[https://i.imgur.com/jg8jBIL.png]

#15

Since the day we almost killed each other on the rooftop, Rika and I clicked somehow. When Rika asked me a few days later to hang out together after school, it did not feel like inviting me to a 'date' at all. For some inexplicable reason, it felt like just a reach-out from a fellow survivor of some catastrophe, like another passenger from the same ship I was in that sank and killed all the others.

The first place we hit was an arcade in a mall. Rika turned up casually dressed in oversized t-shirts bearing some graffiti-looking logo and baggy jeans, with a navy-blue hooded jacket and white trainers. I was a bit taken back at first as she looked so different from her image in school, but she looked charming in her own way with this look too, especially as she just gave a slight show of her palm and greeted me with "Yo" when we first met.

We walked into the arcade more or less in silence and once I got in I asked her if she likes playing games.

"Well, it kills time"

"Ok… but you don't really enjoy it?"

"Let's say it's a necessity. Time has to be killed, especially when you have so much of it"

"er..?"

"Nevermind. Let's go play something"

"Right. What kind of games do you want to play?"

"Killing games"

That made me chuckle for some reason. I came to realise that she has this dull sense of humour with such deadpan comments.

"I guess we could shoot some zombies?"

"Woo yeah. I like shooting things that just never die. Or they die but come back. Again and again"

Then we started to play this Zombie shooter in co-op mode, and damn she was good. She was pretty much shooting everything before I could even aim, and I felt like I was only shooting things that were designed to be physically impossible to be handled by a single player. I did die a few times, and each time Rika asked me to put more coins in so I can continue with her, as she has not died even once. In the end, after furious trigger pulls and loads of coins, we cleared the game, and I was happy when Rika gave me a rare smile as we high-fived each other.

"So what do you want to do now?" I thought we have spent enough time in this arcade, enough to completely clear a game.

"Let's watch some movies"

"Yeah let's see what they are showing today"

Then we took the escalator to the upstairs where there was a small cinema. Rika said she will go to the restroom for a bit and I can check the showtimes. When she came back she asked,

"So what have they got?"

"Well there's this rom-com that's really popular now – I heard it's pretty damn funny. And there's this action movie with lots of car racing – I like this one personally, and a sci-fi movie with some alien invasion – I think this one looks a bit meh, and there's a crime story about a serial killer"

"Cool. Let's watch the serial killer movie"

"What are you, an emo goth?!"

"Pfft, don't give me such a label. It's just to kill time"

"What's up with you and all this 'killing'"

"It's just a running joke I have"

"With whom?"

She paused for a very short but noticeable moment and then replied

"Yeah.. with a friend. A longtime friend"

"Your friend must be weird"

"Yes he is"

"A boy?", it would be a lie if I said I didn't feel a tiny bit of sudden unjustifiable jealousy

"None of your business"

With that, the conversation was over. I bought two tickets and a massive box of popcorns (on Rika's demand) and we entered the hall.

After two hours of intense gore, the movie was over. Although it was disgusting in parts, I have to say it was pretty good and suspenseful throughout.

"So did you like the movie?", I asked her.

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"Yeah it was alright"

"It was pretty intense eh?"

"Well a bit unrealistic though"

"You think so? Which part? You mean like how the detective just happened to figure out who the killer is by chance?"

"No. It's just that…", then Rika hesitated a bit

"Go on"

"You know when you slit the back of a neck like in that second murder, it does not bleed that way in real life", she kinda murmured this and looked away, as if.. she was embarrassed?

"You know some weird things. I don't even know whether that's true or just some 'joke'"

"Nevermind. Maybe we do something else now"

"Right. What do you want to do?"

"You have been asking me what I want to do. Why don't you think of something yourself?"

I gave it a thought.

"Let's go to a café. We've been out for the whole day today but have not really sat down"

"We just sat in the movies for two hours"

"er, I mean sit around and just talk, chill, you know"

"Is that fun?"

