Son Naeun had always liked fairytales. She used to think that it is something that someone like her would never be able to experience. Going on an adventure, falling in love, marrying her prince charming and living happily ever after, she was more of the princesses that get stuck in the tower and is never let out. So yes, she lives precariously through novels and stories of romance that would never happen to her. However, her chance came when her parents finally enrolled her to Hogwarts and finally met the person who became the love of her life. They dated, they got married, life was the beautiful fairytale that Naeun had only dreamt of.

It was, until the day when it all came crashing down. 

The calendar in the house had long been thrown away, any inclination of the date was permanently erased from the comfortable newlywed house, so there is no possible way of knowing what day of the month it is. But still, the chill that ran down her arm, and the suffocating feeling in her chest alerted her of just what day it could possibly be. Naeun was crying even before she opened her eyes, although she had cried every night for god knows how long that she was sure that tears had been permanently drained from her body and she is unable to do so anymore. She was wrong. Eyes blank, Naeun finally cracked open her wide eyes and stared up at the ceiling on the bed big enough for two. Sun was streaming through the white paned windows in the bedroom, the air still, as if it knew better than to make the former Slytherin feel worse than she felt right at that moment. Bare feet padding down the hallway and down the stairs, she felt a choke coming up as she noticed that the house still looked as beautiful as their first night, as they first envisioned it, even after everything that had happened.  

Her sniffles turned into sobs as her eyes landed on the chair he used to sit in, the mug he used to drink his coffee from, the spot where her used to stand when he kissed her goodbye for the day. It has been a little before a year and Naeun couldn’t even fathom how some people could move on from losing someone, she certainly couldn’t, and she is sure that she couldn’t do so until the day she died. Clutching her chest, Naeun shook with a series of heart wrenching sobs as she leaned against the kitchen counter. It was this day last year that they said their vows. The height of spring, when the flowers were in full bloom, Naeun felt like she was the happiest person ever born in to the world, so how did everything change so drastically in the space of a year? 

“Myungsoo.” She called, her cracking voice bouncing off the walls. “Love, wake up~”

He can’t. Naeun thought, tearing her eyes off his empty chair and walked slowly out the back porch. He never could.  Black sweater wrapped tightly around her small frame, she tried and failed to not think of that day all those years ago. The day that started with a sunrise unlike any other, the day when she unknowingly gave her heart to a nameless stranger. She gladly did, now she knows, she would give him everything and anything that she could. And she did. As her bare feet found the grassy ground, the wind immediately picked up, and Naeun felt a watery smile coming to her face.

“Myungsoo.” 

Her whisper carried out in the wind as the breeze caressed her, twirling her hair as he used to. Naeun closed her eyes as her sobs became louder, unable to control herself.

“I hate you.”

She was inconsolable that day. Completely so. Something that none of her family and friends have ever seen. The normally calm and composed girl was in hysterics, crying herself hoarse and shaking uncontrollably, but of course, the event was anything but normal. Naeun could remember being restrained by a few people as she tried punching, kicking, clawing her way to his side. They had told her that they wanted her to remember him the way she did in her memories, not the way he is on the hospital morgue. There were two things that struck her about that, the first, the fact that Myungsoo was in fact …not the way he’s supposed to look, the second, the fact that the only way she could see him again was just that, in her memories. And that just made her cry even harder. They had told her it was a rare disease gone bad. The one where the fire breathing spell gone bad wasn’t just a fire breathing spell gone bad, but a fire breathing spell gone bad laced with dark magic. A fire that cannot be put out. A fire that is deadly. 

“Why do you have to be so smart?!” Naeun yelled at the skies, tears cascading down her pale face. “It wasn’t even your part to play, Myungsoo.”

Naeun had never been angry to Myungsoo. Not once. Not even when he had to cancel on her for the umpteenth time, nor even when he had blown up on her one day for some unimportant, miniscule reason. She prefers to soothe rather than to retaliate, to let him get his feelings off his chest rather than stop him. She had poured all her love to him and had only wanted his love back in return, nothing more. This is why her family and friends jumped in surprised as she yelled in frustration and pain, her parents in particular at a total loss in dealing with who they know as their soft spoken and calm daughter. Tiffany had been in tears beside her, trying her best to calm her shaking shoulders, Yoonjo on her other side, her small hands holding on to Naeun’s cold ones, also equally in tears. 

