Minkyung looks to the photographs on the floor, and then to Kyungwon. 

“Well?”

“You’re telling me... you time traveled. And this is your proof.”

“Well—“

“Minkyung, if this is a prank, I swear to god, I’m going to ing body you.”

“It’s not! I swear on my mother’s grave. Literally.”

There’s a painfully awkward pause as the two of them look at the framed picture of Minkyung’s parents sitting on top of the kitchen counter.

“Listen,” Minkyung continues, “I wouldn’t lie to you. I don’t know just want happened in there, in that forest, but it felt like an hour.”

Kyungwon gives Minkyung a sympathetic look—she can’t quite tell if that look in the other girl’s eyes is pity or empathy, but she accepts it anyways. It was to be figured that nobody would believe her. 

Her roommate leans in closer, studying the photos. 

“This one.” Kyungwon says. “This is the one that makes me trust you.” She points to the shot of Minkyung and Yebin falling with the bridge. “I don’t know how you could’ve faked that.” 

“I’m glad you can... see it.” Minkyung nervously laughs. “I’m starting to feel like I’m losing my mind.”

She looks at the apartment door again, as if any moment someone could walk in, then looks at her watch. 

“Yebin was supposed to be here half an hour ago.” 

“Is she still at work?” Kyungwon asks, standing up to stretch her legs. 

“No. She gets off at 7 on Thursdays.” 

“You have her schedule memorized?”

“Well, of course.” Minkyung replies, thinking nothing of Kyungwon’s smirk. “Just so we can go ghost hunting and stuff.” 

“Sure.” Kyungwon opens up a bag of chips, leaning against the kitchen counter. “Can I play some music? It feels too quiet in here.” 

“Of course.”

Minkyung glances at the door once more, an unsettling feeling creeping up her spine.

An hour passes. 

Minkyung is used to Yebin’s tendency to be late, but she’s never been more than an hour. 

Not for Minkyung at least—she can remember Yebin running all the way to her piano recital from work sophomore year. No, she’s never late for her. 

Minkyung finds herself reaching into her pocket, and pulling out a tube of cherry chapstick. 

Right as she uncaps it, Kyungwon interrupts her. 

“You’re anxious.”

“What do you mean?”

“You only use that when you’re anxious.”

“Ok, so what if I am?”

“You should go find her.”

They stare at each other, Minkyung’s anxiety rising and falling in waves. 

“I’m scared.” she finally says, rubbing the chapstick against her lips like it’ll alleviate something—the possibility of mistake, the possibility of loss. 

“I’ll come with you. Come on, Minky. It can’t be that bad. I bet she just had to work overtime or something.”

Kyungwon, ever calm in the storm. Minkyung admires that. 

She stands up, foot still anxiously tapping on the ground, but feeling a little bit of hope. 

When they pull into the supermarket parking lot, the first thing Minkyung notices is that Yebin’s car is still sitting there. 

That ty used minivan they’ve taken too many rides in—stupid, tacky plush dice hanging from the rearview mirror. 

“See?” Kyungwon says, lightly punching her roommate in the arm, “She’s still at work.”

“I’m going inside. Just to make sure.” Minkyung says, running her fingers through her hair, biting her lip. 

She opens the car door, and looks up at the setting sun over the nearly-empty parking lot. Still, something is crawling inside her from head to toe—an anxiety that Yebin isn’t ok. 

It’s been a sense of hers since she was little—she always could partially just feel that something with Yebin wasn’t right. When she scraped her knee, when she was getting herself into some kind of trouble, when she had been dumped, Minkyung felt it. And now, that feeling was that Yebin was in danger. 

She and Kyungwon walk through the automatic doors of the supermarket, the small ding greeting them. They see Nayoung, humming to herself as she sweeps the completely empty store. 

Nayoung looks up. 

“Oh! You two! I was just about to close up. What do you need?”

Kyungwon exchanges a glance with Minkyung.

“We were just looking for Yebin.”

“Yebin clocked out two hours ago.” 

It doesn’t settle with Minkyung at first, and all she notices is that one of the droning fluorescent lights hanging over their heads flashes red for a singular second.

“But...” Kyungwon appears utterly perplexed. “Her car is still in the parking lot.”

Nayoung stops sweeping, eyes shifting up from the floor. 

“What? But... I watched her walk out there. Oh my god, it still is out there.”

“Maybe she decided to walk home.” Kyungwon suggests, looking for something to comfort Minkyung, who is already searching her pockets for her tube of cherry chapstick.

