Recovery Journal (?) :

They deserved to die. Every last one of them.

 

 

 

 

 

Bae Irene wasn’t ready to die.

Not here. Not now. Not like this. Not standing in the middle of the pitch-black forest clutching a roll of toilet paper. No. That just seemed so wrong. Besides, she was only nineteen. There’s a lot of things she needs and wants to do in this world. But it was going to happen. Especially if that thing—that snorting, breathing, hulking thing—managed to pick up her scent.

Irene stood perfectly still. She tried as hard as she could to keep her breath shallow, but the terror gripping her heart kept making her want to in air, to cough. Her knees quaked and her stomach twisted itself into horrible, ever-tightening knots.

Why had she used that strawberry shampoo this morning? The sugary scent wafted from her thick, silky-brown straightened hair. Or could the thing out there smell her fruity smell body wash? Or maybe the chemical odor of the olive-green nail polish she’d applied to her toes in the kitchen after breakfast, thinking that it was oh so hiking –appropriate? Irene looked down at her bare, throbbing toes in her new Teva flip-flops. Maybe it was her feet. They’d been pretty rank when she’d peeled off her sweaty socks and carefully applied first aid cream and Band-Aids to her lovely new blisters. Oh, God! Could it smell her feet?

Another snort. This one even closer than the last time. She could feel the thing’s presence just behind her like a pulsating warmth. It was so large it radiated heat. She imagined a huge brown-bear with a snout as wide as her father’s hand. Or a wild, ugly boar with its awful fangs that glinting in the moonlight. Or a mountain lion crouched low and taut, primed for the kill. Her instincts told her to run, but her feet kept her frozen. That and some vague notion from a movie she’d once seen as a kid that the best policy in this situation was not to draw attention. Bears couldn’t see you unless you moved. Or was that dinosaurs? [I know. This is nonsense XD]

What was she even doing here? Was being part of the popular people in the Seoul National University really so important to her that she had to risk her life? Just because she had some insane need to prove that she was no longer the nerd she’d been back in Daegu, now she was going to die?

The moment Kim Jisoo or known as Jisoo and Chou Tzuyu or Tzuyu had noticed her in the cafeteria that second week of semester, when Irene had been the shy new girl, she’d latched on to them like a life raft in a storm. And that moment had led directly to this one. Irene had never been camping in her life. Had never felt the need to go camping. But this apparently what people did for fun in Seoul—at least, what her new friends did for fun—so here she was, having loads and loads of fun.

When her boyfriend, Oh Sehun—yes, Irene had a boyfriend now, another upside to being a newly popular—had picked her up instead of her dad this morning, she’d been so nervous that she started up her kind own of mantra—four nights, four nights, four nights. That was all she had to get through.

Yet here she was, evening one, about to get eaten alive.

“Hey, Irene!” Sehun shouted from their campsite, which was probably forty yards from where she was standing. “ Are you okay out there?”

She was about to reply him but there was a surprised snort and, suddenly, the thing took off into the woods. Irene whipped around in the direction of snapping twigs and crunching leaves, but saw nothing. Just some low, weak branches crushed in the underbrush nearby. She heaved a breath, bent at the waist, and pressed her hand to her heart.

“You’re okay, Irene,” she whispered to herself, tears squeezing from her eyes. “You’re okay, you’re okay, you’re okay…” She was going to live. For sure. Four nights and then, it will ended. 

Except.

Irene stood up straight and turned around. She had no clue which direction she was facing. She’d lost her bearings when she’d whirled to spot whatever it was that had crept up on her. Was the camp in front of her or behind her? Where was the skinny, muddy trail she’d taken to get here? A low mewl escaped from her lips. Irene brought her hands to her head, the soft triple ply Jisoo’s toilet paper soaking up her sweat. She thought about shouting out for help, but she didn’t want to look like an idiot. Tzuyu and Jisoo had already spent half the day teasing her for not breaking in her hiking boots, and also for forgetting to bring drinking bottle for a fact was sitting on the kitchen counter where she’d thought she wouldn’t miss it on her way out the door. She didn’t want them to think they needed to babysit her every time she had to use the bathroom, too. If that was what you could even call what she’d just done—squatting next to a tree. Ewww!

