there was no one.
Mason is dead. Now no one will take me out of that traveling luggage case. I won’t be able to get out of that bag forever. Noah wanted to scream that his one and only savior have died, but he couldn’t move his lips like someone had sewed his lips.
My throat is choking, I can’t breathe, it's painful like I'm going insane, but there is no one. No one or nothing will save me. No one will save me. Continuously. Continuously. Until I die.
Noah held his breath because of this rushing fear. That moment when his mind was getting blank.
“…….”
(Swipe) A little bit of air blew and Noah met a pair of eyes that was looking at him. And,
(Slap!)
There was a flash. Slap! Slap! Slap! The sound of slapping continued. With an indifferent face, Haley’s face was right in front of my nose. He was countlessly slapping my two cheeks with his two hands.
“…. ….I am, awake, ….hey…”
Noah tried to talk with his mouth that was not moving. It was still flashing. Haley knew Noah was awake, but he was continuously slapping his two cheeks. Like he’s avenging what happened in the house.
“Are you okay? Huh? Well, it looks like you’re still not okay.”
Mason was staring directly at the eyes of Noah that were coming back to focus, but he ignored them and kept slapping his face. Noah murmured, ‘This fucker….’ Noah forcefully moved his frozen arm and roughly got rid of his hand.
“Ah… Now it looks like you got better.”
Mason’s hand got forcefully taken off and smiled like nothing happened putting his hand up. Noah glared at him like is this son of a bitch playing around? But Mason just asked back with his eyes wide opened.
“Why? Well, I was really surprised too. Suddenly you held your chest and panted. I couldn’t even carry you out so to make you wake up, I unconsciously. –Well, you don’t have like asthma, right?”
While he was hitting him, Mason slapped him few more times with some feeling in it. He emphasized it was ‘inevitable choice’ and played the innocent. Noah knew the truth, but he wasn’t in a situation where he can complain about that. He bit his pale lips and said.
“….I just have a light fear of being in a narrow and dark place.”
“Really? It didn’t look that light though.”
Claustrophobia, is it something like this? Mason purposely said it indifferently, and Noah frowned and glared at him. His eyes were like, what is this bastard? But in this kind of situation, the one who he needs is not a scrupulous non-professional just an indifferent idiot, so Mason pretended not to know and asked.
“Do you not have your medicine?”
“…. I was trying to change the medicine that I was taking….”
“Xanax? You don’t take that anymore?”
“…..”
This time he didn’t answer his question. He had a face ‘why am I talking useless thing with you.’ He frowned and bit his lips, and it looked that the previous questions were answered because he was not right in his mind.
Mason scratched his cheek. His expression got better, and both of his cheeks got swelled so it looks like he has some color, but he was still not normal. Although he got better, it was compared to before when he couldn’t breathe. His breathe was still heavy and sweated cold sweat.
“…..Should I hold your hand?”
They didn’t have any medicine and didn’t know when they will be going out. He won’t like it, but Mason asked. Noah looked at him like he heard something crazy.
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I'm BAAAAACK guys! Thanks for waiting! Did you guys noticed? I changed the cover picture of Kill the Lights! I think the picture on the left is Noah Raycarlton and picture on the right is Mason Taylor and Haley Lusk