Les Laches

Dysphoria

Tian stepped out of his room at around 5 a.m. On the second floor of the hostel building, there are two rooms, each occupied by Tian and Meda. Between the two rooms, there is a bathroom as well as a toilet for guests. Then, in front of the three rooms lay an open space large enough to be occupied by a set of sofas and a 24-inch plasma TV.

After being satisfied to observe the silence in the face of his room, Tian intended to descend towards the dining room on the first floor. However, his steps were stifled when he heard the sound of a door opening beside him. Yeni came out of the second-floor bathroom with a bucket and a long brush.

"Hi!" The woman who again styled her hair in the style of a midget smiled broadly at Tian. Yeni's joy spread quickly to Tian who smiled back no less widely.

"You done with the bathroom thing?" ask her while walking towards the stairs.

"Yes. Around 4.30," Tian replied. He's tailing behind Yeni.

"You guys sure up too early. Piton has not done with the cooking."

Pito is Yeni's husband. The two have been married for 13 years and have a son named Juan. The nine-year-old boy lives with Yeni's parents in Cayo Guillermo. Usually, any long holiday Juan would spend his time staying at the hostel with his parents.

The hostel itself is operated by Yeni and Piton alone without any additional staff. Pito who had studied hospitality managed kitchen affairs and hostel interiors, while Yeni who was born to a merchant family handled financial problems and hostel cleanliness.

"Did Meda wake up already?" Tian asked confusedly.

The young man once said that he had a problem getting up too early. Therefore, Tian had thought that Meda was still asleep.

"He's on the dining hall. Not in a good condition if my eyes don't deceive me" Yeni replied just as the two had been at the base of the stairs that were right on the right side of the reception desk. "Said something about bad dream" he added again before stepping into the back of the hostel.

Tian walked towards the dining hall which was on the other side of the reception desk. Sure enough said Yeni, Meda who he thought had been sitting there for about an hour ago was seen closing her eyes while massaging the back of her head. The first part of the novel series he had borrowed from Tian was wide open on the table, but it received absolutely no attention from him.

"Hi." Tian greeted gently as he patted the young man's shoulder gently.

Meda raised her head quickly. It seemed like he had just realized Tian's presence. He threw a faint smile, but his eyes felt empty. His mind was clearly not in the same place as his body.

"You okay? Yeni said you had a nightmare. Don't tell me you're afraid to sleep alone like Hera?" Tian tried to joke around to make Meda calm down a bit.

Meda gave a small smile and a twinkle of intelligence re-adorned her eyes as usual.

"You sleepin' well?" Meda tried to shift the topic of conversation which Tian happily greeted.

"I can sleep anywhere easily." Tian shrugged his shoulders in style as if he was bragging about something.

"Nice to hear that." Meda suddenly returned with a gloomy smile.

Tian sighed and decided to repeat his question. "Aren't you okay?"

Meda nodded small. "It's just a nightmare. No letal."

"If a person looks so tired just because of a normal nightmare, I can't say it's ridiculous. You're like a depressed person," insisted Tian.

"Maybe the effects of my sleep disorder."

"Insomnia?" guess Tian.

Meda. Almost everyone who hears the word sleep disorder only associates it with one kind of disease. Though many diseases are in the scope of sleep disorders. Call it sleepwalking, sleep paralysis, or as it happens with him, narcolepsy.

"Narcolepsy?" Tian repeated the word that Meda mentioned in confusion. The term was first heard.

"I have trouble controlling my drowsiness. Normally, people feel sleepy for some reason. For example, after staying up all night or because of exhaustion all day hard work. But narcolepsy patients like me can get drowsiness at any time, especially during the day when other people are active" explained Meda.

Tian looked at her concernedly, as if what Meda had just mentioned was a tumor-secronious disease or cirrhosis. Even so, Meda could see from her expression that the girl was not just pitying her, but was also trying to empathize with her condition.

"There's medicine?" tanya Tian was still with a sad look.

"There was. I take my medicine regularly. Just maybe because it's still the same jet lag day night difference between Indonesia and Cuba, so relapse."

Tian who was confused because he was completely foreign to the disease he had just heard this time could only throw questions that made him able to better understand the condition of his traveling companion's body. After all, it is what makes the young man unable to really enjoy his vacation time in Cuba. He didn't even have time to take care of his body with the disease.

"You won't suddenly go to bed when you're on your way somewhere, will you?" Tian asked again. Trying to avoid the worst possible situation by testing out some of the scenarios that are crammed into his head.

"I've never heard of or experienced anything as extreme as that. Just from the description of my doctor, narcolepsy patients can wake up while sleeping and sleep while awake. In the worst case, they can't tell which one is sleeping, which one is awake. So, even though I doubt that it could actually happen to me, I can't say that scenario is impossible at all" explained Meda who increasingly frightened Tian.

"If so we cancel the plan to El-Nicho. Let's go for a walk here or return to Havana." The girl's hands clenched without her noticing. "I didn't think you'd tell me this whole thing."

"There's nothing to worry about, Ti. These are not symptoms that appear once or twice. I'm used to it and like I said, it's not lethal."

