On a bright but cloudy Monday morning, a gentle breeze blew as my friends and I ran to class after the ceremony ended. The atmosphere was like a normal morning, just like any other day. We laughed, chatted, played, joked around, and studied.
About 10 minutes before lunch, I thought about having lunch with my friends while sitting on the noisy and crowded classroom benches. Eating was fun while chatting with friends. The teacher ended class at exactly 12 noon, and all the students immediately left the classroom. I just smiled and sat on the bench while sending a message in the group chat to invite my friends, Ratna, Amaya, and Ami, to eat together at our usual spot under the stairs where it was very quiet, with only a few students around.
We chatted, laughed, and ate together. However, at 12:20 p.m., I realized that there seemed to be no other students or teachers around. I was confused and asked Ami with a puzzled look, "Why is this place suddenly so quiet compared to usual? Something's not right... I have a bad feeling..."
Ami replied, "Really? No, nothing's strange!" Ratna and Amaya just nodded.
Suddenly, a strange feeling came over me. I felt the place shaking, but I wasn't sure because my friends didn't seem to feel or notice it. But then it shook again, this time more noticeably, causing Amaya to say, "Eh? Do you guys feel it too... a shaking sensation... like this place is shaking... the school...!"
Ratna, Ami, and I answered with the same words, "Yes! It's not just a feeling... this school is really sHaKInG?!"
I looked at my cell phone and could only remain silent and shocked, my eyes wide open because there was a message from the school group urging us to immediately evacuate to a safe place at 12:10 p.m. because there had been a powerful earthquake.
We all tried to run out of the school, but the tremors became so intense that we thought the world was shaking, as if it were ending and falling apart. We were all trembling with fear, unable to move instinctively. I immediately said, "Let's hide under the table... the school exit is too far away! We won't make it!"
We ran into the classroom and hid under the table while screaming and crying in fear.
The ceiling and walls of the school began to collapse. We were trapped in the rubble of the school. When I opened my eyes, all I could see was the rubble of the school and a little blood.
"F-friends... friends?? H-hello?" I said, struggling to get out from under the table.
There was also a rock that hit my leg, making it difficult for me to stand and walk because of the rubble. When I managed to stand up, I saw one of my friends, Ratna. The rubble had taken half of Ratna's body. Seeing her, I stood there in fear, but I immediately helped her and said, "Hey, Ratna, are you okay?? Hello?" while trying to push the rubble away from her body. However, as I was doing that, there was an aftershock, and it felt like the world was shaking again.
The school ceiling began to collapse again. I ran to find shelter without thinking twice. After the aftershocks subsided, I rushed to the spot where Ratna had been hit by the building. But all I saw was a large rock with blood splattered underneath it. I froze in place, terrified, crying and vomiting, as I watched my friend's head roll down to my feet from the rock.
I ran, screaming, "Friends! Where are you?! Please, no one is hurt or dead!" while crying uncontrollably and starting to search around the classroom to find them.
Then I heard the voice of one of my friends, it was Ami, "Aisha... help me..."
I looked around to find where Ami's voice was coming from and ran breathlessly. Then I saw my friend Ami, who was alive but both of her hands were pinned under a large rock from the school collapse.
"Are you okay, Ami? Please don't give up, I'll help you! I don't want to lose anyone else..."
I pushed the rock to remove it from Ami's hands, but Ami immediately screamed in pain and cried out in agony.
"AHHHH! Stop it—STOP IT!"
Hearing her scream of pain, I immediately said, "Hold on, Ami! I'll get this rock off! Please, just a little more! A little..."
I pushed the rock once more until it was removed from my friend's hands.
"There! Are you okay? Hey... Ami, can you stand? Here, I'll help you."
While helping Ami stand up,
"We have to find..."
My words were cut off because when I looked to my left, I saw that the last friend I was looking for was dead, Amaya, because a large rock like a wall had crushed her head, causing blood to spatter everywhere. There was so much blood that it looked like an ocean of blood passing before my eyes. I was silent, crying, and vomiting.
Ami asked, "Why are you crying and vomiting, Aisha? Are you okay? Are you..."
Her words were cut off when she saw the same thing I saw. She cried and trembled with fear.
"H-huh? Wh-what? N-no. AMAYA! Why...,"
I covered my friend Ami's eyes so she wouldn't see my friend's body anymore.
"We have to... have to... get out.... Let's find help.... Come on...," I said in a frightened and stuttering voice.
