Kyungsoo is awake. A moonlight shines through the window of his bed room.
The dream feels so real. It gives a warm feeling in his heart that he doesn’t want to wake up soon. It had been a year ago but it feels like yesterday when he had a summer picnic with his best friend. Now his only friend is his loneliness, until a silvery being appears at the corner of his bed room.
“You have a sweet memory,” said a silvery figure with a mask as he swifts his silvery cloak.
Kyungsoo smiles as he remembers his own sweet memories.
“You gave me that sweet dream, Kai?” asked Kyungsoo.

Kai shakes his head.
“No. I’m just eating the nightmares. It’s your own memory that creates the sweet dream,” Kai explains.

Kyungsoo gazes the ceiling. He scratches his own left arm, “Ouch! It hurts.”
He realizes that he is not dreaming. He wonders how a nightmare-eater looks so real as he stares at Kai from head to toe.
“Well… I’m just wondering. What are you made of, Kai?” Kyungsoo never leaves his curiosity.

“I am made of dreams and wishes,” said Kai calmly.

“Can I touch you?” Kyungsoo tries to reach Kai.

“No.” Kai warns him. “You cannot touch my being.”
Then Kai vanishes again because the sunrise is coming from the mouth of the dawn.
 

In another night, when Kai is absorbing the nightmare away from Kyungsoo’s dream, Kyungsoo acts strangely. It seems the dark mist of nightmare he has never ends. Kai is almost overloaded by the nightmares he absorbs. The night is getting darker. Kyungsoo is still dreaming and hard to wake. Kyungsoo is trapped in his own nightmare. 
“I can’t take it anymore. This is too much,” said Kai as he endures.
Kyungsoo drowns in his darkest dream. 

A white carnation.
A bunch of white carnation flowers fall from Kyungsoo’s pale hands. Its white petals are scattered on the asphalt road.
Kyungsoo is running on the street. He is running in front of tall buildings through the night.
He is panting his breath between the crowds of people. In the middle of the crowds, there is a lying man on the street. Blood is everywhere. There is a huge truck near the man. A trophy with blood stains on its golden layer lies near the lying man. The body of the man looks so terrible after being smashed by something huge and heavy with a brake-lose velocity.
“No! Don’t die! Somebody help! Somebody save him!” screamed Kyungsoo.
But people are pulling him. People try to separate him from the dying man.
He needs to save him. But everything is too late.


All of sudden, there is an imaginary hand that pulls Kyungsoo from the darkness.
The moment Kyungsoo wakes, he sees Kai is surrounded by the dark mist. 
“Kai! Are you okay?!” Kyungsoo shrieks.
He tries to approach Kai, but Kai stops him.
“No. Don’t come near me. Let me handle this darkness.”

Kyungsoo insists, “No. I will help you. You’re hurting because of me.”
Anxiously, Kyungsoo wants to overcome Kai’s pain but he feels as if something restrains him.
Kai is struggling against the dark mist.
“Why are you drowning yourself in the darkness too deep?” asked Kai. “This is too much. I can’t even handle it. You must stop your sorrow.” Kai is panting.

Kyungsoo feels guilty. He wishes he can do anything to help Kai, but his being and the dark mist are too supernatural for an ordinary human like him. 
“Kyungsoo… I can feel your sorrow inside your nightmares. Is that your best friend? Someone who died beside the truck?” asked Kai while he is exhausted.

Kyungsoo shakes. “Y-yes. He was being hit by a truck at the night when he won a painting contest. The night when I supposed to confess to him.”

“You love him?” asked Kai again.
It is really heard for Kyungsoo to hold his tears. Remembering the painful tragedy a year ago. Meanwhile there is someone who is also in pain in front of him. 
“I always love him, more than just friends. Ever since we started our days as art students until now. After he was gone, I still can’t forget him.”
Kyungsoo cannot end his own agony. “That’s why… That’s why the dark color paints always remind me of him…”

Kai tries to calm Kyungsoo albeit his own condition is in pain fighting the darkness of the nightmare mist.
“Please don’t cry…,” whispered Kai. “If you want to help me fight your nightmare, you should let him go. You should erase your sorrow and accept the reality.”

Kyungsoo crawls to Kai who is lying on the floor now. Kai’s light is dim. The dark mist almost conquers him. 
Kyungsoo is tempted to touch Kai. He reaches Kai and embraces him.
“Please… you must win the fight. I promise I will erase my sadness. I will hold you and support you. Please be strong,” Kyungsoo begs.
Suddenly Kai rolls himself and avoid Kyungsoo.
“No! Don’t come near! I’ve told you not to touch my being!”
Kai struggles the dark mist. He swallows all the dark mist but he doesn’t get stronger as usual whenever he ‘eats’ the nightmare. Kai is weak and weary.

Bounced, Kyungsoo is getting more confuse. “But I’m trying to help you!” he asserts.
Meanwhile, Kai cannot stop his pain. The effect from the dark mist combines with the effect of Kyungsoo’s touch.
“What will happen if I touch you?” Kyungsoo thrills.
Kai looks so exhausted. “If human touches me, I will disappear forever.”

