5:01 AM. He hadn't slept. His alarm's purpose was lost on him; pointless, as many things seemed to be. Everyday, Ren got out from under his strewn about covers and sheets. He stripped the mattress bare—dirty clothes, pillows, blankets—one by one, tossing them to the floor. Then he re-tucked the sheets with mechanical precision, securing the corners like he always did. The covers went back on, the blanket folded at the edge, pillows thrown up in a way that looked somewhat empirical.
He turned to face the door across the room. His eyes narrowed with each passing second. Moving lightly, he crept toward it, careful to avoid the creaky boards—but of course, they creaked anyway. He froze. The trepidation chipped at his composure. Then his patience snapped. He bolted and pressed himself flush against the door, ear to the wood, still not daring to open it. He listened. It was quiet—but not quiet enough, maybe. He wasn’t sure.
The knob turned, the door creaked open. Ren shifted sideways, cheek against the wall, eyes straining to peer through the crack. Dim yellow light flickered through the hallway and down the stairs. From the void below, an old TV muttered—muffled screams and nails on a chalkboard. He eased the door open just enough to slip through, moving like a dancer—silent, fluid, invisible.
The air turned foul the moment he stepped into the hall. The stench of alcohol was everywhere—embedded in the walls, in the cracks of paint and canvas, in the ceiling. It clung like rot, like damp rags draped over a dying body.
Ren cemented his feet to the floor, and peered over the railing, revealing the downstairs. The front door was at the bottom of the stairwell---right in front of it. Then he panned his head to the right, leveling his head to the door on his floor; the bathroom door. He sprang toward the door, soaring across the floor, and in one fell swoop he landed inside the bathroom, slammed the door shut, and locked it.
Ren turned to look in the mirror in front of him. His eyes were as dull and soulless as ever, but he was perspiring and his chest was heaving. Calm down, he shuddered, reaching toward his mirrored expression with one hand, clutching his chest with the other. He vulnerable for that fleeting moment and only for himself. He seldom ever revealed another side of himself---not even toward the mirror, but then it was gone as quick as it came, a shooting star vanishing into the night.
He inhaled slowly, and sighed, easing himself. Just one final objective in this grim prison and he’d be out the door. That thought was enough to steady him—for now. And so, he tore off his shirt, shedding it like old skin, only to reveal his lacerated arms and torso. Then came everything else, scars embedded into his entire being. He reluctantly stepped inside the shower, turned the valve as far to the right as possible, and just turned around, letting the freezing water welt upon him, soaking his hair and rolling down his neck and shoulders as he hugged himself, back against the wall.
They say the way someone lives says everything about them—well, Ren’s crappy room was empty, bare, lifeless by design. He avoided distraction. Purposefully. Obsessively. Right now, he was staring across the bathroom on the other end of the shower, past the steam, the chilling cold mist, then looked down at himself. His eyes narrowed, the air grew colder as his stomach churned into a knot. Each scar, old and new, was a testament to an incident during the tortuous hours of training, sweating, bleeding---things he had grown numb to. It was routine, everyday, since he was only six. He didn't know if he was tired of it or not. Sometimes, he felt as if he needed the push. Maybe he did. Maybe he deserved it. No---he shook his head---it wasn't just sometimes---the thought was always there, and he didn't know why. That pissed him off. Ren had to be better than that. He had to be smarter.
He would be smarter; stronger too---he knew that, at least that's what he wanted to believe, but through his gawking, through the mist and into the white slate tile, he only found it induced an even greater turmoil. The bathroom was not a safe haven. Not even his own room, or beyond those doors. There wasn't a single person in Ren's life he could trust either. It begged many questions, questions that had been gnawing on him in the back of his mind during long nights when he stared at the ceiling, in the back of the classroom, and through the halls of the academy: what was he fighting for, and why? For fifteen freezing minutes, the answer evaded his weary mind.
