“Did you two sleep?” Kris asked when he walked into the living room as the sun came out and lit up the dim room.

“A little bit,” Lay replied, “Why did you wake up so early?”

“I couldn’t sleep, Suho isn’t there anymore, and I feel a little lonely.”

“Good morning,” Baekhyun said and then yawned numerous times.

“Good morning Baekhyun,” I said and looked at Lay, should we tell him now?

“Baekhyun,” Lay said.

“Yes?”

“You’re next.”

“Ok, it would be me at some point so let’s get it over and done with because I don’t want to be the last one,” he said.

He sat down on the carpet opposite Lay and I.

“I was quite young when I died, twenty three years old,” he started, “I have just finished university and was ready to help my father out at his surgery, and he is a plastic surgeon by the way. The company was bankrupted and then my father lost everything, he left my mother and I but I couldn’t stand watching my mother go through all the pain, so she committed suicide and I made a stupid decision of doing the same.”

I gasped; he seems to have been through a lot.

“How did you kill yourself?” Kris asked.

He was sitting in the living room listening as well, the others were still asleep.

“I jumped off a bridge.”

“Wow,” Lay said.

“I can’t swim, so I was bound to drown so I thought that it could be the easiest way for me to die.”

“So what is your wish?” I asked.

“I want to see my father and speak to him.”

“Do you know where he is?”

“No.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll help look for him,” Lay said.

Lay went upstairs and I followed him. Once we were upstairs, I asked him, “How are we going to look for him? He could be anywhere.”

“I don’t know but we could try.”

“Where are you planning to start?” I asked.

“No idea.”

“Then you shouldn’t have said…” I was cut off when he shut the door loudly.

I walked back into my room with the book and sat down on the end of the bed. I was about to lie down and have a rest when the book shook in my hands.

“What now?” I moaned, the book opened up on a random page this time and it read:

           Is he telling the truth? Ask again and get the real answer, if not, when time runs out and his wish is not fulfilled, his spirit would be lost in between limbo and the path to the afterlife.

What was that suppose to mean? Is the book saying Baekhyun isn’t telling the truth about his death?

I knocked on Lay’s door but no one answered, “Lay,” I shouted.

Only Baekhyun was downstairs, “Baekhyun, can I talk to you?”

“Of course,” he replied, “Do you want coffee?”

“No thank you.”

“What do you want to talk about?” he asked and sat down on a stool opposite me on the little island in the middle of the kitchen.

“You told us about your death today, how you died,” I said.

“Yes, I did.”

“Are you telling me the real story or did you make your death up?”

He didn’t answer me straightaway so I had a feeling that something was not right.

“Of course, why would I lie?”

“You need to tell me the truth, if not; we won’t be able to fulfil your wish and you’ll be stuck when the time runs out.”

“I am telling the truth, why you don’t believe me?” he suddenly raised his voice.

A few have woken up and was in the kitchen too.

“What’s going on?” Xiumin asked.

“It’s my turn and Raine, here, thinks I’m making my death up,” Baekhyun said.

“I don’t think you’re making it up,” I defended.

“Then why are you asking me whether I’m making my death up then?”

“Because the book asked whether you’re telling the truth or not and I need to ask again,” I explained.

“Raine, show me the message,” Lay asked.

I ran upstairs to get the book from my bed and tried to find the page where the message appeared.

“It was here,” I started to panic because it couldn’t be found, all the other previous messages were there but the one which appeared earlier was gone.

“Look carefully,” Lay said.

I placed the book down and flipped through every page, scanning my eyes over them.

“She probably made it up.”

I heard Baekhyun say in the living room to the others.

“I didn’t!” I shouted back, “I didn’t make it up, it was really here.”

“Then where is it?” he shouted and walked back to where Lay and I was standing.

“I can’t find it.”

“Exactly, you don’t have proof so you could be making it up.”

“But I didn’t!” I said quietly, the message was really nowhere to be found.

“I am telling the truth and I don’t care whether you believe me or not because ever since you came here, more and more things are happening and each one of us is leaving. I don’t like it because it feels like a part of me is disappearing every time someone leaves. It would have been so much better if you never came!” he shouted at me.

“Baekhyun!” Sehun said, “Why did you say that?”

“Because none of this would be happening if she never came!”

“It’s not her fault; she’s a descendant, so she needs to do as she is told,” Sehun said to Baekhyun.

“She’s just doing as the book says, the book was found in some random house and who knows what kind of book it is, she could have cursed it so all these words are appearing on them.”

“She’s not a witch,” Sehun said.

“And how are you so sure of that?”

Sehun was about to reply but I stopped him.

“I’m sorry I caused all this commotion, if you want me to leave, I will, but the book really did say that if you don’t tell me the truth about your death and the time runs out, you would be stuck in between here and the next life.”

“I don’t care what the book says and I don’t care if the time runs out because what the book says is absolute nonsense. The front door is right there.”

I left the room before they could see me cry.

“Raine!” Sehun, Tao and Lay shouted after me when I ran upstairs.

“He was just angry, he doesn’t really mean for you to leave,” Tao said.

I was putting my clothes back into my pink suitcase, “I think I should leave, I’ve caused enough trouble.”

“You can’t leave, Raine, we need to do this together. You can’t leave something unfinished,” Lay said as he walked over to me and grabbed hold of my clothes and chucked it onto my bed, “We shouldn’t have started this if you didn’t plan to complete it.”

“You can still do it yourself,” I said angrily, “It’s your body they go into, not mine, and all I do is watch and listen.”

 “But it says we need to do it together, which part do you not understand?” Lay shouted.

“Everything, I don’t understand anything, why am I part of this?”

“Because you were born into the family and you have no choice.”

“I need some air,” I sighed and ran past them, down the stairs and out of the front door.

I didn’t know where I was running to but I just kept my legs moving. No one came after me so I kept moving. Then I stopped when I reached a lake. It was early morning so the air was still a little chilly and autumn mist still lingered in the air. The lake was very big and it stretched out a few meters before ending and surrounded by tall trees. The trees were very closely packed together so it made the woods darker and spookier.

Shaking the thoughts out of my head, I found a bench and sat down. Engraved on the bench was a name:

            In remembrance of Janice Di Silva

                        1820 – 1872

Was this bench built straight after her death?

I continued to sit, staring into the lake. I didn’t notice when someone sat beside me.

“Little girl, are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” I replied nicely to the kind lady, and then I turned my head to face her.

“You don’t look very happy though, I can make you happy.”

I thought my eyes would fall out of its socket when I saw her.

“Don’t be scared of me, little girl. I can make you forget all your sadness,” she said and slid over the bench closer to me.

I moved back, away from her, “Don’t come near me!”

“I won’t hurt you.”

“Go away!” I shouted.

I got off the bench and started running away from her.

“I said, don’t be scared of me!” she suddenly bellowed from behind me and she grabbed hold of my ponytail.

I fell back onto the damp soil as I tried to keep hold of my hair; it felt like my scalp was ripping off.

“Let go of me!” I screamed.  

“Not anymore now that I have got you.”