[Yoongi’s p.o.v.]

‘Finally. I can go for a swim’ I thought to myself. I managed to get out early for once. There weren’t many patients today. I was walking out of the building where I practised when I heard someone calling my name.

“Dr Min I am closing up and leaving for the day. Here are the keys. Have a good weekend” it was my assistant Taehyung.

He was a bit weird but worked hard. He also insisted on being called V.

“You too. I’ll see you on Monday”.

He waved and ran off to his girlfriend, I think her name was Kyung.

I drove off to the club. Suddenly I heard a female voice singing.

‘Again. I have been hearing this for a month. Am I finally losing it or what’ I thought.

‘I must be delusional. My years of self therapy are useless’ I was fuming, I mean I am a world famous psychiatrist but I can’t treat myself.

The song continued. It was sad and melancholic with a tinge of anger.

 

Lost here in this fog

Can’t find my way back home

Held down by chains of unfairness

Can’t be free even in death.

 

For long years I have roamed here

Utterly helpless and hopeless

This pathetic existence

I can’t leave.

 

I can’t accept my fate

Forever bound by these chains

I am just a wisp of fog

Unseen, unheard, just a memory.

 

Always shrouded in darkness

I can’t let go

The chains of my past

I am forever chained to my past.

 

I would have felt bad for the singer if I hadn’t known that it was all in my head. See I suffered from depression. My past may have had something to do with it.

I was lost in my thoughts as I went to the swimming pool in the club. I changed into my swimming trunks and dove into the pool. I was finally in peace since I couldn’t hear the song but I should have known that it wouldn’t last.

I went underwater and felt like I was in a trance. There was a girl, older than me in a white dress and it looked like her hands were tied. She was unable to swim and was drowning. She looked familiar and I tried to reach out to her but I felt like something was holding me back. She was losing her consciousness every passing moment. All of a sudden she stopped thrashing and closed her eyes. Then she vanished.

I snapped out of my trance and realised that my lungs were running out of air. I swam up to the surface but ended up swallowing water anyway.

I got out of the water and went to the showers. After changing I hurried out. I was scared out of my wits but I was Min Yoongi and masked my face into a blank expression. Suddenly two boys blocked my way.

“You are Suga aka Agust D right?” They seemed to be fans.

“Yeah” I didn’t have time for this.

“Wow they were right. You are mysterious and silent” the taller guy said looking at me in awe.

“Hyung, can we take a picture with you and have your autograph?” The shorter guy looked so excited.

I couldn’t refuse. “Yeah sure” I smiled.

“We love your books. We are waiting for your next release” the shorter guy said excitedly.

“You are so cool and awesome” the taller guy said smiling.

“Oh by the way my name is Jungkook” he said smiling.

“Hi my name is Jimin” said the shorter guy shyly, smiling angelically.

“Hi nice to meet you” I smiled at them. They were really cute- almost like two kids.

They waved and ran off. I got into my car. I just wanted to go home and sleep but I really wanted to know who the girl in my hallucination was and why she looked so familiar.

Suddenly I stopped the car.

‘Is it that noona?’ I thought to myself.

“No way” I said out loud but I was scared.

‘I didn’t save her. I saw her die. I should have saved her. I don’t deserve to be happy’ my bouts of depression were sudden. I drove home and was welcomed by my cute dog Holly. I felt better after seeing him. I smiled automatically.

I gave him a treat and cuddled with him for a while. Then I changed out of work clothes and put on a black t-shirt and slacks and went to take a nap. The moment my head hit the pillow I was out like a light.

It was a starry night. I was walking on a bridge. It was cold and it was very windy. I could see the river flowing very fast. It hadn’t frozen yet. I was alone on the bridge when I suddenly saw a noona with ebony black hair standing at the railing of the bridge. I managed to get a glimpse of her face but she didn’t see me. ‘It would have been elegant hadn’t it been covered with cuts’ I thought to myself. I realized what she was about to do and got scared. But before I could do or say anything she jumped. “Noona” I screamed.

 

I jolted awake the image still vivid in my head.

I had been having this nightmare for the past fifteen years. It wasn’t continuous but every time I had it I felt like salt was being put on my wounds. The nightmare was a repeat of the events that had happened that night 15 years ago.

I went to the kitchen to get a glass of water and called a friend.

“Hi Jin hyung, long time no speak. Are you free now?” Jin hyung was my senior in medical school. He was a good friend.

“Hey Yoongi, yeah I’m free. How are you?”

“Same old. I think it has gotten worse” I laughed it off. I didn’t want him to worry.

“So how are you?” I asked. He knew about my depression.

“I am fine, still worldwide handsome” he joked.

“Yeah yeah” I laughed along.

