Chapter 2
The scent of floor wax and old books always heralded the first true day of instruction. For Professor Reyes, the classroom was a laboratory of human potential, a place where the "what ifs" he'd spoken of at the podium finally began to take shape. As he stood at the front of Room 302, he didn't see a seating chart; he saw a collection of shifting timelines.
The girl and the boy were there, seated near the center. Up close, the girl had a peculiar habit of tapping her chin with her pen, her eyes scanning the room as if searching for a hidden door. The boy, meanwhile, was focused entirely on her, his posture protective, a silent sentinel in a denim jacket.
"Good morning," Reyes began, dropping a thick stack of papers onto the front desk. "This is the syllabus. On paper, it tells you that we will cover Kinematics, Dynamics, and the laws of the physical world. It tells you that 40% of your grade is based on your ability to prove that gravity works."
He paused, leaning against the chalkboard. "But at the University of Remembrance, a syllabus is just a suggestion. Our real curriculum is the space between the facts. We are here to study the laws of the universe so that we might understand where they break."
He watched the girl's eyes light up. She wasn't just listening; she was absorbing.
"Before we solve for 'x'," Reyes continued, "we must solve for each other. At UR, we don't start with 'Who are you?' We start with 'What do you carry?'"
He began the introduction—a ritual he'd performed for twenty years. But as a witness, he noticed a different pair of students in the front row today. A tall, lanky boy with ink-stained fingers was frantically sketching in the margins of his notebook, while the girl beside him—wearing thick-rimmed glasses and a vintage watch—was meticulously organizing her colored highlighters.
"I'm Marcus," the boy with the ink-stained fingers said when it was his turn. "I want to be an architect, but not for buildings. I want to design spaces where people feel like they're in a dream."
"And I'm Elena," the girl with the watch added, her voice soft but precise. "I'm here because I want to understand time. Not just seconds and minutes, but why some moments feel like they last forever."
Reyes nodded, a small smile playing on his lips. Another story. Another set of "what ifs" to witness. He turned his gaze back to the girl in the center.
"And you?"
She stood up, her movements graceful yet hesitant. "I'm Maya," she said. "And I carry a lot of questions about things we can't see. Like, if the multiverse is real, does that mean there's a version of this class where we're all flying?"
A few students chuckled, but Reyes saw the boy beside her—the one who would become her keeper—look at her with a profound, quiet respect. He didn't laugh. He simply wrote her name in the top corner of his page.
"That," Reyes said, "is the core principle of this school. We do not mock the seeker. In UR, we believe that 'Remembrance' is the act of keeping our wonder alive against a world that wants us to be cynical."
Professor Reyes paced the narrow aisle between the desks, his footsteps muffled by the worn linoleum. He noticed how the sunlight caught the dust motes dancing in the air—millions of tiny particles, each following the laws of motion he was paid to teach, yet looking remarkably like fairy dust in the right light.
"The world outside these gates will tell you that to remember is to look backward," Reyes said, his voice dropping to a confidential tone. "They will tell you that memory is a graveyard. But here, our core principle is different. At the University of Remembrance, we believe that to remember is an active verb. It is the act of refusing to let the light in someone else's eyes go out."
He stopped at the desk of a student in the far corner, a young man who looked like he'd rather be anywhere else. Reyes tapped the wooden surface gently. "In other schools, you are a number. In the corporate world, you are a resource. But in this room, if you disappear, the equation of the universe doesn't balance. That is why 'everyone matters' isn't just a slogan on our gate; it is the fundamental physics of this campus."
Maya, the girl who asked about flying, leaned forward. "So, the 'what ifs'... they aren't just imagination? They're like... possibilities?"
"Exactly," Reyes replied. "In quantum mechanics, a particle can exist in multiple states at once until it is observed. I like to think UR is the observer. We look at you not just for who you are, but for all the versions of who you could be. We hold space for the version of you that is a scientist, and the version that is still a child dreaming of Narnia."
He turned back to the chalkboard, writing the word VALUING in large, steady letters.
"We do not have a 'Pride and Ego' policy because we simply don't have room for it," he continued, glancing back at the class. "Ego is a wall. It stops you from witnessing the magic in the person sitting next to you. If Marcus here thinks he is the only one who can 'design dreams,' he misses the chance to see how Elena's 'understanding of time' could make his buildings live forever."
Reyes watched as Marcus and Elena shared a brief, startled look—the first bridge built between two strangers. This was the part of his job he loved most: the subtle weaving of threads.
His eyes drifted back to Maya. She was whispering something to the boy beside her. Reyes couldn't hear the words, but he saw the boy's hand twitch, as if he wanted to reach out and steady her, or perhaps just make sure she was real. The boy—Leo, according to the master list—finally spoke up, his voice cracking slightly before finding its footing.
"Sir," Leo said, "if the principle is about not letting the light go out... what happens if the world is too dark? What if we remember, but it still hurts?"
The question hung in the air, heavy and sudden. It was the kind of question that didn't belong in a syllabus, yet it was the only one that mattered. Reyes felt that strange chill again, the one he'd felt at the podium. He looked at Maya's bright, searching face and then at Leo's guarded eyes.
"Then we carry the light for each other," Reyes said softly. "Until the morning comes."
He realized then that he wasn't just teaching them physics; he was preparing them for the gravity of loss that hadn't yet arrived. He was a witness to a beginning that already tasted like a goodbye, though only he seemed to sense the salt in the air.
The silence that followed Leo's question was the kind that possessed its own weight, a physical density that Reyes often encountered in his study of black holes—a point where the known laws of the world seemed to bend. He looked at the class, a sea of young faces who were only just beginning to realize that the "armor" they wore wasn't just for show. They were starting to understand that UR wasn't just a school; it was a sanctuary for the fragile.
