Chapter Text
“Ah, we have the charity thing tomorrow, don’t we?” Macau said, his voice low but expectant. He stood beside Anawin, arms folded loosely, shifting his weight as he leaned slightly against one of the tall library carts. He was in his usual spot, just far enough to not get in the way.
Anawin gave a short nod without looking up, his hands busy arranging the returned books back onto the shelf. One by one, spines aligned. His movements were practiced, almost mechanical, like he’d done it a hundred times without thinking.
Macau sighed, more to himself than anything. “I have a date with my girlfriend though,” he mumbled, rubbing the back of his neck. “What time is it again?”
“Morning,” Anawin replied quietly. “Around 10 a.m.”
Macau nodded slowly, taking that in. He lingered for another moment, eyes drifting from the shelf to his friend. “What about you? Any plans?” he asked, trying to sound casual.
“No,” Anawin said, his voice barely carrying past the shelves. “I’ll probably continue writing.”
Macau brightened just a little. “How’s it going?” he asked, giving him a glance. He waited a beat. The question floated there, light but sincere.
Anawin just nodded again, but this time there was a trace of hesitation.
Truth was, it wasn’t going well. Not at all. He’d been stuck in the same creative loop for weeks now, trapped between ideas that once felt full of promise but now just felt... empty. The story he was working on a fictional piece about supernatural beings who had accidentally left behind a possession on Earth and were now returning to retrieve it, had started strong. He liked the concept. He’d built out the world, mapped out the plot, layered in philosophical ideas. It had all the right ingredients.
But execution was another thing entirely.
And worse than the block itself was the silence. He’d been uploading the story online, bit by bit, chapter after chapter. At first, he was hopeful. But the reactions were nearly nonexistent. No upvotes. Barely any comments. And the ones he did get weren’t exactly brimming with praise. The quiet was starting to crawl under his skin. It made him wonder if people were even reading it. If it was any good. If he was just wasting his time.
He wasn’t going to give up. He didn’t want to. But still... it stung.
Macau, maybe picking up on the tension that Anawin didn’t say out loud, offered a soft smile. “Don’t worry,” he said gently. “I read your story every week.”
Anawin let out a short, dry laugh. “You might be the only one.”
Macau just chuckled and turned back to arranging books on the opposite shelf. He didn’t say anything else, but his presence, quiet and familiar, was enough to fill the silence.
Then, after a pause, he spoke again. “Why don’t you submit your work to that online writing competition once you are finished with your piece?” he asked casually.
Anawin immediately turned to look at him, his expression skeptical, like he thought it was some kind of joke. “Don’t mess with me.”
“I’m not,” Macau said, completely sincere. “I meant it. You should try,”
Anawin let out a deep sigh, one of those tired exhales that carried more weight than he probably intended. “I’ve thought about it. I don’t think I can meet the deadline,” he admitted. “And it’s only for... gifted writers.”
“You are,” Macau shot back without missing a beat, voice bright with enthusiasm. “Seriously, have some faith in yourself.”
He grinned, saying it playfully, but his eyes told a different story, he meant every word.
After a moment, he spoke again. “So, what’s the charity work about again?”
“We’re helping to clean out an old library,” Anawin said, his tone neutral, maybe a little bored. “Near Abbhantripaja’s Palace.”
Macau flinched. He immediately pulled a face and gave an exaggerated shiver. “Abbhantripaja’s Palace?” he repeated. “Isn’t that place, like... haunted?”
Anawin finally turned to look at him, raising an eyebrow. His lips were pressed into a flat line of mild judgment. “Do you actually believe that?”
“Yeah, dude,” Macau said seriously, eyes wide with emphasis. “I’ve read stories about people hearing a woman crying at night there.”
Anawin just clicked his tongue and turned back to the shelf, sliding a book into place like the conversation hadn’t even registered.
The truth was, he didn’t believe in ghosts, hadn’t since he was a kid.
His great-grandfather was rumored to be possessed. People said he talked to walls. Anawin remembered hearing the stories from his grandfather how the old man would sit in corners and whisper like someone else was there, like he wasn’t alone in the room. Eventually, he took his own life. Everyone in the family spoke about it in hushed tones, if they spoke of it at all.
