-Chapter 3-

Luhan

This place you were in; it looked familiar and yet completely unrecognizable all at the same time. The patterned wallpaper, the luxurious rug in the middle of the room, the queen sized bed adorned with beautiful bed sheets in the corner of the room, even the small arm chair you were currently situated in- it was all indistinguishable to you. And yet you felt like you knew this room like the back of your hand.

It suddenly dawned on you that this very room you were in… was your bedroom.

You were sure it was, for the layout of the entire room exactly resembled your bedroom. However, the contents inside it and even the condition of the room itself were completely different. It almost looked as if your room was recently built which you knew was impossible since your house was at least 100 years old.

You couldn’t speak, nor could you move a single muscle except for your eyes alone. Your eyes darted around the room, noiselessly examining your surroundings.

“Jaeyun,”

That voice… it was familiar. You had heard this voice call out to you before but couldn’t remember why it was so memorable to you in the first place… For some reason, when hearing this voice you were suddenly filled with immense joy and bliss- enough joy to bring you to tears. As if some type of invisible force was controlling your every move, your head involuntarily turned to the side and you looked up.

Standing before you was a man.

Using the word ‘man’ to describe this person seemed unfitting, for this face resembled that of a little boy. However, his tall and lean physique told you in an instant that he was most likely a couple of years older than you. His blonde hair seemed to have framed his flawless, radiant face perfectly. This man was incredibly handsome but also had a sort of childish charm to his appearance that would better describe him as cute.

Staring into your eyes, the corners of his mouth instantly curved up into a gentle smile. Having a smile gracing his face only added on to his immeasurable beauty.

He gradually lifted up and extended his arm towards you, his beautiful and welcoming smile never faltering or fading.

“Come with me, my beautiful Jaeyun.”

Your eyes shot wide open as you were gasping for air. You laid there in your bed trying desperately to catch your breath, staring up at your ceiling through the thick darkness. Pulling a weak and trembling hand from underneath the covers, you wiped your perspiring forehead with the back of your hand. Not only was your heart racing but so was your mind.

When you were finally able to get your breathing to a decent rate, you closed your eyes and silently began to sort your thoughts out. That dream that you just had… it was so incredibly vivid. All the sights, sounds and even the emotions you experienced in the dream was still so clear in your mind. And what stuck out the most in your mind was the man that had appeared in your dream. You slowly open your eyes and almost against your own will, peer down at your door on the other side of the room.

It was open…

You abruptly snap your eyes back up at the ceiling. It took you a few seconds to snap out of your terrified state to actually close your eyes. The door is open, which means it’s here already. The thought crossed your mind in mere seconds, causing you to clench your eyes shut even tighter as your heart began to pound a bit faster.

It wasn’t until later on during your fearful attempt at going to sleep did you start to think that maybe, just maybe…. the man in the dream could have been the invisible force following you around all these years…

Sehun stepped out of the bathroom, carelessly ruffling his damp hair against a towel he had slung over his shoulder. “Sometimes I dread waking up this early for school. The weekend should come by faster, I swear.” Sehun grumbled to himself as he shook his head. (It wouldn’t be a real school day without Sehun’s daily complaints in the morning after all) As he was leisurely walking down the hall towards his bedroom and attempting to disregard the loud squeaks emanating from the aging floorboards beneath his feet, his eyes casually locked onto the room next to his. As usual, the door was open to that room.

“I don’t understand how Jaeyun is able to sleep every night with her door open like that.” Sehun mused aloud. He shrugged off his curiosity and continued on. As Sehun strode past your doorway, he had involuntarily peered inside for a quick second.

A few steps after, Sehun instantly halted to a very abrupt stop as he froze up. Hold on a second… Sehun hastily spun around on his heel and rushed back towards your room. Sehun pushed his way through your doorway and practically burst into your room. He stood there staring wide eyed at your bed where he was met by the sight of your sleeping figure.

Seeing nothing out of the ordinary on your bed, he impulsively turned his head and looked around your room. Once again, Sehun noticed that there wasn’t anything out of place. He slowly gazed back down at you and took a moment to silently think to himself. “What…? I-I must be seeing things…” he murmured to himself. He brought a hand up to his head and began rubbing small circles into his temples to calm himself down. “That must be it- I must be seeing things. Because I could have sworn I saw… a guy sitting at the edge of Jaeyun’s bed…”

Sehun shook his head to rid himself of any outrageous ideas that were beginning to worm its way into his head. He placed his attention down at you who was still fast asleep in your bed. “The only weird thing here is that Jaeyun isn’t awake yet. Usually she’s the first one up in this house.” He walked over to your bedside and carelessly shook your shoulder. “Wake up Jaeyun; we’re going to be late for school.” Sehun repeated since calling out to you the first time surprisingly didn’t work.

Eventually, your eyelids slowly but gradually lifted up. You groggily blinked a few times to focus your vision and then you lifted your head up to stare up at Sehun. “S… Sehun…?” you groan, still pretty deep in your morning trance.

“Did you sleep last night or something? You do know that we have to get to school in less than 20 minutes right?” Your eyes immediately sky rocketed open and, miraculously you were somehow already on your feet grabbing your school uniform. Sehun rolled his eyes and sauntered out of your room.

