I took a moment's breath and I was back in my own world. The sun beat down on my skin on the school rooftop. My heart was beating in my throat. I could feel the adrenaline whooshing. My temples throbbed. Tears pooled in my eyes. Light was alone. This knowledge cracked a piece of my heart. I wanted to go back into the comic. I wanted to be there with him despite all the dangers that world possessed.

    “I’m so glad you’re back. Things were getting super scary. You should have turned invisible.”

    Lisa’s advice fell on dumb ears.

    “I need to go back.”

    She was giving me a look, pity and fear mingled in one. She feared for my sanity. I saw my reflection in her eyes, almost feral. The effects of training, the coiling tension, the cuts and bruises and the dagger in my torn hands had made me into something unreal.

    “I need to go back,” I repeated. The dagger slipped from my fingers and was replaced by a pencil.

    “No, Hafsa, it’s dangerous.”

    Lisa had the gall to push me away from the desk. There were tears in her eyes, my own were falling down.

    “Light’s in danger, Lisa. I can’t leave him on his own. He needs my help.”

    “Light’s world is frozen. It’ll stay frozen until you go in there. He’s safe as long as you don’t enter the comic.”

    These words came as a blessing, at once I was placated. Lisa was right. As long as I stayed away from Light, he was safe. This realisation came with bitterness.

    My crestfallen expression came as a surprise to Lisa. She didn’t say a word but she was uncomfortable with my reaction.

    “Hafsa, don’t take this the wrong way but I think you’re getting way to invested in this story. I think we should scrap it and work on another one. ‘The Wishing Stone’ isn’t safe anymore.”

    I knew that too, in my head this made perfect sense but my heart wasn’t listening, it trembled and wept at the idea of being torn apart from Light. I groaned and held my face in my hands. It had been an obnoxiously long day for me already.

    Class was happening in a few minutes. There was no time to dwell. I had to change into uniform and make myself presentable. Light’s world always made a blunder of my clothes. I grabbed my bag with mixed thoughts and limped into the school building while Lisa was gathering the latest update of the comic.

    I went down the stairwell heading for the nearest toilets, into the closest cubicle and threw off my mangy clothes. My skin was covered in bruises. The training was real. I knew this because the pain in my body was awake. Gritting my teeth I put on my uniform.

    Without touching it I knew my hair was a state. It housed the smell of prison, an ancient, unclean damp smell. This was the least of my concerns as I swept my hands over my head. I found a hairtie somewhere among the mass and tugged it out. Nothing but a messy bun could help the mess that was my hair. I tied the entirety on the top of my head.

    This was the most normal I could look in my situation. I took a deep breath, told myself to snap back to reality and dumped the discarded clothes in the bin.

*

I couldn’t concentrate in class. Nothing could bring me to pay attention. Granted this much daydreaming was allowable but this was not me. I always paid attention in classes, listening did wonders for me and I was never without pen in hand, scribbling notes down and engaging as much as I could with the material. 

Today I was listless. My pen sat between my fingers but I didn’t take notes. I stared at the teacher’s moving mouth unable to process what she was saying. My body may have been in this world but my mind was elsewhere. I was agitated. I could only think about how I'd abandoned Light and how much he would hate me.

I almost missed the note that fell onto my desk. I stared at the crumpled bit of paper wondering where it had come from and where it was intending to go.

I glanced around the room cluelessly. Cha Eunwoo caught my eye and nodded at me. I blinked, understanding that this note was for me and from him. But why? Why was he sending me a note?

I unravelled the note. It read, 'meet me after school.' Slowly I recalled what Lisa had said to me regarding Eunwoo. He liked me. I almost snorted. I didn't exactly believe that. Lisa had a tendency to be a hopeless romantic at times.

Then why did Eunwoo want to see me?

I pondered this for the duration of the class. When the bell rang I didn't know that the subject had changed until a new teacher came in.

Why did Eunwoo want to see me? Did he want to talk about his issue? Did he see me as a friend now after I'd helped him out? Maybe he felt like he could speak to me about his problems. This made more sense than him being in love. 

I nodded to myself. If that was the case I didn't mind seeing him after school. Unlike him who had once bullied me, I didn't pick on people. There was a tendency in me to help those around me. That's just how I was. 

I helped everyone except Light. I didn't know how to help him. Did me staying away from the comic save him or did it prolong the dread that was to come? What were things like in the comic when I was absent? The world was frozen but did feelings freeze too or was Light stuck in that picture of fear and determination? I had a feeling the latter was the case. Why, I don't know. Perhaps because I had created that world I felt as though I knew it but I didn't. What was the utopia Light mentioned? I'd never heard of that, I wasn't the one who'd added it into the story.

More perplexed than ever I spent the second lesson trying to figure out the gist of things. In this time another note appeared on my desk. This one was from Lisa. It read, 'what did he say?'

I was of mind to toss her the note Eunwoo gave me but she'd sussed it out because she sent another note asking, 'does he want to see you?'

I pursed my lips. She was making this entire thing sound very insinuating, like as if I were in a secret relationship or something. I gave her a secret nod when the teacher wasn't looking.

Lisa smothered her squeal in her sleeve. She was definitely super excited about this.

I could only shake my head, dismiss the thought and wonder if there was any point in me pretending I understood what the Science teacher was talking about. Without being too suspicious I peered into my neighbour's desk, found what page I was supposed to have my textbook open at and then found that I hadn’t taken out my book at all.

I blushed. I was pretty sure the teacher knew I wasn’t feeling Science today. Silently I pulled out the right book and flicked to the page I was supposed to be on. A diagram stared up at me. I looked at something that was titled 'The Sliding Filament Theory.'

As my luck would have it, I’d been under the teacher’s scrutiny this entire time. I was sure because she asked me a question. She asked me what this theory was about.

Now all heads turned to me. I felt the 25 pairs of eyes watching me, glad that it was me who was picked and not one of them. The teacher was looking at me too from under her lashes. A slow scowl was making its way to her face. I could practically hear the frowning coming from her brows. 

My eyes darted to the page. Sarcoplasmic reticulum, ions, neurotransmitters, synapses, were some of the words jumping up at me. I looked for a clu