But to Anawin, it was never about demons or hauntings. Just a man burdened by a troubled mind, who never sought help to ease it.
Maybe that was why he wrote what he did. Supernatural beings, curses, haunted relics, they were stories. Fiction. Something people read before bed or in passing boredom. Fantasy.
They had no place in the real world.
//
After finishing his library duties, Anawin walked with his head low, hands shoved deep into the front pocket of his hoodie. The evening air had grown cooler than usual, brushing against his skin like a quiet warning. He pulled the hoodie tighter around himself, hunching a little as he crossed the street. The sun had dipped far behind the buildings by now, and the dim orange glow left behind was barely enough to cut through the shadows stretching over the sidewalk.
He turned a corner and made his way toward the apartment building, the same one he’d been staying in for the past year and a half. It wasn’t much to look at. A crumbling, narrow structure. The building looked like it had seen a century’s worth of stories and had survived only out of spite. The paint had long peeled off the walls, revealing concrete bones beneath. Windows were stained yellow, cracked in places.
There were always people around. Not the kind you greeted, though. Just vague shapes loitering in the corners, faces turned away, hands hidden in pockets, some muttering to themselves. Anawin didn’t look at them. He slipped his headphones on and pressed play, letting some lo-fi instrumental blur the world around him. The soft beat and the distant hum of static made everything feel far away, safer, somehow.
This was the only place he could afford. For someone on a tight budget, a student with no family around and too much pride to ask for help, the building, shabby as it was, offered a roof and four walls. That was enough.
He stepped into the building, the lights flickered overhead, buzzing intermittently. He pressed the elevator button and waited. When the doors opened with a metallic groan, he stepped inside and immediately winced. The stench of stale piss hit him and he held his breath and turned to face the door, counting down the seconds.
When he reached his floor, the hallway was quiet, empty. A cold draft followed him as he walked down the corridor. One of the lights above him flickered erratically, then went out altogether. He didn’t slow down.
His keys jingled faintly as he unlocked the door to his room, pushed it open, and stepped inside. The moment the door closed behind him with a soft click, he felt the tension drain from his shoulders. Safe, at least, in this one small space.
He tossed his bag carelessly onto the bed. Then he moved to his desk and dropped into the computer chair. The old thing creaked in protest beneath him. As if on cue, his monitor flickered to life with a low hum, the movement of the shaky chair just enough to wake it up.
The screen glowed in the otherwise dark room, and the last sentence he had typed stared back at him, frozen there like a dare.
“In the dark alley, only the sound of dripping water could be heard probably from a nearby drain, followed by an eerie whistling sound. Then a shadow appeared, and from it stepped a man in a long black robe, an ancient dagger in his hand.”
Anawin blinked at the screen. He didn’t remember writing that. Or maybe he had, in a haze of sleeplessness. It sounded like him.
He leaned in, eyes narrowing, hands hovering over the keyboard. The cursor blinked at the end of the sentence. Waiting. Like it always did.
He closed his eyes tightly, trying to picture the character's face. Anything. A scrap of image. But all that came was a blank, dark shape floating in the void. No features. Just the unsettling suggestion of a man with no face.
Frustrated, he let out a low sigh and tapped the computer into sleep mode. The screen went dark, the hum faded. He pushed himself up and flopped face-first onto the bed, arms splayed, breath heavy with exhaustion and quiet irritation.
He closed his eyes, willing sleep to take him.
Behind him, unnoticed in the shadows, the monitor blinked awake again.
No input. No touch.
Just the screen glowing soft blue in the dark.
And the cursor.
Still blinking. Still waiting.
//
The next morning, Anawin carpooled with Macau to the site of their charity work. As expected, Macau had the radio blasting at full volume before they even pulled out of the parking lot. He was belting out the lyrics to some upbeat pop song with zero shame and even less pitch, drumming on the steering wheel.
Meanwhile, Anawin just stared out the passenger-side window, chin propped on his hand, watching the scenery blur by. The city slowly gave way to quieter roads, old buildings, and wide patches of green. The contrast between them in that moment was almost comical.
