chapter 37

Tim, who vowed to come back tomorrow morning since it was already late at night – threatened to kill him before he dies of an internal illness if he had a drop of beer after he was discharged – After Beckman somehow took Clara out, Jude was lying blankly facing the ceiling in the ward with the lights off.

Rather than the last words of the little girl he just parted with, the words he heard way earlier kept stirring his head. It seemed like he could hear a small scream in the corner of his heart that he should not step further, but it did not stop voluntarily. When Tim that keeps attracting his attention in front of him and other people disappeared, the feeling just stuck together and grabbed the back of his head and didn’t let go.

-It is our own world.

-This is our own world.

Have you ever had a silly get-together with other kids in your childhood? No, that’s not it. It’s not like that. This is, something a little closer than that. Something more fundamental, more deeply conscious. The boy’s voice, which he clearly don’t remember, kept whispering in his ears.

-This is our own world…….

It was clearly a voice calling for him. But oddly enough, the familiarity felt in the words was too much. I can’t believe I don’t remember such a familiar voice. It was an incomprehensible word, but the feeling was exactly the same. Tossing and turning on his bed, Jude finally let out a short sigh into the air. The air in the hospital room was warm enough, but one corner of his chest was frighteningly cold. All of the sudden, the rims of his eyes became hot.

-This is our own world.

There is no more. I don’t know what it is, but the voice was now inaudible. That was all he could tell. Was it something you shouldn’t have forgotten? As opposed to the unconvincing heat gathering near his neck, his heart was frozen stiff. He couldn’t understand. Why would his body shake so much at pieces of words that he doesn’t even know the meaning of? With one shake of the head, Jude closed his eyes, dispersing the heat. While he was unconscious, he felt like he saw something in that sticky darkness. Something he doesn’t want to think about.

When small footsteps were heard in the silence, Jude’s body was paralyzed. The sound of walking from the end of the hallway was magnified slowly. Is it a nurse doing a midnight rounds? The quiet footsteps weren’t in much of a hurry. In the silence, even the breath is heard so clearly, as the sound of the footsteps gradually came closer; close enough to alarm his whole body. When he felt that the calm, restrained sound had grown so loud that it could no longer grow, it stopped abruptly in front of Jude’s ward.

Jude breathed a long, long sigh at the feeling of certainty.

Soon the door opened little by little, and a silhouette floated into the bluish darkness. Upon confirming the silhouette, the blond detective clicked his tongue without even realizing it.

“Yeah, you again.”

“You were awake.”

The delicate smiling face could be identified only by the weak streetlight outside. The door closed without a sound. The platinum-haired young man, wearing horn-rimmed glasses, quickly approached Jude’s side. The gesture of sitting in the chair was so natural, and Jude turned to him with an unfavorable face.

“Why again. How do you know I’m here?”

“Gee, don’t be angry. I just came here because I heard you were sick.”

“Who the hell is this guy…… I’m going to report to my superiors and investigate the spy.”

“Ahhaha, don’t be so angry. He doesn’t do much other than report on you.”

The neat face, which was smiling clearly, soon clouded a little after taking a glance at Jude. With smiling eyes, Alvin swept Jude’s head lightly.

“Are you okay? You don’t look well.”

“Oh, it would be amazing if a person who has collapsed from a stomach cramp had a good complexion.”

“No, it’s not like that.”

“Ha? Then what is it?”

“Something’s bothering you? That’s the kind of face you have. You can’t even sleep till this hour.”

“……you, are you wearing some kind of necrotizing antenna? How come you only come in time for those rare moments when I’m in a bad mood?”

A low laugh rang once, and the touchy hand smoothed Jude’s hair. As the cool hand moved on to the side of his face, which had been burning up just now, it doesn’t feel too bad. Rather, his eyes were about to close, and the voice whispered thinly in his ear.

-This is our own world, our own, our own.

His eyebrows narrowed by itself, and a low yet soft question came from the side.

“What’s wrong, Detective? Did something bad happen to you?”

“……noisy…….”

“Gee, I thought I was talking low enough.”

“No, it’s not that……….something keeps whispering in my head………..”

Suddenly, he felt very tired. It was true that he had been tired since he collapsed, but the straps he had been holding on to seemed to break one by one. He didn’t want to hear this voice anymore. It was clearly tightening his heart. The nerves in his head were all messed up. The hand that was stroking his hair came down and touched his cheek. Through that hand, the fever that drove back to his neck went out a little, and Jude gave out a small sigh.

“Are you all right?”

“……it’s comfortable except that I can’t sleep.”

“Did you remember anything when you were a kid?”

“……I don’t know.”

“You don’t know, do you hear what the voice said?”

