Curious

Chapter 14: Relapse

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Relapse

The next few days passed in a blur of reconnecting with old friends, visiting old people in his family, and a lot of potluck dinners. His mother would wake up everyday at precisely 8:15 am, and have breakfast set for Simon at precisely 9:00 am, a habit he was perfectly fine with. They would eat breakfast in silence per Simon's request. Simon would always finish breakfast early and then he would usually go on a walk in the neighborhood by himself. When he came back, his mother would always be chatting with one of her friends on the phone. He was happy for her vibrant social life, happy that his disappearance had not left her lonely, elsewise he would feel supremely guilty for just deserting her like that.

While his mother would talk on the phone, Simon would sit on the sofa in the living room and read a book. After his mother would finish, they would have tea and talk for half an hour. Simon was happy to note that only five minutes of this conversation would actually be devoted to his well-being, the rest was just like a normal conversation with anyone else. After tea, his mother would go out for her daily lunch at the Wertons restaurant. Sometimes Simon would willingly go with her, sometimes he was forced because his mother wished to further his acquaintance with so and sometimes he would just stay home or go somewhere else on his own. At night, the routine was always the same. Simon was allowed no freedom in where he ate dinner that night. It was always at so-and-so's house and don't you remember so-and-so they took care of for so-and-so long when you were so-and-so young and your parents were away for so-and-so at so-and-so. He was going to stay at his mother's house for the majority of his two-week stay, having a three-day joint at Adam's place during the last week so he was staying ten days at his mother's place.

During his days, when his mother left him, Simon spent the first few days just exploring London and visiting all his old haunts to see if they were still the same and marveling at the changes, if they weren't. His awe and reverence for England lasted only four days before it began to fade. The reason for this fading was not that he just did not enjoy England has much as he thought he did. It was just something was itching at his skull and eventually this itch got to the point where it could not be distracted anymore. It took away all his attention away from England, slowly eating at him until he really could not ignore it.

This was as always the issue of curiosity.

This time the question that caught Simon's interest was about what I had told him about him being a character in a story. It had bugged him since he had said goodbye to the girl and he wondered what it could possibly mean. The girl had admitted that she had been working for me and that she was the guide to lead Simon to the storyline. Simon wondered, did this mean that what the Writer had said about him being a character in a story and only existing in her mind true? Did that mean that everything he had ever held dear was not real? That it was just a bunch of people conspiring together to lead him to the big plot twist?

This question began to consume him even more when he was back in London surrounded by his loved ones, the ones who might have actually been laughing at him behind his back the whole time. He started researching online about alternate realities and how to know what is real and what is not—if this world even exists. The usual stuff: are we all just in someone's dream? How do we know its actually happening? Everything that could relate to existing realities and Descartes most famous quote: "I think therefore I am." But Simon's issue was how do you know your thoughts are your own and not some figments of someone's imagination? How do you know that there isn't some writer out there whose writing your thoughts out on paper because its what goes in her story? How can you ever know?

Well, one way was that the Writer herself would pop up in your life and tell you herself the truth about her life, though Simon wasn't sure he would recommend that path to anyone, especially since the Writer's methods, seemed to Simon, unquestionable.