Peking’s skyline was coated in a gentle grey dust as it outstretched in front of Lu Han, who had stood by the big window of his bedroom for the past ten minutes.

He was in his parents’ apartment, the one he had left when he had took the chance to study in Korea. The chance to experience something new. A new life, which had nearly led him to death.

Strangely, he did not feel regret, remorse or anything like that. He probably should be glad that he found his way back to his hometown, but the truth was…he wasn’t.

Lu Han tore his gaze away from the deep forest of buildings outside and found the suitcase to the right of his bed instead. Inside of it were his belonging from Korea: books, documents, some clothes, some other things. His mother had come for them personally, a few weeks after the accident.

“I haven’t touched them since then,” she had told him, her eyes dipped in a sad glimmer, as if it was still hard for her to talk about what had happened. "You should probably wash the clothes though.”

Yes, I should, Lu Han thought, as he browsed the suitcase. The clothes, indeed, had a moldy scent to them, but also a familiar, almost comforting, one. Something, Lu Han could not find in the other things around him.

He turned to face the window again; leaning his palms against the cool glass, he could not avoid wondering, if he were in Seoul right now, would he have the same longing inside of him?

~*~

He was on the swing again.

The grass in front of him shimmered silver-green in the cold light of the moon. There was another person, covered in such a dark black that Sehun could only identify his outer silhouette.

“Sehun,” he said. “Sehun.”

And then he screamed.

His voice pierced through Sehun’s body and mind like a storm made out of fire and ice, leaving nothing but stabbing pain.

“Sehun,” someone said, jolting him awake.

“Man, seriously?” Jongin was right beside him. „What did you do last night that you are so desperate to sleep now?”

“W-what?” Sehun lifted his head, clutching a hand to his chest, unused to the dull throbbing inside of him. For a moment, he had absolutely no idea about his whereabouts, his thoughts still circling around something they weren’t able to catch.

“You’ve become more silent too lately.” Sehun felt Jongin’s gaze burning holes in the side of his head, waiting for him to say something, to agree with him or to defend himself. But he didn’t. Because Jongin was right and there was nothing more to add to it. At least not for others to hear.

Ever since this so-called ‘club incident’ a few weeks ago, he’d kept having similar dreams. Even while taking naps during classes, where they appeared to rather be memories; not something his head made up. And Sehun knew that probably some of those images he’d seen were real memories indeed, they had to. Because there was this voice. And there was no way he could hear it so clearly, when he’d never met the person it belonged to before.

A sigh rolled over Jongin’s lips. “Whatever,” he said. “Class is over, so how about we fetch some coffee before the next one starts?”

Sehun pulled a face, while putting the wrinkled notepad he had slept on in his bag, followed by his pen and a bottle of water. “I don’t even like co-“

Jongin did not let him finished, as he yanked him, quite roughly, out of the lecture hall and towards the already crowded cafeteria at the end of the hall. “Well, from now on you do.”

~*~

Lu Han was back on this street.

This street, he had no memory of and yet he knew that he’d already been here before.

There were two boys just a few steps away from him, arguing about something he could not quite grasp. He didn’t need to. There was a more important matter going on, about 4 floors above of them. A man and a woman. A falling flower pot. Falling.

Lu Han rushed forward without further ado, he called a name, but he couldn’t here himself. It was as if someone had turned the scene in front of him on mute, he saw himself running and at the same time he saw the boy in front of him coming nearer and nearer. Soon he would reach him, would touch him, would protect him, safe him.

He cradled the boy’s head against his chest, his light brown hair soft in between his fingers. Lu Han had reached his target – the pot hadn’t.

Bewildered he looked around, Sehun’s hands tightening around him as if he didn’t want to let him go. There were no traces of broken fragments or mushy soil on the ground. He followed the wall upwards, finding the pot standing at the left end of the window sill.

Relief washed over him. Sehun was safe.

Then Lu Han saw the man behind the pot, his face was blurry and his hands were shaking as he held something in his hands, pointing at him.

A loud gunshot echoed through the romantically illuminated streets of a warm summer night.

When Lu Han woke up the next morning, he knew, that there was no way he could stay in Peking any longer.

“What?” His mother’s shocked expression sent a burn through Lu Han’s chest; the feeling of regret rose inside of him, but he told himself to go through with it. It was the right thing to do. The right thing. Something about this thought sounded highly familiar to Lu Han; still, he could not link it to any of the memories he had.

“I want to go to Korea,” he repeated. “I think that it might be able to help me with handling this…situation. And to put it behind.”

His mother did not look too convinced yet. “I don’t know, love. I think it would be better to stay he-“ “But now I actually have time to go. Who knows, when I’ll ever have this opportunity again? I need to finish my study soon and find work then, you said it yourself.”

She remained silent but Lu Han could almost see her head running from one argument to the other, not quite sure on where to settle down; Lu Han decided, that now would be the right time to ask the most important question. In her state of unsteadiness she would most likely tell him the truth.

“Is there anyone I can contact? Someone else who survived the accident maybe?” Another boy, he thought, but did not say out loud. First, waiting for her reaction would be on the safer side. Telling her about him having weird dreams would have been of too much risk. Doing this whole thing was tricky enough already. Only a mother coaxed in with honest desperation would let her son go back to the place where he had nearly died.

She was looking at him now, and Lu Han saw that she was battling with herself, balancing between lying and telling the truth. Then she sighed, and Lu Han’s heart grew warm when she said “Yes. Yes, actually there is someone.”

And then she told him. Everything. Everything she knew and more than was necessary for him to know. The gunshot in his dream had been real. Not only in his dream, because that dream had been like a re-enactment of what had happened in the past. In his past, a year ago, where he had saved this boy. This boy, whose name he already knew, although his mother had not told him yet, because she had promised not to.

Sehun.