Chapter 18
Before Her Very EyesThe young woman wrote down Arin’s curse in a notebook. She studied it with narrowed eyes, pensive.
“I’m looking for a loophole,” she said.
“Loophole?” Arin asked.
“Magic only works when we use words, and words are… well, faulty. They don’t always mean what you want them to mean. Curses are like that. The mage can string the words together with an objective in mind, but the wording often implies something that the mage never intended.”
Arin looked blank.
“For example, it seems like your curse will work if three conditions are met: 1) you love a person, 2) that person is before your very eyes, 3) you call out the person’s name. That’s what the words suggest. But I don’t think the mage wanted the curse to be so conditional, you know. Or maybe she did. I don’t know. I’m working on it. I want to find something that will let you live your life normally without worrying about the curse.”
“Why are you even helping me?” Arin asked her. Arin didn’t even know her name; this woman was an absolute stranger who was randomly doing so much for her, and Arin didn’t know why.
“I protect the cursed, Arin. That’s my job.”
Protect from what, Arin thought. From the curse? From the cursers? From Arin herself? The latter seemed the most dangerous at this point.
It all seemed so hopeless. Why carry on if she was a walking weapon? Why stay alive when seeing someone you love die before your very eyes would always be a lingering prospect that you’ll have to live with for the rest of your life?
“There’s nothing left for me,” Arin said. “You don’t need to protect me. Can you use your powers to just end me?”
“Get those thoughts out of your head, Arin,” the woman said, disapproving. She didn’t let that depressing thought linger for long, and added: “I actually have an idea. I’m going to try something. A loophole. I’m going to tell you my name, and I want you to call it. If I die, I die. It’s a chance I’m willing to take for you.”
Arin shook her head, the memory of the purple faces coming back to her in flashes. She did not want a repeat of that. If this stranger was willing to risk it, Arin wasn’t.
“No!” she said, plugging her ears with her fingers and singing “lalalalala.”
The woman didn’t seem to care. She just drew something on her notebook and held the notebook up to Arin’s face so she had to look at it.
It was a symbol, “~”.
Arin stopped babbling and unplugged her ears.
“That’s my name,” the woman said with a smile, pointing at the symbol.
“What even is that?”
“My name.”
“That’s not a name.”
“For you, it is. It’s the loophole. If you call it, I don’t think I’ll die.”
“Well, obviously,” Arin replied. “How can I call it if I can’t say it?”
“Visualize it. Call my name. Let’s see if it works.”
And so Arin did that. She visualized the symbol and called ~’s name. Nothing happened.
~ smiled. “I heard you call me.”
“Because of mind-reading magic?”
“No,” ~ answered. “Because of eye contact. Words are not the only way to communicate. Even if you can’t say my name, I can still know when you call me, Ar. This is our loophole. We’ll find another one, but for now, this one is enough.”
-
Arin tried to call ~, but her phone was off. She texted her, but the message wasn’t reaching her.
Arin didn’t know what to do.
She hated Jeonghan. She hated Woozi. She hated them for exerting their power over her like that and putting her in a position where she had to choose between losing her livelihood or losing her bodily integrity.
It all made sense now: why Woozi was being so invasive. Why he was doing her all of those favors. Why he was kind to her and to Meemo. He was trying to play a power game with her. Arin felt so gullible.
When ~ put a knife to his neck, he deserved it. Arin wished ~ were here to do it again and protect her from the monsters she was stuck with.
Arin spent that night outside, looking over the rooftop and wondering why she was holding onto her miserable life anyway. She had no money. ~ was gone. The sorceress was out to hunt her. Her boss was cruel. Her neighbor was a ual predator.
It was like God had listened to her, because she suddenly got a notification from Chilli. It was a teaser to their new album.
It was silly how excited that made her. Even with everything that was happening, a picture from a dumb boy group could still shine a little light on the darkness she was feeling in her heart.
Maybe just a little more. Until after the next album, Arin thought. She would endure it all until then.
She was too tired and emotionally drained to think about her situation that night. She just wanted to escape it all, and so she put in her earphones and played Chilli’s music on repeat until she drifted off to sleep.
-
Jeonghan had to knock on her door and physically drag her down to the eighth floor when the time came for her to work for Woozi .
Arin had already practiced dissociating herself from her body, but it was still hard to take the initiative to go down there and set herself up for such an experience. She needed Jeonghan to come and drag her.
They took the elevator from Jeonghan’s apartment, and when the elevator door opened, Woozi was standing right there, expecting her.
“Hey Arin,” he greeted with a bow.
Arin didn’t respond. She didn’t care that Jeonghan was glaring at her.
