CW: Disturbing

Everything was dark…

No– wait.

There was light. Somewhere. 

I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it. 

My hands reached around me. The texture of cotton sheets had suddenly been replaced with rough fabric, sinking in some places. Slowly it came to me…

I was on no bed, but the couch. 

I tried thinking back, but my confusion could not surpass the haze of fatigue. Even after minutes, the only memory that I could muster was simply coming home from work and then…black. My mind was foggy and I still had my work clothes on, white-coat wrinkled, the light blue t-shirt beneath sticking tight to my skin. 

It was not surprising. Not my dishevelled physical state–no, that had become a routine–but instead, the fact that I couldn’t even reach the bed this time.‘That’s a first’ I thought. 

My head radiated pain from an invisible hand of pressure, pressing against my skull. My eyes, as heavy as lead, could not bear to open. 

But slowly, I did. I opened my eyes and there was the light.

It wasn’t anything large or bright–it was only a small kitchen light I had somehow missed before passing out– but still, a ray of warmth nonetheless. 

I stood up, taking off my coat and my glasses–throwing one back to the couch and the other on the coffee table; wobbling from the sudden movement. My vision blurred, nothing had a shape except the light, but it would do me and my current state better than having everything intensified and sharp. 

The next thing I knew, I was moving. Moving towards the fridge, then the cabinets, then the sink, then the stove. My hands had a mind of their own. It was as good as clockwork too, because I was suddenly cutting spring onions, cracking an egg, ripping a package open and pouring water into a pot. 

And not even twenty minutes in– a bowl of noodles sat in front of me. 

I didn’t have to put my glasses on to see that the time was 12:30 am, I had slept for six hours straight, and I certainly couldn’t possibly function before the food was in my stomach. It was routine for me. My midnight snack. Except, this wasn’t the midnight snack you’d try to sneak in during a sleepover, this was the midnight snack your body clock would scream at you to have every midnight for the past three years. 

This was surely unhealthy for my body… I thought. 

But then I remembered why I did this. 

I had only just gotten my white coat three years ago. Of course, the times were hard, it was shifts all the way into the night, non-stop movement along with the timezones had led me to utter exhaustion, yet unable to fall asleep. And when I did manage to pass out, every midnight at 12:30 am, I was always awakened again by notifications. 

I had only moved here three years ago, and there was not one midnight my dad didn’t message me a picture of his lunch. 

It was hard adjusting to the horrid timezone at first, with my brain and body fighting different beliefs while my energy drained from me every passing second. Money was scarce and I had no one here with me. 

But what I did have was comfort. Every night, my dad would always message me, and I would always make something–anything really–to enjoy lunch with him, alongside him, chatting about work while we both shared a meal no matter our distance. 

He kept that light on my phone shining, he flicked the light in my kitchen every night, and he showed me the sun on the other side of the earth. 

I dug my phone up from my bag and opened the light, all by myself this time. My fingers tapped and swiped the stained screen, opening my messages and flicking to the last message my dad had sent me. 

3/6/24, 12:30 am. Three months ago. 

It had only been three months ago, his death. 

That night I had a later shift than usual. My body had already adjusted to the timezone well enough. 

Fate had somehow aligned because that night my dad was flying here to surprise me. 

Because that night, the plane crashed straight into the ocean, my dad had bought the most ridiculously expensive wifi to send me a last picture of his last lunch–

Instant noodles. 

The very same ones I have had every midnight for the past three months. 

And since then, I was the only one left to keep the light on. 

Writer – Stephanie Lin
Editor – Kenneth Gong
Artist – Cindy Zhang

–September 2024–