CHAPTER  II

— Summer, 1989

It hadn't been a dream. Chanyeol hoped so, he had convinced himself that nothing had been real and even believed the arguments he was making in his mind to justify the sinister experience he had until he found a small metal box and a vial of medicine hidden in the pocket of the sweatshirt. 

Since then, he couldn't sleep anymore and spent the next few hours awake through the night staring at the box and jar he'd placed on the counter that separated the kitchen from the living room.

Hours later, when the sun began to rise, he would still be there, barely blinking, unreconciled, waiting for responses from two tiny inanimate objects. He resisted for hours until he was overcome by the pain in his foot and looked at the medicine bottle with needy attention. His wound had started to bleed when he woke up and he, irresponsible with himself, just bandaged it without applying any kind of anti-inflammatory or ointment to help it heal. 

But now it hurt, more than before, and perhaps that medicine he had received from the man with the button eyes could help. 

Chanyeol tried to ponder.

He was in so much pain… But, accepting the ointment would imply that he was agreeing that everything — the buttons sewn into the irises, the witches, the insects serving a meal — had been real. He wanted to be stubborn, he wanted to be tough, and for that reason during the wee times of the morning Park Chanyeol continued his stalemate, unmoving, not leaving his seat in the kitchen. 

Until around what he assumed was 10 am, resisting became very unendurable, and he, tired of self-harming, hungry, and in pain, reached for the clear vial. 

“…” he mumbled, opening the vial. Chanyeol tried not to pay attention to the shape of the lid, a black button, similar to Baekhyun's eyes.

The medicine had a refreshing scent that filled the room, minty like peppermints, sweet like the desserts served by ants and centipedes. The ointment was pasty and whitish, chilled to the touch, and it had an instant calming effect when Chanyeol applied it over the cut.

He allowed himself to take a deep breath, relieved, laying his head back on the counter. The burning subsided the moment the medicine made contact with his skin, allowing him to feel something other than the pain.

Biting his lip, he held the vial close to his face, looking for some kind of instruction. But apart from the top of the button-shaped cap, there was nothing to distinguish the transparent bottle, nothing was written on its surface or any adhesive with the ingredients that formed the base of the ointment. 

He tried to discover something by the smell, daring to open the vial one more time, inhaling the refreshing scent of the medicine, strangely familiar as it reminded him of the interior of the apartment hidden on the other side of the door.

At that very moment, near the counter where he was standing, Chanyeol heard the telephone ring. The gray telephone that sat alone on the coffee table in the room almost empty of other furniture had been the only thing he had managed to bring with him from the old apartment, a farewell gift purchased by his students. With the box that came with the telephone, the older children had sent a letter including their home telephone number along with the request that their favorite teacher would call them and not forget them in their new lives. As if he could forget about them. 

Causing a shrill noise from the living room, the lone telephone was the only object unpacked and installed among all the sealed suitcases and boxes still hidden in the room. 

Chanyeol's eyes dropped to the table where the device had called before he, with a huff, went back to playing with the package still in his hands. 

The memory of his students reminded him of how, despite everything that had happened the day before, he was still an outsider alone in a strange city, fresh out of a broken and unemployed relationship — which was probably the most damaging in all of your situation.

He definitely didn't want to take that telephone call. Changing the old telephone number had cost a fortune out of his pockets, but it had been a sacrifice worth it, no one who didn't know his new number could contact him and, luck or bad, the only one who'd memorized the sequence of numbers was Jongin. 

Chanyeol could picture him impatiently on the other end of the line, twirling his finger in the telephone cord as he waited for someone to pick up. It was difficult to use the telephone at Jongin's house, he had a large family, a mother who loved to talk, and many teenage sisters with whom he disputed over the telephone line.

So, out of consideration for him, Chanyeol should serve him, right? He knew he should.

Distressed, he held back a groan. 

What would he say to his best friend? 

Jongin should have been calling to see how he was doing, he would certainly ask something like that and Chanyeol wouldn't know how to answer. He had no idea how he was doing. 

Physically, he could tell he was fine, the cut on his foot had already stopped hurting, that's because the medicine delivered by Baekhyun was surprisingly potent.

He was still confused, scared, and fearful, maybe even disturbed by the thought that everything that had happened from the moment he walked through the small door had been real. There were no injuries or bruises on his skin, but his head ached, throbbed with the force of his thoughts.

Then he stared at the telephone for a few minutes, watching it fall silent and resume furiously with its scandalous ring, once, twice, three times... He had given up on answering, misjudging himself for it, but still cowardly enough to refuse to talk to his best friend.