Kai’s presence looks transparent now. The dark mist vanishes.
“Kyungsoo, listen. Do you remember what am I?”
Kyungsoo furrows his eyebrows. “You are a nightmare-eater. The spirit of a dreamcatcher. Am I right?”
Kai nods. “Right. Then, are the dream and the nightmare real?”
Almost doubt, Kyungsoo answers, “They… are not real. They are the subconscious.”
“You’re right again. Then I have told you before that the daylight disguises me and the reality erases me,” Kai stops a while. 
“You are human, Kyungsoo. You are the reality. I am just a spirit that comes from the unreal thing. The dream itself is not real,” he continues. 

Astonished, Kyungsoo is afraid. The night is tense.
“That’s why you don’t want me to touch you?” asked him.

“Precisely,” Kai feels helpless, “Because I can’t protect your dreams anymore.”
Kai is transparent now.
“I can’t accompany your nights anymore. I lost my power after fighting the nightmares, then the reality touches my being. I can’t resist anymore.” Kai looks so weak. “I’m sorry Kyungsoo. I will disappear forever.”

“No! Please stay. Please don’t disappear from me… I can’t fight this alone,” Kyungsoo begs for miracle. 
Kai smiles, “You can.” He closes his misty grey eyes. 
“You just have to face the reality, Kyungsoo. Goodbye….”
Slowly Kai’s presence dissolves into sparkling particles and disappears forever under the shower of moonlight.
Kyungsoo tries to catch Kai’s being with his hands, but Kai vanishes very soon. 

Crestfallen, Kyungsoo stares hopelessly at the moonlight from his window. He stays in silence. It feels like Kai never exists. Kyungsoo is pensive. He sits on his bed until slowly he loses his consciousness. 
 

Kyungsoo awakes on his bed. Tears fall on his face. Everything feels like a dream. The sun light shines through the window of his bedroom. The solitude accompanies him. 
Kyungsoo must spend the nights without Kai’s protection from the nightmares. He feels so helpless. He is too afraid the darkness will pull him deeper.

The next night, Kyungsoo’s dream changes. It is not about him running on the street and surrounded by the crowds of people anymore. It is him alone in the darkness. There is no blood. There is only darkness and he walks on a small path. He can’t see anything clearly. 
At the end of the path, he sees a figure. A familiar figure. Kyungsoo approaches him, but every time he tries to reach the figure, it disappears.
The dream goes on every day. A bizarre dream Kyungsoo doesn’t know whether it is a nightmare or not.
 

A month has passed. 
Kyungsoo decides to face everything bravely. The first thing he needs to do is visiting the art gallery in the city. 
The sun of summer’s afternoon shines brightly above the downtown of Seoul. Kyungsoo arrives at 17 Apgujeong-ro 80-gil of Cheongdam-dong area in Gangnam district. The circumstance near the gallery is quite the same as a year ago. Frenzy flashes of memory run inside Kyungsoo’s mind as he never visits this place again since the death of his best friend. The gallery building is all white. He misses this place. Just like he misses those times he went here with his best friend almost every week.

Kyungsoo walks inside the gallery to the corner where there is a painting hanged on the white wall. The painting is rich with dark colors which are Kyungsoo’s favorite. Under the painting, there is a carved wood tag emblazoned by Monotype Corsiva fonts written “The Spirit of The Night”. That is the title of the painting. It portrays a scenery of midsummer night under the moonlight by the riverside of Han river. An evocative solemn and dreamy scene of sparkling festive night among the diffused city lights. It successfully depicts a subtle nuance of night, categorized as nocturne painting which is typical with muted tones and hazy colors.
Under the title, it shows some Hangul fonts written a name of the painter: ‘Jongin, Kim’.

Meanwhile Kyungsoo looks up facing the large painting, someone calls his name. 
“Kyungsoo.” A middle-aged woman walks close and greets him. “Thank you for coming.”

Kyungsoo smiles and bow to the woman. “How are you Mrs. Kim?”
“I’m fine. It’s been a long time, Jongin must be happy that you come to visit. He is waiting for you,” said the woman with a warm and gracious smile on her face.

The woman takes Kyungsoo to a classic carved table at the corner near the painting. He sees an artistic ceramic urn in Lapis Lazuli color on the table. There is a wooden-framed photograph of a man. 
Kyungsoo puts a bunch white carnations in a vase on the table near Jongin’s painting. Similar with the carnation bouquet Kyungsoo brought at the night Jongin won the painting contest.
“Such a peaceful place for him to rest, in the middle of beautiful art masterpieces.” Kyungsoo is amazed.

He bows his head and whispers some prayers.
The woman pats Kyungsoo’s shoulder. “You must be missing him so much. We miss him too. Everyone misses him.” She wipes her eyes with a sheet of tissue paper.
Kyungsoo embraces Mrs. Kim, he holds back his tears. He doesn’t want to make Jongin’s mother sad.