“You promised me that we would stay together forever. You lied!” She cried, sinking down to the ground with sobs. “We were supposed to go to France today, don’t you remember? We planned it already.”

Today is their first wedding anniversary. The beautiful blooming flowers in their back yard hauntingly echoed how the flowers in their wedding bloomed, pure white and glowing in the sunlight. 

“Why can’t you come back to me? Why did you have to leave? Take me with you!”

Naeun laughed bitterly through her tears, eyes still staring up at the mockingly clear blue sky, the spring breeze still blowing through her hair.

“W-we were supposed to wake up to each other’s faces every day, sleep by each other’s side all night. I was just getting used to that oppa, the feeling of joy that attacked my heart every morning when I turn over and you’re right there beside me. The way you like to my hair before going to sleep and the way you kiss me and hold me whenever you can. I-“

She closed her eyes, pausing as she tried her best to calm her shaking voice, wrapping the black knit sweater closer to her body, the sweater that still had the faintest traces of his smell. 

“It h-hurts, oppa.” Naeun whimpered pathetically, clutching at her chest and pulling her knees closer to her. “Oh god, it hurts so much and it’s your fault.”

“Your boss was just about to relax your schedule a bit, being newlyweds and all, did you remember? …so we could spend some time together. I’m not the best cook but you had always eaten my food like it’s the best in the world, you would always hug me from behind when I’m cooking and whisper how beautiful I was in the kitchen like this, no matter how many times I told you it was dangerous for you to be remotely near me when there is a lot of room where things could go wrong…”

“I cried like I never did before, screamed like I never did before. I only had you for two months before you’re taken away from me. Two months. ‘Soo, did you you have any idea how much I cried? It was terrible. At your service I- …I couldn’t even say anything about you up at the podium. You know that I love you, that I’ve always loved you and even this wont make me stop.”

She sat in silence, letting the wind swirl around her as if encasing her in a hug, stretching her fingers to the front to reach out for something, anything that could make me feel better. 

“Can’t you hold me one more time?” Naeun whispered, closing her eyes. Almost immediately, he appeared in front of her, small smile and plaid shirt and all. 

“Love, I would kiss you all day if I could.” She could hear the echo of his voice sounded through the wind, a mere shadow of what used to be.

“I need you. I miss you so much …I don’t know what I’m doing without you.” She begged, sobs wrecking her body once more, eyes still closed and focused fully on the beautiful embodiment of her late husband right in front of her. 

He shook his head, a sad little frown on his face, as if telling her that he’s disapproving of her actions. But she shook her head weakly, signalling that there’s nothing else she could do. A particularly violent wind suddenly appeared and blew her long brown hair back in one go, it reminded her so much of Myungsoo’s no nonsense reactions that she had to let out a small bitter laugh.

“But I’m yours.” She whispered. “I’m yours and I don’t know how to do all of this without you. I don’t want to do this without you.”

“Try, love, try for me.” The shadow answered back.

” ‘Soo-“

“Naeun, you’re stronger than you think.”

“Not without you.”

She sighed, wiping tears from her frozen cheeks.

“I must look pathetic oppa, I’m sorry.”

“You’ve never looked more beautiful.”

Naeun cracked the tiniest of smiles and let out a slither of laughter out of . The Myungsoo she knew had his moments, those special moments where he would make her happy with one word and nothing else, and the image of him in her mind seem to be doing the same. 

“Open your eyes, love, it’s time to get up …I love you.”

She felt her heart constrict with the best type of pain there is and complied to his request. The soft spring light greeted her, the bright blue sky and the flowers in their garden. His shadow disappeared, her heart immediately feeling empty at it’s wake. Naeun looked up to the sky, knowing full well that he’s up there wishing that he could hold her just as much as she does.

“I love you too.”

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