Yeonwoo stepped onto the first floor of the apartment. “I’m lucky he didn’t rent on higher floor. There’s no lift here” she sighed, exhausted.

      She stepped through the hallway with a few empty boxes in her grip. *Maybe I should just collect his stuff and move them tomorrow morning* She glanced at the passcode in her grip and looked through each door to look for the unit Yuchan had rent. The landlord’s voice came into her mind for a while.

“He comes here quite often. But once he’s in the house, he never goes out. Maybe he’s too tired with work that he need some place alone to rest. He said he need to rent here because it’s close to his grilfriend’s place. He’s quite mysterious, the neighbours said. But to me, he’s just okay. He smiles a lot when we met each other. It’s unfortunate that he need to left before us”

      She stopped in front of a unit numbered 105. “Yea maybe he need some place for him to be alone”

“Tell me about it” Donghun continued to eat. “Maybe he need some space to keep his stuff away from the house. Or us” he whispered the last two words.

“But why did Donghun said like that?” she pushed the door open and paused. Yuchan’s sneakers were laid carelessly at the doorsteps.

      Yeonwoo covered as she sobbed silently. “Yuchan-ah” she whispered. For a moment, she couldn’t move. Yeonwoo chuckled. “Mian, Yuchan. I should stay strong, right?” she sighed and wiped her tears away. “Yah, this place is so like you, Yuchan. How many times do I have to nag you about putting your things neatly?”

      The door was closed and she entered the living room. The boxes were put on the floor. She looked around. The house has not much furniture. Only a coffee table, a sofa with a floor lamp in living room. Books and papers laid carelessly on the coffee table. She stepped into the kitchen that only have a heater and a microwave. A small melancholic smile appeared on her face as she saw the stack of ramen bowls on the small dining table. “I told you many time to come to my home if you’re hungry, didn’t I?” She went to the veranda. She bent down to the floor where a colouring book and sketch book was beside the wall. Colour pencil scattered around them. She smiled as she went through the sketching book. “So here’s the place that relax yourself and do everything that you like” She stopped at a familiar sketching.

-Flashback-

      Yeonwoo saw Yuchan from afar at the park bench. She smirked and tip toed to him. He was too immersed into drawing with a smile on his lips.

“Yuchan!” she jumped in front of him that made him jolted in surprise. “Yah, Yeonwoo! You almost give me heart attack” he nagged. She giggled. “What are you drawing?” she reached out for the sketch book but he took it away. “Nothing. Just something I think beautiful. You can’t see it”

“Why?” “It’s not finish yet” “C’mon, Yuchan. Let me take a look” “Ani” Yuchan moved a bit far from her. “Yah” she tried to take it again but he held it away. He laughed. “I’ll show you once I finish it”

“I want to see it now” “Okay okay” he held out the sketch book to her.

“Woah!” she gasped. He was trying to draw her picture who was smiling brightly.

      Yuchan looked away with his hand scratched the back of his neck. His face grew red. “I told you I’m drawing something beautiful”

-End of flashback-

      Yeonwoo stared at the picture of her drawn by Yuchan. “Yuchan-ah, you’re the best”

 

 

      She dropped a box on the floor of a room. “Let’s see what do we have in here” She stood again and pushed the closet open. A few clothes were hung there. She began to take them out and fold it nicely. “Aigo we really gonna miss him so much” She folded his favourite white hoodie. “I really like to him in this” she smiled as she held the hoodie up. “What the” her finger went to the holes at the bottom edge of the hoodie. “How can this get torn?”

      She ignored it and continued to keep the clothes away.

“What the” she tried to pull the last clothes from the bottom part of the closet but it won’t budge. She sighed and slid the sliding door of the closet on the other side. The shirt was stuck between the back plank of the closet. She narrowed her eyes. Yeonwoo pushed the plank and tried to push it aside. And the plank did move. That made she gasped in surprise as she didn’t expect it to work out that way. She took the shirt and threw it away from her shoulder. “Is there something behind here?” she tried to push open the gap wider. There was a black area before her. She the flashlight on her phone. The light shone the stairs before her that lead downstairs. “Secret passage?”

*Should I go down or not?* All kinds of eerie looking ghost from the movies she watched came into her mind. *Damn it! Do that thing supposed to pop up into my head right now?!*

*I want to know where does this place lead to but I’m scared* she sighed and paused. *You know what. This time curiosity outstand my fear!*

      Her hand formed into a fist. She took a step down the stairs. *Still safe* she exhaled a relieve sigh. Her other hand went to her chest. *I’m too nervous! Seriously!*

*Alright, let’s go, Yeonwoo!* she held onto the railing as she descend the stairs.

      She stepped onto the cold cemented floor. *What is this place? Nothing will come and jump onto me in this total darkness right?* she knocked her head. *Why am I even thinking negatively right now?!*

      She tried to search for any switch box and discovered a switch at the wall near her. She turned it on. The once pitch black area was now lighted up. It was a studio room. The wall painted with light colour. There was a coffee table full of papers scattered around along with a sofa set. Another table was placed quite far from the coffee table with a white board in front of it. The white board was full of words, unidentified mind maps and sticky note pasted onto it. A few photos were pasted onto it too.

“What is this place?” she paced around the room, eyes wandered around. She bent down to the coffee table and held onto a paper. She read the information about short circuit. Yeonwoo picked up another newspaper article about accident due to short circuit. The image of the boys’ house on fire went into his mind.