I walked out of the collapsed school through the corridor filled with rubble while helping my last surviving friend. My friend Ami said in a low voice, "Why... why did this happen? Why... today was supposed to be a normal day... like usual... Why..."
I fell silent, saddened, but as I walked I said, "Yes..."
We continued walking out. A few moments later, as we approached the exit, we saw rescue workers. We immediately shouted for help spontaneously, "There! Hey! Help! Rescue workers! We're here, help! We're injured!"
The rescue workers ran towards us to save us.
We were taken out of the school. We sat together, thinking about what had happened.
"Hey... This is a dream, right? This can't be real... it's impossible... Too many things happened, right, Aisha? Right?" said my friend Ami, smiling forcedly and holding my shoulder.
I replied in confusion, "Huh? Oh, maybe... I hope... Ami... I saw them both die... right in front of me... Ami... I tried, but..."
Ami was shocked, her eyes wide open, "They? Wait, he died too??? No way! Is it true, Aisha...? Aisha...?"
I remained silent, looking down with a gloomy expression.
"Aisha? I need an answer... Aisha! Please tell me he's not dead, please!"
Her eyes began to well up, tears falling every time she asked me. I stared at her with a blank expression, showing no emotion.
I could only say honestly, "He died, his body was crushed and there was only blood splattered everywhere..."
Ami's face was filled with sadness, confusion, and shock. Her feelings were mixed.
"I'm sorry..." I said, then I walked away from her and immediately went to my house to see my parents.
I entered my house and saw my parents talking to each other in a worried tone, which was unusual, because of the earthquake. The earthquake did not cause any damage to our house, but it still affected them.
"Are you okay? We were worried," they said.
"Yes, Mom, Dad, I'm fine..." I replied briefly.
Then I took a shower and put on my house clothes without telling them anything about what had happened, but I told them why I was able to come home early by showing them a notification in the school group that there had been an earthquake in the school area and students could go home early.
I rested and tried to calm down, trying to process what had happened today.
"Ha... today... I will always remember.... Friends... forgive me.... This is all my fault... I caused them to die.... We should have gone to an open area! Stupid...! Stupid! I'm so stupid...! I hate myself...! Hate...!"
I cried in my room with the door tightly closed, so no one could hear what I was saying.
My parents called me down to have dinner with them. After eating, I did what teenagers usually do: play, do schoolwork, pray, and watch TV until nine o'clock. Then I got ready for bed. But as I was trying to sleep, my cell phone vibrated and rang, signaling that I had received a message. I immediately turned on my phone and saw a message from my friend who had survived the tragedy that had occurred that afternoon.
"I want to meet you at the park tomorrow afternoon at five," he wrote.
I replied with a message, "Okay."
After that, he didn't reply further. I turned off my phone and fell asleep in a hurry. I had a dream that reminded me of today's tragedy.
The next day, in the morning, I woke up earlier than usual. The dream even made it difficult for me to sleep. I prayed tahajud and then subuh to forget the dream, but it didn't work. It felt like yesterday's tragedy was always chasing me and following me every moment. After that, I took a shower, ate, and did my normal daily activities.
Time passed quickly until five o'clock. I walked to the park to meet Ami, my last living friend, as promised last night. I sat on a park bench waiting for her while enjoying the cool and peaceful afternoon. A cool breeze blew around my body and passed me by. I was curious about what my friend would say.
Five minutes later, I heard Ami calling my name.
"Aisha... Thank you for coming..."
I replied, "Ah, Ami, why did you call me to the park in the afternoon?"
"Aisha, let's end our friendship..."
I was shocked and looked at Ami's eyes with a sad and confused face, then said, "W-what? A-Ami, you're joking, right...?"
Then Ami said, "I'm not joking, Aisha.... Yesterday, they both died because we followed you. We shouldn't have had lunch in a place far from the exit. It's all your fault, Aisha! Ratna and Amaya's families are very sad. Don't you understand, Aisha?!"
I just stood there silently, tears streaming down my face, and said in a sad, broken voice, feeling guilty, "I-I know... I know... P-please forgive me. Please don't leave me, Ami, please...!"
Ami said angrily, "Shut up, okay?! Enough, I hate you!"
Ami left me alone in the park. I shouted, "A-AMI! Ami...!" Ami didn't answer and kept walking. Then I said in a small, sad voice, "P-please... don't leave me alone..." Ami didn't answer. I just looked down and cried. After that, I immediately ran home and lay down on my bed.
***
The next day, I went to the funeral of my two friends who had passed away: Ratna and Amaya. Their families were very sad because of their loss. There, I just sat silently, looking down with a blank expression and empty eyes, realizing how foolish my choices and actions had been.