Once you were able to get your uniform on, you rush over to your desk to grab your school bag. Just before you could reach for it, you stopped. “Huh?” you involuntarily said, the word coming out of your mouth almost on its own.

You school bag was opened. And peering down at the floor, you saw that all the contents that were previously in your bag was strew sloppily on the ground.

“I-I could have sworn I had put everything away in my bag last night before I went to sleep. Plus, if I did leave something out, it would have been on my desk and not on the ground like this.” You crouch down and began picked up all your school supplies. “It couldn’t have just dropped out or slipped out of the bag because… it almost looks like someone purposely threw it on the ground…” Something in the back of your mind was telling you that something didn’t seem right at all and you were beginning to feel goosebumps run up your arm just thinking about it. However, you quickly deduced that it was probably just some type of prank Sehun pulled on you while you were asleep.

That had to be it. What else could have done this anyways?

You luckily made it to school on time despite sleeping in. You were unsure as you why you would even wake up late in the first place when you were so accustomed to waking up early. It’s hard to indulge in sleep when you’ve got something watching you all night… You had no time to think about it too deeply though since you had to put your attention on your school work.

You were in class, silently waiting for your teacher to arrive in class. As usual while the other students were up and about chatting with their friends, you were quietly sitting at your desk, practically an invisible rock in the eyes of your classmates. You didn’t mind the solitude though. You found staying quiet easier than attempting to think up a conversation with a random person who most likely wouldn’t even talk to you out of this class or out of school.

Plus, you found that being alone left you at ease. More than anything you liked being alone since you never really had that privilege at home for obvious reasons…

You reached over for your school bag and rummaged through it for your notebook and pencil. Once you were able to fish these two items out of your bag, you stared down at the two things curiously. “What happened to my notebook and pencil?” you silently whispered to yourself. Both items looked completely manhandled and abused. Your pencil had small dents in it and the tip looked almost painfully dull. And your notebook’s cover was completely mangled up with some pieces of papers hanging out and barely hanging on.

You were in such a rush this morning, you hadn’t even noticed the condition your things were in. “Sehun has some nerve doing these things to my stuff…” you griped.  

You laid your notebook down on your desk and flipped through it to look for a fresh clean page. As you flipped through your previous notes, you suddenly stopped at a single page and stared at it with widened eyes. A small chill ran down your spine. “What… in the world…?”

Luhan. Luhan. Luhan. Luhan.

Scribbled all over the paper in bold and sloppy hand writing was the name Luhan. There were no empty spaces for the name had taken up every available space on the page. You mind went vacant as your eyes darted from one corner to the other. You held up your pencil and stared down at it. This wasn’t Sehun’s handwriting and even if it was, why would he write down a random name all over this page? Your pencil was practically broken, your notebook was mangled up and someone had etched an unknown name all over your notebook. What was all this supposed to mean?

You were so engrossed in your jumbled thoughts and confusion that you didn’t even notice the onlooker sitting beside you, looking over at your notebook as well.

“Hey Sehun. Does your sister Jaeyun have a boyfriend?”

Sehun paused midway from sipping at his chocolate bubble tea and stiffly turned his head to stare at his friend Jongin who was staring at him curiously, lips pursed out slightly as he awaited an answer. “…What?” Sehun finally uttered out, his straw still lingering in his mouth.

“Does your sister Jaeyun have a boyfriend?” Jongin repeated, emphasizing each word. The others sitting around the table looked at each other with the same curious and confused looks but none of their expressions could top Sehun’s.

“What…Why would you even… No she’s doesn’t… I mean…” Sehun rambled on. He was so surprised by the question that he himself wasn’t even paying attention to his own words.

“Why do you wanna know anyways?” Baekhyun called out to Jongin.

“I have my reasons.” Jongin slickly replied back, leaning back into his chair and amusingly staring at Sehun ramble on and on to himself.

“Is it because you like her?” Joonmyeon lightly chuckled.

“Well get in line because we all know that Chanyeol here has dibs on her.” Baekhyun said, roughly slapping Chanyeol on the back. Chanyeol stiffened up as his cheeks suddenly turned a shade red.

“Hey, I told you not to tell them!” Chanyeol said, lightly shoving Baekhyun.

“Come on Channie, what are you even trying to hide. We all know you have a crush on Jaeyun.” Baekhyun playfully teased. Chanyeol nervously looked around the table and saw the others nodding in agreement, except for Sehun who was now glaring daggers at Chanyeol.

“Okay calm down now you guys.” Jongin finally intervened, much to Chanyeol’s relief since Sehun looked as though he was seconds away from pouncing on him and ripping his eyes out. “The reason why I’m asking is because today in physics class, I looked over at Jaeyun’s notebook and written all over a page was the name ‘Luhan’ which sounds like a guy’s name to me.”

“Luhan? Sounds foreign.” Kyungsoo said.

“Ah, so maybe Jaeyun had a foreign boyfriend you don’t know about Sehunnie.” Jongin said, giving Sehun a small smirk. “Better luck next time Chanyeol.”

Sehun looked down at the table and began feeling a bit of unexplainable anger welling up inside of himself. “Jaeyun… couldn’t have a boyfriend, right?” he muttered to himself. “She couldn’t but… what if she does? I definitely need to ask her about this ‘Luhan’ guy.”