“The investigation team discovered the cause of fire was from short circuit at the main switch box”

      She tilted her head at remembering the police officer’s voice that told her that the other day.

“Maybe just a coincidence?”

      She approached the white board. The boys’ pictures were pasted onto the board. Her finger trailed to the words written near their picture. Her eyes widened and reread it again, in case she read wrongly. She gasped. She stopped at the last words of the sentence.

“Kill them” Her stomach sank.

      She took a few step backward and now saw the whole whiteboard with arrows pointed around the boys’ picture, articles along with pictures of weapon. Yeonwoo covered to stop herself from bawling louder. Her back hit the table. She turned to the table, still confused and not wanting to accept the reality she just learnt. A few screwdrivers rolled to the side as she accidentally hit the table just now. She saw a plier on the table. She remembered the holes on Yuchan’s hoodie that had the same size as the screwdrivers.

      She noticed the presence of a hard cover notebook on the table.

*What’s this?* The book was now in her grip and she opened the book. *It’s Yuchan’s journal* For a while, she smiled as she read an entry.

| I confessed to her today ^-^ I’m so happy. That she accepts me. Jo Yeonwoo, I’ll never leave you ever |

      She flipped to the other page. Her smiles disappeared.

| I really hate them! Donghun, Sehyoon and Junhee. I wish I could kill them! Living with them can make me crazy! I swear I’ll kill them one day for doing this to me|

      She glanced at the board. *It just as I guessed. Yuchan tried to kill them. But why? They are his friend*

*Wait!* Her eyes went back to the journal. *If he caused the fire and want to kill them…* Her eyes trailed to the newspaper near her. She reached out to it and read the date. “Yesterday” Her eyes widened. *He’s alive! I need to get out from here!*

*Wait!* She took her phone and quickly took the picture of everything inside the room.

* * *

      A set of footsteps walked through the hallway of ground floor. A lean man in black outfit with cap that shadowed his face appeared.

* * *

      Yeonwoo shut down the electricity of the room she just discovered and ran up the stairs. She slid close the stairway and was about to run off. She saw the clothes she had put in the box. “No. I can’t let him know I was here” She kept her phone away and quickly hung the once folded clothes into the closet again.

* * *

      The man arrived on the first floor. His hand slipped into his pocket to take out something as he walked through the hallway. He looked up to see the door of the unit.

* * *

      Yeonwoo bent down to take her stuff and the boxes.

* * *

      The passcode was entered correctly.

* * *

      Her head snapped to the source of sound. She gasped.

* * *

      The man entered the house and closed the door behind him. He put his wallet on the table as he was holding onto it in his pocket. He turned to the living room. It was just as it was.

* * *

      Yeonwoo ran to the main door. A cat was there playing with her shoes. A relived chuckled left her lips as she saw she had left the door agape. “Yah, you totally surprise me” she bent down to the cat and put it outside. She once again turned to the unit. “I should not let anyone know about this place”

* * *

      The man walked to the veranda and looked up to the already dark sky. It was night.

* * *

      Yeonwoo flopped onto the seat at the bus stop. She took out her phone.

“Hello, ahjussi---Nae---I’m sorry but can I just keep his stuff there?---I’ll pay the rent every month---Alright. Thank you”

      She looked down and saw the journal in her grip. Her eyes saddened. *I can’t believe he did that to the people he considered friends. He’s a total psychopath!*

* * *

      Yeonwoo slid the picture in her phone to the next photo. Her right hand was busy copy down the plans she just took from Yuchan’s secret room. Papers laid carelessly around the study table as well as the floor. “I need to know his plan. His motive. Why he wants to kill his friends?” Her curiosity will never light off until she found her answer.

      She paused. “But I could be wrong” She stared ahead and saw the picture of both her and Yuchan she had put in a frame. “I can’t be thinking the man that I love for years to do something lunatic like this. But” she looked down to the sketches and plans she had copied. “This is the solid proof. What more can I ask to deny this fact?” She sighed and continued to write. “But he looks normal” sighed again. “Just someone that looks normal doesn’t mean he’s really normal without any flaw. Everyone have their flaws that they hide well. It only the matter of time that things unravel itself”

Short circuit.

      She stopped and stared at the words. She pulled the newspaper about the boys’ house on fire. Yeonwoo recalled Yuchan’s torn hoodie and the plier she discovered. She shut her eyes for a moment. When she opened them once again, she blinked back tears.

*My mind doesn’t want to believe this but these proof point to Yuchan as the offender. How can I even safe him even if he’s not the one? It’s impossible!*

“But I can’t charge a ‘dead’ person as a criminal”

 

 

“Unless he’s not dead” she remembered the newspaper she saw that date the day from before at the secret room. “Yuchan will be back at the unit. He has nowhere to go besides their house that was caught in fire. If he’s the one who plan to get the house on fire in attempt to kill everyone” she glanced at the papers. “He’ll come back and finish his uncompleted plan. Because I know he’s not the type to do things until it’s totally complete. I need to know his next move”

      She looked down to her phone again. It was the picture of she just took at the secret room. The picture of Junhee along with a few papers explaining how he’ll die in an ‘accident’.

*I should warn them. But will they believe me? They believe in him. But why can’t he believe in them? Why does he want to kill them? There’s only one place I can look for the answer*

      Yeonwoo looked to Yuchan’s journal on her bed.