Nara: The Girl with Blue Eyes
August 2022, Banjarmasin, South Kalimantan
In a boarding house, a girl still in her high school uniform lay playing on her smartphone. On the wall above her bed, two crossed mandau knives, complete with their scabbards, were displayed. Below the mandau, a blowgun and several darts rested. The girl turned over onto her stomach, still holding her smartphone.
"Ugh, Balang's never online anymore, what a bummer... Where is he? Oh, Ismi's online! I'll ask her."
She immediately contacted her friend, a fellow player of the popular multiplayer online battle game. Even though her friend was currently playing, she left a chat message to be replied to after she finished. Then, she rolled onto her back again, lying on the bed with an arm covering her eyes.
"Boooored..." she screamed silently.
She then got off her bed to change her uniform. She stood in front of her wardrobe and opened it. After taking out a few pieces of clothing, she closed the wardrobe door, and her reflection appeared in the mirror. The girl's eyes were bright blue like water, and she was still wearing a mask.
"Whoa, I haven't taken it off yet," she thought.
She immediately removed her mask and looked at her face in the mirror. When her mask was off, the girl was strikingly beautiful, like a foreigner, but she had one flaw that she always covered with her mask: she lacked the vertical groove that connects the mouth and nose (philtrum). She looked at the golden pendant necklace, made of brass and adorned with an aquamarine stone in the center, resting on her chest. She clasped her hand around the pendant.
The pendant was a gift from her mother, whom she had never met. All this time, she had lived with her father and grandfather on an island in Kotabaru Regency, who taught her traditional martial arts and spiritual powers since she was a child. However, two years ago, when she was 15, her father suddenly disappeared, and her grandfather became seriously ill. Her grandfather said that her father had gone to her mother's house in Saranjana city, a mythical city in kalimantan island and would never return.
After that, she lived only with her grandfather and took care of him until he passed away six months ago. Afterward, she sold her house with the help of her uncle and moved to Banjarmasin to continue her schooling and complete her university studies there. She brought the mandau knives inherited from her grandfather and father, as well as her blowgun, as mementos. Now she lived alone in a boarding house, and after school, her only activity was playing on her smartphone without leaving her room because she had no friends other than her online ones.
"Ping," a message came in on her smartphone.
The girl immediately put on her clothes and grabbed her smartphone, then sat on the edge of her bed.
"Hey, psycho, you were asking about Balang? He's been retired for a long time," said her friend, whose nickname was Ismi.
"Retired? Are you serious?" the girl asked, replying to the chat.
"Yeah, I don't know about that guy, but he's like me, he said he wants to go to Jakarta for college," Ismi said.
"Geez... that's bad. You and him are going to college in Jakarta?" the girl asked.
"Yeah, I'm alone here. If I go to Jogja or Surabaya, I'd be lazy. Might as well go to Jakarta. You're in the same year as me and Balang, right? Let's go together," Ismi replied.
"Ugh, I'll have to think about it. It's hard enough here, let alone Jakarta," the girl replied.
"Well, you're crazy too, online morning, noon, afternoon, night... You're a psycho..." Ismi teased.
"Let me be, I'm just idle. I'm sad I lost a friend," the girl replied.
"Oh come on, don't you have friends in real life? Anyway, I gotta go, I'm going to work, need to shower first," Ismi said.
"No wonder you smell, hahahaha," the girl teased back.
"You're annoying, bye now... I'm logging off," Ismi replied.
"Yeah, bye-bye," the girl replied.
She put her smartphone back on the table, then she lay back down on the bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. Then she got up again, grabbed her smartphone, and put on her mask.
"I'll go to Al*** Mart, then..." she thought.
She stood up and put her smartphone in her pants pocket, then put on her jacket and stepped out of her room. She walked downstairs to the first floor to head towards the exit, then she passed the boarding house landlady.
"Oh, going out, Nara?" the landlady asked.
Nara nodded, then took out her smartphone and typed something on the screen. Then she showed the writing to the landlady, who squinted to read it.
"Oh, going to Al***," the landlady replied.
Nara nodded again, then she typed once more to say goodbye and walked out of the boarding house. The reason she used her smartphone to communicate was so no one would see her face, which lacked a philtrum, and be scared by it. Nara walked with her hands in her jacket pockets. She walked a little fast, avoiding encountering anyone she knew, because her boarding house was near her school.
At a street intersection, she saw an old woman about to cross, but even though the old woman had pressed the pedestrian light button, many motorcycles still passed by, ignoring the red traffic light. Finally, she approached the old woman and helped her cross the road. When they reached the middle, "Watch out!" a pedestrian shouted. Nara turned and saw an online motorcycle taxi driver speeding towards her while looking at his smartphone.
Nara closed her blue eyes, then opened them again. She was in a dimension bordering the world of the living, limited only by a transparent, water-like wall. Casually, she released the old woman and approached the online motorcycle taxi driver, who was still focused on his smartphone, not looking at the road. For Nara, who was in that spiritual dimension, beyond the water wall that was the real world, time seemed to stop, although in reality, they were still moving, just very slowly.
When she stood next to the driver, who was still looking down without watching the road, she turned and saw a garbage cart. She kicked the driver, sending him flying into the cart, and adjusted his motorcycle so it would slide past without hitting the old woman in front of her. Then she returned to the old woman's side and exited her spiritual dimension. "Crash!" The motorcycle crashed into a utility pole, its dashboard shattered, and the driver was in the garbage cart, looking surprised and confused.
After that, she safely brought the old woman across and continued her walk towards her destination mini-market, calmly, her hands still in her jacket pockets. Behind her, however, a commotion had erupted due to the unusual incident on the road, with many people gathering around the confused motorcycle taxi driver, who was telling his long story.