Jongin, however, was persistent and kept calling him until on the sixth call he gave up. Chanyeol sighed when he finally stopped, avoiding the coffee table as he got up and limped to the center of the kitchen to pick up the broken pieces of the nutcracker.

Another problem he would need to solve. How could he deliver the broken toy to the neighbor?

As if it had been rehearsed, the instant the thought crossed his mind, Chanyeol heard the sound of the doorbell ringing, followed by a series of knocks on the door, this time much lighter and more subdued than the night before.

Before he could ask who was knocking or trying to hide to avoid answering, the shaky, feminine voice of an elderly woman came up, saying,

"Chanyeol, are you home?"

"." He grunted in panic. The pieces of the doll were in his hand, shattered, one leg severed from the rest of his body, the helmet and head cracked and the missing sword still stuck in the door like a key Chanyeol dared not tamper with. 

Another knock on the door and then the ringing of the bell. 

"Chanyeol!" She called, not in a rushed tone but still urging him to open it. "Your friend called me, said you weren't answering, he's worried and asked me to come to talk to you." 

He should have guessed Jongin would do something like that, even though it felt weird that his best friend would call on the neighbor who'd scared him the night before, that they'd exchanged telephone numbers to keep in touch. Yet, Jongin was equally overly concerned, especially for him. Jongin knew how Chanyeol hated to be alone, and he had promised he would call in the next few days. 

Getting in touch with a creepy neighbor just to keep an eye on him was typically Kim Jongin's thing to be. With that knowledge, Chanyeol answered the door. 

Just as he had imagined Lady Jung appeared, dressed in a flowered dress that covered her ankles and colored rubber boots on her feet. In her hands, which were covered by green rubber gloves, she held a small mud-covered gardening shovel. When she realized she was being stared at, she smiled at him, tilting her head, strands of gray hair escaping from under her hat and falling over her forehead.

"Are you okay?" she asked carefully, the way a concerned grandmother would ask her grandchildren. His eyes went up and down, looking for any sign of illness, reminding Chanyeol of his mother. “What took you so long to answer the door? Your friend was concerned, he wanted to know why you weren't answering. Do you need help with something?”

Pursing his lips, fighting the urge to roll his eyes at the thought of Jongin calling the old woman and filling her with questions, Chanyeol tried not to huff. He was grateful for his best friend's good intentions, but there was no need to create such a fuss.

“I'm sorry for the inconvenience caused by him. Having to get calls from him asking after me must have been pretty irritating, I apologize on behalf of both of us,” he said bowing. 

"What? Oh no child, don't worry about something like that.” replied the neighbor, holding out her hands in time to lift him. “No need to bow down or apologize, it's a pleasure to help the neighbors.” and laughing, the old woman paused before continuing, speaking in a whisper as if she were sharing a secret: “Besides, I was thinking of visiting you anyway. We have a community garden in the building and we need a lot of help taking care of it.”

Hearing her talk about the garden, Chanyeol felt his fingers clenching in a fist, inevitably remembering the man with the button eyes telling about the witches' garden, his cheerful smile as he spoke about the insects visiting it as if they were his friends and the promise that when they saw each other again Chanyeol would be introduced to all sorts of species that lived there.

That other world beyond the door seemed a prettier, enchanted but mirrored version of the reality in which he lived; he had seen the same building, the same apartment, and even a button-eyed version of his childhood dog. So maybe he could guess that the garden Baekhyun was talking about and the garden his neighbor wanted to take him to could be two versions of the same garden?

It would make sense, he thought. Chanyeol remembered that the interiors of the buildings were similar, almost as if they were copies, so maybe everything was the same, although he couldn't explain how or why. It was still a little disturbing to think about it.

Shaking his head, pushing away strange thoughts about buildings and worlds he didn't want to think about, he dared to put his injured foot on the ground, testing whether he could walk without a limp, fearing to worry or arouse his neighbor's suspicions.

Carefully, the music teacher distributed his weight to the injured foot, pressing it to the ground, waiting for the pain that didn't come.

"What?" he muttered.

"What happened?" Lady Jung echoed, frowning her gray eyebrows.

Chanyeol didn't know how to respond, in shock, torn between feeling surprised or not at the realization that he didn't feel anything anymore, any kind of burning or stinging of his skin as if the cut that had previously been so deep and painful had magically healed.

"N-Nothing." Chanyeol stammered, "It was nothing." he lied with a weak smile at her, rubbing his foot on the floor one last time despite his own disbelief, waiting for the agony that should burn the cut.

