Back to the Future: The Reversed Murder Case
1
I'll remember that night until the day I die.
It was a summer night in 2004. My parents weren't home. I was sitting at the computer with a bottle of soda, playing games.
Back then, everyone was obsessed with QQ status — middle school was the age when having a few "suns" on your profile was a big deal.
Something strange happened at exactly midnight. I remember it clearly. Zero hour. I heard the sound of a suitcase being dragged across the floor, but it stopped almost immediately. Then came the sound of a lock being opened next door.
Before I could think about it, I turned back and saw that my computer had frozen.
The next second, the frozen screen erupted with an incoming video call, the ringtone echoing through the quiet night.
The mouse wouldn't move. And the video call, under my gaze, connected automatically.
A figure appeared on the screen.
A man in his mid-twenties, stubbled face, cigarette butts overflowing the ashtray beside him, looking utterly defeated.
We stared at each other in silence for a long time.
Until he spoke.
"Kevin?" He looked utterly astonished.
That was my name.
For reasons I couldn't explain, I had a visceral certainty that this was a video call that should never have happened.
I furiously moved the mouse, but it was completely unresponsive. I leaned down, about to yank the power cord, but the man stopped me.
"Wait! You have a puppy-shaped birthmark on your ankle! And when you watch Digimon, you close the living room door and watch it secretly because you're afraid the girl next door will think you're childish... because you really like her."
Damn!
"Who the hell are you?" He'd gotten everything right, and I was genuinely furious.
"Based on how well I know you, if I told you, you'd be even angrier, and we wouldn't be able to keep talking. I can only tell you this first: we're very close. I'm not a bad person."
I frowned.
Then I noticed music playing from his end. It sounded nice.
"Going home, back to the original beauty, don't give up so easily..."
I hesitated. "Is that a Jay Chou song?"
"What?"
"The song you're playing. Sounds like Jay Chou."
He paused. "Yeah. 'Rice Fields.'"
"I've never heard it. Is it new?"
"It's an old song. From 2008."
What? I was even more confused. "It's 2004 right now."
"Kevin, you're in..." He paused visibly. "What's today's date?"
"August 6th."
"August 6th, 2004..."
He murmured this, and I saw him pick up a rectangular object. The entire front was a single glowing screen.
"What's that?" I asked. "The thing in your hand."
"A phone."
"How? There's no keyboard — how do you make calls?"
He ignored the question. Instead, he operated the so-called "phone," appearing to check something. Suddenly, his head jerked up.
I flinched.
His expression was graver than I'd ever seen.
"Kevin, I don't know how much longer this call will last. Time is limited. I'll give you the key points."
"The house you're living in now — three months from now, your parents will sell it at a low price, and you'll move out with them. Because this apartment building became the site of a murder. A haunted house. Everyone was terrified."
"The murder happens tonight."
He said these horrifying words with an expression that made it impossible to believe he was lying.
"Kevin, I can tell you your future. After that murder, you completely changed. You abandoned your studies, you got into fights constantly, you drifted through life. Then gambling, online loans, mountains of debt. You became garbage. Absolute trash."
"Why do you think you changed?" He gave a bitter smile. "Because tonight, you were busy playing games and ignored the sounds next door. That girl next door, the one you've always liked — you've always told yourself you could have saved her."
"So you imagined everyone as a murderer... You took revenge on everyone. You took revenge on yourself..."
I was completely frozen.
Then I remembered — the sounds that had come from next door just now.
"The murder is happening tonight," he said. "Right next door."
"Right now."
Was he lying? Was this some kind of prank?
In an instant, a thousand thoughts flashed through my mind.
But he wasn't giving me time to think.
"All I can give you are two pieces of advice. First — don't grab the kitchen knife, you're not strong enough. Look for a fruit knife instead. Second — if you want to save her, you need to move now. Any later and it'll be too late."
"She's running out of time." He locked eyes with me.
I swallowed hard.
2
The door next door was cracked open slightly.
With a fruit knife in hand, I pushed it open silently.
A pitch-black living room. Only the room at the end had light. In front of the room, an enormous suitcase was parked.
I seemed to kick something. Looking down — a pair of pink sneakers.
Mustering my courage, I tiptoed into the room.
On the bed lay a grown man.
I leaned closer, my knife hand trembling so hard I nearly dropped it.
It was an adult's corpse, eyes wide open.
The neck showed clear signs of strangling. The bedsheets were in disarray — he must have fought desperately for his life.
I'd killed people in games. I'd seen gory scenes in movies.
But standing there, looking at a person who'd been choked to death, I was overtaken by fear. My whole body went out of control. I couldn't stop shaking.
Something brushed my ankle!
I nearly screamed. In my panic, I looked down and saw a girl's hand reaching out from under the bed, gripping my ankle.
I recognized the watch on that wrist. It was Mia's.
She recognized the puppy birthmark on my ankle.
From the bathroom came the sound of flushing.
She pulled my ankle, drawing me beneath the bed.
3
Mia Yu.
