By Fendy Tulodo



The first time the floor opened up like a game glitch, it didn’t feel dangerous. More like a test. One minute, fingers twitching on a cold ceramic plate. The next, the plate was gone, and the wall had a pulse. The paint peeled backward like tired eyes. There wasn’t a sound… only a vibration deep in the gums, as if truth was drilling straight through the bones to find a shortcut.

There’s a small plastic clock on the shelf. Its ticking doesn’t match the blinking red light of the extension cord. That’s the first clue. Something inside the room wants to shift, but the rest of the world is slow, or late. The wiring behind the wall hums even when everything is off. No one’s touching the switch, but the ceiling bulb sometimes brightens with the mood. Once, when the body sat too still, the socket spat out a spark, small but mean. Still, the fingers returned. Over and over, just to check.

The thing with speed is… it never feels wrong when it’s happening. Standing barefoot on the tile, with both arms filled with open notebooks and coins and a cracked remote, it’s easy to believe this version is the real one. The good one. Ideas stack fast. Everything has a purpose again. Even the uneven crack on the window edge becomes part of the math. Lines crossing. Messages appearing in reflection. A response was sensed – from someone or something. The chest pulsed unnaturally even before the red light intensified, its rhythm separate from the heartbeat. This one lived in the throat. It made even standing still feel like flying. Words came faster than thought. But then came the plastic smell. A burnt wire, maybe. Maybe not. That’s when things started uncoiling.

A shirt sleeve snagged on a nail that wasn’t there yesterday. A paper fell off the fridge even though the magnets were strong. The magnets were always strong. That paper had instructions. Or drawings. Or an explanation. What’s done is done. Gone for good, never to return quite the same.

That corner table? Meant for snacks, really. Yet somehow it became command central. Stray glasses sat there, some with flat energy drinks, others holding juice gone warm. A calculator. Four pens, none working. A lighter that works too well. It all became a kind of altar. A place to arrange proof. Of what? Still unclear. But the layout mattered. Everything needed to be in line. Even the dust pattern told stories. Lines meant direction. Direction meant reason. And reason was the only way to hold onto this strange, sweet climb.

The fingers moved on their own, even as thoughts wandered elsewhere. That was the blessing. The wires in the wall were not threatening anymore. They were invitations. Sometimes, when everything buzzed loud enough, the furniture shifted half an inch without help. The table groaned when the thoughts got louder. It liked to move, but only in bursts. No one believed this before. They will now.

What looked like celebration felt more like truth cracking open. A bright, brilliant breaking. Somewhere in the middle of organizing receipts from three years ago by paper texture, a feeling bloomed. Something like joy. Not the party kind, but the kind that makes the lungs expand beyond their limits. A discovery made real only because it had a name now. Mania. And not as a threat. Not as a monster. But as a frame. A lens. A reason why everything suddenly made such sharp, glittering sense.

And that’s why the wires got tangled. That’s why the notebook pages couldn’t stop multiplying. That’s why sleeping didn’t feel necessary. Not because of danger. Because of clarity. And the body, finally recognizing itself in the reflection of this burn, stood taller.

Something shifted again when the plastic clock stopped ticking. Not broke… just paused. The red light stayed. But the silence behind it turned loud. It made the back of the neck itch. The notebook entries, once filled with straight lines and exact ideas, started to slant. One sentence didn’t end. Another didn’t start. The math slipped. The hands trembled. Something inside wanted to keep flying, but the legs were too heavy.

One by one, the tools on the table lost meaning. The pens refused to draw. The calculator blinked and then went dark. The lighter flicked, sparked, then fell. This was not the crash. Not yet. This was the fog before the drop.

There had always been a small mirror above the table. Usually ignored. But now, it caught light at the wrong angle. And in that wrongness, the face in it looked unfamiliar. Not scary. Just off. The kind of face someone else might recognize faster. That’s when the idea formed. Maybe the wires weren’t helping anymore. Maybe they were pulling.

The body didn’t move much after that. Not until the blue notebook (the one with the ripped cover) fell behind the radiator. That’s where it had been stored last time. Not by choice. By forgetfulness. Or instinct. Inside it was the diagram. One made during a slow season. A quiet drawing of electric fields mapped against mood swings. The center was a basket. Inside the basket, a fruit. Labeled: “recovery.”

The shelf with the plastic clock was now dustier than before. Not from neglect. From pause. One slipper missing. One pen rolled under the small stool. The red light still blinked, but no longer in sync. Now it blinked… off beat. And that was enough to reset the pulse.

Not fast. Not grand. Just slow arms picking up the pieces. Unstacking the altar. Refolding the receipts. No one celebrated. There were no claps or confetti. But something felt earned.

The notebook pages didn’t end with answers. But the margins had calm. Scribbles turned softer. No more plans to rebuild time from scratch. No more theories on electricity and thought transmission. Instead, a quiet diagram appeared. This one shaped like a brain. Not a perfect one. A lumpy, dented shape with jagged lines running through it. Labeled: “me, mostly.”

The twist wasn’t a collapse. It was the discovery that the mania wasn’t an enemy… but also not a god. That maybe celebration wasn’t in the fire, but in the naming. And naming meant knowing. And knowing meant the wires could stay… but unplugged.

