8:19 PM
The small hand of the clock in the Psychology faculty lounge pointed like a judgmental finger. Selena sat at her desk, alone in a room once filled with the hum of conversation of the faculty members. Now it was all silence, save for the soft buzz of the overhead light and the faint hum of an old desk fan that rotated like it, too, was tired of the long day.
She stared at the stack of papers in front of her-- eyes scanning over the same paragraph for the third time. The words bled into each other, a shapeless inkblot she could no longer decipher. Overtime again. Her body ached from the stillness, her shoulders tense and tight from hours of sitting. She pressed the base of her palm against her temple, closing her eyes for a moment, letting the dull ache settle into her bones.
There was something cruel about the precision of the clock, how it declared her presence as excessive. Past eight. She remembered the new policy. Nine hours, max. But no one really followed it, not if they wanted to stay on the good side of the new Dean.
She breathed out slowly.
Since her uncle's removal as Dean, things had soured. The office didn't say it outright, but everyone knew it wasn't just a shift in leadership-- it was a purge. Her uncle, Dr. Ignacio Madrigal, had been a brilliant figure, maybe too brilliant for some. And when the new Dean came in, his changes were immediate. Faculty reassignments. Budget cuts. And for her, an inexplicable pile of administrative work that's purpose is to break her spirit.
The clock ticked on.
A low, gravelly voice murmured from the radio tucked in the corner of the room. It was an old model left behind by a retired professor that was her uncle's friend. It had been playing a static background music earlier, but now, the voice of a news anchor took the stage.
"--incident occurred yesterday at approximately 7:00 PM, caught on CCTV footage. Two construction workers were found dead in a narrow alley behind Osmeña Street, Cebu Chapel. Police describe the scene as 'unusual' No signs of struggle. Identities of the victims have yet to be disclosed pending family notification..."
Selena's head lifted, her brow furrowing.
She knew the alleyway they were talking about. She passed it sometimes on her way to her boarding house when the tricycles weren't running. It wasn't the best-lit path, but it was convenient. Hearing about the murders struck a chord somewhere quiet in her chest, like someone had plucked a string too tight.
"CCTV footage shows the incident taking place at exactly 7:00 PM. Investigators say the footage ends moments after the act, with the camera shorting out. No suspects have been identified."
The door to the lounge creaked open, drawing her attention. For a moment, a rush of cold air swept through her, sending chills down her spine.
But as she turned around, she saw Joshua, her colleague who is standing there, holding two steaming cups of coffee. He always carried himself like someone half-ready to crack a joke, but wise enough to keep it in reserve for just the right moment.
"Still alive?" he asked, holding one cup toward her.
"Barely," She replied, offering a tired smile as she accepted the coffee.
Joshua sat across from her, setting down his cup with a soft thunk. "I figured you'd still be here. You've been working like a machine lately."
She shrugged. "Trying to keep up. Doctor Eladio has a talent for... delegation."
Joshua chuckled. "You mean vengeance by paperwork."
Selena didn't reply, but the slight twitch at the corner of her mouth told him he wasn't far off.
He leaned back in his chair, stirring his coffee slowly. "Did you hear the news?"
Selena didn't answer immediately. She stared into her cup, watching the coffee ripple faintly. "The incident near the chapel? Yeah. I walk near that alley sometimes."
Joshua blinked. "You do?"
"Only when there's no ride. I try not to. It's not the safest place even without murderers."
"Well, maybe let's avoid dark alleys for now, yeah?" He said, voice softening,
She nodded faintly.
"The news... there was some really creepy stuff going on around this town," he said. "One of the deceased... was my cousin, Ronaldo."
Selena blinked, startled. "I'm so sorry, Josh. I didn't know."
"It's fine," He said as if it was really, but his voice was distant. "We weren't that close. But still... he was a good guy. Honest work. Just trying to make ends meet."
There was a silence between them before he continued, quieter now.
"The thing is... my aunt said there was something strange about the way they found him. Like, no bruises. No wounds. Just lying there like he fell asleep. But his eyes were wide open."
She shivered despite the warm coffee in her hands.
Joshua looked at her. "They're saying it was probably a cardiac thing, or maybe something in the air. But I don't know. CCTV caught them walking into that alley. And then... nothing. Just gone."
He didn't need to say it outright. But it was clear that there was no rational explanation.
She looked down at her desk, suddenly aware of the weight of everything around her. The quiet halls. The flickering light in the corner. The unfinished papers.
"You shouldn't be staying this late, Sel, it's not safe"
There was a pause, long enough for the radio to start playing soft jazz again. The moment might have settled into nothing, but Joshua cleared his throat.
"I was thinking... once you finish, maybe we could grab dinner? There's a new place near the gate. Bright, well-lit. No alleyways." He began looking at her with those warm, searching eyes,
Selena blinked, momentarily surprised by the shift in tone. "Tonight?"
"Yeah. I'll walk you to your boarding house afterward."
She hesitated. Her first instinct was to decline. Between the work, the news, and the general fatigue. But Joshua had always been there. Patient. Gentle. Unintrusive. She looked down at her coffee, her fingers curling around the warmth. She thought about the dim path she took home, the stories on the radio, the unread papers waiting for her. She thought about the clock and how it always seemed to move when she wasn't looking.
"Alright," she said, voice quiet. "Just a quick one."
Joshua smiled. "I'll take what I can get."
Selena returned to her work for a bit, Joshua quietly sipping his coffee across from her. Outside the window, the streetlights flickered on, one by one, casting long yellow beams across the pavement. It felt like the kind of night that wrapped around you, the kind that folded in on itself gently, like paper.