If only she’d had her phone. She could text Sehun and he would come find her without alerting Jisoo and Tzuyu to her total lameness. But she’d left it in the pocket of her hoodie, which was tossed uselessly on a blanket by the fire.

“Irene,” She muttered to herself. “Think. You’re a straight-A student. You survived getting lost on the Daegu Gyeongbuk English Village by yourself when you were ten years old. You can figure out which direction to walk to get back to camp.”

It was funny, really. Until now, she’d always thought of herself as a survivor. Her parents had been letting her walk home from school with her friends in Daegu since she was eight. At twelve, she’d flown to Gwangju, alone, to visit her grandmother, and hadn’t freaked out or cried once. She hadn’t even crumbled when her parents had told her that her dad had gotten the job at Namsan Law Firm and they were moving to Seoul, leaving behind the friends she’d had her entire life and the only neighborhood she’d ever called home. But it seemed Seoul survival skills were entirely different from Daegu survival skills.

Irene looked up. It was past eight o’clock n an August night. The sky was deep ink blue beyond the tangled canopy of branches and leaves, and every last tree trunk looked black in the darkness. Black and exactly the same.

Okay. She should forget about pride. Pride was stupid. Not in the time like this. It was time to shout for her friends.

She opened just as a hand came down on her shoulder.

Irene didn’t shout. She screamed.

“Hey! Calm down. It’s just me.” Sehun trained his flashlight on his face, the bright white light illuminating the dark flop of hair over his concerned brown eyes. 

Irene felt a rush of warm relief. The fact that Sehun was at least a foot taller than her, with his long legs and his broad shoulders, was suddenly very comforting. Nothing fazed Sehun. He was handsome, smart, practical, reliable, funny, and—thank God—here.

Irene reached over and hugged him as tight as she could. Sehun was a bit surprised with her sudden action.

“There’s something out here,” She said into the soft cotton of his shirt. “Some kind of animal.” 

“Really? Where?”

Totally casual. Like she was about to point out some rare variety of plant. It seemed that growing up surrounded by mountains had inure her friends to what Irene saw as obvious dangers.

Sehun shone his light around them in a circle and Irene gripped his free hand. She held her breath, dreading the thought of feral eyes glittering in the dark.

“Don’t. I don’t want to know. Let’s just get back to camp.” She held his free hand.

“Hey.” Sehun trained the light at her shoulder to better see her without blinding her. He squeezed her hand lightly. “Seriously, are you okay?”

She tried to imagine how she looked to him right then. Her white T-shirt streaked with dirt and sticking to her skin. Sweat saturating her hair and probably making it frizz, even after she’d worked so hard to get it perfect that morning. Her mascara was waterproof, but she wasn’t sure if it was perspiration, stress, and exhaustion—proof.

When Sehun had asked to come on this trip with her and her friends, she jumped at the chance, not wanting to be away from him for five whole days. But now she wondered if it was a bad idea. Between her camping clueless and her total inability to groom, he wasn’t going to be seeing her at her best.

“I’m fine,” She said. “ Just do me a favor and don’t look at me. At least not until I’ve washed my face and tied my hair.”

“Why?” Sehun titled his head. “You’re beautiful. You’re always beautiful.” He hadn’t even blinked. It was so cool, how he stated it like that—like her beauty was an accepted fact. 

“And you’re crazy,” She joked. “But thank you.” She tugged at his hand. “Come on. Let’s get back to camp.”

“I’m serious!” He said, falling into step with her. “Even in chem lab, when you’re wearing those foggy goggles and they’re pinching your cheeks next to your nose, you’re, like, the hottest girl in campus.”

Irene laughed and leaned into him. She had almost forgotten about the nameless animal by now.