“I don’t know……I don’t know anything, but I shouldn’t have done something…”

I think I did something I shouldn’t have done. Something that should never be done. Swallowing the words, Jude bit his lips once. Alvin stole his attention again, as he tried to close his eyes.

“You don’t remember much about your childhood, do you?”

“Are you expecting me to tell you about it?”

“I don’t think you’re going to tell me.”

I hate you at any rate – and when Jude looks askance at him with his eyes, Alvin laughed. This guy, he’ll never stop trying to dig it out even if I didn’t tell him one day. He’s about 20 light years away from the good-natured Tim. Jude shook his head once while lying down, and spat it out in a flat voice.

“It’s just a very fragmented scene. The image of a house, the image of an old man, and the screen that was reddish. Don’t ask me what that red thing is, I don’t know. It’s just those pieces that remained, and I don’t remember specific people or events.”

“After only remembering those images, and then all of a sudden, the voice came up today? What did the voice talk about?”

“……I’m not sure what it is.”

-This is our own world.

-Our own….

“I don’t know, but even though I don’t know…”

The eyes heated up again. He didn’t know why. He couldn’t even express it in front of Tim, and he was desperate to push it inside even when he was alone, but the intense feeling that could not be accurately determined by a few words, filled his chest and overflowed because of this blue-gray-eyed man. Before it became uncontrollable, Jude clenched his molar and spat.

“Get out.”

“It’s all right.”

“I didn’t think we were close enough to show this. Get out, before I call someone.”

“It’s all right.”

Reciting the same word, Alvin slowly swept Jude’s forehead. Slapping the hand a little roughly, Jude rose from his bed with his body that was a bit hard to move. The pale gray eyes did not even budge with the eyes glaring at them.

“Get out. Don’t make me say it again.”

“Detective, it’s okay. I’m not going to tell anybody about this. Because I don’t want to share it with anyone. So, it’s okay.”

Speaking in a voice like memorizing poetry, Alvin gently swept across the back of Jude’s shoulder. As if comforting and soothing him, his gaze and touch were amiable. Jude’s eyes, which were looking at his face with a tense body, soon seemed to be slightly distorted, and then hid under his right hand.

“Then, it wasn’t supposed to be…”

The hand touching his back pulled him with a force that was not so strong. The touching bodies, unlike the cool hands, was a bit warm. A voice that sounded like music, asked from beside his ear.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know……but I shouldn’t have. I knew, but I still did it. I don’t know what I did, I don’t know, but I feel like I’ve let something big, something that shouldn’t have been removed, disappear with my own hands, and keep…”

-This is our own world, I promise.

The tears escaped no matter how hard he tried to suppress it with his throat. The boy’s voice stimulated the area of guilt, which had hardly been stimulated since his memory lost. It was a painful emotion which can be felt through his lungs, and Jude was thrilled to feel both unfamiliar and familiar at the same time.

“I had to……no, I don’t know……but……that was, that was what I did…….”

“Shh-shh. It’s okay, you don’t have to think about it right away. You can just rest now.”

A kind voice seized his crushing spirit and melts it away. You can just rest. The words filled his mind with strange clarity. As he breathed in a wet breath, he idly placed his chin on his shoulder, and that sweet voice echoed again.

“By the end of the night, you’ll feel much better. After a good night’s sleep…..I mean, after a rest. So, sleep at ease…….okay?”

You’ll feel better after a nap. The sentence penetrated sharply into his head. And at the same time, his eyes closed as he was relaxed. Why, is it because I was buried in the voice of the young man in front of me? The boy’s voice was no longer heard. Rather, he wanted to hear his voice than the boy’s. It may be annoying, but it wasn’t painful.

Lying down slowly as Alvin led him, Jude snapped at him.

“Say something.”

“What do you mean?”

“Anything………so that I can get some sleep.”

The curve of his eyes bent gently. Jude pulled up the quilt and closed his eyes, and the musical voice began to ring quietly in the room.

“I recently went on a trip to LA…”

“Oh, don’t include bloodshed, murder, and hatred when you’re talking. I’m afraid it will come out in a dream.”

He heard Alvin laughing as he made that remark.

“Okay, I’ll only talk about the general landscape. Even in LA, the non-urban areas were pretty quiet and peaceful. Like Mrs. Rice’s town, people get along well. Most of all, it’s a place where the home meal is really delicious. I think I gained more weight there…..”

He couldn’t not be tired after hitting and running around all day. Moreover, the voice was now so faint that it could no longer strains his nerve. The whole body quickly fell into a sweet sleep, and Jude did not resist.

– By the time Alvin’s voice, which had been echoing like a velvety whisper in his ears, was cut off, something soft seemed to touch his cheek.