- honesty -

"Was that you?" Chanyeol asked into the twilight of the room. The house was still completely silent. The sun had not yet risen. Outside he heard a car in the distance, inside he heard the ticking of his alarm clock. He still felt dizzy and as he looked at the red light of the smoke detector above him, it danced in front of his eyes. But he was also sober enough to feel Baekhyun staring at him in the dark.
"Was I what?" Baekhyun asked with a voice like the soft rustling of the wind in the trees.
"The one trying to make out with me. Was that you?" Chanyeol asked and his voice sounded hard and foreign in the dark. They had never talked about this. Had never specified it or any of the wishes any of them might have had back when they had both still been alive. But to meet Kim Minseok had messed up that tacid agreement.
"What do you want me to say now?" Baekhyun asked in an even voice and Chanyeol angrily sat up, only to feel dizzier than ever. Gravity pulled down his head as if it was made out of lead. Baekhyun was just a vague shape in the flimsy darkness.
"What I don't want is you talking like a ing politician," he said while he rubbed his face. "Reply to a question with another question? you. Just don't ing lie. Was that you or was it him?"
The words burst  out of him with a ferocity that startled him a little. He was mad. He was frustrated. He was disappointed. He had always believed that he was able to cope but he couldn't this time. He had staggered back home after slightly sobering up on the entrance stairs of an office building where Kim Minseok had buried his head between his knees for what felt like an eternity. He had felt more useless than ever because he had not understood a single thing. And as he had eventually opened his front door and finally sensed Baekhyun's presence, a realisation had hit him and had spread in his veins like venom.
"That was me," Baekhyun said in a flat voice and Chanyeol unwillingly slapped his own forehead. He was a complete idiot.
"What the is wrong with you?" he unwillingly muttered under his breath and even as the words left his mouth, he wasn't sure whether they were directed at himself or Baekhyun. He should have seen it coming. He should have sensed that something had been off.
"Yeah, well, he's hardly a damsel in distress, is he?" Baekhyun said meekly. "You know the guy. If he wanted to-."
"What the , Baekhyun?" Chanyeol interrupted him and stared at his shape in bafflement. A shadow in a room full of darkness. "What is even going on inside your head? Is there nothing but a pile of in there? Because that's what it ing sounds like to me."
Baekhyun let out a short laugh and he pressed his lips together. Swearing was not going to help him, he understood that much. But he also wasn't sure how much more he wanted to hear. Nothing would change the fact that he had been betrayed. Worse even. He had been used.
"I get that you're embarrassed," Baekhyun began and Chanyeol interrupted him.
"Embarrassed? Are you ing kidding me?" he scoffed. "Why do I have to be the one who is embarrassed? Why do I have to be assaulted because you couldn't ing take no for an answer when we were kids and then jumped off the roof? You're ruining my life because I was sixteen and couldn't deal with your and now I'm the one who has to feel embarrassed because there's one good thing in my life and you ing had to go and ruin that, too? Because you just can't ing leave me alone? I made one mistake but you just can't let it go. You wanted to die and I have to suffer for it."
He didn't realize how much he had raised his voice until he heard his sister stirring in her bed next door. There was a groan and mumbling and the creaking of her old bedframe. And then there was nothing but heavy silence. It was only then that he realized what he had said and dread washed over him.
He had thought these things before. There were thousands of silent monologues he had amassed over the years, constantly perfecting his ultimate speech. But he had never voiced his thoughts because he was alive and Baekhyun wasn't. Because it wasn't fair. Because things would have been different if only he had stopped him. If only he had been more sensitive and less confused about what he even wanted.
"I'm only here because you..." Baekhyun quietly began and sounded oddly distant and uncertain.
"Because I what?" Chanyeol asked impatiently and then immediately felt scared of the answer. Baekhyun had never blamed him directly but he had answered the question for himself over and over again. Baekhyun was there because he had killed him. Because it was his fault. Because he deserved to suffer.
"Because I was there when you..." Baekhyun continued and clearly wavered. There was a strange tone to his voice, like the wind rattling an old house at night. He didn't finish the sentence, as though he feared it.
Chanyeol blinked and then a sudden suspicions chilled his bones. He unwillingly touched his wrist.
This was the part he had never wanted to talk about again. It had never appeared in any of the monologues he had repeated over and over again in mind while he lay awake at night. He didn't want to remember the dull panic he had felt when his sister had found him in the bathroom, his blood covering the tiles and soaking the bathmat. He didn't want to admit that his biggest regret was that moment of weakness because it had broken everything. His relationship to his family would never be normal again because he knew that they constantly feared that he could do it again.
He wanted to lie about it.
He wanted to pretend that the moment was unconnected to everything else.
But then it slowly damned to him. His unwillingness to just talk about it had maybe caused even more misunderstandings. Maybe Baekhyun intentions were different from what he had believed all this time.
"I could hear you even before I... did that," Chanyeol quietly said. "My best friend had died and everybody looked at me with pity and anger because they knew we had argued. And then I heard voices and I thought I was losing it. I wasn't thinking straight. I just wanted it all to stop."
He had never thought that it would make a difference but once he had voiced them, his words felt incredibly heavy. Baekhyun said nothing in return. There only was faint noise like static.
"I mean, you see me every day and not everything is great but despite all that, I..." He folded his hands in his laps and stared down at them on his light blanket. "I don't want to die."
There was an apprehensive sound.
And then there was a long pause in which Chanyeol felt coldness spread through the room.
Now that he had said everything there was to say, his own mind felt empty.
"The one good thing in your life..." Baekhyun then began in a whisper and Chanyeol looked up. "Is it Kim Minseok?"
Chanyeol's eyes widened. "No," he said quickly. "That's not what I..."
"I didn't meant to ruin anything," Baekhyun continued as if in trance. "I can still make it right. I'll talk to him. I just need to-."
"No! Don't! Don't talk to him!" Chanyeol interrupted him and jumped up as if he had a way to actually stop him. Like an idiot he waved his arm into the darkness of his room and winced when he accidentally slapped his hand against his bookshelf. But there was no coldness, no sign that  Baekhyun still was there.

