I'm still alive.     I'm unsure who the scream belongs to now.      It’s 3 AM and I've been watching a variety of videos from funny caught-on-camera ones to real crime documentaries on YouTube. I manage to ignore the scream by not thinking about it but it’s there. Moreover, my eyes are tired and my back is stiff and I do not feel comfortable at all. My palms are sweating from holding the phone upright throughout the hours and after a while, they slip and my phone slides down, poking Brian's arm-pillow.     Brian has been shifting sleeping positions during my wake; an hour ago, he was laying his back on his – hard-plastic (not suitable to rest on) – chair and snoring; fifteen minutes ago, his head slipped so he moved to place his head back onto my bed, his face facing mine. As my phone touches his skin, his head slowly gets up from the covers, his eyes squint as they always do after a long sleep. His brows narrow at me, questioning.     He croaks, “Why are you not sleeping? What time is it?”    “Good morning, Sleeping Beauty – or Frog Prince. It’s three-thirty-five in the morning and I slept the whole afternoon yesterday.” I yawn, “I can’t sleep.”     He follows yawning, “Well, you’re going to be too tired to do the exercise later so at least rest.”    I grab my phone, my finger brushes against his arm. He jumps as a reaction. He sees me retrieving my phone and quickly returns his hands on the bed, relieved. “Let me charge your phone so you can focus on sleeping.”    I shake my head as disapproval. Surfing the internet is the only way to avert my attention fully from the scream. I can’t do that without my phone. “I don’t want to sleep,” I tell him, frowning.     “Give me your phone,” Brian says, sternly. His eyes more awake now.     “No.”    “Your phone’s battery will be empty sooner or later, anyways.” He pushes my piece of technology down onto my thighs as he takes a peek at my lock screen, looking at the battery bar. “Hah! Five percent! It’s going to shut down sooner than I expected.”    My hands are sleepy so they can’t do anything to stop Brian from taking the phone away from me. He stands up and goes to charge it just beside the sink. His back facing me, he inquires, “Do you want to eat or something? I just remember you didn’t eat anything other than breakfast yesterday. I'm sorry I turned up late.”     “I’m not hungry. But, hey, did you remember to lock the dorm?”    “Yeah, I have the keys.” He slaps the right pocket behind him and the keys chime inside. Returning to his seat, he says, despite the questions he want to ask of me written on his face, “Now, sleep.”    “I can’t.”     “You must.” He lets out a big yawn, his chin on his palm.     I inhale deeply as well, catching his yawn. I have to admit I want to sleep. Those who don’t want to rest their eyes are those who have never experienced the bad side of life, those who don’t dream because they are living the dream. I just need something to push the thought of the scream lingering in my ears away so my eyes can shut down on its own. “Tell me a boring story. That'll help.”    “A boring story?”    “Ah! I know! How about you tell me what you did yesterday? I think that’ll do,” I sound, lightheartedly.     Brian’s eyes narrow at me, doubtful. “So you’re saying my life is boring?”     I laugh behind my hand, “No, but we’ll see if it is boring. If you manage to make me fall asleep with it, then, yeah.”   Brian clicks his tongue rather playfully. He seems to be up for the challenge. I slide myself under the covers, trying to make myself comfy. He starts, “Well, yesterday… I woke up at like 9…? I was still sleepy when I went through the kitchen to cook rice but then, one swipe and down the rice cooker goes, crashing onto the floor. The plug forced out had the metal piece bent… I don’t know how to explain it. But, yeah, the metal thingy bent so we can no longer plug it in... Jae?”    My eyes close, I hear Brian’s voice instead of the scream, saying, “That was too fast.”       “My life is boring without you, you know that?”      “Slowly, Jae. Slowly. You'll slip.”     “For ’s sake, Brian, I will not! I'm actually getting a hang of it.” Brian follows me as I try to walk further away from his touch, holding onto the handles of the crutches. I let the feet of the tool a step further ahead of me before I join it with one foot pushing and the other, hiding under all those bandages, numb. I'm still tired. I want to sleep and I am aware of the bags under my eyes worsening each day because of the scream.     It’s almost lunch time and I'm in the hallway of Ward 11 with Brian as my supervisor, heading towards Room 6, about to visit ‘an old friend’.     “Why are you in a hurry, anyways?” Brian asks, hands ready to hold me if I ever fall.     It must be the lack of sleep that I'm irritated more easily today. “Because at any time now, the world could end,” I tell him off,