Jongin takes a deep breath. He’s standing in front of the Do house for the second time in just a few weeks, and he’s having a hard time gathering the courage to ring the bell. After what had happened with Mrs. Do last time, he’s not sure how well his visit will be received.

There is the flicker of curtains at the window of the house next door, an elderly woman looking at him suspiciously between the lace. He can only imagine what it looks like to a neighbor. He’s been standing here without ringing the bell for about five minutes now.

He takes another deep breath and pushes the bell. He can hear it echoing throughout the house.

After what seems like forever, Mrs. Do opens the door. She looks almost as suspicious as the neighbor had. “Jongin?” she says uncertainly. “What are you doing here?”

“Hello, Mrs. Do.” Jongin greets her with a polite bow. “I wanted to apologize for the other day. I never meant to upset you. I really do need to learn to leave things in the past.”

She seems to relax the slightest bit. “Yes, well. It’s understandable. My husband and I have had a difficult time coming to grips with Kyunggie’s disappearance as well. We don’t like to be reminded of it.”

“I understand,” Jongin says, bowing his head again. “I was just…I was wondering…if it isn’t a bother, can I look through some of Kyungsoo’s old things? I know you still have some of them, and I think it would really help me sort through some things in my head if I were able to look through them.”

Mrs. Do’s defenses are back in place immediately. “Oh, I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” she says. “Everything’s all packed in the attic. It would be a nightmare to dig it all out. And it’s really not good to dwell, dear. I think you should leave.”

“But-” Jongin tries desperately.

“I’m sorry, dear, but I’m cooking. I’ve really got to go.” And she shuts the door in his face.

Jongin stands there for a minute longer, half in shock and half in disappointment. He needs to go through Kyungsoo’s old things. It isn’t until Mrs.-next-door’s curtain flickers again that Jongin gathers himself up and leaves the house.

But he’s definitely not giving up. He’s come too far and already broken too many rules to turn back now.

He waits until Sunday. He knows that Mr. and Mrs. Do are religious – even more so since Kyungsoo’s disappearance – and they go to church every Sunday morning like clockwork. They’ve been doing that as long as Jongin has known the family, which is most of his life. Kyungsoo used to complain about it all the time.

But right now he is thanking his lucky stars that Mr. and Mrs. Do are creatures of habit.

He parks his car at the corner – as far away from the nosy neighbor’s house as possible – and waits until Kyungsoo’s parents come out the side door and get into their own car. Mrs. Do is carrying some sort of covered dish; Mr. Do checks his pockets for his cigarettes and lighter. Eventually they get settled into their car and pull out of the driveway, heading down the street and around the corner, out of sight.

Now is Jongin’s time to act.

He slinks out of his car and walks behind the houses, in the shadows. He knows he’ll probably look suspicious if anyone happens to look out their back windows, but he figures he’s less likely to be seen here than on the street. And he’ll pull the “I’m a cop” card if anyone happens to say anything.

He reaches the Do’s house. It hasn’t changed much since the last time he’s been in the backyard. The only thing missing is their old dog, who died not long after Kyungsoo disappeared. Jongin feels a pang of sadness at the loss of the dog. Funny, really, when he had never really liked the dog anyway.

When he was younger, Kyungsoo’s parents had always kept their spare key under a rock in the back garden. Thankfully that hasn’t changed. The key is still under the same stone, a little damp and dirty but perfectly usable. Jongin isn’t a religious man by any means, but he thanks whatever god is out there that Mr. and Mrs. Do haven’t changed all that much over the last ten years.

He puts the key in the lock in the back door and lets himself into the house. It’s quiet and smells a bit like whatever Mrs. Do had cooked earlier. He doesn’t hesitate, but heads straight up to the attic. He’s not sure if Mrs. Do had spoken the truth before when she’d said Kyungsoo’s old things were boxed up in the attic, but it seems like the best place to start looking.

Luckily for him, Mrs. Do seems to have told the truth. There are dozens of boxes piled up in the attic. Jongin knows exactly which ones he’s looking for because they are the only ones that are unlabeled. Everything else is meticulously labeled: Christmas decorations, family photo albums, wedding mementos, etc. But there are a few stacks in the far corner that have nothing written on the outside, which identifies them probably better than any label would have.