She scribbled a note in red pen, paused, and looked up at the old clock again.
8:19 PM.
It hadn't moved.
She tilted her head, then shook it off. Probably just stuck. Or maybe she misread it earlier.
The soft jazz from the radio played on, like a memory that refused to end. And the night, like time itself, moved quietly forward, unnoticed but present.
Selena smiled faintly and turned back to her papers, not realizing the music had started over again.
9:01 PM
Later, they chose a modest eatery across the street from the campus "Manang's Kitchen," a place frequented more by faculty and students pulling all-nighters than by couples on quiet dates.
The kind of diner where tiny moths circling around the faintly-lit fluorescent lights and the menus laminated in their tables covered with plastic always had the same woody smell and coffee stains no one bothered to wipe off.
Selena slid into the booth across from Joshua, her black coat draped over her arm, her body still caught in the rhythm of exhaustion.
"Thank you," she said, offering a brief smile as she took the seat. "This place hasn't changed at all."
Joshua returned her smile. "It's one of the few constants around here."
A waitress, barely older than their students, approached with tired eyes and took their orders without enthusiasm. A sandwich for Joshua, pancit canton and iced tea for Selena. It wasn't glamorous, but it was warm and bright and filled with the sound of late-night conversation.
Joshua folded his arms across the table and leaned forward slightly. "I'm glad you agreed to come. You need to eat."
"I wasn't hungry, but I needed a break." She replied, looking out the window beside her.
The view outside was nothing remarkable. Just the street and a few stores, though she noticed some that hadn't been there before. Work had kept her so busy that she'd stopped noticing the small changes around her such as the little shifts she once might have caught.
But something about the reflections on the glass made her pause. The headlights of a passing motorcycle refracted oddly across the window, bending just slightly in the wrong direction. It was as if the light were folding inward instead of out.
She blinked, and it was gone.
"Tired?" Joshua asked, noticing her gaze.
She nodded. "Yeah. Maybe more than I realized."
They sat in silence for a moment until their food arrived. The clatter of plates on the table brought a slight brief sense of comfort. Selena took a bite of her noodles, chewing slowly, letting her mind drift.
"I was thinking about earlier, about my cousin..." Joshua said, breaking the silence.
She looked up.
"My aunt also said something strange to me this morning," he continued, picking at his sandwich.
"For a few days before it happened, Ronaldo would just stop mid-sentence sometimes. Like he forgot where he was."
Selena furrowed her brow.
"And it wasn't like zoning out, He'd say weird things, like... 'It's happening again,' or 'I think I was just here already, waiting for it to shine' in between those lines".
"You think it was stress?" she asked, her voice serious.
"Maybe. But he wasn't the type to crack under pressure, my Aunt says. It was something that she had never seen before."
Selena let the words hang in the air. There was something oddly familiar in what Joshua had said-- like a word you hear in a dream and forget by the time you wake.
She was about to respond when the overhead light above their booth flickered. It wasn't dramatic, but just a subtle dimming, like the bulb sighed before catching itself. Joshua looked up briefly, but no one else in the diner seemed to notice.
Then something happened.
The old wall clock behind the counter, a plastic thing with a faded cartoon cat on it, stopped ticking. Selena didn't see it stop, she just suddenly noticed it was no longer moving. Its second hand was paused precisely at twelve.
She glanced around.
The chatter in the diner continued. The waitress poured coffee. A man near the door tapped away at his laptop. Nothing had changed. And yet... something had. She felt it.
Joshua must have noticed the change in her face. "What is it?"
"The clock," she said quietly, nodding toward the counter.
He turned. "Huh. Maybe the battery died."
"Yeah... maybe."
But something about the pause felt deliberate, almost too clean. She checked her wristwatch. 9:01 PM. The wall clock said 9:01 too. She looked again thirty seconds later. Still 9:01.
"It's been a weird week," she muttered, shaking her head as if trying to dispel a fog.
Joshua took a slow sip of his water, his eyes drifting back toward the window.
"You ever feel like time moves differently when you're tired? Like hours shrink and minutes stretch?"
She nodded. "Lately, I've felt like whole days go missing. Like I blink and it's Wednesday again."
"Same," he murmured.
The light above their heads flickered again. The hum in the air seemed to shift just a notch lower, like the diner's atmosphere was breathing with them-- lower, deeper. But no one else reacted.
Selena forced a laugh. "Maybe we're both just exhausted."
"Maybe," Joshua said. But there was a curious look in his eyes. Not fear exactly. It was more like some sort of a recognition.
They finished their meal in thoughtful silence. The clock behind the counter resumed its ticking with a faint click, just as Selena stood to gather her things.
Back outside, the air felt a little cooler than it had been when they entered. The street was calm, the only movement a solitary cat slipping across the curb. Overhead, the clouds had thinned again, revealing a full moon... pale and quiet.
Joshua walked her to the gate of her boarding house as promised. There, he paused, hands in his coat pockets.
"Thanks for dinner," she said softly.
"Of course," he replied.
"Get some rest."
She nodded. "You too."
As she stepped inside and closed the gate behind her, Selena paused for a moment before turning toward her unit. She glanced back at the street, where Joshua had already begun walking back toward campus.
The streetlight overhead buzzed briefly before stabilizing.
And far above, the moon hovered thin, muted, watching.
Just to be sure, she checked her wrist watch.
9:23 PM
It seems that everything is back to normal, must have been her head all along.