Both of them stood there, their faces drained by the rain. The tree behind. Their figure could hardly be seen from all the mist and darkness surrounding them.
The boy faced the man, his short hair covering his forehead, reaching the top of his eyes.
"Why did you stop?" he accused the man. "Finish it."
Without hesitation, the man responded. "I stopped for a reason—"
But it was cut short by the boy.
"I said finish it!" he demanded in a more aggressive tone. "What good does being dishonest do to your heart? You know it's there, so just say it!"
Who was he? Nothing matched what the man pictured him as in the little time he had known him. Though, that didn't matter. Deep in his heart, he knew the truth. He was just too afraid to admit that. Even so, the man prepared to tell the boy about the end, deciding not to keep the truth from him anymore.
He took a deep breath.
"The world will end today," he told the boy. "Not just that, it ends in less than thirty minutes."
The last time he said that phrase, it was met with shock and disbelief, and yet, the boy in front of him behaved nothing like the woman who had heard that. He wasn't even fazed.
"Is that… it?" asked the boy, puzzled.
"You knew?" the man asked back, having the feeling of déjà vu. Though, the difference between that time and this one was that the confused response came before the revelation of the time, unlike now, which clearly came after.
"Of course I did. What, you thought that the reason I was excited was because I was oblivious to the world around me?"
The man gazed at the boy, his forehead slightly compressed.
"Then why are you happy?" he asked. Voice raw.
Did he ask how someone can be happy when the world is ending, or was it perhaps that he wanted the secret formula to feel that kind of warmth in his chest, too? It wasn't clear. Maybe both… Or maybe neither.
I have no idea. Never had.
The boy paused as he put his hand on his chin.
"Why am I happy?"
Pondering that question for some time, he gave his answer.
"Because there is no more time to feel that way."
"What do you—"
"I think you know exactly what I mean. You are just afraid to admit it."
The man didn't immediately probe for an answer, waiting there for seconds before he finally let his voice take over.
"Admit what?"
The texture of his voice was flat, but beneath, he was the furthest from what he could express.
The boy paused. With a serious expression on his face, he looked into the man's eye.
"That you want to live," he said, cutting deep into the man's soul.
The tightness in the man's chest intensified. He could barely feel the pain in his hand. All he felt was the thing inside him. It was unbearable. He could hardly gasp for air. His hands trembled as he felt the warmth entering his veins, he had fought so hard to keep it outside.
The boy put his hand on the man's shoulders.
"It's ok now. You can let it out," he said, his voice soft.
The man hunched over, almost falling to the ground as his right hand pressed against his chest so hard he could feel the pressure of his skin pushing against his ribcage. That pain, he could hardly bear it. Every time he made the slightest movement, he felt his heart stung as if thorns poked holes in it while they wrapped around his red flesh like a rusty metal cage.
His blood flowed, pumping his heart, warming him from the inside.
The man asked:
"Let out… ?"
Pausing for a little, he continued.
"What, my anger?" Frustrated, he tried to keep his body steady.
"Look at the tree! I've already done that."
He pointed at the tree with his left hand, leaning forward.
The boy glanced at the tree, spending some time looking at it, and then came back to him.
"I have told you before. I have seen you. I know what you had done with that tree even before I came here."
"Then why did you ask what happened?" The man kept his hand on his chest.
"Because I wanted to see who you are." He briefly paused, then continued. "And when I saw you, I was disappointed," said the boy, caressing the man's shoulders.
"Huh? What—"
"But I wasn't disappointed in you." He cut him off. "I was disappointed in what made you feel that way. The thing that told you that it's ok to die like that. I was disappointed in that."
"…"
There was a brief moment before the man opened his mouth.
"…Why do you know this much…?"
"What!?"
The boy found his question a little too offensive, so he raised his voice above what he allowed himself to let out.
After calming down, he continued.
"Are people of my age only allowed to have lollipops in their mouths or what?" He glared at the man.
"No! I just… If you're telling me all this, then what have you suffered to offer me compassion in ways no one ever did?"
Was he even listening to what he said? Even if he was the kind of person who'd think stuff like that, it was an entirely different matter saying it out loud so shamelessly.
The boy approached him with the tone and care someone within that stagnant state would need.
"Others' compassion never reached you because they never saw that you needed theirs," he said. "How could they lift their fingers if they always saw you lift yours ahead of them?"
He took his hands off the man's shoulders.
"And I already told you. I have lived the life of yours. So I even know that all these things I'm saying to you right now, you already knew all of them. You just chose to forget it, because that was easier than facing them."
Rain poured, and even in that noise, the boy's words felt like the only sound he could hear. Everything else was dull and distant.
Having heard all that, he didn't know what to say. Even though the person before the man was just a little boy, he knew more than what the man had known of himself. Sure, the man didn't think much while he was confined in his dark room; he was still someone who aged like any other. He wasn't well informed about anything that happened outside that little space; he could still pick up new information through his computer. Whether he played or just browsed the net aimlessly, there was a lot of valuable information he could pick up over time.
Though, he never made too much effort to learn about new things, a part of him went the extra mile to know things he'd deem redundant. The point is, even in that little space, he wasn't without the option to become more informed. But even with the occasional craving for understanding the world around him, he was far from the level of what the boy had shared with him.
That's the narrative he told himself, anyway.
As the rain fell on his skin from his hair, he looked into the boy's eyes.
"Who are you?" he asked, his voice low.