t was that white surrounding again.

“Okay, I’m getting used to this,” she thought.

She took another look around the place ― nothing seemed to be in sight.

Letting out a heavy breath, her feet started to move, getting her around the all-white place that she had seen for quite some times already.

There was still nothing, and she was still all alone; but she wasn’t as scared or as frightened as she used to during the times she had been in this place before.

Sure, she wouldn’t completely deny that a slight worry of what would happen next was still there, lingering inside her chest

But at least most of her terror was already gone

“Well, well… I see you’re already getting around,”

That voice again.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t as frightening as how it was before

Really, she thought she was getting it all mixed up: one minute that voice sounded like its owner wanted to kill her…. but now?

She might be crazy to say this, but listening to that voice now, she felt a somewhat jolty feeling jumping inside her chest ― in a surprisingly good way

And as she didn’t feel the need to run away like a bunch of antelopes getting chased by a leopard, she felt rather safer now that she knew she wasn’t alone in that middle of nowhere anymore.

She smiled, before letting out a soft ‘humm’ sound, trying to respond to the voice she heard earlier.

“I’m rather used to this now,” she continued. “Can you please come out? I want to see you,”

It wasn’t a lie. She really do want to see her sister; considering how intimidated she was every time she saw her sister in any form ― even in photographs ― after her death, she really wanted to see the girl comfortably again, even if it was just for only this once.

And the girl’s wish was granted.

As how it usually appeared, a thick and blinding ray of light suddenly appeared before her, piercing through her corneas; but she didn’t mind, as long as she could see her sister’s face in her life form again…

It took roughly a few seconds before the lights faded out, allowing her to see more clearly of the girl’s form

She almost couldn’t believe that her sister was standing there now, in front of her, in her best appearance yet: pale but brightly cleaned face, a flowing white dress that fitted her body perfectly, a pair of matching white flats, and don’t forget her hair, falling beautifully by the sides of her face.

She wouldn’t lie ― she was truly stunned. This wasn’t exactly the form she had ever imagined a ghost would be in, even if it was her own sister.

With gaping and jaw hanging as low as they could get, she still managed to express her praise

“Wow, you look…. Enchanting,” she complimented, earning a chuckle from the girl in front of her.

“Thanks,” she returned the compliment, smiling “it’s not everyday I could get those kinds of compliments from you,”

The girl smiled sheepishly ― really, she wouldn’t even try to deny that. “Yeah, I guess so,” she said, though in a rather unsure manner; her sister’s smile didn’t wear off any bit anyways

“It’s good,” the ghost stated “it’s good that the both of us can actually have a verbal conversation like this without bothering with sign languages,”

Both of the girls knew exactly what the sentence meant, and so the two of them unconsciously hung their head low, their eyes reflecting pure sadness and hurt. They both knew that the sentence held a deep regret and disappointment about the fact that they couldn’t even communicate normally when they were still both alive; and it was such a sad thing that the chance of them being able to actually ‘talk’ and have a normal conversation was through a dream like this one, with one of them already being nothing but a lost soul, still wandering around on the face of the earth, unable to leave.

Speaking of which, it wasn’t until now that the dreaming girl realized how wrong the situation she was currently in was.

Right, her sister wasn’t even supposed to be here if she was really dead

What could possibly be holding her up here in the sad, old world?

Voluntarily, her gaze landed on her sister’s direction.

“Could she possibly know the reason?” She thought. “It wouldn’t hurt to ask, would it?”

“You seem to have something in mind,” crap, that ghost’s sense was good. “Care to share?”

She looked at her sister’s form’s curious eyes momentarily. Right now, she was contemplating whether to let out her curiosity and ask or not.

“That… umm…”

“Yes?”

“I was just, umm….”

“Yes?”

