“Could you please explain to me one more time what are we doing here?”

I needed to ask again to make sure. It was eleven o´clock at night and I was walking on the hallway of the university with a flashlight in my hand. Beside me was Lee Hyukjae with a beanie and sweater so long it could be confused with woman dress, especially since he wore leggins underneath.

“I told you already,” Hyukjae nervously glanced sideways, “we need to catch the ghost.”

“Ghosts don´t exist,” I rolled my eyes. I can´t believe he made me go with him.

“They do!” The skinny man protested strongly. “Some of the students saw it too!”

I sighed. There was nothing I could do with this guy. I can´t get angry at him since fifty-six percent of young adults between the ages of 18 and 29 believe in ghosts. But if I pretend that they actually exist and that it´s possible to catch them, I have to ask this. Why does a man who is completely terrified of them walking at night around the school?

“Now that I think of it, what were you and the students doing here at night that you managed to see it? The school should be closed at night,” I raised my eyebrows and Hyukjae stopped to think.

“I have a few guesses of what could have the students been doing here at night,” he smirked, “but I saw the ghost by chance two days ago when I was leaving the showers.” That doesn´t explain what he was doing here so he had to use the showers! I decided to drop the topic for my own safety. I don´t need to know everything about this punk, do I?

“How do we catch that ghost, Hyukjae?” I hoped it sounded sincere.

“If I have you, it´ll be possible.” The teacher nodded with determination and I stopped in my tracks.

“What do you mean by it?” Hyukjae opened his mouth to hopefully explain his reasoning to me but a horrible screech interrupted his not even commenced speech. The white head widened his eyes and rushed to my side. Without asking Hyukjae grabbed my arm with his hands and squeezed it in a death grip. I got startled by his action and wanted to pry him away when I noticed him shaking. Such a scaredy-cat.

“Hahaha,” I laughed aloud, “Hold on tight, my little Hyukkie, so the monsters won´t eat you.” I said in baby talk and the adult next to me blushed.

“Ehm,” Hyukjae cleared his throat, “my hands are cold,” he defended but made no effort to detach himself from me. I decided to let it go and instead thought of the noise we heard just a second ago.

“I think the scream came from the first floor. Let´s go and check it,” I commanded and started walking up the stairs with Hyukjae in tow. I don´t believe in ghosts but someone definitely screamed and right now the school should be empty. As a teacher I need to find out.

“Waaah,” a high pitched yell echoed through the first floor and I identified that the female voice came from the bathrooms. I pulled struggling Hyukjae towards the white doors leading to the girls toilets. I opened it harshly and switched on the lights.

“See?! It´s empty but nobody left or else we would see him,” my co-worker panicked gripping my jacket even tighter.

“Let go,” I pushed him away and thoughtfully checked all the cabins. Empty. But the female scream came definitely from the bathrooms. Now I was starting to feel strange too.

“Let´s lure her out then,” Hyukjae whispered but his posture was so awkward that I couldn´t even think of what he was saying. The white head was crouched on the ground, his head looking in all possible directions and his arms wrapped around his body. Hyukjae was scared as hell and I was fighting back the urge to laugh at him. All of a sudden another scream disturbed the quietness of the night.

“It´s coming from the male bathroom,” I noted. I pulled Hyukjae up on his legs again and together we went to take a look to the room beside. I was opening the door slowly, being stressed needlessly because of the shaking teacher behind me. But when I peeked into the room I relaxed. Somebody was sitting there but as well as I could tell, he was still pretty much alive.

“Chansung?” Hyukjae´s white head poked from under my arm.

“Oh, Hyuk Teach,” the tall student answered ignoring my presence totally. I must be the ghost here. “I´m sorry if I disturbed you but I´m almost done here,” Chansung waved with something in his hand. Is that a blade?!

“I know what you are thinking, Donghae,” Hyukjae suddenly spoke from under my arm and went to sit next to the huge boy on the floor. “But you were pretty close thinking about suicide,” Hyukjae laughed. It´s true, I was worried whether the boy didn´t want to harm himself. “Unfortunatelly this is only a social suicide. Why are you shaving your legs? I guess you aren´t happy about it, we heard you cry like a girl from downstairs,” the teacher shook his head.

“You see,” Chansung sighed, “my girlfriend insists I keep my legs shaved so I always come here to take care of it. Don´t want anyone at the dorms to see, you know.”

“I get you but you can´t do it here from now on, okay?” I tried to persuade Chansung who put on a sad pout. I admit it´s very heartbreaking but he just can´t be alone at night at school, especially not with a blade, or a razor.

“Donghae´s right but before you go,” Hyukjae leaned to whisper to Chansung´s ear but he was either lame or wanted me to hear him. “Why shave? Does it feel better in bed? Like when-“

“Hyukjae!” I scolded with my beat red face. How dare he ask this to his own student!

I scolded him as hard as I could without using any swear words, which was very difficult and made him evacuate from the bathroom. Together we waited in front of the white doors for Chansung to finish his own little torture. Then we walked the boy out of the building and once more told him to not do his body hygiene at school. Hyukjae offered to me from the campus because he would apparently feel bad if something happened to me because of him. Funny how he turned into a hero so quickly. Just some minutes ago he was squatting on the ground begging me not to leave him alone. But it was okay, I had something to ask him anyway.

“Hey, Hyukjae,” I started and the latter only hummed, “if it was really a ghost, you said you would catch him thanks to me, how?”

You see, forty-one percent of people believes in ESP and twenty-one percent that some other people can communicate with dead. I wouldn´t be surprised if Hyukjae was one of them. I mean one of those who believe not that he can talk with ghosts.

“Actually I thought it was a lost female soul or something. I don´t know how to catch it, I´ve never really seen a ghost but I guessed they must be just like humans only bodiless,” Hyukjae chuckled. “If I was a female ghost, I wouldn´t hesitate even a moment after seeing a guy like you.”

Hesitate to do what? I didn´t really understand Hyukjae´s reasoning. It sounded as if he wanted to compliment me or maybe he just complimented me but wasn´t aware of it. Still I wasn´t really sure what he was trying to say.

“I hoped that seeing you would send her straight to heaven,” Hyukjae shrugged and calmly continued towards the gate. For the first time tonight my body shivered, I just hope it was only because of the midnight bells.

Hey! :D This time there might be some mistakes. I finished this at night and I was too scared after reading all those paranormal statistics that I hurried to bed before checking it properly. Sorry T_T I´ll do it later. Anyway, I hope you are a little confused now. Hyukjae isn´t even a hero, so what is he? :D But still didn´t fail to add to Donghae´s frustration again. Thank you for reading and be careful of catching a cold - Nurse PandaHero