Jongin knows that he doesn’t have much time, so he rips the lid off the first box and starts rifling through it. There are all sorts of mementos from Kyungsoo’s childhood inside: his first tooth, his first baseball glove, a pair of booties he’d worn as an infant. Jongin wants to sit and really take his time looking through all these things that had once belonged to the most important person to him, but he knows time is not a luxury he can afford right now. So he tries to shove the sentimental feelings to the back of his mind as he sets aside each item, looking for the one particular thing he needs.

He doesn’t find it in the first box, nor the second or the third.

But by the fourth box, he gets lucky. It’s buried at the bottom, hidden beneath baby blankets and newborn outfits and pictures Kyungsoo had drawn in kindergarten.

Jongin feels like his whole world has stopped spinning as he grabs the plain metal box and pulls it out from the confines of the box. It’s light, so much lighter than he remembered it being when he was a kid. He is impatient – so impatient – but before he can even fit the key in the lock, there is the slam of a car door in the driveway.

Jongin’s head jerks up. He can vaguely hear Mr. Do complaining about how his wife had forgotten her prayer book through the vents. And of course Jongin panics.

Honestly, he probably could stay in the attic and neither Mr. nor Mrs. Do would be any the wiser. But Jongin is panicking, so he starts throwing everything haphazardly back into their boxes. Tucking the metal box under his arm, he steals down the attic stairs into the upstairs hallway.

Mrs. Do is in her bedroom by this point, searching for her misplaced prayer book. Jongin slips past the bedroom door as quiet as a mouse, tiptoeing down the main stairs. Mr. Do is in the living room, watching television while his wife searches, and the noise muffles the sound of Jongin opening the back door and slipping outside. After making sure to replace the spare key under the rock in the garden, he scurries back to his car, breathing a sigh of relief that he hadn’t been caught.

He drives like a madman back to his and Sunyoung’s apartment. Thankfully she’s out for the time being – a bridal shower for one of her many friends that are getting married – and he has the apartment to himself to examine the contents of the box.

He holes himself up in his study, shutting the door for maximum privacy. Then he settles on the floor with the box in his lap, hands shaking.

Even though it’s been literally decades since he’s last seen this box, he remembers everything about it as if he’d been holding it just last week. It had been a time capsule. Mr. Do had bought it for them when he was in kindergarten and Kyungsoo was in first grade. They had learned about time capsules from a teacher and both of them had been gung-ho about making their own.

Jongin even remembers what they put in it. Little trinkets that had seemed so very important to their child selves: spinning tops, robots, pictures of power rangers and cartoon characters. They’d made a pact to open it together when Jongin graduated high school. They’d even had a little countdown they kept at Kyungsoo’s house. But Kyungsoo had disappeared before Jongin could graduate.

His hands are shaking so much that it’s almost impossible to get the little key properly in the lock, and for a moment Jongin is afraid that the key doesn’t fit after all. But in the end he manages to steady his hand enough that the key slips into the lock and clicks open.

Nothing that he remembers putting in is inside. Where are his pokemon cards? What about the little stuffed dog he distinctly remembers putting in? Or the little dried flowers?

The only thing inside the time capsule is a single piece of paper, one that he definitely doesn’t remember putting it inside. It’s lying facedown, yellowed with age and splotched with water stains. He picks it up with trembling fingers. The paper is brittle and smells a bit moldy. He turns it over.

The handwriting is definitely not that of a child. It’s elegant, loopy. Jongin is fairly certain that it is Kyungsoo’s handwriting. Kyungsoo’s handwriting around the time of his disappearance.

But Jongin can’t read anything on the note. It’s been damaged too badly by water that must have leaked into the time capsule at some point. He can pick up a few articles here and there, and he’s pretty sure this word here is far but that’s all he can really make out.

The disappointment he feels is absolutely crushing. He had been absolutely positive that this would be something. Anything. He had been certain that whatever was in this box would point him right to Kyungsoo, alive or dead. But this doesn’t lead him anywhere. This only leaves him with more questions than he’d started out with.

He gets up to go get himself a much-needed drink – or ten – when something at the bottom of the note catches his eye. There are a few symbols that haven’t smudged, haven’t been destroyed by water. And he’s fairly certain that it’s a signature. He’s equally as sure that it’s been signed by Kyungsoo. 

So cookies to all of you who guessed it was a time capsule! I was actually really surprised that so many people guessed that haha. So did you guess right? 

And now we have a note from Kyungsoo. A real note. It's illegible, but it can still be a lead, right?? 

Ooooh I'm so excited for what is going to come next! I think this is my favorite story that I'm writing right now haha