“No. She promised me that she would come right on time. Yebin doesn’t break promises.” 

“I-I’m sorry, guys.” Nayoung half-stutters. “I don’t know what to say. I thought for sure she had left.”

The light flashes red again. Is it only Minkyung who notices this? Maybe she is ing going crazy, maybe even Yebin is an illu—

Ring. Riiiing.

Her cluttered thoughts are interrupted by the ringtone emanating from her back pocket.

When she reaches for it, her heart sinks when she sees Eunwoo’s contact instead of Yebin’s. Both Kyungwon and Nayoung stare at her while she answers—like they’re waiting for some sort of magical solution to come from this call.

“Minky.” It’s Eunwoo’s voice, all scratchy from the phone, sounding vaguely panicked. “Minky, holy . You have to get down here, right now. To my house. I don’t know what to do. Yebin, she’s... she’s on my roof.” 

Minkyung screeches to a stop in front of Eunwoo’s house. She had demanded to be the one to drive, grabbing the keys from Kyungwon before her roommate could even say anything. For some reason, Nayoung was in the car too, citing “making sure her employees were safe”. 

Practically kicking the car door open, Minkyung frantically runs out into the street, where she sees Eunwoo and Soonyoung, standing at the curb, looking up at the sky. 

Her head shifts up as well—and there she sees it. 

Yebin’s silhouette is clear against the night sky as she paces back and forth along the sloped incline of the roof.

“Yebin!” Minkyung yells. 

The shadow of Yebin turns, and Minkyung practically yelps when she sees it. The entirety of her best friend’s eyes are a bloodshot, burning, illuminated scarlet red. 

Yebin turns away, and continues her pacing. 

“It’s no ing use.” Eunwoo says. “She’s been pacing and muttering like that, nonstop. She won’t listen to any of us.”

“I don’t know how the she’s doing that with her eyes, either.” Soonyoung adds. “But I’m so confused. I don’t know how she got up there. I just heard a thumping while I was trying to fall asleep, and when I ran out here, she was just walking around. There’s no entry point to the roof from inside the house. I don’t get it.” 

“Minkyung, everything I said earlier.” Kyungwon hisses. “You were totally right.”

“I need to get her down from there.” Minkyung says, a determined look crossing her face. 

“I don’t think you can. We’re just going to have to call the police at this point. There’s no way to do it.” Soonyoung tries to say, but Minkyung already feels a rush in her bones. 

She has to save Yebin. 

Yebin’s done it way too many times for her, she owes her one, at least. 

“I’m going to climb it.” Minkyung announces. 

“Climb what?” Eunwoo asks. 

“Your house.”

Minkyung charges forward, hopping onto the front porch, fingers gripping the balcony railing as she hoists herself up.

“Minky, wait—“ Kyungwon shouts, to no avail.

She looks up at the small roof covering the porch and awkwardly balancing on the railing, legs wobbling like they’re going to give out, she grips the very edge, kicking one foot to rest against a windowsill. 

Minkyung’s not really a climber, or an athlete, but something just makes her want to do this—no, need to do this—and so, with all her strength, she lifts herself up, knee roughly scraping against tile and wood. 

“Holy .” she vaguely hears Soonyoung say, but him and the shouts of everyone else have become a background noise as distant as a faraway car. 

She can see Yebin more closely from the top of the balcony’s mini-roof, and she studies her best-friend’s face. Her lips are moving fast, like she’s chanting an incantation, and her eyes, her horrible cherry-red eyes, gaze off into nowhere. 

Minkyung grabs a storm pipe, placing one foot on top of a molding detail, pulling herself up again, breath heavy with a weight of adrenaline, as she uses her free hand to grab the edge of a window. 

For a split second, she hangs almost completely free, before her feet land on a tiny ledge and she crawls—desperate, animal-like up to the window she’s gripped so feverishly on. Her feet land on the tiny windowsill, anxiety so sharp it doesn’t even hurt anymore. As she reaches for the final conquest, the edge of the roof, her breathing slows down. 

She can do this. 

When her palms land flat on the coarse roof, tile, she feels a few layers of skin scrape away—but its fine. 

She uses every last bit of strength in her body, pushing every muscle fiber, and lifts herself steadily, cheek so close to the roof it’s almost scraping, fully aware that one slip-up could result in instant death, or at the least, a lot of injuries. 

