Receiving the attention of the person you love may seem like a privilege, but not when that attention turns into obsession.
"Please, Ren… eat. If you don't eat, you could die."
Miya's voice was filled with an almost maternal concern. In front of her, Ren remained tied to the chair. His wrists were beginning to show reddish marks from the constant friction.
Since the confinement began, Ren had not tasted a single bite.
Not because of lack of hunger.
But because of strategy.
If his body weakened enough, maybe Miya would be forced to take him to a hospital. To a public place. Somewhere where he could speak and ask for help.
After all, Miya herself had said that destiny would not separate them.
"Ren…" she insisted, kneeling in front of him. "Don't make me…"
The pale boy kept his gaze fixed on the floor, ignoring the words.
"If you're not going to eat… I'll make you eat."
Miya took two spoonfuls from the dish she had prepared only a few minutes earlier. She brought them to her mouth and began chewing slowly.
Ren watched her in confusion, since he didn't know what she wanted to do.
Suddenly, Miya leaned toward him without warning. Before Ren could understand what was happening, his lips were pressed by hers, and without allowing him to close them, she forced him to accept the food she had chewed.
The boy's body tensed instantly, unable to react.
The sweetness of the food was not the only thing he tasted. There was something more, something Miya had given as a sick gesture of bond.
When she pulled away, Ren noticed that his face was completely red and that his temperature was high.
"See? This way is easier."
Ren was breathing with difficulty. He didn't know if it was because of disgust or anger. After all, Miya had gotten her way.
After that, Miya spoke to him with complete normality, fixed his hair, and promised that she would return later.
Ren remained silent while he watched Miya leave the room.
It was not the first time she had left him alone since everything began. In just three days, she had already been absent twice for long periods.
Perhaps Ren could think that Miya was getting rid of Leída during that time she was gone.
But that was not the case.
How did he know? Because on the second day of confinement he woke up alone. The house was silent, too silent, and Miya did not appear anywhere. In that loneliness his mind began to fill with horrible ideas.
What if while he slept… she had taken the opportunity to eliminate her?
The idea left him frozen.
Ren held his breath and closed his eyes as if the mere act of thinking it could make it real.
Then he heard dry knocks from the adjacent room, breaking into the chaos of his mind and bringing him back to reality.
At first Ren believed it was Miya moving some furniture or dropping something. But no. The sounds had rhythm. They were not simple accidents.
They were intentional.
Ren remained completely still, thinking.
Then the knocks returned, synchronized.
Ren's heart began to beat strongly with a single hope.
"If it's you… knock three times."
For a few seconds there was no response, only silence. In that lapse, Ren began to think that his own imagination had played with him. However, that was not the case. Three knocks sounded, and with them the energy he had lost began to return to his muscles.
Ren lowered his face and cried silently. The uncertainty that had been devouring him inside had ended.
From that day on, for Leída and Ren, the knocks became their only form of communication.
On one of those nights, when darkness covered the room and Miya was lying beside him, Ren once again heard the knocks on the adjacent wall.
His body remained rigid at that moment. He pretended to be asleep while his mind worked without rest, searching for a way to escape.
In a low voice, barely moving his lips, he murmured toward the wall:
"Don't worry… we will get out of here. One way or another."
At that moment Ren didn't know how, but he needed to say it.
The truth was that the moment was beginning to approach, just as he was starting to recover a little energy. Maybe because of the food Miya had forced him to ingest in that rough and invasive way. Or maybe because of the determination that was beginning to grow inside him.
Ren struggled with the knot that imprisoned his hands, but he achieved nothing, or so he believed.
After several minutes of trying, sweat began to accumulate on his skin, making it slippery. Because of that, the rope began to slide more easily than he had imagined. Then, with one last desperate twist, the pressure gave way and his hand came free.
Ren, now free, tried to stand up, but he couldn't. For some strange reason, his legs did not react. And that was not the only thing. His vision began to fail.
"What is happening to me…?"
The illusion of getting out of there, of escaping with Leída, began to fade as his body fell to the floor.