Mrs. Kim twines her hands to Kyungsoo’s arm and takes him to seat on a red carved-bench in the gallery. 
“Kyungsoo dear, have you received a package from your mother?” asked her.
Kyungsoo’s eyes widened. He wonders how Mrs. Kim know about the package from his mother.
“Yes, I have. How do you know about it?”
Mrs. Kim smiles. A familiar warm smile Kyungsoo had ever seen before on his best friend’s face.
“It was from me. I gave it through your mother. Actually, it was Jongin’s,” she explains. “The dreamcatcher is Jongin’s. I gave it to him when he was little, to protect his sleep from nightmares. He still kept it in his bedroom when he grew up.”

Kyungsoo is agaped. “I never knew he has that kind of thing.” He is still shocked.
Mrs. Kim holds her chuckle. “Maybe he was too shy to show it to you. Maybe he thought it was a childish thing.”
“It’s not childish. It’s really functional. It helps me through the nightmares,” Kyungsoo convinces.
Mrs. Kim pats Kyungsoo. “It’s good to know it’s useful for you. I know you might have bad memories after seeing Jongin’s accident. Because I experienced the nightmares too, dear.”

“I entrusted it to your mother because I’m afraid you’ll avoid to meet me. Especially if I said I had a thing from Jongin for you.” Mrs. Kim sighs, “I know you’re still sad.”
Kyungsoo stares at Mrs. Kim. 
“I’m sorry. It’s so difficult for me to accept the reality.” He feels guilty to her. “I didn’t realize that it’s difficult for you too.”

Mrs. Kim nods. “It’s alright.” As if she tries to soothe Kyungsoo whereas she is also hurt. “I understand. That’s why I don’t want you to have nightmares because of that sad memory.”
Kyungsoo feels so thankful to Mrs. Kim.
“Really. Thank you very much. You’re right. It protects my dream.” 
They are embracing each other, just like mother and son. 
“Please come here often, Kyungsoo. Anytime,” said Jongin’s mother with teary eyes.


Kyungsoo stares at the painting a while longer. He views every inch of the Midnight Blue, Dim Grey, and Ebony colors that fill the canvas. They are combined very well with a few bright colors of light yellow, soft white, neon green, and vermillion. Jongin’s paintings always give a warm feelings.

Kyungsoo remembers all the good memories he spent with Jongin. He remembers his sincere smile, his sleepy eyes, and his warm arms. He remembers his cold look, his precise athletic tall body, and his artistic fingers. He remembers everything, the joy and the pain. He tries to accept them both.
 

It was a very important night for Jongin.
He had prepared everything. The exhibition of Korean Young Artist Competition was going to begin in a few minutes.
Jongin was staring on his phone screen. He dialed a number. 
“Kyungsoo, where are you? It’s going to start,” Jongin was worried.
“Jongin, my scooter’s tire is blown-out. I need to change my tire. Damn… I think I’m gonna be late,” said the voice on the other side.
“Alright,” Jongin tries to calm, “Hope you can arrive here soon. Take care.”
Jongin wished his best friend can see his artwork for the contest.

He won.

Jongin couldn’t believe that he win the painting contest, he couldn’t even blink his eyes.
His artwork was one of the best masterpiece displayed in a room with opened-roof so that the painting was showered under the moonlight. It made his painting lit beautifully.
Everything felt perfect, except Kyungsoo’s presence here.

Jongin managed to call Kyungsoo again. 
“Hey, is everything alright?” asked Jongin to the other side.
“Jongin, I’m so sorry. There’s a glitch in my scooter’s battery. The battery’s dead. I’m taking the subway now. Please wait, I’ll arrive soon,” Kyungsoo’s voice sounded agitated on the phone.
“I see. Don’t worry, okay. I’ll wait for you at the avenue in front of the gallery,” Jongin tried to calm.

Jongin sighed.

He received so many praises and compliments by the people in the gallery for his brilliant masterpiece, but he made the artwork special for Kyungsoo. As he never showed his work-in-progress to Kyungsoo before, just to show it as a surprise. He had prepared everything for Kyungsoo.

Jongin had been patiently waiting, then he got bored with the crowd of people inside the gallery so he decided to walk outside to the avenue near the gallery building. The summer night was beautiful as Jongin gazed to the full moon in the dark sky. He waited for Kyungsoo as he strolled on the sidewalk under the green ginko trees. Jongin enjoyed the moment and the atmosphere as he took out a piece of earphone from his pocket. Listen to some music while strolling on the sidewalk is such a peaceful time for Jongin. 

A sight of a small figure across the road just came out from a subway station. Jongin was so excited to meet Kyungsoo. He walked to the crossroad, unfortunately he didn’t realize there was a huge truck running with a high speed. 
It was too sudden for Jongin. He saw a blinding light from his left side. Then he saw nothing after.
Jongin felt hurt.

Everything seemed dark.