But, again, he couldn't feel anything.

Noticing the way the taller rubbed his foot as if trying to get rid of some itch, Lady Jung appeared to be even more worried about him.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

Giving a forced laugh, Chanyeol nodded.

"Yes, it's fine." he let out a dry, embarrassed laugh, a cold haha that chilled his entire insides. Horrified at what a terrible liar he was, Chanyeol tried to change the conversation: "Hm... About the garden, I'd like to meet him."

Almost as soon as the words left his lips, Chanyeol watched the concerned look fade from her neighbor's face, replaced by a small smile. Her thin lips curled upwards and wrinkled hands hidden under rubber gloves gripped his right hand, pulling him out of the apartment in a silent invitation for him to follow.

Nodding, the taller obeyed, entering the apartment only to retrieve his own keys, tucking it into the pockets of the sweatshirt he was wearing, before closing the door and following the old woman.

On the way, he came across a trail of ants walking in a row carrying crumbs of a broken biscuit that was on the ground.

The sight reminded Chanyeol that he hadn't yet eaten his first meal of the day, the image of dinner popping into his mind — the sweets served by moths, the tea offered by locusts, and the bounty of food had been so great that the next day he still hadn't felt hungry.

Being careful not to step on any of the ants, Chanyeol heard Lady Jung talking to him. 

"The elevator is broken, so we'll need to take the stairs to the roof terrace," she warned him.

It also reminds him of Baekhyun, although this time no lamps were lighting the path or flowers that seemed to move by themselves on the walls. It was daytime, however, there was little light in the building. Some of the lamps that were supposed to light when they passed were missing, others were broken, and the lack of windows blocked the sunlight.

As much as it hurt to admit, the version of the runner he had known when he was with the button-eyed man was much prettier and, ironically, far less frightening. 

The door to the inner stairs was made of iron and creaked when pushed, too heavy for Lady Jung to open on her own, so Chanyeol had to push it open for them to pass. The stairs, in turn, as well as the corridor, had few lamps and no windows. Still, the lack of light didn't stop the gray-haired neighbor from walking confidently through the darkness, as if she'd already walked that same path hundreds of times before.

"Be careful with these steps, these stairs are treacherous," she warned the music teacher, holding the hem of her dress as she climbed.

Behind them, the heavy door closed with a sudden bang, a snap that reverberated down the stairwell, until the noise disappeared into thin air in a whisper of what was, as the clatter of footsteps on the floor.

Swallowing hard, Chanyeol d for the banister for support.

They completed the first steps in an agonized silence, occasionally interrupted by the sound of their shoes on the floor.

It was easy for Chanyeol to think about how simple it would be for him to miss a step and fall down the stairs, suspicious of his sanity and the possibility of dying and perhaps meeting the man with button eyes in the afterlife.

His mind was going down a dangerous trail.

Annoyed by the silence, Chanyeol asked without thinking too much,

"Is there still a long way to go?" he was feeling childish like one of his students when the words escaped from his lips.

Looking up at his neighbor's silhouette standing out in the darkness, Chanyeol could imagine her waving a hand as she snorted humorously, mocking him.

"Are you tired already?" was her response, teasing him. 

"No, of course not." he said, but quickly corrected himself "I mean, I haven't even finished my move, Lady Jung, I'm a little tired." and then he hurled another question at her: “But what about you? Isn't it exhausting to climb the stairs?”

"Nonsense, child." Lady Jung laughed, "I've been up and down these stairs thousands of times, so many times I could go up and down even without these old eyes." 

Not believing her stubbornness, Chanyeol just rolled his eyes. And, as if she knew what he was doing behind her back, the music teacher watched the way his neighbor's silhouette seemed to be turning back, shoulders tensing as her head lifted as if she were trying to see him even with the lack of light.

She didn't meet his eyes but laughed, founding it humorous amid the slight dread the silence provoked.

With that, he heard a hoarse laughter sound from where the neighbor was. It was still not possible to make out her face immersed in darkness, but, from her eyes, he noticed a distinct colored glow, shimmering like a nugget of gold still hidden in the earth. 

However, it was brief enough that, with a quick blink of an eye, the glow disappeared in the absence of light.

“I have a lot more energy than you think, Chanyeol.” she snapped.

And he chose not to respond, following the echo of their feet clicking over the floor until they reached the top of the stairs. 

Like the front door, the door that led to the terrace was heavy and rusty, creaking as it opened.

What they found on th