"If it hurts," Reyes finally said, breaking the silence with a voice that was both firm and tender, "then you are doing it right. Pain is often just the friction caused by a soul refusing to become hardened."
He walked to the window, looking out at the sprawling green of the campus. From this height, he could see another set of students—a group of seniors under a Narra tree, likely discussing their thesis or their fears of the "outside." Among them was a girl with a guitar and a boy who was laughing so hard he had to lean against the trunk. Even from a distance, Reyes could see the "values" of UR in motion: the absence of hierarchy, the presence of genuine connection.
"Look out there," he gestured for the class to follow his gaze. "That is the 'real world' people keep warning you about. But they're wrong. The real world isn't just bills and deadlines. The real world is the kindness you show to a stranger when no one is watching. It's the decision to value a person's 'what if' over their GPA. That is our adherence. That is our discipline."
He turned back to the room. The tension had shifted. Marcus was no longer sketching; he was listening with his whole body. Elena's vintage watch ticked audibly in the quiet, a steady heartbeat for the room.
"Our core principle is simple," Reyes stated, writing it beneath the word Valuing: YOU ARE THE STORY. "You are not just passing through these halls. You are the architecture. When you leave, you leave a part of your 'multiverse' behind in the bricks and the beams. And we, the faculty, the staff—we are the keepers. We remember so that your stories don't have to end when the semester does."
Maya was looking at her hands now, tracing the lines on her palm as if they were the ley lines she had seen in the rafters. Leo was watching her; his skepticism having fully dissolved into something much more dangerous: hope.
Reyes felt a pang of something he couldn't quite name. As a witness, he saw the beauty of their beginning, but he also saw the "what ifs" that would eventually haunt this very room. He saw the empty chair that would one day be Maya's. He saw the way Leo would eventually look at that chair, searching for a version of reality where she hadn't left so soon.
"For today," Reyes said, clapping his hands together to break the spell, "your only homework is to look at someone you don't know and acknowledge the universe they carry. Class dismissed."
As the students began to pack their bags—the familiar rustle of paper and zipping of backpacks returning—Reyes stayed at the podium. He watched Maya and Leo walk out together, their shoulders almost touching. He watched Marcus and Elena exchange numbers, their "dream design" and "timekeeping" already beginning to overlap.
He stayed until the room was empty, the ghost of their presence still vibrating in the air. He was Professor Reyes, the witness of UR, and he knew that today, he hadn't just taught a class. He had watched the first page of a tragedy—and a masterpiece—turn.
The shadows in Room 302 grew longer as the afternoon sun dipped behind the mountain, casting amber streaks across the desks. Reyes stood by the doorway, a silent sentinel watching the exodus. He noticed a final pair of students—two girls he hadn't focused on before—lingering by the window. One was wearing a Mulawin pendant, the silver bird-wing shimmering against her uniform. She was explaining the concept of Liryas to her friend, not as a fan-girl discussing a show, but as a philosopher discussing the weight of words.
"Even if it's just a script," the girl whispered, "saying 'Avisala' feels like a promise, right? Like you're actually wishing for someone's breath to stay strong."
Reyes tucked that small exchange into his mental archive. To anyone else, it was just "magic and superpower" talks. To a witness of UR, it was a manifestation of the school's soul—the refusal to let the magic of their culture be reduced to mere entertainment.
He finally stepped out into the hallway, his leather satchel heavy with the syllabi he hadn't fully finished handing out. As he walked toward the faculty room, he passed the "Wall of Remembrance," a corridor lined with photos of previous batches. He stopped in front of a faded polaroid from ten years ago. He remembered the boy in that photo—a dreamer who wanted to build a bridge to the moon. The boy hadn't become an astronaut; he was a social worker now, but Reyes knew he was still building bridges, just of a different kind.
"Professor?"
Reyes turned. It was Maya. She had come back, Leo standing a few paces behind her in the shadows of the corridor, looking like a moon caught in her gravity.
"Yes, Maya?"
"What you said earlier... about the physics of missing pieces," she started, her voice echoing slightly in the empty hall. "If someone leaves... if a part of the story gets cut short... does the universe really stay balanced? Or does it just create a new dimension where they're still there?"
Reyes looked at her. He saw the flicker of the "what if" in her eyes—the same one that would eventually lead her to ask about the multiverse. He saw the way Leo's jaw tightened, as if he were already bracing for an answer he didn't want to hear.
"Physics tells us that energy cannot be destroyed, Maya. It only changes form," Reyes said, his voice a steady anchor. "But heart-work? That's different. When a story feels unfinished here, we carry it into the next room. We keep the 'what if' alive until it becomes a 'thank God it happened.'"
Maya nodded, a small, cryptic smile touching her lips. "Avisala meiste, Professor," she said softly—the ancient Enchanta farewell. May the light be with you.
She turned and walked away, Leo falling into step beside her. Reyes watched them until they were just silhouettes against the sunset at the end of the hall. He realized then that his role as a witness was a heavy one. He was the only one who could see the invisible threads connecting these children—the ink-stained architect, the girl who timed the stars, the skeptic boy, and the girl who believed in flying.
He went into his office, sat at his desk, and opened his journal. He didn't write about the lesson plan or the departmental meeting. Instead, he wrote a single line that would serve as the epitaph for the day:
Today, the multiverse felt very close. I saw it in the eyes of a girl who isn't afraid of the rafters, and a boy who is learning how to watch the sky.
Reyes closed the book. The first day was over. The stories had begun. And as the guardian of their memory, he knew his work had only just started.