“So what do you mean by it has gotten worse?” He sounded worried.

“Hallucinations but don’t worry” I frowned. I didn’t like making him feel stressed.

We moved on to lighter subjects and caught up with each others’ lives. We hung up after talking for a while.

I was walking back to my bedroom when I felt the air getting colder. It was freezing cold.

I heard holly barking and went to check on him. He had been doing this for the last one month. He looked scared so I took him to my bedroom and told him to stay there. He was very obedient so he stayed there.

I went to the living room to switch on the heater and stopped in my tracks.

The girl [with the white dress] in the pool was floating in the air. She moved towards me, I was scared to hell and wanted to run but my legs stayed rooted to the spot. I was in shock.

The girl had a sad smile on her face. Her ebony black hair trailed down her back stopping at her waist. Her dark eyes were filled with sadness and seemed to have a tinge of insanity in their depths.

Her skin was deathly white and her lips were blue due to the cold. There were dark circles under her eyes and she was really thin. She looked hauntingly beautiful. It was frightening. It was the noona from my dream, the noona from my past.

I hoped that Holly would stay in my room.

“Wh- who are you?” I stammered.

“You know me Yoongi” the girl said looking at me sadly.

“Are- are you that noona?” I was scared to know the answer.

“Yes.”

I collapsed onto the sofa. The feeling of guilt was overwhelming.

“I must be hallucinating” I tried to convince myself.

”You know you are not” she sounded angry but it was a plea.

I knew I wasn’t crazy,

“Mianhe noona jeongmal mianhe” I felt tears of guilt trailing down my face. {A/N: mianhe jeongmal mianhe means sorry, I am really sorry]

“Shh you were just ten years old. He would have hurt you as well” she comforted me.

“I didn’t tell the police because I was scared they wouldn’t believe me” I wanted her to understand.

“Yeah my body was never found” she said sadly.

“I am sorry noona” tears were coming out of my eyes.

“I forgive you. It’s not your fault” she smiled.

“Wait noona he?” I hadn’t seen anybody that day.

“Yeah” she looked confused.

“You mean you didn’t kill yourself?” I had seen her jumping off the bridge.

“No, somebody threw me into the river” she looked surprised.

“But noona I didn’t see anybody” something was not right.

“There was somebody. I saw him. You must have not seen correctly” she looked scary.

I decided not to press the issue. I had no idea what she was capable of. She looked a bit insane.

“Ok noona I believe you” I pacified her.

She calmed down and started explaining everything.

“My name is Li Daxia” she started…

 

[Daxia’s p.o.v]

I looked at the boy sitting in front of me on the sofa. I envied him. I couldn’t sit, I could only float.

He had jet black hair and his skin was the colour of porcelain. His dark eyes looked mysterious, scared and calm at the same time. His cheeks were chubby and softened his features. He looked like a kid and adult at the same time. He was what you would call pretty.

Frankly if it had been a month ago I wouldn’t have been so forgiving. But he seemed to have suffered as well. I could feel the guilt coming off him in waves.

Being a spirit allowed me to read others minds when looking into their eyes [that’s why I knew a lot about Yoongi]. That was the only ability I liked. Even floating got tiring after a while. I missed the feel of the ground under my feet.

“My name is Li Daxia and I was a Chinese immigrant and I died when I was 24 years old.” I started off. I started recalling, the memories still vivid and painful.

“My parents passed away in an accident when I was sixteen. We had settled in Korea just before I became 16 years old. I had no other family other than my parents. I was all alone” I paused.

“Didn’t you have any friends?” Asked Yoongi hesitantly.

“No, I was a loner by nature. I didn’t really like my life. I really didn’t have an aim. I missed my parents. You have to understand something. I didn’t mind dying. I knew it was a part of life and I accepted it. The reason I am so pissed is because I didn’t want to be murdered” I paused to make sure he was following.

He was a pretty good listener, I had to give him that. I continued talking.

“Nobody should get away with murder. I was just forgotten. It was unfair. I wanted revenge, I still do” I paused again and looked at him expecting him to be scared but his face didn’t give anything away. His mind was in total chaos. He didn’t know what to think.

“You can freak out if you want to you know” I told him.

“I don’t know what to think. I think you are real but as a psychiatrist I find it hard to believe. And you have every right to want revenge, its natural” Yoongi wanted me to continue.

“But I guess you’ll tell me that I have to forgive and forget huh?” I wanted to know his answer.

“No, it’s your choice. Leaving a criminal unpunished is a crime in its own right. And noona you can read my mind right?” Wow this kid was full of surprises.

“Wow you are observant as hell. How did you know?

“Because I’m sure nobody saw me that day.”

“Noona I have a doubt. How come you came to me? Aren’t you supposed to go after the one who did this to you?”