Sometimes, Anawin wondered how they even became friends in the first place. Macau was loud, always talking, always moving, always the first to jump into something with no plan. And Anawin… wasn’t.
But it all started back in their first year. There’d been this one day when a group of older students giving Anawin a hard time after class. Macau, out of nowhere, had stepped in. No fight. No big scene. Just a firm, easy interruption that shifted the atmosphere enough for them to leave.
Anawin hadn’t said thank you right away. Not out of rudeness, just... unsure how to. But the next time Macau failed a quiz and complained about it loudly in the hallway. Anawin offered to help. One time. Or so he thought.
It became a bit of a pattern. Macau messed up a test, Anawin helped him figure out the syllabus. Macau forgot a deadline, Anawin reminded him. At first, it felt like a debt being cleared. A quiet way of saying thanks. But somewhere along the way, it stopped being transactional. Somewhere along the way, it just became... friendship.
"Are you seriously telling me you’ve got no plans this weekend?" Macau asked, eyes still on the road but a smirk tugging at his lips.
Anawin just hummed faintly in response, not really answering.
Macau raised an eyebrow, like he couldn’t quite wrap his head around it. “You know, you could go out once in a while. Meet people. That sort of thing.”
To him, it was simple. You only need to show up.
But to Anawin, it was a different world entirely. Social settings drained him. He could fake small talk, sure, but it left him feeling like a balloon slowly deflating. Sometimes, he wondered if he was just... built to be alone. Like solitude was his thing.
“Not really interested,” he said after a beat.
Macau drummed his fingers on the wheel, thoughtful for a moment. Then, as if struck by inspiration, he said, “Do you want me to ask my girlfriend? I bet she knows some girls who’d totally be into you.”
Anawin sighed, deep and tired, eyes still fixed out the window. He wasn’t the kind of guy girls noticed. Or if they did, it was more out of politeness than interest. Before he could open his mouth to protest, Macau cut him off.
“Just try it, dude,” he said, tone shifting into something more sincere. “You know, if you keep pushing people away, one day you’ll end up alone.”
The words hit harder than Anawin expected. Not that he let it show. He stayed quiet, watching the trees roll past the car window, pretending he didn’t hear.
But inside, the truth whispered back to him.
I know that already.
//
They reached the library sooner than expected, thanks to the unusually clear roads. The building itself looked old but well-maintained, tucked between two newer structures like it had been there forever and quietly refused to move. As soon as they stepped inside, they were greeted by an elderly man who didn’t even ask their names, just motioned for them to follow him deeper into the archive-like back section of the library.
“Most of the books here are almost my age,” the man said with a chuckle as they walked, his voice rough but warm. “Some might even be older.” He smiled at the shelves, like the books were old friends.
He led them into a narrow, dim aisle and gestured toward the dusty shelves lined with worn, mismatched spines. Then he reached for one particularly fragile-looking volume. The spine was crumbling, the pages threatening to fall out any second.
“Keep the intact ones on the shelves,” he instructed, holding up the book, “but if they’re like this one beyond saving, just toss them in the box.” He pointed at a large beige box sitting by the wall, its sides already slightly sagging under the weight of forgotten literature.
Both boys nodded, already rolling up their sleeves as they split the task. Anawin took the left side of the aisle, Macau took the right, and just like that, they got to work.
Anawin started going through the books one by one, carefully flipping through each to assess their condition. Most were dusty but still usable. Some were falling apart beyond repair. He tossed those into the box without hesitation, letting them go like old leaves on a windy day.
Macau, of course, couldn’t stay quiet for long. He was already complaining about the dust within ten minutes.
“This is, like, a health hazard,” he muttered dramatically, fanning away invisible clouds from his face. “I swear I’m gonna develop an allergy just from standing here.”
Anawin barely listened, caught up in the rhythm of his work. That was until he came across a strange-looking book wedged in the back of one shelf. It looked completely different from the rest, larger, heavier, with a dark, almost black cover that felt like real leather. It didn’t have a title or author listed. Just an old, faded emblem embossed on the front. When he opened it, the pages were blank. Not crisp or new, but yellowed and blotched with age, as if water or time had stained them from the inside out.