My childhood friend. The girl who lived next door.
Under the bed together, our view blocked by the hanging bedsheets, we couldn't see the whole room.
Slowly, a pair of leather shoes appeared in the room.
I couldn't stop shaking.
My hand was grabbed. I turned — it was Mia, her face filled with terror.
The leather shoes paced slowly across the room, dragging a large suitcase.
I heard the sound of a zipper, then saw a pair of lifeless feet appear on the floor.
The body was lifted and placed inside the suitcase.
When the owner of the leather shoes crouched down to close the zipper, I finally saw his back.
A powerfully built man.
Looking at those rock-like muscles, the knife in my hand felt almost impossible to grip.
If he found us, we were done for.
My nails dug deep into my own palms, forcing myself not to make a sound.
"Old Yu, don't blame me. I had no choice." The man sighed, seemingly speaking to the corpse in the suitcase.
He stood up, dragged the case out of the room, and left.
After a long time, I heard the front door click shut.
I was drenched in sweat, nearly collapsed.
4
Mia still gripped my arm, refusing to let go.
I waited a long time. The living room had gone completely silent.
I crept out from under the bed. Mia tried to follow.
I tapped her arm three times with my fingers.
She understood and stayed under the bed.
I gathered my courage, crept to the door and peeked out to check the living room.
The living room was empty. Only the suitcase remained.
Had he left...?
The bedroom light dimly illuminated the room.
Mia's pink sneakers, which I'd kicked earlier, lay quietly in the faint light.
Every hair on my body stood on end.
The killer would have seen those shoes too!
He knew there was a child in the house!
From the doorframe, a massive hand shot out and grabbed my head.
The next second, my skull was slammed against the doorframe.
I lost all strength and crumpled to the floor.
Struggling to open my eyes, I saw his silhouette.
He'd been hiding outside the door, pressed flat against the wall.
He'd lured the kid out on purpose!
The knife... I reached for it, but he kicked it far away.
He crouched down and wrapped one hand around my throat, lifting my head like a ragdoll.
My throat felt like it was being crushed. My eyes rolled back. Blood spilled from my mouth.
"A boy?" He paused, surprised.
He whipped his head around.
A girl's scream.
He'd spotted Mia under the bed.
5
He released me, half-dead, and my head slammed against the floor. My consciousness blurred.
What I saw through blurred vision was Mia scrambling out from under the bed. She screamed for help, but before she could finish the first syllable, the man pinned her to the floor and locked his hands around her throat.
Her body thrashed violently, but no sound came out anymore.
I... I could only think of one way to save us.
I couldn't stand anymore. I crawled across the floor toward the living room window, pulling myself forward with everything I had.
Time had never moved so slowly. Faster. Just a bit faster.
I could no longer hear Mia's struggle.
Finally, I reached the window. I hauled myself up, propping my body against the sill.
"Help..."
"Save us..."
Damn it.
Damn it...
I was shouting with all my strength, but my crushed throat could only produce a thin, hoarse whisper.
Mia.
I couldn't say exactly when I'd fallen for her.
When I was little and boys bullied me, she'd fight them off for me.
When the teacher suddenly appeared outside the classroom window, she'd tap my arm three times.
When I got bad grades and my parents hit me, she'd mock me at the door but then bring ice for my bruises...
Looking back, she was always the one taking care of me.
Now it was my turn.
6
I remembered.
Directly below the third-floor living room was an awning.
During thunderstorms, it would rattle and shake.
7
It was the last burst of strength my body could muster.
My joints trembling, I stood, propped myself against the sill, and hauled myself onto the windowsill.
I coughed hard once. My throat tore with a searing pain, like blades spinning inside.
A mouthful of blood I couldn't hold back sprayed across the window in a radiating pattern.
The man's hands were covered in bulging veins. Beneath him, Mia had only feeble twitches left.
He heard the noise and turned his head.
The neighbors would hear it. I smiled.
Time for you to run, you bastard.
He realized what I was about to do.
Mia was finally released. He lunged toward me.
Too late.
I lost my balance and fell.
Walls, windows, the man's silhouette at the sill — everything rushed away at terrifying speed.
Bastard...
A few seconds later: BAM.
Like hitting water. My body crashed through the awning. Metal and plastic fragments sprayed up like water.
A deafening crash!
The last thing I saw was every light in the building turning on. Faces appeared in windows. Someone looked up and saw the stranger at the window.
The blood dripping down the window — did they see it? They must have, because I heard someone shout, "I'll call an ambulance! Someone call the police!"
The man's figure vanished from the window in panic.
8
...
If I had died there that night.
I suppose I would have been a hero.
...
9
Four years later. An autumn day in 2008, the sunlight warm.
A basketball rolled to my feet.
Mia crouched down and threw it back to the kids calling from across the way.
I sat in my wheelchair, watching those running, jumping children, something unwilling flickering in my eyes.
Yes.
That night, the awning had broken my fall, and I'd barely survived.
But the doctors told us the shattered lumbar vertebrae and dead nerves were irreversible.