“That’s because spirits like me can only be seen by people with a conscience. They have to be related to the incident as well. In this case you are a witness so you are related to the incident. Also the criminal is near you. I feel it. I have been searching for years but a month ago I felt his presence near you and so here I am”.

He didn’t seem fazed by the fact that I had haunted him for a month.

“Noona tell me the rest” he wanted me to finish my story.

“I guess I was at the wrong place at the wrong time. I had been to the club a day before I died. I was pretty well off, my parents had left me a trust fund. I had passed out from college but I didn’t know what I wanted.

I was sipping my drink when I felt someone watching me. It was scary. I turned around but I didn’t see anybody. I was uncomfortable so I went out of the club and hailed a cab. I went home” Yoongi looked like he had a question.

“Noona didn’t you have any neighbours?”

‘This kid could have become a detective. He doesn’t anything at face value’ I thought to myself.

“I didn’t have many neighbours. Most of them were abroad so I was never disturbed. When I reached home I started thinking more rationally. I thought that I must have been paranoid, after all I lived alone. I forgot about it and the next evening I went to the club again.

I had a bit too much to drink and I wasn’t feeling good so I decided to get a breath of fresh air. I stumbled out of the club and walked down a dark alley. I guess he had been following me but I must have been too drunk to notice.

Suddenly I heard a noise from behind and turned to see a guy coming at me with a rock in his hand. The last thing I saw was his furious expression before he brought the rock down on my head and knocked me out” I paused waiting.

“Noona did you know the guy?”

“Yes I did. He had been stalking me for a month. I confronted him and he asked me out. He told me that we had been friends when we were in college. But I didn’t have any friends in college. I would have remembered since I was so lonely.

I rejected him saying he was delusional and ran away from there. Thankfully he didn’t follow me. That was a week before the incident.

Anyway when I regained consciousness I realised that my hands were tied, we were on a bridge and that I was a second away from being thrown into the river. I started thrashing around, screaming at him, calling him crazy and that’s when he finally lost it. He told me to die and threw me into the river.

I showed you what happened [at the pool]. The next thing I know I am floating in air. You know why you are cold even after switching on the heater? It’s because the cold is coming from me. The water was freezing cold and it was winter then so the cold became a part of me when I died” I finished my tale.

“I am really sorry noona” he looked really guilty.

I felt sorry for him [just for a moment]. He hated this as much as I did.

“It’s ok but I need your help. I know that the culprit is one of your patients but I couldn’t read his mind. It was painful. It might be because he killed me” I was angry.

Yoongi looked scared at my sudden change in temper. I didn’t mean to scare him. I schooled my face into a more serene look and he looked relieved.

“Do you know his name?” He asked hesitantly.

“Yeah I heard you say his name when you were consulting him. His name is Kaito Sano.”

 

[Yoongi’s p.o.v.]

I had a hunch. When I figured out that she could read minds I tried to think of a lot of things at once so that she would get confused and not know what was really on my mid.

“………..His name is Kaito Sano” said Daxia noona.

I didn’t remember having a patient with that name.

“The name seems familiar. I will check now and we’ll get to the bottom of this” my hunch was getting stronger.

Oh by the way noona are ghosts and spirits the same?” It had been bugging me for some time now.

She started laughing. It was nice to see the change.

“Wow it has been a long time since I laughed. I missed it. And no ghosts are the souls of people who hated everybody for no reason while spirits are the souls of people who didn’t get a closure before they died, in my case I didn’t know why I was killed. Ghosts and sprits don’t get along.”

‘Interesting’ I thought.

I understood why Holly had been acting strange. He must have sensed her presence.

I went to my study for some privacy and called my friend Jung Hoseok aka J-Hope. He was an author and a journalist. He had been my patient but we had ended up becoming fast friends. He had also had depression but he was alright now.

“Wazzup hyung” Hoseok’s cheerful voice greeted me.

“Hey, can you do me a favour?” I asked him.

“Yeah sure hyung”.

“Can you send me all the information you have got on a guy named Kaito Sano?

“Yep. I’ll send it to you right now”.

“Kumao. I owe you one.”

“No problem. Just give me your next book for free” he joked.

I laughed and hung up. He sent me the information. I called him again to confirm something and asked him for another favour. Then we talked for a while and hung up. I also made a few other calls to confirm my hunch.

My hunch was right. This was gonna be interesting.

[Daxia’s p.o.v.]

I saw Yoongi walking towards me. I had been standing [floating] at the balcony in his living room. I loved feeling the wind on my face.

“Noona I remember him now” he said as he sat down on the sofa.

I tried to read his mind but it was too chaotic. I decided to trust him. After all he had listened to my story.