Without thinking much of it, Anawin tossed it into the recycling box and moved on.
They kept working for hours without realizing it, the repetitive task making time slip by unnoticed. By the time they finally stopped, it was nearly 2 p.m. The sun had shifted outside, casting long shadows through the narrow windows.
“Shit,” Macau muttered, glancing at his watch. “I’m supposed to meet my girlfriend at 2:30.”
“You can still make it,” Anawin said calmly, wiping his hands on his jeans. “I’ll just take the bus.”
Macau hesitated, looking like he felt guilty for ditching him. “You sure? I can drop you off real quick-”
“Don’t worry about me. I’ll take the bus,” Anawin repeated with a faint smirk. “It’s better than sitting through your off-key concert in the car.”
Macau laughed and slapped his shoulder. “I thought you were my friend.”
“I am.”
“Asshole, alright, see you at college,” Macau said before jogging off toward the exit, waving over his shoulder.
Anawin stayed back, dusting off his pants and stretching his arms. As he turned to leave, he nearly bumped into the old librarian who had reappeared silently, as if out of thin air.
“We’re done here,” Anawin said politely, offering a small bow of gratitude. “Thank you for letting us help out.”
“Thank you for coming,” the old man replied, his voice as kind as before. But then, his eyes shifted behind Anawin, to the beige box he filled over the last few hours.
For a second, his face changed. It was quick. Barely a flicker. Something unreadable passed through his expression, almost like recognition, or hesitation.
“Take that with you,” he said, nodding toward the box.
Anawin blinked. “The box?”
“Recycle it at your place,” the old man said, already turning away.
“But… I can’t really-”
The man was already gone, shuffling down the hall like the conversation had ended before it really began.
Left with no better option, Anawin sighed and turned back to the box. He hesitated for a second before bending down and lifting it. Surprisingly, it wasn’t as heavy as it looked. The books inside barely made a sound, except for one at the very bottom that shifted ever so slightly.
//
It didn’t take long for Anawin to find the bus stop, it was barely a three-minute walk from the library, just down the street past an old convenience store and a row of parked motorcycles. To his relief, even the weather decided to cooperate for once. The sun was still out, but the breeze had cooled a little, and the clouds overhead gave just enough cover to keep things from feeling too stuffy.
The bus pulled up not long after he arrived, and he climbed aboard, still carrying the box. The driver barely glanced at him as he dropped his coins into the tray and made his way toward the back.
He found an empty row and slid into the window seat, setting the box on the seat beside him. It didn’t take long for the vehicle to jerk forward again, and Anawin leaned his head against the glass, eyes fixed on the scenery sliding past. The city blurred into suburbs, apartments gave way to shoplots, shoplots gave way to low buildings and empty lots.
The journey felt longer than the morning ride with Macau, probably because the bus stopped at every possible station along the way, picking up and dropping off passengers like clockwork.
By the time the bus finally stopped near his apartment building, it was already pushing 4:30. Anawin got off with a quiet exhale, still lugging the box, though he was more determined to ditch it somewhere before going home.
He spotted a public trash bin near the edge of the sidewalk, and headed toward it. But as he got closer, he noticed someone already standing there, a man, tall and strangely still, smoking a cigarette with one hand in his pocket. He wasn’t doing anything suspicious, really, just... standing. Watching. And when his eyes flicked up to meet Anawin’s, there was something unsettling in them. Cool. Flat.
Not wanting to risk any kind of weird interaction, Anawin didn’t even slow down. He adjusted his grip on the box and kept walking, heading straight toward his building instead.
He stepped into the elevator glad to finally be inside. It rattled as it ascended, stopping at each floor with that same mechanical sigh. When it opened onto his level, the hallway greeted him with its usual half-lit gloom. The same flickering bulb above his door was still stuttering, and right as he walked past it, it died completely.
“Great,” he muttered under his breath.
With a resigned sigh, he fished his phone out of his pocket and turned on the flashlight, using the beam to light his path. The shadows stretched oddly across the walls as he moved, exaggerating everything into unfamiliar shapes.