Afterwards, I walked home because my house was close to theirs. I walked around looking everywhere with empty eyes and a great sense of guilt. I hadn't told anyone what happened during the earthquake, not even my parents. I just walked aimlessly without looking where I was going. When I got home, I went straight to my room and lay down again.
***
I started thinking about what had happened: how they had died and how Ami had ended our friendship. In my mind, I just thought, "Why did this happen to me? I shouldn't have taken us all there... We should have gone somewhere open... AHH! I'm tired...!"
Then I fell asleep but had a nightmare about Amaya and Ratna's deaths, and Ami ending our relationship. I woke up gasping for breath and sweating.
"Haa... ha... hah... ouch, why did I have that dream? Urgh... damn nightmare...! I'm tired... I want to sleep... I want to forget everything..."
I fell asleep again, but I kept waking up because of the same nightmare, which kept repeating itself, making it difficult for me to sleep soundly and dream peacefully.
***
In the morning, I woke up. More accurately, I had been awake all night because I couldn't sleep. I prayed as usual and then took a shower. While showering, I kept thinking about the incident that caused me to lose my friend, always on my mind. I sat on the bathroom floor and hugged my legs while crying. After showering, I put on casual clothes because school was closed for a week after the earthquake a few days ago.
I just locked myself in my room alone. Occasionally, my parents wanted me to come out or they wanted to come in to find out what had happened to make me like this, but I refused. I rarely left my room except to go to the bathroom or eat.
Every time I closed my eyes, I kept remembering the earthquake that happened at my school, to the point that I often heard a whispering voice in my ear, "You! This is all your fault, you should be the one who died...! Aisha, how about just killing yourself? Life is so tiring... Aisha, hurt yourself..."
Every time I heard these whispers, I screamed. I then saw a sharp cutter in my desk drawer. After thinking for a moment, I immediately grabbed the cutter with my right hand and carefully pushed the blade lever to release the blade from the cutter handle. Then I tried to cut my wrist with the blade, but I hesitated to do it.
"H-should I...? Urgh... damn it...! Why did I even think of doing this?!" I immediately threw the cutter across my room, hitting the wall with a thud and falling to the floor.
I sat leaning against the bed, hugging my legs, and said, "Why did I even think like that...? Am I losing my mind...? Yeah... I locked myself in my room... Hah... was it because of that voice...? Damn... si... al..." I immediately started crying, my hands covering my eyes as I sat there.
***
The next day, I tried to do the same thing. I tried to cut my wrist with the cutter. I pushed the blade out of the cutter handle and pressed it into the skin on my wrist until blood came out. I cried in pain during the process, but I felt a sense of relaxation after doing it for the first time. It felt like releasing the stress I had been holding in after the earthquake at school. I realized what I had done, "What... no.... What did I just do? It seems like I've lost my mind.... Haha... haha...." I cried while laughing bitterly. I cleaned the blood from the blade and my wrist with a clean tissue, enduring the pain, then quietly left the room and went into the bathroom to wash the blood off my wrist.
After I came out of the bathroom, my parents were shocked to see me.
"Eh? Aisha, are you coming out of the bathroom already?"
I replied while looking down and hiding my injured wrist behind my back.
"E-eh, yes... yes..." I immediately ran into my room.
Before I could close the door, my mother called out, "Aisha! Don't close the door! What's wrong with you?! Let's talk about it, Aisha!" in a slightly raised voice. But I didn't answer and just closed the door and locked it.
I lay on the bed, hugging my pillow tightly, and said sadly, "I'm sorry, Mom..." as I shed a few tears.
***
A week had passed since then, and I often hurt both my wrists with a cutter every night to relieve my stress. A week had passed and school had started again. Because I often hurt myself, the wounds left scars. When I returned to school, I wore a pink jacket to cover the scars on my wrists. At school, I remembered the earthquake, which made my body tremble with fear. My personality changed and I became quiet.
All the students at school started talking and gossiping about what happened during the earthquake, that there were four students who were victims of the incident. Two of them died and one transferred schools, Ami, and then there was me. I just sat silently in my seat, ignoring everyone. When I went to get my things from my locker, suddenly three female students from the same class approached me.
One of them said, pushing me until I fell to the floor with a sneer, "Hey, it's you?! Haha... look at him... So you're one of the survivors? I heard that because you guys were far from the exit and didn't see the group notification, you hid in the classroom? Hahaha! Stupid!"
