Kai appeared before Kyungsoo with a twisted grin plastered on his face. It sent chills down Kyungsoo’s invisible spine to see the kind-hearted Kai happy – actually happy – that he was about to murder an innocent creature – even if it was just a spider. What hurt even more was the fact that he knew Kai was happy about it because he was doing it for him. “Give me the spider. I’ll do it.” He encouraged him, but Kai was set on doing it himself.

Wandering over to the set of drawers he kept his stationary items in, Kai reached his hand inside the bottom drawer and pulled it out a second later, his finders curling around the handle of a penknife. While Kyungsoo was left wondering why his boyfriend had a penknife hidden in his room, Kai swiftly and easily chopped off the arachnid’s head using skills he had learnt when dissecting in Biology – though this was obviously harder as he wasn’t used to using moving targets.

The rat and the cockroach were found and caught with very little struggle. Kyungsoo had watched a rat scuttle by him in the attic the day before, and Kai had seen a cockroach in the same place.

The real problem was finding ‘the bird of the dead’. Neither Kai nor Kyungsoo understood what that meant. How were they supposed to catch it if they didn’t know what it was? “Maybe we should start by looking in pet shops?” Kai suggested. “It’d be easier if we could by one.”

Kyungsoo scoffed. “You think with your wallet. Try using your brain. We should start at the cemetery.”

“Ok, fine.” You’re the dead guy, he almost added, but decided against it – he felt it might come out more offensive than he meant it to, and he didn’t particularly feel like arguing with his boyfriend right then.

Kyungsoo surprised Kai once again by directing him to the closest graveyard – although, when he thought about it, a ghost should know where at least one graveyard was located. Glad that it was daytime and that Kyungsoo was with him, Kai nervously glanced round the cemetery, wondering what it was they were looking for.

Something suddenly captured his gaze. He stopped in his tracks and felt Kyungsoo’s hand tug on his own. “What is it?” He asked as Kai crouched down in the grass to get closer to what he’d seen.

R.I.P

Do Kyungsoo

January 12^th 1993 – January 14^th 2013

Voice of an angel

Do Kyungsoo. It was Kyungsoo’s gravestone.

He stared at it for a while, frozen even though it was warm, repeating every word in his mind over and over until they were eternally etched in his mind. He was kneeling directly above his boyfriend’s body. As he lifted his fingers to trace over the inscription of Kyungsoo’s name, he felt a warm hand rub his shoulder. “Come on, let’s go. I get it now.” It was true: he did have the voice of an angel.

Kai didn’t stand up. There were more words, he noticed. They’d been hidden by the grass that didn’t look like it had been cut in a while. He lightly brushed the grass aside, revealing the secreted engraving.

Died protecting the One He Loved

“You don’t have to explain.” He mumbled, although it wasn’t completely true.

“I want to.” Kyungsoo’s answer was not what he expected. “Back when I was alive… I watched you a lot. I… fell in love with you the second I saw you. Sometimes I even followed you home… I know it sounds creepy – maybe I could even have been classified as a stalker… But I couldn’t help it. Then… when I saw you about to get hit by a speeding car… I… I didn’t know what else to do so…”

“You ran in front of it.” Kai finished for him. “You died for me even though we hadn’t met. You died in my place and I didn’t even notice you. I deserve to die for that alone.”

Kyungsoo shushed him. “No. No you don’t. Don’t say that.”

The squawk of a bird interrupted the sweet silence that had formed between the two of them. It was a crow. “A crow. Crow’s symbolise death.” Kyungsoo said flatly.

The charcoal bird flew towards them, perching on top of the gravestone Kai was still staring at. Without warning, the crow dropped to the ground, blood seeping out of its beak. “It was diseased. At least it’s made it easier for us.” Kyungsoo spoke again.

Still in paralysed due to his discovery, he didn’t move when Kyungsoo slipped off Kai’s jacket and wrapped the bird’s corpse in it. He didn’t speak as he held it to his chest on the way home. He didn’t speak to anyone until later that night.

“You died on my birthday.” He whispered. “I walked away from you when you died. It must have been so terrible.”

“It’s ok.” Kyungsoo soothed him, rubbing his chest. “It’s all ok. It was never your fault. I never blamed you. You didn’t notice. That’s not your fault.” He repeated it over and over again until Kai had fallen asleep in his arms.