Milan’s body froze when he awoke the following day. He gawked at his phone. Seven forty-five.

  Seven forty-five?!

  He sprang from the bed and rushed to get ready. It would take him a quarter just to get there. The exam started at eight. He could’ve sworn he’d set that damn alarm. He knew he had. But when he searched through his phone, it was as if the alarm had been deleted. All of them had.

  Milan clicked his tongue. By the time he left the house, it was already fifty past. He hadn’t brushed his teeth, taken a shower, or even gotten to eat breakfast. But none of those things were important now. He hopped on his bike and blitzed past the road. The Spring sun caught him in its heat, and his breaths came out in short, pained gasps. Shrubs rattled by the force of the wind as he blasted past them, his legs pumping faster and faster.

  It wasn’t right. Milan couldn’t think of one time when he’d been late for school, let alone an exam. Out of all the days he could show up late…

  Milan pushed faster. The handlebars wobbled, threatening to throw him off the bike. His thoughts flashed back to last night. He couldn’t believe he’d taken the bait. That letter had been what he initially thought; a lame joke. Someone had had a lot of time to kill.

  Wind rushed through his dark-brown hair and prickled his face. Fluffy clouds hung over the school building as it came into sight. Golden rays glinted off the metal letters, making up the words ‘Pine Hill High School’, a private high school specializing in science and mathematics. Enrolling in this high school had made him realize that physics was the subject he was going to study at the university. The laws of nature all made perfect sense logically. That was all he had to use to makes sense of his life (except the mystery of the missing alarm). His parents had insisted on enrolling him in a private high school, even though the cost was triple the cost of public high schools. Milan didn’t mind. They had the money, so he could go to the best high school there was around town. He didn’t mind, not at all.

  He fit his bike in the bike stand and dashed through the entrance. His hand clasped around the handrail, heaving himself up the stairs.

  A shooting pain hit his shoulder as someone bumped into him.

  “Watch where you’re going, klutz!” Milan said in a sharp tone. He barely made out a head of shiny, black hair before continuing up.

  There it was. His classroom. He pulled the door handle and stepped in. He slumped on the chair, chest burning as he gasped for air. Two minutes left. He’d made it on a whim. Mrs. Mallory, their teacher, walked around the room, handing out the exam paper.

  “Hey, did you hear?” Two of his classmates were gossiping. “The transfer student starting in our class next year got caught up in something and was arrested.”

  “What? No way!”

  “She’s being held at a detention center.” A third classmate chipped in.

  “No talking before the exam,” Mrs. Mallory said. She neared Milan’s table. Turned out, she liked anyone who got top scores in her class — Physics. Milan was one of them. Then again, he got top scores in all his classes. She always greeted him with a grin, revealing the space in her front teeth and exposing him to her coffee breath. But today, as she handed out the exam paper to Milan, her eyes were cold and narrowed.

  “I hope you’ll at least do well in this one,” she said before moving on to the next student.

  Milan rounded his lips. ‘At least do well in this one’? What the hell did that mean? He was about to ask when the clock struck eight, and the exam began. All he needed to take was one look. One look, and he knew he was screwed.

  This topic wasn’t on the syllabus. Quantum mechanics — yeah, he knew of the term and the basics, and they’d gone over it shortly once in class, but to apply the formula in the assignment without a book or the internet was impossible. He had studied the whole damn syllabus, so he knew it wasn’t in their study book. This exam question couldn’t exist. It was wrong.

  His eyes darted between the students, but their heads were in their computer screens and fingers tapped away on their keyboards. All of them, without exception. Then, he thought he was in the wrong classroom and taking the wrong exam, but that couldn’t be. The exam was held in classroom 104, their usual classroom. That was what Mrs. Mallory had said. He had noted it down on his phone… which he couldn’t check right now. And if there was a one percent chance he was mistaken, wouldn’t Mrs. Mallory tell him? Nothing made sense.

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  Milan raised his hand. Mrs. Mallory’s high heels clattered against the floor as she neared him.