“Was just uhh…  curious about something,”

She couldn’t help it. Her curiosity was taking over, and she couldn’t surpress it. Though, there was also a slight glint of worry buzzing around inside her as she tried to guess how her sister’s reaction would be; will she get mad? Will she be hurt? Is she even willing to answer my question? Does she even care?

Though, her reaction was actually nothing she would’ve thought up.

“Go on, I’m listening,”

She gulped. Okay, here goes…

“I hope you won’t be offended by this, but…. How come you’re still hanging around here? Is there something holding you back?”

There, she finally let it out.

She closed her eyes, waiting for her sister to shout at her or something

But it never came.

Instead, all she heard was

“Yes, there is,”

***

“Hahh-…” Jung Hee gasped as she literally jolted up from her lying position on the bed.

It happened again… she thought.

What she meant by ‘it’ was actually none other than the familiar chain of routine that had happened to her for a few times already: her sister appearing in her dream, her jolting up from the bed with either beads of sweat or tears running down a river across her face, unstable breath, and of course, mixed up and confused mind that she really needed to calm down right away.

And as she said, it happened again.

Jung Hee’s mind was now officially trashed out. She really wanted to cry, but at the same time she just couldn’t; something that she could not yet to identify was blocking her way to expressing her feelings. It killed her inside slowly, to be honest, but Jung Hee knew she should never raise the white flag to her own feelings ― however bad they would try to make her mind explode ― at least for the sake of her sister.

It was truthfully too hard on her, she supposed; but what can she do? Psh. she couldn’t even help herself to do much at the moment since she was still on her wheelchair, prior to her injuries during her accident. She couldn’t even do anything properly by herself (at least at the moment), so what do you suppose she’d do?

Silently, Jung Hee carved the shape of a sarcastic smirk on her lips. She was now laughing at herself; laughing at herself for being so weak and helpless, for being such a burden to everyone, for being the one to survive instead of her sister ― someone that would definitely mean much more to other people that she herself would ever be.

At that moment, as if a force was telling her to, Jung Hee took a scan around her room.

Empty.

The bed was empty. The room was empty; she was the only living and breathing being in here.

Suddenly she felt really alone.

It was lonely.

The empty bed, the empty room, the empty house. All was lonely. And it was slowly eating away her sanity.

Sure, there were some maids, a few chauffeur, and some other workers that she didn’t even know what to call, but she had truthfully never considered them as a companion. All they do was do what you order them to do and then pamper you like you’re some kind of sickling or something. And Jung Hee didn’t like that any bit.

And right now, she finally felt that feeling when half of your soul seemed to be gone, wiped away to the middle, deepest part of the Pacific Ocean.

At this time, she missed her sister the most.

Jung Hee looked up, not a drop of tear staining her face this time. She had promised herself to be strong from now on. Jung Hee bit her lower lip in assurance as she held her breath for a while, her gaze piercing through the air, and landed right onto the now smiling half-transparent figure standing at her usual spot at the corner of the room.

***

Lu Han was feeling very pleased. After their little walk a few days ago, he had seen Jung Hee slowly opening up to him once more. Though he hadn’t once seen another one of her beautiful smile yet, he understood completely ― he wouldn’t want to force Jung Hee to forget Jung Chae’s death all that fast; he knew she needed time to adjust to the fact that the girl she had been sticking with all her life was now gone, gone like the blowing wind, separating them by a distance even further than the end of the world. Lu Han knew all too well that forcing his fiancé to forget her sister’s death was no different than rubbing salt on her slowly healing wound, which would never do any better in Jung Hee’s mental progression.

So now Lu Han already had his mind set: he would try his best to be there for her whenever she would need him, and see if the power of their love would be able to revive Jung Hee back from her lost soul.

Lu Han sighed. It was hard work doing all those thinking, alright. But to him, it all didn’t matter. He didn’t matter. What’s important to him right now was Jung Hee’s wellbeings, and nothing else. Wasn’t that the reason he was here, in her mansion, carrying her lunch-on-bed to her room now in the first place?