- secrets -

In human society there was nothing more powerful than knowledge. It was a currency in its own right. Hidden knowledge could allow an individual control over their own lives. Uncovered knowledge could be used as a weapon against others.
Minseok knew that. He knew it because he had learnt it the hard way. As a child all kinds of knowledge had been kept from him by a mother who had raised him in secret. With eleven, when the people from the Office had finally found him, he had not been able to read or write and had rarely spoken to anyone but her. Like an animal that had never been in human contact before, he had not seen them as predators and had naively told them everything. They had made notes but he had not understood the purpose until he had been old enough to find his file in the archives. His secrets were a closed file. They were words that were withheld from most people although he had so willingly shared them.
It had taken him years to really understand. The moment he allowed someone else to know something about him, he gave them power over him. So he had stopped sharing.
But the existence of Park Chanyeol had changed that.
Suddenly he found himself losing control over what the people around him knew.

Luhan had tried to call at least a dozen times but Minseok had managed to ignore him. Then, close to midnight on Sunday, when he dripped on the floor after nearly passing out in the shower, he sat with his head on the surface of the kitchen table and mechanically picked up.
"Minseok-ah," Luhan's surprised voice said and it obviously took him a while until he cleared his thoughts. Minseok, too tired to say or do anything, turned his head and lay the phone on his ear while staring at the fridge.
"Look, I know it's none of my business but," Luhan began and Minseok immediately drowned out his voice. He was drunk and dizzy and barely managed to keep his eyes open, so he didn't feel like arguing.
When there was a long pause as though Luhan waited for a response, he muttered, "I'm going to hang up now."
He fumbled with the phone, dropped it, simply left it where it was and then nodded off at the table. The sun already rose outside when he woke up, so he  turned off all the lights and dragged himself to bed.

The next morning he found Byun Baekhyun in front of his door and felt the strong wish to just shut it again.
"What the did you do that for?" Byun Baekhyun began impolitely. "I thought we had a deal. You have no ing idea what you have done. It all went to because of you."
Minseok sighed and then furrowed his brows. What bothered him the most was that his first impulse wasn't to think of him as 'a ghost' or 'the companion' but simply as 'Byun Baekhyun'. As if he still was human.
He tried to say more, but Minseok put up his hand in front of him and spread out his fingers. When Byun Baekhyun halted his tirade and looked at him warily, Minseok swiftly balled his hands into a fist. Byun Baekhyun clearly understood the gesture. Even if he wanted to, he couldn't continue his rant.
After that he followed him, but Minseok pretended not to notice the coldness tingling his back. He would not allow a ghost to have the upper hand.

