Zhou Mi had his key out as he approached the door to his house. The rusted metal matched the tattered white paint that covered the door. He turned the key in the lock slowly, and pushed the door gently. It creaked as it swung open. No noise came from inside.

Nobody was home, but what did he expect?

He took a step inside. The furniture was covered in white sheets and a thin layer of dust covered everything. The floorboards creaked beneath his feet as he took a few steps into the house, shutting the door behind him.

He walked through the familiar arrangement of furniture, trailing his hands along the couch and the beads that hung from a lampshade. The sunlight glared through the dusty windows and reflected off the mirror in the hallway, casting the living space in an awkward angle.

Zhou Mi could remember when the house didn’t look like this. Once it was filled with light. Once there were people who lived here, who made the house a home with their love and laughter.

But not anymore, that was only when he was alive.

Zhou Mi walked farther into the house and entered the kitchen. He went to the sink and lifted the tap to turn it on. No water came out. The electricity and utilities had been cut off. Had been cut off since long ago.

He left the kitchen and went up the stairs, each one creaking as he went. The house wasn’t terribly old, but it hadn’t been lived in for years and the lack of maintenance had left it in decay. For a while he had wished that somebody would buy it. It was a nice house out in the country, but not too far away from the nearby small town. It offered a nice sense of privacy, especially for a young couple just starting out.

It wasn’t as though there hadn’t been renters. There had been a few, but all had left. They hadn’t stated their reasons. But Zhou Mi knew what it was that drove them out.

He was standing at the closed door to the master bedroom now. His hand was resting on the knob, all he needed to do was turn it. Yet he hesitated, because he knew what was behind it and it scared him. Even if he had come here plenty of times before, it still scared him.

Yet seeing as what he came here for rested behind that door, he needed to open it. So he did, in a quick twist of the wrist and with a jerk the door swung open and he stepped inside.

The room was darker than the rest of the house because the curtains had been pulled over the windows. The dust made it hard to breathe because there was so little circulation. The bed against the full wall across from the window was neatly made. No one was there.

Zhou Mi sat down on the edge of the bed to wait. He sat with his hands resting on his knees and his head slightly bowed. His body was stiff, and he didn’t know how long he waited but by the time he looked up his neck was rigid from being motionless.

“I thought you weren’t going to come back.”

The voice had come from the corner of the room and Zhou Mi had to squint to make out the figure there. His body was barely visible, but he could make out his face in the dark shadows.

“Kui Xian, I,” Zhou Mi said quietly, standing from his stiff sitting position and turning to face the figure.

“You what?”

“I needed to see you,” Zhou Mi muttered with his face to the ground. “Just one last time.”

As the figure moved out of the shadows and glided towards Zhou Mi he became more transparent.

“How many times will it be ‘just one last time’, Mi?” Kyuhyun asked, hovering directly in front of Zhou Mi. “I’m dead.”

Zhou Mi just stood there in silence, looking into Kyuhyun’s hollow eyes.

“I just need to know why,” Zhou Mi stated, his voice unwavering. “Why did you leave me?”

Kyuhyun turned from Zhou Mi now and drifted back to his corner.

“I didn’t leave you,” Kyuhyun said without turning around again. “Don’t you know by now that you were the only thing keeping me on this earth?”

“But why then? Wasn’t I enough?”

Kyuhyun did turn around now, his image wavering in the shadows.

“I couldn’t burden you any longer with being the reason for my existence. It wasn’t fair. I couldn’t love you because I couldn’t love myself.”

Zhou Mi walked towards Kyuhyun, his footsteps screaming in the silent room.

“You weren’t a burden to me, Kui Xian. I love you.”

Kyuhyun shifted forward so that he was as close to Zhou Mi as he could get and looked directly in his eyes.

“Don’t you get it? You are the reason I stayed alive for as long as I did. And now your love is keeping me here, trapped. Your love trapped me, Zhou Mi,” Kyuhyun said angrily. “If you really love me, you will let me go. If you did that, then I could finally be free from this damn world.”

Zhou Mi stood stock still as Kyuhyun floated around him. He couldn’t believe his words. Couldn’t believe them true. But could they be?

Zhou Mi spun and found Kyuhyun floating on the other side of the room. He didn’t move to get near him again.

“I’m sorry, Kyuhyun,” he said, his tone cold and distant. “I’m sorry for loving you.”

Zhou Mi turned and left the bedroom, shutting the door and Kyuhyun behind him. As he walked down the stairs, a voice came quietly from the bedroom again.

“No, I’m sorry,” Kyuhyun said in a whisper. “I’m sorry for not ever being good enough for you.”

Zhou Mi locked the front door behind him and went to his car. He started it and pulled away, driving down the wooded lane in an angry silence.

Behind him, in the window of the upstairs bedroom, a nearly invisible face watched him from behind the curtain. As Zhou Mi drove out of sight the face disappeared.

As Zhou Mi got closer back to town he pulled out his cell phone and dialed a familiar number. He got an answer after three rings.

“Hi, Sungmin, do you want to go out tonight?” Zhou Mi asked, though a bit hurriedly.

“Sure, pick me up at seven?”

Zhou Mi agreed and hung up. Around him the trees were thinning and there were more houses. The more houses there were blurring past him, the more he forgot the one he had finally left behind.