"Author lethal? You know why I asked about the possibility of you falling asleep on the road?" Tian slowly hit the surface of the dining table before him. "We have to walk for a while before we get to El-Nicho. I'm sure you're well-educated enough to know how dangerous it is to travel through such terrain in conditions that might be considered semi-conscious."

"I don't know what's going on in your body. What are you feeling? What pain is that? I won't understand. But, one thing I see from your face, you're not in a good condition."

Meda. "I still can't accept that our trip here should be wasted just because of your excessive paranoia."

"I'd rather be paranoid than be sorry for a lifetime if something happens to you because of me."

Meda smiled cynically. "So, you just don't want your hands dirty because of the risks that might occur if my condition actually worsens?"

"Seriously, Meda? I think you're smart, but you can't even figure out which is more profitable between staying safe or trying to keep your stubborn decisions." Tian grabbed one side of the hair on his head violently. "If you go up to El Nicho and nothing happens, okay. But, if you go there and wretch in that place? How's your future? How do you feel about people who care about you? Compare with if we change our destination to a safer place, which will not affect LETAL even if your disease relapses. We'll still have good news to tell the same stories of the people we love."

Meda's brain began to justify all the speech that came out of Tian's lips, but her heart still insisted on its own choice. It was clearly on his face. Therefore, Tian ventured to give the young man one final push.

"Please, Meda. It's me, yeah." With wet eyes, Tian tightly grasped Meda's hand.

Meda who saw a puddle of fluid in the eye of the girl immediately experienced an incredible inner upheaval. He who was already on the verge of giving up, finally nodded in agreement. Tian looked at him gratefully before getting back up from his chair.

"I'll get the bag first, yeah. Before we go home, we take a walk in Cienfuegos."

The tail of Meda's eyes that followed Tian's movements stopped on the clothes the girl was wearing. A low-cut knitting sweater and dark blue ripped minipants wrapped Tian's body pretty flat for the Asian girl's size.

"Tumben's not wearing a robe?" meda Goda.

The young man referred to a variation of the Tian outfit that included an oversized dress or one that was far below the knee as a robe.

"This is the dress code for the exploration mission in El-Nicho. I don't bring a change of clothes besides this anyway." Tian shrugged.

According to him, the clothes he was wearing this time were indeed a little open. However, compared to what Meda had seen in Safira's room the morning before, this was still much better.

"Are you sure you're not going to El-Nicho?" Meda who heard the name was re-pointed, felt the need to make sure that Tian would not regret his choice.

"Come, Med. You won't prove anything by going there. It's El-Nicho, not the summit of Everest" Tian said as he sauntered out of the dining room.

"What was going there at first, was you." Meda could only shake her head.

***

Tian looked at the building before him doubtfully. Meda pulled her hand once again making the girl tail behind her.

"I want to go for a walk in Cienfuegos, but I don't have to see dolphins either, Med." Tian held back his steps.

The two are currently on a ride to watch a dolphin show in Cienfuegos.

"So you showed me this place." Meda issued several pieces of banknotes to pay for two rides.

"I've only said that I used to go to the same kayak rides Af—" Tian's lips clenched back.

Now he realized that it was his tongue that was wreaking havoc on himself. This was the second time Tian wondered how exactly the mechanism of Meda's brain worked whenever he heard the name Afgar called. Clearly, Meda will immediately act impulsively when Tian presents the figure of his best friend when they are spending time together.

Meda herself is no less confused by her attitude. To be sure, he felt the need to "warn" Tian that their togetherness need not be disturbed by the existence of an Afgar.

In fact, there was indeed little reason that could be the basis of his attitude. On the night that he returned to his hotel room after a long day spent with Tian in Vanales, Afgar asked him what he had been doing with Tian all day.

Initially, Meda casually recounted all the important events she had gone through with Tian in the valley. However, when Afgar responded to his story with other little stories about how Tian was familiar to him at the age of 3, what colors he liked, his favorite foods, his unique habits, and his, until his proximity to the nuclear family as well as the Tian extended family, somehow Meda's ears felt itchy. Had he not known the fact that the young man was engaged to his mother's granddaughter, Meda would have thought that Afgar was trying to compete over who would have been more deserving of Tian that day.

Afgar even thanked Meda for accompanying Tian when he was not around. As if everything that Meda did all day was not purely of her will, but a form of duty because Afgar entrusted his care to Meda. For that reason, it felt right that Meda kept a little "venge" on the young man.

"Dismiss his coat first" Meda ordered Tian, who was preparing to sit in the last row of the audience seats.

"Why?" tanya Tian was confused.

"In a moment the attraction starts and the back row can also be splashed with water. At least we secure the same coat of our jacket just in case," explained Meda. His hand again gestured for the girl to take off her coat.

Tian who heard that hurried up. However, for a different reason.

"If you knew it would get wet why did we come here? I told you this was the only one ...."

Tian did not continue when a splash of water inflicted by a massive dolphin shot into the air and soaked most of the spectator benches. Meda who did not expect that the attraction would start as soon as they sat down could only react at the last second when most of the splashes had already landed on Tian's body which was still wrapped in a coat.

Meda could only let out a long sigh as Tian threw a blaming gaze at her.