Finally, he reached his unit. The lock clicked open with a familiar sound, and he stepped inside, shutting the door behind him with a soft thud. He dropped the box just near the edge of the kitchen.
He then tugged off his hoodie, then his shirt, kicking off his shoes along the way. His body was sticky with dust, and all he could think about now was the shower. He headed straight for the bathroom, not even sparing the strange old box another glance.
//
After his shower, Anawin realized, rather suddenly, that he was starving. It hit him the moment he stepped out of the bathroom, towel slung over his shoulder, hair still damp. His stomach gave a quiet grumble like it was reminding him he hadn’t eaten a proper meal all day.
He padded over to the fridge, opened it, and stared blankly inside for a moment before pulling out a half-eaten rice meal in a plastic container. He popped the lid open, gave it a cautious sniff, then shrugged and shoved it into the microwave. Three minutes on high. That should do it.
Once it beeped, he took a fork, poked at the rice, and tasted a small bite to see if it had gone weird. It hadn’t. Still edible.
He sat down on the chair by the kitchen, eating slowly, chewing while staring at the box the librarian had told him to take home. It was just sitting there on the floor, dusty and old and weirdly quiet.
After he finished, he dumped the container in the sink, then all but collapsed on his bed. His limbs felt heavy. The day had dragged longer than expected, and somehow the mix of dust, bus rides, and old books left him more exhausted than he thought.
He didn’t mean to fall asleep, but he did. It felt like he blinked and hours passed. When he finally stirred, the light outside had completely disappeared. The room was dark, thick with shadows, and only the faint glow of city lights seeped through the edge of the curtain.
He groaned, sat up, and stretched. Every joint in his body cracked. Then, still half-asleep, he made his way over to his desk. The computer screen flickered back to life almost immediately, blinking into the same document he’d left open last night. The sentence, the one he didn’t remember typing was still sitting there like it had been waiting for him.
He sighed, not really wanting to deal with it. Instead, he opened a new browser tab, telling himself he just needed a distraction. Something to drown out the weird energy clinging to his apartment.
After some mindless scrolling, he settled on an old comfort watch, The Lord of the Rings. A movie he’d seen probably a thousand times by now. Maybe more. But there was something about watching a film where you already knew what was going to happen. Where you didn’t have to think too hard.
He leaned back in his chair and let the movie play, the familiar sounds and sweeping score washing over the room.
That’s when he heard it.
A soft, almost imperceptible thudding noise. Not loud, not jarring. Just... there. Like something had lightly bumped against something else.
He paused the movie.
The noise stopped.
He sat still for a second, waiting, ears straining.
Nothing.
Weird. He hit play again, and not a full minute passed before he heard it again. The same faint sound, like a dull thump, soft, but definitely real.
He paused the movie again and stood up, scanning the room. His eyes slowly swept across the floor, the shelves, the kitchen corner. And then they landed on the box. That same box, still tucked by his desk, right beside where he’d left it earlier.
Curiosity tugged at him, strong enough to make him reach for it.
He sat back down, pulling the box close to his leg. With a quiet breath, he began lifting the old books out one by one. There was an atlas, yellowed at the edges. A tattered history textbook from decades ago. A trashy romance novel with its spine cracked beyond repair.
Then his fingers brushed against it again.
The strange book. The one that looked more like a grimoire. Its cover was hard and textured like aged leather. He pulled it out, brushing the dust off with his palm. No title. No markings. Just this nameless, heavy thing that didn’t quite feel like it belonged.
He opened it again. The pages inside were blank. Old, brittle, and stained a strange brownish tint. He flipped through it slowly, page after page, but found nothing. No scribbles. No symbols. Not even a library stamp.
He let out another sigh and set the book aside on his desk, deciding it wasn’t worth overthinking. Then, without much thought, he stood up and carried the box back to the kitchen, pushing it out of the way under the counter. Out of sight, out of mind.
He sat back down and resumed his movie.
The room settled again. Quiet. Steady. Familiar.
But if Anawin had looked just a second longer at the cover of that book now resting beside him, he might have seen it, faint, almost invisible unless the light hit it just right.
In small, curling script, words had started to form across the worn leather surface.
This property belongs to Damon Cillian.