"Yes it kills time"

She gave a short unexpected chuckle before quickly recomposing herself

"Ok you pick a place then"

#16

I'm sitting on my desk chair and looking at the wall against my desk. It's covered in pictures and photographs. Pictures of Rika that I drew, photographs of Rika that I printed off my phone. I actually had a few poster-size photographs. It would have been too embarrassing for me to take a picture file to a local printer and ask them to print a big size picture of a girl, but I had bought a regular A4 size colour printer that could print on photo print papers. I printed a big picture over multiple pages, like three by four, and taped them together to make my own Rika poster. We were not 'dating', and by all means, we were more like friends. But I have grown more and more obsessed with her in a way that's more than simply liking a girl. I wouldn't even call it love. If my feelings were anything similar to love than obsession, I would call it a violently intense form of crush. There was only so much pictures could do though, as they only showed her appearances. I wanted more. I wanted to build a whole world where I can just indulge in Rika.

I printed out a map of our town to mark down where Rika and I have been together, all the places where I ran into her by coincidence. I made a map of our school and did the same, also recording the times of our encounters. I wrote transcripts of all our conversations off my memory as soon as I could after talking to Rika, be it over the phone or in person. I printed out my favourite bits of her deadpan quotes and stuck them on the wall too.

I plotted graphs on a time scale to show how much time I've spent with Rika each day. I was keeping statistics of common words she used and the common topics we talked about from my transcripts. They could have all been just stored on my computer but I wanted these records to surround me in physical form. I wanted to sit in my sweet spot in front of the desk and be completely engulfed by everything about Rika. All the moments were recorded, not just as memories, but as physically undeniable presence in front of my eyes. This allowed me to do more than just gaze at her beautiful faces on the countless pictures I have put up. I had the whole Rika experience in my room. This wasn't a substitute to keep me going during the time I couldn't see her. This was part of the whole package of having her in my life. I would not say these pictures and records mattered more than the real Rika, but I almost felt like these records were what kept my experiences with her real, for otherwise they might as well all have been a fantasy, only to be re-affirmed by Rika herself in person. Set up this way, my feelings, thoughts, and invaluable interactions with her were manifested in undeniable physical form, they were the proof of their existence, and in this way, also the proof that I exist in her life, as much as she exists in my life like a sore spot that hurts so much but also feels so good to scratch.

Now as I sit and let myself re-connect and merge into the fabric of the reality that binds us together, I feel reassured that everything will be okay again. Rika is around. She is alive. She still exists somewhere. It's been three weeks and five days since her disappearance, and although she has not gotten in touch with me during all this time, I knew everything was okay, and we shall meet again when the right time comes. Until then, I have to hold strong and continue what I have to do.

#17

"Dude I saw you with this girl Rika at the mall yesterday", Peko asked me in the morning before the homeroom started.

"Oh you did?"

"Yes, what's up man? You managed to get a date with her?"

"Nah it wasn't a date. We were just hanging out"

"A boy and a girl hang out together alone in a mall after school, that sounds like a date to me man. What happened? Did she accept your confession? That sounds impossible"

"I ended up almost killing her a few days ago"

"What the fuck?"

"It's embarrassing to say what or how it happened. It was my mistake"

"But she looks okay now? What happened after you 'almost killed' her?"

"She almost killed me"

"Lol, what in the fuck..? You are talking like a creep"

"Well, I am a creep after all ain't I. Everyone seems to think so"

"Yeah I'm probably your best – or even the only – friend and I still think you are a creep too"

"Thanks for that mate"

"No problem. It's quite amazing how you suddenly end up going out with probably the prettiest girl in our year though. I still can't get my head around it"

"No, as I said, we are not going out. We are just hanging out"

"Same thing"

"You won't understand"

"Yeah whatever man, congrats anyway. So how was the date?"

"We killed some time"

"Doesn't sound particularly exciting"

"No, it wasn't. But it was. In a way. I don't know man"

"You are being weird again"

"Because I am"

"You freak, lol. Anyways hope it's all good man. Let me know if you in any trouble or need anything"

"Cheers bro"

As Peko walked back to his desk and the teacher came in to start the homeroom, I reminisced back on my day before with Rika. She certainly was a weirder one. Unlike the pretty, likable, and popular girl image she held at school. I knew many guys had a crush on her, and some have even confessed already although we are only in the second month of the school year by now, like that blonde dude that beat me up before. Knowing her better now, she's probably enjoyed the idea of me getting beaten up. But now that she seems to have opened up to me, talk about what she thought and how she felt, I felt closer to her and liked her even more, although in a bit of a weird way.

I wanted to do what she likes, and I wanted to stop what she didn't like. And that meant I now had a target, and a self-given mission to make Rika's life better.