They're Here

Chapter 1: The Call of Childhood

The sun began to sink in the western horizon. A tired body starts screaming wanting to lean back immediately. This afternoon, the traffic jam on the road I was walking through felt different. It's been almost half an hour since my car couldn't move. Desire to temporarily flee to a village while completing my thesis.

Jakarta, with all the hustle and bustle, sometimes so hardened the mind. Traffic jams, pollution, and noise that never stops like pain that is difficult to avoid for peace seekers. I'm used to this every day. Getting used to it does not mean numbness. When it hits, I can be like crazy.

After a long time struggling with patience until the dark sky is perfect, I was free also from the queue “jahanam”. Apparently, in addition to the volume of vehicles that always boomed in the hours of work, there is a work on repairing people's crossing bridges (JPO) that makes vehicles accumulate in one lane. Ah, why is the repair not done in the middle of the night or early morning?!

I set my mood turbulent. It felt like something was pulling me into the past when my head focused on the word bridge. In fact, every day I see and through various types of bridges, from pedestrian bridges to overpasses (flyover).

Uh! Maybe I'm just tired. Sometimes the mind that is not careless is caused by the body that wants to rest immediately.

When I got home, I put my body on the couch. Then, I closed my eyes to adjust the agitation that attacked. I don't know! I seem to remember something, but it feels heavy to reconstruct.

Blowing air conditioning (AC) helps to secure the atmosphere. I imagine being in a beautiful village. I try to relax myself with a suggestion.

Then, there was a faint laughter of crispy children playing. Drawing the martyrdom of childhood when the toughest problem is just PR (homework) Mathematics. No revisions, no arguments that strangle the nerves of the brain.

“Yana!” There was a voice of a child calling out the name.

“Yana!” different sounds of a child.

“Your turn is on guard. Why do you even want to go home? Don't cheat dong, Yan!” said another little boy.

I feel like I haven't reached dreamland yet. My brain was still in a conscious state, painting an imaginary scene.

“Yana cheating. Yana cheating.” Now, I heard a thud being chanted simultaneously by the three little ones.

I focused my mind and hearing more carefully. I don't present supporting actors or figures in my imaginary space. So, how can there be sounds of small children penetrating my physical world? They also said my name out loud.

Who're they? The excitement they presented felt so familiar. However, I find it difficult to identify where this has happened.

I listened to their voices again while matching my childhood memory. My body goosebumps shivering and breathing is a bit breathless.

Yeah, correct. I remember - after a long time of meditation. That call came from three of my childhood friends.

“Hamid! Moses! Rusman!” pekikku while opening his eyes.

Unknowingly, my tears flowed greeting cheeks. Sadness and trauma spread open memories that had been buried so deep in my daily life.

Umi (call for mother) ran up to me. “What's up, son? Who were you shouting to call?” ask him while rubbing my cheek.

“Ti. Yep…. Yana was a nightmare,” kilahku.

“Yana have Salat Isya yet?”

I saw a look of anxiety on Umi's face. Immediately I set my nose and facial gestures. “Numbered, Umi. Yana also had not had time to pray Maghrib because it was stuck in the street. Then go to Yana's room, Mi. Yana wants to shower continue to pray.”

As I climbed up the stairs to my room, I heard a faint call from Hamid, Moses, and Rusman. I turn the view. Umi looked at me while throwing a smile. So, I hurried to fulfill my intentions.

After the prayer, I lay my head by the window. One by one the forgotten traces of the past rise up. The story of my three karyab is reinforcing.

Before I moved to Jakarta, I lived in Citiis Village located in Banten Province with a travel time of 4 hours. I left the village when I was 10. It was not me who wanted to leave, but my parents who wanted to recover my psychological state.

Parents and residents have actually banned children from playing at any time. He said, afraid of being made into a collision. However, we are wayward children. We still play behind excavators and trucks carrying building materials.

In joy, I heard a whisper telling me to go home. I also left them. I invited them, but they claimed not satisfied to enjoy the rides.

From that day on, they disappeared. Circulating news they are used as a collision bridge construction.

My days were suddenly bleak as they continued to be interrogated by their parents. Meanwhile, I really don't know what happened to them after I chose to go home alone.

Seeing me as a parent, Umi and Abi often took me to kiai and a psychiatric doctor. I spent almost two years recovering traumatized from the loss of my friends. I can't remember them at all.

Could they have come to me for help? I don't know!

I went to bed. I'd rather sleep to quiet my mind than struggle with bad memories.

I recite the prayer before going to bed many times. May my rest be spared from the interference of jinn and demons.

Yoke! Yoke! Yoke!

I sharpened my ears when I heard someone knocking on my window.

“Yan, please help us! We don't want to be stuck here forever. Please, Yan! Please find us!” hamid, Musa, and Rusman said in turn.

Hot air was roaring my feet. I immediately got up and fought fear.

“Hamid, Musa, Rusman, we are different nature,” I grimaced.

With a few steps, I approached the window. My feet are shaking withstanding prejudice.

After a dozen years had passed, were they angry with me because I came home without telling them the whispers I heard? Had I told them, they might as well have come home with me.

Bruckkk!!!

I almost fell. My heart is beating so hard.

“Bang Yana again what?” ask my sister, Nana.

“Na, you have said many times that if you enter the room you knock on the door first,” my anger spills a pretty great shock whack.

Nana is approaching me.“Nana knocked on the door. Nana also called Brother. Nana wants to borrow Abang's hape charger. Well, just as Nana turns the doorknob, uh, can open. What else is Brother doing? Again play hide and seek same satan?”

I just give her the thing she wants. He even opened the window.

“Udah go anyway, Bang. Maybe they were afraid to see Nana,” he said.

I saw a clock hanging on the wall. Time shows at ten o'clock in the night.

I pushed Nana out of my room so she wouldn't make my fears worse. “Morning chargeback to Abang. Don't stay up just to play hape mulu. Studying diligently let me pass the final exam.”

After Nana came out, I pondered. Ever since I was a kid, she used to scare me with stories about ghosts. However, why was his momentum so suitable? He seemed to convince me that my childhood friends were coming to see you.