28

The tale of Deepa hanging herself marked the end of Gibbs and his friends’ fourth year in CGTSS. There was supposed to be a week more until the year-end break started. There was supposed to be a drama staging by Ray’s Drama Club which had been awaited by the whole school.

But when there’s a dead body hanging in the auditorium like that, who would want to stay in school for a week more?

Ray was the first person who saw the body suspended in the auditorium. Ray, as usual, went there for a rehearsal and he was usually the one who arrived first. What he saw immediately made him rendered him speechless. His legs were nailed on the audience floor while he gazed at the suspended body over the stage a few metres from him.

Ray fainted. When he woke up, he was directly below the corpse. Ray wasn’t sure how long he was out for, and what puzzled him was how he woke up at a slightly different place.

From there, Ray immediately called KJ and Troll who rushed there immediately. Just like Ray, KJ and Troll were frozen for a few minutes (or probably hours – time was no longer relevant then) before getting to Ray on the stage.

KJ then called Gibbs – and it was then their uneasiness factor increased fivefold…

Because Gibbs said that he was eating with Deepa, as Deepa was actually dangling over the stage. At first, the theory of the Deepa they saw was actually a realistic-to-death dummy (geddit? Realistic-to-death?) was made, but no one was brave enough to examine it. And touching it was not an intelligent thing to do in the first place as they would leave their fingerprints that way.

What happened afterwards was blurry – Gibbs screamed. Ray fainted yet again. Fara came. So did Old Lan. Ray woke up. Gibbs was hugged by Fara…

Everything went by hazily. Everyone went back home with confusion and trauma clouding their mind.

And on their return to CGTSS after the break, everything changed.

During the break, Gibbs went to Ray’s house. Ray was the kind of person who disliked talking over the phone. He preferred meeting face to face. And Gibbs could feel from their brief conversation on the phone that Ray was distressed. As usual, Gibbs felt like he was being beckoned to accompany Ray. That’s how it was – Gibbs’ protective attitude towards Ray came as if it was natural.

“This is going to sound corny, but… do you get nightmares?” Gibbs asked when he was at Ray’s that evening.

Ray puffed ou a cloud of smoke before replying. “No.”

“Seriously? No?”

“I don’t get nightmares, Gibbs. I get flashes when I’m awake.”

Gibbs became quiet. He knew that it was worse. He stared at Ray’s profile – a face of someone who didn’t get enough sleep as seen from the bags under his eyes, his face concaving for his lack of appetite.

“Don’t tell KJ I said this because he’ll kill me… but technically, we’re not wrong. We weren’t involved. It’s KJ and Troll that’s…”

“Do you know who Edmund Burke is?” Ray interrupted while lighting another cigarette.

Gibbs sighed. Here he goes again with his philosophy. Just go with it.

“No.”

“A writer. Born in Dublin, Ireland,” answered Ray. “He said: All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

Gibbs was silent. The problem with artists was that their random words pierced straight at where it hurts. But Gibbs then laughed; sinisterly.

“Good men. Were we ever good men, Ray?”

“We can still be…”

“How?! The bitch’s dead! Because of us!”

“That’s wrong. She died committing suicide, we did nothing,” replied Ray, calm.

Gibbs stared at Ray deeply. He then shook his head. “I’m asking you this for once. Can you talk until the end? Don’t just give me sentence by sentence. Explain this situation to me. I’m going crazy because of all this.”

“Maybe that’s what she wants. For us all to become crazy.”

Gibbs got up. Maybe to release the energy stored in his chest because of his anger. As for who he was angry at, he didn’t know. Not at Ray – so before he inadvertently sends a punch flying to Ray, it’s better he did some light exercises.

“Don’t you feel that that’s exactly what she wanted to do? To make us loose our mind? For our friendship to be destroyed, no longer being like before?” asked Ray.

This time, Gibbs sat back down, interested in the theory Ray proposed.

“I kept thinking – that maybe she suicide because of that. It’s the ultimate revenge, don’t you think?” Ray said again.

“That sounds too drastic…”

Ray laughed. “It’s Deepa. Bitch’s a psycho!”

“Certainly.”

“Just look at what’s happening now. You’re feeling guilty for no reason. When you go back later, I bet we’d feel awkward with each other. In the end, she wins, no?”

Gibbs was again silent. That damnable Deepa. Truly damnable!

“The question now is… should we let her win?”

Deepa’s ‘victory’ started when Gibbs, KJ and Troll returned to school without Troll. Nobody needed to ask anything as each person understood that Troll transferred schools. Maybe it’s of his own initiative, or perhaps his parents forced him to. It’s understandable as his parents were old school, they don’t really like it when there’s a suicide case (what’s this got to do with old school or new school? Anyone would hate things like that).

Automatically, the quorum decreased to three people. Ray who now had no roommate became even gloomier as he was often alone. Gibbs would try to accompany him as often as possible but it’s not easy as he had to divide his time between Ray and Fara.

KJ was another thing – he was still relaxed, just as usual. It’s like nothing happened. Gibbs felt slightly angry ant him, but thinking of it again, there’s no point to it. If that’s how he’s handling his life after the tragedy, what could he do about it? Maybe what Gibbs felt was more akin to jealousy. Jealousy towards KJ who could still live normally, while Gibbs was in disarray.

That evening, KJ arrived back when Gibbs just entered his room after accompanying Ray. He was even whistling! Gibbs became angrier looking at him.

“Where were you from?” asked Gibbs, rough.

“Teratai block.”

“For what?”

KJ grinned. “As usual. Got a project involving the fairer sex.”

“Don’t you have anything else to do?”

This time, it was KJ who looked at Gibbs. “What’s with you? Got hernia or something?”

Gibbs was quiet.

Then, KJ smiled mockingly. “Haiii… ever since you got a SL girlfriend, have you stopped doing things that break the rules?”

“How come the topic shifted there?”

“Then? Why are you being emo for no reason?”

Gibbs sighed. “Can you please not act like nothing happened?”

KJ looked confused for a while. Gibbs became madder looking at his confused face – now he’s playing ignorant!

“So you’re mad at me because I’m not anxious like you or depressed like Ray? That’s why?”

“Troll’s no longer here! How can you be so relaxed?”  Gibbs snapped. Ah! Even he himself felt pathetic hearing the sentences that came from his mouth. Listening to it again, it really was like an unreasonable emo dude.

“Eh, Should I stop him from moving school? What’s with you, Gibbs?”

Gibbs sighed, “Fine. Troll is one thing, but Ray is traumatised. Don’t you care about him even a bit?”

“He’s a big guy, Gibbs. Until when do you want to babysit him?!” KJ snapped. It was quite loud.

“Dammit, turn it down a bit! He’s right next to us,” reminded Gibbs.

“See! You’re still thinking of him. There’s only one cure for depression – death! Just commit suicide like that bitch. End of story!”

Gibbs grabbed KJ’s collar and slammed him to the cupboard. But KJ looked calm – like he knew Gibbs would act like that.

“The truth is that our group is destroyed because of you, Gibbs. Because you start having a girlfriend, all this happened. You’re mad because you know that you at fault, right?”

Gibbs released KJ’s collar. KJ went out of the room slamming the door, leaving Gibbs who acknowledged the statement given by KJ.