  “This isn’t on the syllabus, Mrs. Mallory,” Milan said.

  Mrs. Mallory lifted her head, looking down on him. “Didn’t you study? Or listen in class? It’s the first topic on the syllabus.”

  “No, the first topic is….”

  “Just try not to fail,” Mrs. Mallory said, and her high heels clattered away.

  Milan’s mouth was left open. His gaze intensified at the exam question, and he wrung his brain out trying to remember something, anything, about this stupid topic, but it was no use. He knew he was right about it not being in the syllabus. But if he was, then how, and why, did everyone seem to know about it? The tapping on the keyboards filled the classroom to the ceiling. It was all Milan could hear.

  He straightened his back. Milan knew he’d fail anyway, but it couldn’t hurt to at least try to write something.

  And those were the worst four hours of his life. Scratch that. It was the worst day of his life. After handing in the exam, he scanned the classroom for Damien and Travis. They could confirm he was right about the topic not being on the syllabus. And there they stood in the corner of the classroom, talking to each other. Like they always did.

  At least something’s the same, he thought.

  Milan called out to them. “Did you guys notice the first exam question wasn’t on the syllabus?”

  They both stared at him, then at each other.

  “Nah, that was deffo on the syllabus, bro,” Damien said.

  “Why do you ask us?” Travis said. “You could technically ask Mrs. Mallory.”

  “You’re right,” Milan said. “What would you know? You were both gaming that Lord of the Bullshit last night.”

  They shared a look again and burst into laughter.

  “It is technically called Lord of the Universes. And it comes out next week, technically.”

  “Yah.”

  Milan staggered backward. Next week? He could’ve sworn they played that stupid game last night. What the hell was going on? Why was everything wrong, even though he did everything right?!

  Milan left the school building without looking back. He had to ask his parents. Maybe they knew something. He hadn’t seen them since yesterday, and they should still be at work. But he’d wait for them. Whatever was going on, it wasn’t normal. He’d worked his finger to the bone this semester. He knew the syllabus like the palm of his hand. He knew he’d set that alarm at five o’clock. And he was certain Travis and Damien had played that game yesterday. Had it all been a dream?

  He racked his brain to find the answer to all this nonsense, but Milan didn’t have a clue. Not even as he trudged inside his house. All thoughts vanished from his mind when a constant ringing blared in his ears. An alarm clock buzzed from his parents’ room. Milan hadn’t heard any clocks ringing before leaving the house, and his parents left before him for work. Why on earth was it ringing?

  As he slipped toward his parent’s bedroom, a pungent smell, like rotten meat, wafted into his nose. His internals somersaulted, threatening to empty his stomach.

  “Mom?”

  The door was ajar, creaking, as Milan slid it open. The antique alarm clock danced on the bedside table and dropped to the floor with a clank, continuing its ringing. The duvet had curled up on the corner on the bed, and the pillows were spread out all over.

  Weird, Milan thought. His parents always made sure to make the bed before leaving. They had pestered Milan about it for a long time, too, but he hadn’t done his bed this morning because of… priorities.

  Aside from that, nothing else was there. Everything was normal. The lamp on the nightstand. The TV his father had bolted on the wall to watch action movies in peace when his mother was in the living room. The frame with the red and white flower painting, which Mom insisted on buying because she loved flowers, and Dad disagreed because it was too expensive but had gotten it anyway. The bifold closet in the corner of the room…

  Wait, that wasn’t normal. Milan blinked.

  No way. This couldn’t be right.

  Dark, red liquid dripped from the cracks between the closet doors, forming a puddle of crimson on the ground.

  Milan clasped his shaking hand around the handle, holding his breath. The metal felt cold against his sweaty palms. He gulped, wrenching the door open.

  Before his feet, his parents’ lifeless bodies heaped against the hard, wooden floor. Their mouths twisted into a silent scream, and their eyeballs bulged out, staring blankly into the void.

  Their eyes were empty.