“Noona I just wanna clarify something. What happens when you find out the truth and how will you know it’s the truth?”

“I will go back to where we all came from. It is said that when you hear the truth you will disappear” I told him.

“Even if you won’t believe it?” He asked.

“Yeah. We became spirits because we needed the truth. The Creator or God or the Ultimate Power or whatever you call it knows the truth but allows us to find it out ourselves” I didn’t understand what was going through his mind.

“But how do you know all this?”

“I just do. When I became a spirit, the information was all in my head. Also other spirits told me the same thing.

Enough questions. Tell me what you found out” I was getting impatient.

“Ok so Kaito Sano is a schizophrenic patient. Do you know what schizophrenia is?” He asked me.

“I have heard of it but I don’t know what it is. I just know that it is a mental disorder” I told him hesitantly.

“Ok so in order to understand the culprit you have to know what it is.”

“I don’t want to understand him” I lashed out in anger.

“But don’t you wanna know why he acted as if he knew you?” Yoongi looked a bit scared but he spoke really softly.

I admit I was curious. I remained silent.

Yoongi took it as a sign to continue.

“Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by abnormal social behaviour and failure to understand reality. Common symptoms include false beliefs, unclear or confused thinking, hearing voices that others do not, reduced social engagement and emotional expression, and a lack of motivation. So they may experience hallucinations. I guess that’s why he acted as he knew you. But that doesn’t explain why he killed you though” he paused to think.

“But I don’t understand what that has to do with me” I was having difficulty controlling my temper.

“Think carefully. Doesn’t it sound familiar” he remained calm and unruffled.

“Psychiatrists are stupid. You guys over- analyse everything. Even I don’t have much social interaction and I am not the most motivated person either. But that doesn’t mean I am schizophrenic. You are just trying to justify the criminal. Even if he’s schizophrenic he’s still a criminal” I finally lost my temper.

“Daxia noona you were in the car with them when they gotn into the accident weren’t you?” He suddenly changed the subject.

“What does that have to do with anything?” I was getting confused.

“Did you know where you were coming from?” He asked.

I did not like way this was going.

“I don’t remember. But why are you asking me all this?”

“You were coming from a psychiatric clinic. Your parents had taken you there for a diagnosis. They must have noticed something” he said.

He looked a bit scared. He didn’t know how I would react.

I sat there in shock. Then I started laughing.

“You expect me to believe this crap?” I asked him still laughing hysterically.

“Do you think I am insane?” I asked him angrily.

 

[Yoongi’s p.o.v.]

Her mood swings were scary. My hunch had been right.

There was a person called Kaito Sano but he was in Okinawa. He was not patient either. So I had asked Hoseok to send me all the information on Li Daxia and her family.

“Go on. Continue. You should make more stories like this. They are hilarious” noona was losing it but I continued.

“You didn’t remember going to the psychiatrist when you woke up in the hospital because you had selective amnesia due to the accident. The psychiatrist didn’t contact you because he didn’t have your number and you didn’t leave a forwarding address at the hospital” I paused.

She looked at me disbelievingly.

“And pray tell me, what did the psychiatrist diagnose me with?” She asked mockingly.

“Schizophrenia. It was hereditary. Your grandmother had it. Do you understand what I am saying?” I knew she understood what I was implying but she was in denial.

“I think you are the one who needs to pay a visit to the psychiatrist” She looked ready to explode.

I continued undeterred. It was time to lay down the harsh truths.

“I have no patient by the name of Kaito Sano. There was no stalker. It was all in your head. He was a part of your hallucination. Also I know what I saw. You were alone that night” I paused again.

 

[Daxia’s p.o.v.]

He was watching me like a hawk waiting to see how I would react.

“So you are implying that technically I killed myself” I said in a high-pitched voice.

“Yes” he said bluntly.

I was on the verge of hysteria.

“But I read your mind” I told him desperately.

‘No you saw what you wanted to see. You couldn’t understand what you saw so you saw what you wanted to see” he said softly but sternly.

“I can smell the bulls@#* from a mile away. You are a liar and a con artist” I shouted at him angrily.

“I am not lying. Look you are starting to shimmer” he told. He looked at me in wonder.

I looked down and saw that he was right. I froze in shock and then started sobbing.

 

[Yoongi’s p.o.v.]

I looked at her not knowing how to comfort her.

“I am sorry” I genuinely felt bad for her.

“No I am. I am sorry for not believing you” she continued sobbing.

I remained silent.

“So I was mad huh? I was insane” she looked heartbroken.

I knew this would happen.

“No you were different and it’s hard to survive in this world when you are different” I told her my honest feelings.

“Thank you for everything” she smiled a genuine smile and disappeared.