As he got closer and closer to Jung Hee’s room, Lu Han suddenly felt a weird nausea striking him. It wasn’t bad, but annoying enough to him.

“What is this?” He thought. Was he actually nervous about meeting Jung Hee? Or was it something else? He knew no answer.

Lu Han shook his thoughts off. “Jung Hee. All that matters is Jung Hee.” He said repeatedly, hoping that it would be a kind of mantra to get his mind focused on his fiancé. But of course, it wasn’t that effective. Somehow…. Somehow, Lu Han felt an uncomfortably weird feeling tingling inside his heart, and was creeping up his chest. What is it, really? He never felt like this before, so… why now?

It wasn’t something he had planned nor expected, but Lu Han just kept feeling that weird thing getting worse and worsening by each time the clock ticked. His hand was now hovering on top of Jung Hee’s door handle. It was cold, as Lu Han had noticed. Why? It wasn’t only the handle that was cold, it was almost as if his whole body was attacked by a mysterious chill, giving him the goosebumps.

Finally, after quite some minutes struggling with himself and his own thoughts, Lu Han finally gathered up some guts to open the door.

“Jung Hee, I got your foo-…”

Lu Han’s voice trailed off as he saw his fiancé, on her bed, sitting as ever motionlessly to the point he couldn’t even see her breathing, with her long dark hair curtaining up his view to her face, though he could still see large drops of sweat running down her exposed forehead.

“Jung Hee!”

Worried, Lu Han abruptly almost literally threw the tray he was holding to the dresser right beside the door, and rushed to Jung Hee’s side, instantly grabbing both side of her shoulders.

“Jung Hee! Baby, are you alright?! Hee-yah, do you hear me?” He called her name frantically, worried that she might get another nightmare that scared the wits out of her… again.

But of course, his worry wasn’t for a concrete excuse.

Good thing for him, Lu Han could already breathe his sigh of relief as he witnessed that Jung Hee was still breathing, and now was slowly lifting up her head.

Jung Hee’s condition was still as bad as he last saw her ― red and baggy eyes, pale and dimmed face, dry and chapped lips, and lost aura ― but today, he saw something different: he could see a light, still very dim, yet was visibly emerging from her eyes. Lu Han thought that he had found a new hope for Jung Hee, and was going to dance in joy when he realized…. The light wasn’t a light to rely your hope onto. It wasn’t a light of hope that he had been waiting for, but rather…. A light of fear, and slight terror.

Lu Han’s hopes quickly dried away, evaporated by the Sahara sun.

“Jung Hee?” He finally asked “Is there something wrong?”

Slowly, Jung Hee lifted her gaze up to meet his ― almost as hesitantly as somebody who had no rights to look at him in the eye, only to quickly squat her view to somewhere else but Lu Han.

She shook her head.

Lu Han winced inwardly. What is going on inside this girl to see me that way? He wondered. Sure, he should. After all, it must be a serious matter for Jung Hee ― his Jung Hee ― if it can make her look at the only man she loved in the whole world with that intimidated gaze all over her eyes.

But his thoughts were broken away by Jung Hee, lifting up her hands to sign him something.

“I’m going to the restroom for a minute,” she signed. Lu Han, being a quick wit he was, instantly caught the meaning of her hand movements.

“Let me help you,” he announced.

Lu Han was just about to help Jung Hee get on her wheelchair when the girl dismissed his hands away from her. Lu Han looked up to Jung Hee, not understanding what she was trying to imply by doing that.

Outside of his expectation, Jung Hee was now having this hard and threatening expression that Lu Han couldn’t identify, all directed to him. Right now to Lu Han, her face was full with “I can do it myself, so stay away,”, making his spine shiver in some way, but he let her do whatever she pleased anyway.

And as he watched her back slowly going further away, he wondered for the umpteenth time during the last quarter of hour:

What is happening to my Jung Hee?