The hawker centre’s rice cooker hums as Lian
stirs the wok, her hands steady despite the
tremor in the air. The steam curls strangely,
forming shapes that flicker like old film reels.
She pauses, glancing at the neon sign above the
stall—Kampong Food Co.—a relic from the 1970s.
The power cuts. Shadows stretch unnaturally. A
man in a 1940s suit steps through the doorway,
clutching a satchel. His face is familiar. Her
father.
The neighbourhood watch uncle, Ah Beng, notices
the missing stalls. He checks the security
cameras, but the footage loops. The hawker
centre’s walls pulse with a faint blue light.
Lian finds a torn photo of her father in a rice
sack, dated 1948. The rice has turned to sand.
She touches it, and the world fractures.
She wakes in a highrise apartment, the scent of
durian and ozone. A holographic menu floats
above the table. A woman with her face stares
back from a screen, warning her: “You’re not
supposed to be here.” The system identifies her
as a ‘time anomaly.’ A rule bites—no returning
to the past without a permit. The hawker centre
is now a restricted zone. Lian’s father is gone,
erased by the new timeline.
Ah Beng finds a hidden chamber beneath the
hawker centre. It’s lined with rice sacks, each
containing a person frozen in time. He records
the footage, but the camera malfunctions. The
system flags his device as ‘unauthorised.’ He
pockets a rice sack, unaware it holds his own
younger self.
Lian traces the rift to a forgotten temple
behind the hawker centre. The stone carvings
depict a ritual to bind time with food. She
cooks a dish from her mother’s recipe, the same
one that vanished from the centre. The rice
glows. The past and future collide. She sees her
father again, but this time, he reaches for her.
The hawker centre collapses. The rice sacks
burst, releasing trapped souls.
Ah Beng emerges from the rubble, holding the
rice sack. He looks at Lian, then at the sky.
The city is unchanged. But the hawker centre is
gone, replaced by a vacant lot. The rice field
where they once grew food now stretches empty.
Lian whispers the recipe one last time. The wind
carries the scent of steamed jasmine rice. The
past is sealed. The future remains.
