CHAPTER 6 — BOOK III
The Thin Air
(Blue Mountains — Leura, 2007)
Central Station felt heavier than Manly ever had.
No ocean wind.
No open horizon.
Just steel tracks and departures.
Embong stood with his suitcase, watching commuters move with certainty he did not feel.
He told himself this was temporary.
Just one semester.
Just recalibration.
The train pulled away from Sydney slowly, then steadily, then without apology.
Leura
Leura arrived in mist.
Federation-style shopfronts.
Iron lace balconies.
Pink magnolia trees soft against pale sky.
It was beautiful in a way that required quiet.
The air was thinner here.
Cleaner.
Colder.
The taxi driver waiting outside the station looked unimpressed by all of it.
“Quickly,” he snapped as Embong approached. “I don’t have all day.”
Embong tightened his grip on the suitcase.
Take a chill pill, old man, he thought.
He didn’t say it.
Instead, he climbed in and handed over the address calmly.
Growth sometimes meant silence.
The First Warning
When he later asked the same driver whether he could contact him directly for future trips, the man scoffed.
“My mobile? No. You call the company.”
Flat.
Closed.
Embong nodded.
“Right.”
Some people did not offer warmth.
They rationed it.
The Campus
The Blue Mountains campus was smaller.
Functional.
Less romantic than Manly’s Gothic stone.
Here, ambition felt narrower.
More competitive.
Less forgiving.
Students seemed quicker to irritation.
One staff member snapped when he asked a procedural question.
“Read the handbook.”
Embong nodded.
He would.
The Roommate
His roommate was Muslim.
Non-practising.
Some nights he returned drunk, the scent of alcohol sharp against the thin mountain air.
One night, shouting erupted outside their door.
Voices.
Anger.
Embong woke to the sound of metal sliding free.
His roommate stood near the doorway.
Holding a knife.
“Not you,” the roommate muttered. “Them.”
Embong didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
He prayed quietly.
No one was hurt.
But something shifted permanently.
Safety here felt conditional.
Ramadan
Ramadan arrived quietly.
The mornings were cold.
He woke before dawn alone.
No Ibu in the kitchen.
No shared sahur.
No soft recitations drifting through the house.
Just a kettle.
Steam.
Thin light.
Fasting in Manly might have felt cleansing.
Fasting here felt testing.
He was tired in class.
He forgot one group meeting.
They had waited an hour.
The Karina in his project management group was already stretched thin.
“You cannot do that,” she snapped. “We are serious here.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You make us look bad.”
Her voice trembled.
Stress, not cruelty.
Still, it stung.
Later, when she threatened to remove him from the group, something inside him snapped.
“I said I was fasting,” he replied sharply. “I said I was tired. You think I want to sabotage this?”
The room went silent.
Her face tightened.
She wasn’t wrong.
He wasn’t wrong.
They were both exhausted.
The presentation later went smoothly.
Professional.
Measured.
They received strong marks.
But the warmth did not return.
The Joke That Backfired
He joked once that Nate liked Mira.
Lightly.
Stupidly.
Mira had a boyfriend.
She didn’t laugh.
“Behave,” she said firmly.
Later someone told him she’d considered reporting it if he repeated it.
Lenny pulled him aside.
“She’s stressed. Don’t push it.”
Embong nodded.
“Got it.”
Lenny later joked about Nate himself and grinned.
“You’re lucky.”
Some students were grumpy.
Some were generous.
He learned quickly which ones to test.
Fred
Not all taxi drivers were blunt.
Fred was different.
Younger.
Spectacles.
Calm.
Two years older, maybe.
He asked questions.
“Why hospitality?”
Embong shrugged. “Because I like building spaces for people.”
Fred smiled.
“That sounds less corporate than you think.”
One evening, as Embong gathered his bags, Fred hesitated.
“You can call me direct next time,” he said, scribbling his mobile number on a receipt.
Embong blinked.
“Really?”
“Yeah. Easier.”
It wasn’t flirtation.
Not quite.
But it was warmth.
And after weeks of guarded faces, warmth felt like oxygen.
They talked about music once.
About Sydney.
About nothing significant.
Embong found himself enjoying the drive more than the destination.
The Town
Leura was breathtaking.
Magnolia trees bloomed soft pink against pale sky.
He found a small Thai restaurant overlooking the main street.
Sat alone by the window.
Steam rising from green curry.
Antique stores tempted him.
He bought a Chinese ginger jar with a lid — blue porcelain, deliberate.
And a framed kiswah panel.
He didn’t know why.
Perhaps to anchor himself.
Perhaps to remember scale.
The Three Sisters
He stood at Echo Point one afternoon.
The Three Sisters rose from the valley.
Ancient.
Unbothered.
He felt small.
Not in a humiliating way.
In a clarifying way.
The mountains did not care about Jonas.
Or Leif.
Or taxi drivers.
Or group tensions.
They endured.
He breathed.
And wished someone stood beside him.
The Exit
On his final departure, the blunt taxi driver eyed his luggage.
“You should’ve booked a bigger car.”
Embong didn’t respond.
He just wanted to reach Central.
Just wanted Sydney’s noise again.
The train descended slowly back toward the city.
Air thickening.
Sky widening.
Central Station.
Geoffrey and Uncle Rusaldi were waiting.
The Range Rover felt solid.
Familiar.
Safe.
“How was it?” Geoffrey asked.
Embong looked out the window.
“Beautiful,” he said.
A pause.
“But not for me.”
The Quiet Conclusion
After one semester, he never went back.
Blue Mountains had tested him.
Spiritually.
Socially.
Emotionally.
It taught him:
Not every beautiful place is meant to hold you.
And not every silence is peaceful.
Some are simply thin.
He carried the ginger jar home.
The kiswah frame hung carefully on his wall.
He kept the lesson.
And left the air behind.
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