And really, it would have been fine if not for Jongdae who appeared out of nowhere at the station.
"Morning, hyung," he said cheerfully and then frowned at a spot behind him. "Uh, I think you're being followed."
Minseok nodded at him and continued his way towards the platform. Jongdae walked next to him but kept throwing nervous looks at Byun Baekhyun. He obviously recognized him because Minseok had been stupid enough to allow them to meet.
"I think he's trying to say something," Jongdae noted and Minseok shrugged as he entered the crowded train. Byun Baekhyun stayed with them for a few stations but then disappeared eventually. It probably was too alluring. In a packed train he couldn't avoid passing through other people and he now knew what it was like to possess. Minseok had learned enough about him to understand that he would not easily become addicted to it. He had morals, almost like a person.

"Hyung, I'm free tomorrow night," Jongdae suddenly said when they stood at the crossroads in front of the office.
Minseok threw him a questioning glance, so he quickly added, "You know, in case you need me to jump in tomorrow. I mean, if you're not feeling well or anything." The way he said it, made it clear that he thought he understood something. Minseok probably looked sick.
"No need," he said dismissively because it also hit him that he had to figure out what to do about Park Chanyeol.
He probably came off as rude but it the whole situation bothered him. It bothered him immensely. He had given Jongdae only a small amount of information but it already was too much.

He only spent a few minutes in the office before he went on his neighbourhood rounds for the rest of the day.
Luhan tried to call a few times but he didn't pick up.
He had lunch in a family restaurant where he knew no one and no one knew him.
Byun Baekhyun appeared in front of his house at night but this time he could simply flee inside.

On Tuesday morning, he shooed Byun Baekhyun away before he had a chance to utter a single word. He felt better but still not in the mood to be cursed at.
When he met Jongdae in the office kitchen, he looked as though there was something he wanted to say but then he simply poured himself a cup of coffee and walked back to his desk.
Luhan called again. Only once this time, as though he finally gave up.

"Where's Yixing by the way?" Minseok asked when Jongdae left for an appointment while Junmyeon wiped the leaves of the rubber tree next to his desk with a wet cloth.
"He called in sick again," Junmyeon said absent-mindedly.
"Again?" Minseok asked and could tell by the look Junmyeon threw him that the question was stupid. He had not seen Yixing the day before but he had been too preoccupied with himself to really take notice of his surroundings.
"Yeah," Junmyeon said and leaned back in his chair a little. "He called yesterday and said that he must have caught the flu during the weekend. Said he has a fever and everything. It's probably the season to get sick. On my way here I heard so many people sneezing, I keep thinking that it's only a question of time until I'm out of action myself." The words flowed out of him in a perfectly chatty tone but something about the way he slightly squinted his eyes at Minseok felt a little off.
Minseok only nodded apprehensively.
"Speaking of which, you don't look great either. Are you okay?" Junmyeon then asked carefully.
Minseok angled his head with a questioning glance.
"Because, you know, if there is anything you need our help with," Junmyeon continued in a deliberately patient voice. He spoke to him the way he had spoken to Yixing and Jongdae back when they had still been new and confused and scared. "You know that you can count on us, don't you?"
He thought he knew something. So although he obviously meant good and probably really thought that he was capable of helping, Minseok only curtly replied with, "I know."

A Nameless One appeared right before noon to call on Junmyeon so that Minseok spent the early afternoon by himself completing and archiving reports.
Jongdae came back and tried to chat him up about a news story he had seen on TV about an actress who had to go on hiatus because she had been seen coming out of the apartment of another actor at night.
The sky already was a mayhem of orange and purple when Kim Jongin from the Eastern branch called to ask about a case. Luhan had supposedly suggested to contact Minseok of all people.
"Well, he said that you're my best bet if things escalate," Kim Jongin's indifferent voice said. "He said you're good at dealing with complicated situations, so yeah, that's why I'm calling."
Minseok sighed. It was Luhan's twisted way of reaching out.

He was ten minutes late when he reached the bike shop. The sky already had a dark brown shade and he felt as though he had never spent as much time staring at it as he had during the past two days. Looking at the sky made it seem possible to just forget about his responsibilties.
Barely anything in life scared him any longer but the closer he got to the shop, the more it felt as though his legs were made of rubber. He didn't know what Park Chanyeol knew. He didn't know what Byun Baekhyun had told him or what he himself would have puzzled together. Whatever it was, Minseok had no excuse and all he could do was to apologize. Apologize, repent, tell him how to contact someone else from the Office. Maybe Junmyeon. Maybe someone from the Southern branch. They had been praised before for being efficient in organising their recruits. Maybe Wu Yifan who was more straight-forward with his trainees than most others.
But in the end they were all the same and Minseok hated his options. None of them seemed quite right. But who was he to judge when he had misjudged his own capabilities?