Her knee lands on the roof with a scrape, but its fine, and she’s there, there on top of the house. 

A faint cheer resonates—she knows its from down below, but it feels like it’s coming from a stadium miles away, and she looks up. 

Yebin, standing over her. 

“Yebin, it’s me.” Minkyung pants, the amount of energy she just exerted suddenly fleeing from her body. 

Yebin says nothing, but her lips move like she’s trying to say something.

Their eyes are meeting—or as far as Minkyung can tell, there’s not really anything there in Yebin’s except for pure red. 

“Can you hear me?” she asks. 

Yebin opens , like she’s trying to scream, and nothing comes out except a long, terrifying static noise.

“It’s just me.” Minkyung reaches out her hand, and it touches Yebin’s. 

The moment the very skin of their fingertips contact, Minkyung’s entire head feels like it’s spinning. She looks up and sees that no longer is the sky blue, but a burning, perfect red, but right in front of her is Yebin, who continues to look at her, her eyes no longer scarlet, but now full of fear. 

“Minkyung!” she shouts, but like the kneeling girl can’t hear her. “Minky, I can hear you, why can’t you hear me!”

“I can hear you now, Yebin.” She grips her hand tighter. “I can hear you!”

“Minkyung?” 

“What are you doing on Eunwoo’s roof?”

“What do you mean? We’re at your apartment.”

“What?”

Minkyung blinks, then looks around. The roof is gone, the faint crowd of her friends is gone, and instead they’re in Minkyung’s living room, standing in a circle of scattered photographs. She gazes out the window—no red sky. A perfectly normal nighttime one. 

She stands up off her knees. 

“What just...”

“Happened.” Yebin finishes.

“I don’t know.”

“I was here... I don’t know why I was here. I was trying to leave for your apartment, but something happened in the parking lot. I’m forgetting it already, ing hell. But then I was here, and you came in the door, but you couldn’t hear anything I was saying, but once you took my hand you could—“

“Hear everything. Yebin, you were on Eunwoo’s roof. Your eyes were ing glowing, and everyone saw. I-“

She turns and glances at the clock. 3 am. At least 6 hours have passed. 

The sound of a key in the lock startles the pair, who still haven’t let go of each other’s hands, and suddenly, Kyungwon busts in through the door. 

“You guys! Oh my god! I’ve been driving all over town looking for you!”

“Wait...” Minkyung furrows her brow, searching her memory, trying to make it all make sense. “If we were on the roof then just suddenly came here...”

“You disappeared.” clarifies Kyungwon. “It was like you just kind of... glitched out of reality. It was freaky.” She runs to the kitchen sink, filling up a glass of water. “I feel like I’m high on something.”

“That was only a minute ago for me.” Minkyung clarifies.

“What?”

“We just... traveled here, got here, whatever. Like we left Eunwoo’s roof and then we were here, but Yebin was here the whole time, or... I don’t know. I don’t understand! What is happening to us!” 

Yebin’s phone loudly rings, and everyone jumps, nerves already stretched to the edge with tension. 

“Mom?” Yebin answers. “Yeah, I’m at Minkyung’s. I’m just going to stay the night, maybe two, ok? Go back to sleep, it’s fine.”

“You’re going to stay?” Minkyung asks, perplexed. 

“I don’t want to be alone.” Yebin says, looking down at the pictures on the floor. 

“Hey, Minky, do you still have those pictures I took of you in high school?” Yebin asks. 

The pair is sitting on Minkyung’s bed, under a blanket, lights still on like they’re little kids scared of the dark. 

“Of course. God, I remember those. I love you, but photography is not one of your talents.” Minkyung stands up as Yebin chuckles, and walks over to her desk, pulling open a drawer to reveal a small envelope. 

She shakes the contents onto the bed, photos falling out face down onto the sheets. 

Yebin picks one up, perhaps expecting a rush of nostalgia, but instead her eyes widen in fear. 

“What’s wrong?” Minkyung asks, a stupid question. She already senses the answer. 

Yebin wordlessly hands the photo to Minkyung as she begins to flip the others over. 

The image no longer depicts the smiling Minkyung she remembered it—instead it’s a photo of her, lying motionless in what looks to be a clear pool of water. Chillingly, her photo counterpart doesn’t have eyes, just vibrant red orbs burning in place.

“They’re all like this.” Yebin whispers. “But they’re signed. That’s my handwriting in the corner. I never took these.”

Above them, Minkyung’s bedroom light flickers red.