After saying that, she grabbed my hair tightly and pulled me up, making me stand and groan in pain. I shed a few tears, "Ouch... it hurts!! Stop it!" while holding her hand to free myself.
It made me look really weird. One of them immediately said, "Hey! Look at his face, let me take a picture first..." He immediately took a picture of me in my pitiful state.
"Stop! Please... Please..." I said while crying.
Then the one who grabbed my hair slapped me very hard, silencing me in pain as I cried, "Hiks... hiks... h-ha...."
Then he whispered in my ear, "How sad you are! No wonder your friend died so sadly... sadly... haha...!"
They let go of me, causing me to fall to the floor, and immediately left me alone as if nothing had happened. I just stood there silently, looking down with a blank expression and empty eyes. After school ended for the day, I immediately grabbed my bag and went home.
I went into my room, threw my bag on a chair, and locked the door. I lay down on the bed, covered my face with a pillow, and screamed, but the pillow muffled my voice and made it smaller.
"AHHH!! I HATE IT! I HATE IT! EVERYTHING! I hate... everything... Damn... I want to die.... Damn...!"
I immediately grabbed a cutter and slashed my wrist repeatedly while crying and saying over and over, "I want to die...! Die...! I'm tired.... Tired... damn it...!" while enduring the pain and agony from my failed suicide attempt.
***
Since then, I was bullied more often by them at school, insulted, and humiliated. That's why I often hurt myself every night and heard more voices in my ears telling me to end my life. I locked myself in my room more often and rarely went out, sometimes not even eating, showering, or going to school.
***
The night had fallen hard and heavy, pressing down on the world like a thick, wet blanket that smothered all the light. I walked out the door without even knowing why, my feet carrying me down the empty street one after the other. There was a cold wind that bit at my face, but I barely felt it. Inside, I was completely numb, a hollow shell just going through the motions. It was like I was watching a movie of someone else's life, and that someone was lost and broken.
My path led me, as it always did these days, to the old iron bridge at the edge of town. It was a monster of dark metal, stretching its long body across the black water of the river. You could tell it was old and strong, but time had been rough on it. The big iron beams holding it up were coated in flaky orange rust, and the road on top was cracked and full of puddles from the earlier rain. Each step I took on the bridge made a lonely sound that got swallowed up by the darkness.
I walked until I was right in the middle, suspended over nothing. My hands, which felt like they belonged to someone else, gripped the cold, wet metal railing. I leaned over and looked down. The river below was wild and angry, churning and smashing itself against the giant, sharp rocks that poked out of the water like teeth. The noise was incredible, a constant roar, but instead of scaring me, it felt... peaceful. It was like the river was singing a song just for me, a song that promised to wash away all the pain and make me clean again.
That's when they started. At first, it was just one whisper, so quiet I thought I imagined it. It was right beside my ear, a soft, breathy voice that said,
"Jump..."
I shook my head, trying to clear it, but then another voice joined in, and another, until it was a whole crowd of them hissing and murmuring inside my skull.
"Just jump, Aisha... It's so easy... Everything will end... The pain will all be gone... you will be free..."
The voices grew stronger, more confident, wrapping around my mind like thick vines.
"Come on, Aisha, you're so tired, aren't you? You can't keep fighting. Just jump!"
A sharp breath caught in my chest, and my heart started beating like a trapped bird.
"B-but... but..." I stuttered, the words feeling thick and useless in my mouth.
The voices laughed, and the sound was cruel and sharp, like glass breaking.
"But what, Aisha?"
They sneered, all of them talking at once.
"Do you really think your family will be sad? Think back. When you were crying, when you needed someone, did they even notice? No. They were too busy with their own lives to care about yours. And your friends? Where are they now? You're all alone, Aisha. You know why. It's because you're not good enough. It's all your fault! Just jump, jump! It's the only thing you can do right!"
Every word they said was a knife twisting in my heart because it was all true. I was alone. No one cared. I was so, so tired of trying. My fingers, shaking so badly I could barely hold on, dug into the freezing metal of the railing. I used all the strength I had left to pull myself up, my feet scrambling for a foothold. The wind whipped my hair across my face, and tears I didn't even know I was crying streamed down my cheeks.
"Yes... no one cares..."
I sobbed, the sound getting lost in the roar of the river.
"I'm so tired... I can't do it anymore..."
And in that one moment, everything went quiet. The voices stopped. The wind stopped. All I could hear was the river calling my name. I closed my eyes and let go of the railing. For a single second, there was nothing but air beneath me. Then I was falling, plunging into the cold, dark water that was waiting to take me away forever..
***