The drive back from the crime scene is passed in silence.

Fog clouds the taxi’s windows and Heungsoo clears a patch of glass with the back of his hand before looking out into the darkness. The snowstorm has kept the majority of wanderers off the streets but despite the desolation, the neon signs of restaurants and noraebangs are as bright as ever, their light spilling onto the snow-covered sidewalks. The night scenery flashes past, eventually blurring together until Heungsoo can only see the images conjured by his memory.

Namsoon had gotten the call from Inspector Minki just after midnight and Heungsoo had followed his roommate out into the night. It was a murder, one of many that had popped up throughout Seoul since the beginning of December. The killer behind it all had been dubbed the Advent Murderer for the simple fact that each day of the month had yielded a dead body with a cluster of mistletoe in its mouth. Tonight was Christmas Eve and the pair of them had spent half-an-hour circling the corpse of Jung Injae, a high school teacher with a fondness for poetry, if her wall-to-ceiling collection of Do Jonghwan was anything to go by.

“I got nothing,” Namsoon had sighed after inspecting every inch of the blood-stained carpet. “A clean kill like always and nothing to trace except for the goddamn berries.”

They had left after that and Heungsoo had promised to give Minki a call if Namsoon experienced an epiphany. Having cohabitated with the man for over a year, Heungsoo knew that Namsoon usually required a quick bowl of ramyeon and an undisturbed hour in his ‘memory palace’ to connect the dots and come to a conclusion. The case of the Advent Murderer was the first to stump Namsoon so completely and he had been so on edge that Heungsoo was beginning to worry about his roommate’s sanity.

The silence in the car is lifted when Namsoon shifts in his seat.  

“I couldn’t save her,” Namsoon says, so softly that Heungsoo could barely distinguish the syllables. “I couldn’t save her because I wasn’t good enough to beat him.”

There’s a noticeable tremor in Namsoon’s voice and his shoulders are slightly hunched, as if he were physically holding in the feelings of guilt and self-loathing, afraid that they would escape if he let his guard down and take his humanity with them. It’s heartbreaking to watch, but Heungsoo is merely a supporting character in this twisted game of life and death and there was little he could do to ease his friend’s suffering.   

“It’s not your fault,” Heungsoo replies. It was the truth and he knew he had to say them, despite the fact that Namsoon would, as always, refuse to believe him.

“It is. While I might not have held the trigger, my stupidity was still responsible for her death.”

Heungsoo reaches across the space between them and places a hand on Namsoon’s shoulder. Giving it a small squeeze for emphasis, he says, “Stop blaming yourself for things that are beyond your control. You might be smarter than the average person but even you can’t predict the future. There was nothing else you could have done.”

Namsoon grows quiet after his speech and Heungsoon is almost convinced that he had failed in his duty as a friend when he suddenly feels Namsoon’s head on his shoulder. It’s a perfect fit and Heungsoo scoots closer until their arms are pressed together and he can feel Namsoon’s every breath reverberate through their bodies.

They revert to silence for the rest of the ride back to the apartment but it was a warmer kind of silence. The kind that makes neon signs seem more like lighthouses at sea, guiding them to safety. Beside him, Namsoon’s breathing evens and Heungsoo feels his own eyes fluttering close as the waves of warmth pulled them under. The windows cloud once more and the memories of blood and death grow hazy as they drift off.

To sleep, perchance to Dream.