The phone yanked me out of sleep.“ I should’ve unplugged it,” I muttered, dragging the pillow over my head. The ringing stopped, then started again insistent, like a drip you can’t find.
My parents were in Johor for the week, so no one else would pick up. I shuffled to the living room and snatched the receiver.
“Hello.”
“Good afternoon, darling!” A woman’s voice—bright, familiar. No need for introductions.
“Good sleep?” she asked. “I think so—until you called.” I squinted at the alarm clock. “You know what time it is?” My head was still heavy from a strange dream I couldn’t hold onto.
“A case,” she said. “Ready to take another one?”
“Oh, Susan… I just completed mine last night. Seven nights in a row. I need a break, lah. You asked the others?”
“Yep. Nobody wants this one.”
“Why?”
“Can’t talk details on the phone. But you’ll like it.”
“A reject, is it? So everyone says no and you think I’ll say yes.” She laughed.
Susan might be our agency’s clerical assistant on paper, but she ran the board like an air-traffic controller. I’d met the owner twice Susan I heard from daily. She knew our limits—and when to push them.
“Well, I know you,” she said. “If you don’t take this, I’ll have to tell the family, and they’ll be devastated. You know it’s not right. How can we say no when they need us?”
“Okay, stop.” I rubbed my eyes. “Give me the details. When am I coming in?”
“Tonight. Usual time, eight to eight. National University Hospital.” She rattled off the diagnosis and the name of the family contact, her voice falling into that clipped, steady rhythm she saved for hard cases.
When I hung up, the flat fell quiet so fast it buzzed. Almost noon. I needed more sleep. Tonight would be another long one. Abandoned cases always stretched the hours—thin and mean.
Why do I always end up with the ones everyone else refuses? Because I don’t choose. The agency calls I say yes. And yes has a way of finding the difficult. I set the alarm and crawled back into bed. The pillow was still warm. My eyes closed before I could think twice, and the dream found me again.
Weeks had gone by without it, but it always came back the same way. I’m in the kitchen, arguing with Mom about Dad. She’s relentless accusing him of seeing some young girl, of hiding something from her.
If it’s not Dad, it’s one of my brothers, my sisters, or the in-laws. Poor Anita gets the worst of it. She’s too timid to answer back, and I’ve seen her cry in silence. I tell her, “Mom’s not well… you know that,” and she just nods, like that makes it easier.
When I finally speak up, Mom turns on me. “Ungrateful! I took you back into this house and this is what I get? Why can’t you support me for once?”
“Mom, please… must we start this again?”
“Where are you going?” she screams.
“For a run.” I’m running again this time in the stadium. Round and round, in an endless cycle. I can’t go on like this. I need to get out. This stadium is driving me crazy. It doesn’t matter where—just out.
The familiar voice again: Head toward the mountain. Mountain? I see no mountain. Look again… There. Do you see it?
Yes—I see it now. Good. Head straight to the mountain. Do not stop until you reach the top. How will I know when I’ve reached it?You will know. Don’t stop running, you hear?
I’m on the mountain now. Do you see the path? Yes.Just follow it up. Do not look back. You must never look back.
First stop an old man, sitting under a tree, eyes closed. “Salutation to you, Sir. Is this the top of the mountain? I must get to the top.” He opens his eyes, shakes his head, and points toward another path.
“Follow it,” he says.
Second stop another old man, same posture, same silence. “Salutation to you, Sir. Is this the top?” Again, he shakes his head, points me onward.
Third stop… fourth stop… it goes on and on. An endless climb. Each old man looks like the last, says the same thing: You will know.
Then suddenly, the next stop is different. No old man. A middle-aged man and a young boy crouch over a white dove with a broken wing. They don’t look up as I pass. Beyond them, an old hut leans into the slope. A middle-aged woman stands in its doorway.
Our eyes meet. Somehow, I know her. I’ve seen her before but I can’t remember where.
Her hands rest lightly against the doorframe, fingers curled, as if she knows I’ll come closer. Somewhere deep in my chest, I know her. I’ve seen her before in a crowd, in a passing bus window, maybe in another dream but the memory slips away when I reach for it.
“You’re running again?” she asks.I nod. “Come,” she says, her voice low, but it carries over the wind.I step inside. The air smells of woodsmoke and rain.Then the walls sigh and fall away. The small room stretches into a vast white hall held up by plain pillars. The floor is cool under my feet, smooth as stone worn by centuries. The sound of my steps echoes back, as though the hall is listening.We move toward a wall lined with small, closed doors in neat rows.
She stops, opens one, and draws out a small parcel wrapped in dried leaves, the fibres dark with age. A string of twisted bark holds it shut.She places it in my hands. It is heavier than it looks. The leaves smell faintly of earth after rain, and it is warm, as though it’s been sitting in sunlight.
“Keep this with you at all times. You don’t have to run anymore.”
“Have I reached the top of the mountain?” My voice sounds thin, like it’s travelling a long way to reach her. She glances around, then back at me.
“Look at where you are do you think you have? That” she points to the path I entered by, “—is your exit point.”
Before I can ask what she means, the room dissolves. I’m back on the stadium track.
The ringing gets louder closer until I realise it isn’t the stadium at all.