The diagram sat untouched for hours. Not because it wasn’t important. Because it didn’t need fixing. It already said what needed saying. Three circles overlapped in the middle. One labeled “noise.” One “rest.” One “spark.” In the center where they met, a scribbled word… not quite readable, but close enough to guess. It wasn’t the kind of thing to decode. Just something to keep near, like a rock or a button in a pocket. A quiet anchor.

The lightbulb finally gave out. No burst. No flash. Just silence. The red light stayed, blinking slower now. One beat… then two. Then another pause. Still alive, but tired. That was fine. The body understood tired now. Not the collapsing kind. The quiet sort. The kind that means it’s okay to stop rearranging furniture. Okay to stop chasing meaning in coffee stains or trying to write the blueprint for every mood in the margins of used envelopes.

It had been enough. The wires were left alone. The drawer full of batteries no longer needed testing. There were no voices outside the door. No crackling behind the plaster. Only the familiar creak of the ceiling as the air shifted. That was real. That was steady. That was something to count on.

The celebration wasn’t loud anymore. It looked more like a desk being cleared. A spoon washed. A note removed from the wall, folded carefully, and placed into the back of a drawer. Not forgotten. Not ignored. Just… kept.

A broken-spined book rested near the shelf’s edge. A book about old machines. Pages missing, but the illustrations remained. Gears, pulleys, belts. Diagrams that once seemed like holy scripts now felt less urgent. More beautiful, in a way. Not because they explained anything new. But because they survived the chaos. Like witnesses. Like proof.

The old floor kept its familiar creak underfoot, though now it didn’t seem so fragile anymore. More like walking through a memory that had settled into its bones.

There were scratches on the table’s edge now. Deep ones, from keys or scissors. Not deliberate. Not angry. Just the kind made when hands move too fast and the mind is ten steps ahead. They were left untouched. A map of what had been. No need to sand them down. Every mark was earned. Every chip part of the structure.

The window didn’t open all the way anymore. Paint sealed it shut halfway through the last attempt. That was okay. The breeze still found a way in through the frame. Not cold. Not warm. Just there.

In the middle of what used to be the planning storm… now only one note remained pinned to the wall. The rest had been taken down. Not trashed. Filed. Or burned. Or folded into strange shapes and tucked under the pillow. But this one stayed. It said:

“Don’t chase the light. Let it find you.”

Below the words, a single drawn apple. Electric lines around it. A basket underneath. Nothing else.

Somewhere during the late hour, the blinking light stopped. Not permanently. Just long enough to be noticed. The room didn’t darken completely. There was always a glow from somewhere. The hallway. The street. The device left charging in the other room. But still, that pause… it echoed. Not with sound, but with space. Like a breath held longer than usual.

There were no dreams that night. Only flashes. But not the kind that felt like fire. More like a reel of short memories. Small things. A bite of toast. A toe stubbed against a chair leg. A song hummed without knowing the lyrics. In the flashes, there was no running. No spinning thoughts. No voice booming through static. Just the quiet facts of being.

The next morning arrived slowly. Not with sun, but with dust in the air. Moving gently through the weak light from the window. A sort of invitation. Nothing grand. Just a chance to begin again. The extension cord, once the center of everything, lay limp on the floor. Not needed.

There were only two pens left on the table now. One worked. The other didn’t. That felt right. Not every tool had to function. Some could just exist.

The page from the blue notebook was torn out. The one with the brain. It didn’t need to stay hidden behind the radiator anymore. It was pinned to the same wall as the apple drawing now. Side by side. Two parts of the same story. No need for arrows. No need to explain.

Sitting became easier. The chair stopped squeaking when weight shifted slowly. Breathing matched the blinking again. And even though the red light was inconsistent, its rhythm no longer dictated the heartbeat.

There were still notes, of course. Scribbled thoughts. Ideas. Lines that might become poems or instructions or nonsense. But they no longer needed to be perfect. They no longer needed to save the world.

One of the scraps simply said:

“The mind breaks… but it also builds.”

That line didn’t feel dramatic. It felt like weather. A fact.

It took three tries to tape the torn edge of the diagram without folding it again. The hands weren’t shaking. Just careful. And a little tired. Tired was allowed. The energy of before… the burn, the fast, the bright… it had done its job. It had shown the parts of the self that still believed in brilliance. It had drawn the maps, set the fire, carved the trail. But now, it was rest time.

Not collapse.

Not retreat.

Rest.

The chair was turned toward the wall now. The diagram and the apple sat eye-level. The eyes didn’t search them for meaning anymore. They just observed. Like looking at a friend across the table. Knowing what they meant, even if nothing was said.

The last change was the most subtle. The basket… the one from the drawing… started appearing in other sketches. Not the same way each time. Sometimes it was round. Sometimes rectangular. Sometimes with wires. Sometimes made of wood. But always there.

That’s how the mind worked now. Not chasing the highest point. Not fearing the drop. Just mapping the shape of things. Letting them evolve. Letting them stay.

The celebration, it turned out, wasn’t the electricity. It wasn’t the madness or the beauty of spinning out. It was this. The quiet holding. The drawing again and again. The knowing that even when the light flickers… even when the pen dries out… the basket remains.

Waiting.

Not for the next fire.

But for whatever comes next.

Whatever shape it takes.