Ren closed his eyes, trying to cling to the consciousness that was slipping through his fingers.
Then, in the middle of the darkness, a light appeared.
"Are you okay, son?" his mother's voice sounded worried as she saw him on the ground, next to the bicycle she had given him for his birthday.
Ren, only five years old, was just crying.
That first experience with the bicycle had not pleased him at all, since as soon as he tried to move forward, he fell against the asphalt, which left his knees burning and sore.
Ren, between sobs, shouted:
"I fell, Mom! Waah! Waah!"
The woman who had given birth to him crouched beside him.
"Come on, son, you can do it again. I know you can."
Ren shook his head, still trembling.
"No… I won't do it anymore. I don't want to get on the bicycle ever again."
His mother looked at him directly.
"Son, you can't give up like that. Maybe you don't see it now, but falls are very common in life, and that doesn't mean you should stay on the ground."
Ren tried to avoid her gaze, but even so he noticed something that made him stop. A deep sadness, different from any other he had seen on his mother's face.
"You must not give up just because of one fall."
Ren looked at the wound on his knee, feeling how the pain blurred his vision.
"But what if I fall again, Mom?" he asked with a trembling voice.
His mother barely smiled, wiping his face with her thumb.
"Then you get up again, son. You know? Your name in Japanese means lotus. It symbolizes purity and growth. The lotus blooms even in the mud. It shows that the name I gave you truly identifies you."
Ren swallowed.
He tried to stand up, but his knees gave way because of the pain.
"I can't, Mom… my leg hurts."
"You can, son. Get up and do it."
Ren clenched his teeth. Determined, he placed one foot down, then the other, enduring the burning that ran through his legs. When he finally managed to remain standing, he got back on the bicycle. The tears were still falling, but this time there was something else on his face.
A smile.
"That's it, son… get up."
The words echoed strongly inside his memories.
Ren opened his eyes.
He was no longer in the park.
He was on the floor of that room.
And then he heard it.
Knocks on the front door.
"Is someone there? Hello?"
It was Leída's brother.
The sound crossed the house like a divine signal. Ren began to move desperately. He tried to rise by supporting himself on his arms, dragging himself as best he could.
"Here… please… help us…"
His voice, although filled with hope, was barely audible even to himself.
Frustration struck him violently.
But it would not be his end.
"I won't give up," he murmured firmly, pushing himself against the floor.
"Ahh…!"
With an effort that tore through his muscles, he managed to stand up, holding himself against the chair that minutes earlier had been his prison. His legs trembled, his vision was still unstable, but this time he would not stay on the ground.
Not again.
Carefully he took his first step, then another and another, slowly advancing until he left the room.
Fortunately, or perhaps by Miya's carelessness, the door was open. Ren took advantage of that so he wouldn't waste so much energy as he headed toward the adjacent room.
When he entered, he saw Leída completely pale, unconscious on the chair. Fear pierced his chest when he saw her in that condition.
Ren moved toward her with broken sighs, but he stumbled and fell to the floor. Even so, he did not give up. He stood up as best he could and began untying her with trembling hands.
When he finally managed to free her, he held her with all the strength he still had left.
"I'll get you out of here… right now."
He didn't know if she could hear him, but he needed to say it.
With extreme care he began to go down the stairs, holding her against his body.
The knocks on the front door did not stop. Leída's brother kept calling from outside with the hope that his sister was there.
"Come on… Mom… give me strength…" Ren murmured between his teeth.
He could barely feel his legs anymore, but the entrance was only a few steps away. Hope was right in front of him, so close that he could imagine the open air hitting his face.
When he finally reached the door, he opened it.
The light that entered from outside stole his breath and the words he was about to say.
"Hello, Ren… where do you want to go? And above all… with the guest?"
The voice paralyzed him.
Miya was standing in front of him.
A few meters away, Leída's brother lay on the ground, motionless.
The silence that followed was more cruel than any scream.
Perhaps dreams and hope were nothing more than fleeting illusions.
Ren did not know for sure.
He only knew that he was a slave to his own destiny.
Chapter 36: A Secret of the Night