When he finally opened the door to the shop, he meant to apologize. Even if he couldn't explain it rationally, he at least wanted to be upfront.
But then, when he entered, Park Chanyeol looked up from his seat at the counter with a frown and said, "Minseok-sshi, so I've been thinking about it and I'm not sure I can join full-time. I mean, I like my job here and maybe that's wishful thinking but I don't really want to lose any of our customers. This probably comes as a surprise to you, but we offer repairs, so we actually have a couple of regulars. And my boss currently is on bike trip in Thailand, so technically I'm the only full-time employee at the moment. There are two part-timers but they're both university students so we can't really rely on them."
He said in a such an almost deliberately ordinary tone that Minseok just blinked at him in confusion.
"So I was thinking," Park Chanyeol continued brightly. "Maybe I could work part-time. Jongdae said you're not really working regular hours anyway, so maybe that could work." He smiled but there was nervous twitch to his eye, as if he only put on a facade.
Minseok frowned. He didn't want to play a game of pretend. But there was something almost pleading in Park Chanyeol's look that made it hard to be honest.
"Sure," he said and scratched the back of his neck. "I mean, if that's what you want. You don't have to join. The Office exists to help, even if you don't work for them."
Park Chanyeol wrinkled his forehead in thought and then shrugged. "Yeah, well, I guess I learn faster the more I immerse myself in all that stuff. And the more I learn, the easier it gets, right?"
He gave him a smile and Minseok felt awful when he returned it.

It bothered him although it shouldn't have. Keeping secrets was the only survival technique he had learned. He was good at not talking about things and about pretending that nothing was wrong. All day he ignored ghosts and his own loathing towards them. All week he ignored questions and hints by colleagues who all wanted to share their stories but had been trained not to. All year he lived his life in the same routine of work and sleep and more work.
But as he sat next to Park Chanyeol behind the counter of the bike shop and talked about contract options and office duties, it unnerved him. He wanted to say something. He wanted to talk about the deal he had made with Byun Baekhyun and about how he had seen every little detail of his life.
The longer they talked, the more obvious it became that Park Chanyeol simply pretended that Byun Baekhyun didn't exist and that Sunday had never happened. It felt wrong because Minseok got the feeling that Park Chanyeol didn't blame him for anything. As if Minseok, too, had merely been a victim of a ploy.
He had never seen it that way but that was what secrets could do. Ultimately they simply obliterated the truth until there was nothing left but shadows and hushed words.
He wanted to say something but couldn't and the evening simply passed in perfect unspectacularity. They said their goodbyes and Minseok agreed to make arrangements to have Park Chanyeol officially introduced.

"Look, I promise I won't swear at you this time. But I think we really need to talk," Byun Baekhyun said urgently as he appeared beside him outside the shop. Minseok didn't slow down but didn't do anything to stop him either.
"I admit that I maybe was a little rash and I'm not saying that I blame you or anything but we did have a deal and you did agree to it," he said quickly, as if he wanted to make sure that he could say what he had come to say before Minseok could interrupt him. "And if you had just allowed me to follow through with it, things would be a lot easier now."
"Easier how?" Minseok asked with a short side glance at him. Byun Baekhyun looked a little spooked and slightly less focussed than before. "Easier for you because you wouldn't have to explain anything?"
Byun Baekhyun scoffed and Minseok oddly felt at ease. It was satisfying to say these things out loud. That was what the plan had been about. Byun Baekhyun had meant to use Minseok and in return Minseok would have destroyed what was left of him. But then Minseok had felt doubts and had ruined the plan. Because the plan would have meant to hurt Park Chanyeol and it wouldn't have felt right.
"Easier for everyone involved," Byun Baekhyun said as if through gritted teeth. "If only you had-."
"Pretended that it was me for the rest of my life?" Minseok interrupted him and coldness washed over him when he stopped to look at Byun Baekhyun. He floated although he had usually stood before and his shape seemed to fizzle out at the edges. He looked defeated and unsure what he wanted to say. Something had changed.
"You don't understand," Byun Baekhyun began and clearly had trouble finding the right words. "Because I know that you know what I thought I knew. But it was different all this time. I made a mistake, a big mistake, and to make it right I need your help because he..."
He never got to finish his sentence.
"Byun Baekhyun, stop!" a voice interrupted him and Byun Baekhyun flinched while Minseok turned his head in surprise.
Park Chanyeol stood only a few paces behind them with an open jacket and a set of keys dangling in his hand.
"I told you," he huffed at Byun Baekhyun. "Don't talk to him. Don't make it worse. I told you, you'll only make it worse."
Minseok sighed. This was the truth he had wished to hear.