When Wildan forced his eyes open once more, the first thing that struck him was a harsh, piercing glare. Morning sunlight stabbed through the gaps of the gray bedroom curtains. Yet instead of the fresh, golden-yellow hue of a normal morning, the light felt dull and hazy, casting an eerie, pale orange tint across his bedroom walls.

Wildan rubbed his head. Thankfully, last night's throbbing headache had subsided a little, though his body still felt stiff and heavy, as if he had been severely beaten.

He glanced toward the small nightstand by the bed. His phone was still resting there. When he reached out and pressed the power button, the screen didn't even flicker. Pitch-black and dead.

"Ah, it's probably completely fried," Wildan grumbled, tossing the device back onto the mattress.

Wildan sat up. A profound wave of guilt slammed into his chest like a crashing surf. Remembering his mother's warm soup the night before and the tenderness of her treatment, Wildan felt like the most useless son on earth. He had been unemployed, drifting aimlessly for far too long, and had become nothing more than a financial burden to his family.

Today had to be different. He needed to change. He had to step out of this house, walk toward the shop lots near the market, or anywhere his feet would take him, just to land a job. Any job—he would even work as a cargo porter at the market—as long as he never had to look at the weary, disappointed lines etched across his parents' faces again.

With a hardened resolve, Wildan hurriedly snatched his plaid flannel shirt hanging behind the door. He threw it on hastily, ran a quick hand through his hair in front of the cracked vanity mirror, and strode purposefully out of his room.

Yet the moment his foot touched the living room floor, Wildan’s steps ground to an abrupt halt.

Sitting on the leather sofa with its foam sagging at the corner of the room was a sturdy middle-aged man with dark, sun-baked skin. He wore a white undershot singlet yellowing around the collar—casual attire he rarely ever wore on a weekday.

It was his father.

Wildan furrowed his brow, staring at his father in disbelief. His father was a deeply disciplined construction worker, the type of man who would head out to work even with a fever just to chase the daily wages needed to feed the four mouths under this roof. To his father, there was no such thing as a "day off" on a work week unless the project was completely shut down.

"Dad?" Wildan called out hesitantly. "Why haven't you left yet? What... what time is it?"

Wildan instinctively glanced at the wall clock near the television. The hands sat frozen in the exact same position as last night. Dead on twelve, with the red second hand stubbornly locked in place, frozen stiff.

His father slowly lowered the old newspaper he had been holding. The stern face usually lined with the furrows of anger or exhaustion now looked completely calm. Too calm, to the point of feeling unnatural. His father's skin looked somewhat pale beneath the hazy morning light, and his gaze—usually sharp and judgmental—now looked upon Wildan with an unfamiliar, profound gentleness.

His father set the newspaper down onto the wooden table with a very slow motion, almost without producing a single tapping sound at all.

"Dad has the day off today, Wildan," his father replied. His voice was heavy, deep, and echoed quietly through the silent room.

Wildan grew even more confused. "Off? But isn't your foreman strict, Dad? If you take a day off, wouldn't your pay be heavily docked? Especially when we need money for—"

"Quiet, don't worry about money today," his father interrupted gently—a response that made Wildan barely recognize the man before him. Normally, the moment Wildan brought up money or work, his father would instantly flare up in anger, cursing him out as a child who only knew how to make demands.

His father stood up from the sofa. His upright posture usually intimidated Wildan, but for some reason, today his father's figure felt terribly fragile, as though he were merely a shadow woven from wisps of dust. His father stepped closer to Wildan, then placed a heavy, calloused hand upon Wildan's shoulder.

Instantly, Wildan flinched.

The exact same freezing sensation from his mother's touch last night crawled over him once more. His father's hand felt as cold as a block of ice freshly hauled from a freezer. A stiff, rigid cold that made the hairs on the back of Wildan's neck stand straight up. Yet his father's grip on his shoulder was remarkably firm, as though anchoring his feet so he couldn't take a single step forward toward the front door.

"Where are you going all dressed up like this, Le?" his father asked, staring at the plaid shirt Wildan wore.

"I'm... I'm going out, Dad. Looking for job openings at the shops up front or at the market. I don't want to keep being a jobless freeloader," Wildan answered somewhat nervously, trying to smoothly slip away from his father's freezing grip.

At the word "market," the muscles in his father's face suddenly tightened. A flash of intense panic flickered deep in his eyes before being instantly reined back in behind a bizarre, forced smile. Instead of letting go, his father's grip on Wildan's shoulder only tightened, pressing the young man down.

"No need to look for work today, Wildan. Just stay home. Keep your mom and me company," his father said, his voice laced with heavy emphasis. It wasn't merely a suggestion; it was an absolute, veiled command.

"But, Dad..." Wildan tried to protest. His stubborn streak began to flare. "If I don't look for work today, when will I? I'm sick of staying cooped up in this house! Besides, it's been so stuffy in here since last night. Wildan needs to go out, needs some fresh air."

Wildan shifted his gaze toward the tightly shut front door. For some reason, beyond the hazy window, the outside world felt utterly dead. There was no sound of a neighbor's motorcycle warming up, no street vendors calling out, no sound at all.

"Dad said, stay home, Wildan," his father's voice suddenly dropped, trembling violently—not out of anger, but as though bearing the crushing weight of a profound sorrow. His father's expression instantly twisted into a look of heart-wrenching pleading, staring at Wildan as though if Wildan stepped through that door, they would never see each other again for the rest of eternity.

"Out there... there is nothing left for you today. Everything is... gone," his father whispered softly, his final sentence hanging with a mystical dread in the stuffy kitchen air.

Wildan froze.

His heart hammered harder. An unsettling unease crawled up the back of his neck. Why were his parents so stubbornly determined to keep him locked inside the house? Why did this sudden warmth feel like an invisible trap caging him within an alien dimension?

Faintly, the acrid smell of burning he had caught a whiff of last night drifted back into his nostrils, thicker now, blending with a creeping wave of heat rising from somewhere beneath the concrete tiles under his bare feet. Wildan stared at his father, then cast his eyes back toward the front door. Suspicion and bizarreness piled up in his mind, forming a monstrous, terrifying question mark.