“I’m glad you’re here,” She said.

He kissed the top of her head. “Me too.”

They had only taken a few steps when they heard Tzuyu’ s voice.

“I told you, no!” She whisper-shouted. “Mingyu, I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. You can’t come up here.”

Sehun raised his eyebrows and Irene almost laughed realizing that Tzuyu was on the phone.

Nothing like stumbling on to a lover’s quarrel. Kim Mingyu was Tzuyu’s uber-popular linebacker boyfriend. Irene glanced around but couldn’t figure out which direction Tzuyu’s voice was coming from.

“So what if Oh Sehun weaseled his way on to this trip?” Tzuyu went on. “ I wanted it to be girls only so I’m not going to be responsible for bringing another guy. Just because Irene is clingy, doesn’t mean I am.”

Irene felt like she’d just been punched in the gut. Was that what Tzuyu really thought of her? She glanced at Sehun to see his jaw drop.

Tzuyu was still talking. “Look, it's only five days. If you can’t handle life without me for five days, then I don’t know what to tell you.”

Sehun snorted a laugh, then slapped his hand over his mouth.

“Wait, shh…” Tzuyu said. There was a pause for a second. “Uh..I have to go. Bye”

Tzuyu stepped out of the trees so impossibly close and Irene almost yelped in surprised. How could she not have seen her friend when she was standing ten feet away? These woods were the greatest camouflage ever.

Tzuyu’s black hair was pulled back into a ponytail and she still wore the brown cargo shorts and white ribbed tank top she’d had on all day, only now she had a blue Seoul Elite High (Tzuyu's past high school) basketball hoodie zipped halfway over it.

“Stalk me much?” Tzuyu asked, her brown eyes flashing.

Irene flinched. “We were just on our way back. Is everything okay?" She asked, gesturing at Tzuyu’s phone.

Tzuyu looked down at the cell in her hand as if she’d forgotten it was there. “Mingyu,” She said, then scoffed. “For a football jock, he’s seriously needy. But whatever. He’ll live.”

She shut the phone off and shoved it into her sweatshirt pocket. No apologies or acknowledgement that she’d said anything wrong, even though it was clear that Irene and Sehun had overheard her. Sehun rolled his eyes; he’d known Tzuyu since they were little kids and never seemed rattled by her. But Irene’s stomach felt tight. She knew Tzuyu could be callous, but Irene hate any sort of conflict or tension, even if it was unspoken.

As Tzuyu turned to walk back toward camp, Irene saw a flash of something white near Tzuyu’s heel.

“Hey, Tzuyu. You dropped something.”

Tzuyu stopped and Irene bent to pick it up, but then recoiled. It was a wad of torn white gauze, soaked with blood.

“What is that? Is that yours?” Irene asked, standing up again so quickly she almost tripped backward, but instead found Sehun’s steadying hand.

Tzuyu crouched over the scrap. “Nope. It was probably dropped by some other camper. Just leave it.”

“Like we were really going to risk the hepatitis?” Sehun asked.

“Nice one, Science Boy,” Tzuyu said archly. Then she walked off, her ponytail swinging jauntily behind her.

“That is so gross,” Irene said, hugging herself as she edged around the wad of gauze. “I hope whoever used that wasn’t seriously hurt.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Sehun said. “ It’s probably been there forever.”

“Yeah. I’m sure you’re right.”

But she shivered nonetheless, because Sehun hadn’t noticed the most important detail—which he probably should have, since he had taken a special elective criminology last semester.

The blood had shimmered in the beam of his flashlight, wet and sticky. There was no way it had been there forever.

That blood was still fresh.

A/N:

Hi guys! How are you? Thank you for subscribing! ^_^

Am really sorry for a boring chapter and also for the numerous grammar mistakes. >_<

I am really happy if you guys could comment down here and tell me your thoughts.

Can't wait to meet you guys again in the next chapter! 

xoxo

► 12 FEB 2017