“Don’t tire her out too much,” Jeonghan said to Woozi. “She has a lot of work tomorrow.”
“I won’t,” Woozi replied.
When Jeonghan disappeared behind the elevator door, Arin’s first instinct was to pick the skin her nails to ease the tension in her heart.
“Woah, woah, woah,” Woozi reached out to hold her arm, but she flinched at his touch. When he noticed this, he pulled his hand back, and said, “don’t do that. It’s a bad habit.”
She didn’t care. She continued compulsively picking her skin. It was the only way she could dissociate, the only way she could prepare herself for what’s to come.
“What’s wrong? Why do you look so pale?” he asked her.
“Just get it over with,” Arin sputtered. “What do you want me to do?”
“Look, if you don’t want to do anything now, it’s okay. I just wanted an excuse to see you without your boss spying on us.”
“What do you want me to do?” she asked again through gritted teeth.
“You can start with the kitchen. I tried to cook earlier today and made a mess…”
Arin narrowed her eyes. “Stop beating around the bush. Just tell me what to do.”
“What?” Woozi looked genuinely confused.
“You… you don’t want to… to do that?”
“What are you talking about?”
It was like a huge weight was lifted from Arin’s shoulders. She stopped picking her fingers and dropped her arms to the side, studying his face. Maybe this was part of the power play? Lulling her into a false sense of security?
“I… nothing,” Arin said.
“What did you think?”
“Nothing,” she said, shaking her head. She walked past him toward the kitchen, eyes on the ground.
“What did you think I wanted to do?” he asked again. Arin knew that he wasn’t going to relent. He was going to keep asking the question until he got his answer, like he always did. That was just the kind of person he was.
“Jeonghan told me that… that you wanted to.. um... sleep with me,” Arin answered.
“W...what?” his eyes widened, and he arched his neck so much that his glasses slid off his nose and he had to use his palm to push them back up. “What kind of person does he think I am? Rest assured, Arin, that is not what I want. But oh god, now it all makes sense why he snapped at me.”
“What? He snapped at you?” Arin asked, genuinely surprised that Jeonghan would snap at his wealthiest tenant.
“I told him that I wanted to hire you as a personal maid, and he got angry at first. He told me not to go near you and not to even look at you. He said that he would not let me rent here if I even asked that question again. Now I understand why he acted that way.”
Arin blinked.
“From the way he acted, maybe he’s not such a bad guy after all? Then again, he did sell you out in the end with the assumption that I wanted to sleep with you? And don’t get me started on the way he treats you. He confuses me. On one hand I feel like he’s in love with you, and on another hand, I feel like he would murder you and hide your corpse in a closet.”
To be honest, Jeonghan confused Arin too.
“Does he have bipolar disorder or something?” Woozi asked, his eyes narrowing as he considered his theory.
Arin shrugged.
“I think he does,” Woozi said. “That’s the only way to describe his behaviour. Anyways, really, I just want to get to know you. I’m serious. And not in the ‘I-want-to-end-up-sleeping-with-you’ way. Believe me; I just find you mysterious, and mysterious people intrigue me. Again, not in the ‘I-want-to-sleep-with-you’ way. More like ‘I-want-to-uncover-the-mystery-behind-you’ way.”
“Then please find another mystery to solve,” Arin replied. “And leave me alone. Please.”
Woozi sighed and took a few steps closer to her. “I’m a curious man, Arin. If I don’t understand something, I go crazy. And I do everything it takes to figure it out. You are like this conundrum I have to unravel. So, with all due respect, I really want to continue investigating the curious case of Arin…”
As he was speaking, the doorbell suddenly rang. Woozi narrowed his eyes and made his way to the door to peer through the eyehole. When he saw who it was, he opened the door.
Jeonghan walked past Woozi and barged inside uninvited. He strode toward Arin, a blank expression on his face.
He grabbed her wrist and pulled her toward the elevator.
“I’m taking her. Find another maid,” Jeonghan said to Woozi with a frown on his face.
“Jeonghan, you’ve got the wrong idea. I…”
“I don’t care. Just don’t talk to Arin ever again or I swear I will kick you out and never let you lease here ever again, you hear?” he spat.
What?
slightly agape, she let Jeonghan drag her into the elevator.
She was surprised, to say the least.
It was surprising that Jeonghan took her away from that annoying person after insisting that she ‘work’ for him; it was surprising that he threatened a wealthy tenant for her; but the most surprising thing of all was that for the first time in three years, he said her name.
A/N: I apologize for the late update. I actually started writing something for another fandom so I was distracted for a bit but I will not leave you guys hanging anymore. I will commit to updates at least once a week for Feb!
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