when the flower blooms

CHAPTER 1

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They said that when people die, they either go to heaven or go to hell depending on how they’re judged—whoever that is who judges. Chanyeol doesn’t believe in heaven or hell, even the place in between the two. Growing up in an orphanage, praying each day for his parents to come back and get him, and being disappointed every end of the day gave him a new perspective in life, other people’s lives and his life. He didn’t have anyone to cry to, to tell stories to—to love. He was alone, until he decided to live his own life and then he left the orphanage, and there he continued living in independency at an early age of 15. He had various jobs, learned about the process of life the hard way, until his beliefs became less solid and more transparent, until they were gone, until they were only dusts in the wind, vapors in the air. But even after going through his teenage life relying on nobody else besides himself, he never lost his smile and the hope that someday, he’ll feel that joy his parents must’ve felt when he was born, before life took another route, turned around and walked into another direction.

Flowers made him happy. As a child, he grew up taking care of the orphanage’s flower garden. He didn’t know where his fondness of the said material came from but he liked seeing it in the process of growing, watching it bloom into a more beautiful flower. It’s the only thing he considered closest to living, actually living.

And speaking of living, even after 4 years, he’s still living alone. It’s not that he’s allergic to people or their presence or anything but sometimes people drag things for too long, their concerns become your concern and that is one pain in the for him, to be quite honest. Chanyeol had enough of problems to think about every day and other people’s problems wouldn’t be one of them. He’s already in his 3^rd year with the finals getting close. He’s had a lot of friends—and lovers—but only one seemed to have stuck with him for too long. Don’t worry, you’ll meet him later.

So anyway, living alone meant having to deal less with other people. Which is why he’s crying out in panic when he accidentally made trouble with the jocks hanging around their school. So now he’s running away from them, slipping in every corners and roads of the streets in hope to get away from them and this is the time he’s mostly grateful that he has long legs even though exercise doesn’t exist in his vocabulary at all.

“Sorry!” He yelled when he accidentally bumped into a woman while running. This is troublesome. This is the worst. But the only way to end this tiring chase is to get into that hollow road he uses as a shortcut to his apartment because it’s muddy and dirty and those jocks chasing him are rich so there’s no way they’ll sacrifice their own health and get their clothes dirty just to punch the out of him. Because, hello, who the hell wants to get beaten?

So when he finally saw the road, he ran even faster and then took a left turn to in between the thin space the abandoned walls made and finally arrived at the start of the shortcut—muddy soils of holes and dead fallen leaves taking up most of the ground, like an abandoned park, only there’s a grave yard a few steps behind the fountain. The place is closed down because of continuous accidents that happened before but Chanyeol saw it as a mere abandoned place of joy and happiness, where children used to be children.

He can hear the numerous groans from the other side of the wall and he grinned from ear to ear when he successfully got away. He brushed the dusts and dirt off his clothes and continued walking to the direction of his apartment.

 

--

 

Living alone meant he had to provide money for himself on his own as well. He knew that the jobs he took aren’t permanent so even at an early age, he already set a goal to build his own flower shop to gain financial stability. It was hard, at first, but there’re no hard parts in life for him anymore. And thankfully, he really was able to build his own flower shop. It’s situated just below his apartment complex so he doesn’t have problems changing shifts with his co-worker, Jung Nicole, from time to time.

He arrived at the door to the shop panting and catching his breath violently—a good reason why he doesn’t exercise or do sports in general, he’s got the lowest stamina anyone can hope for. Nicole raised an eyebrow as she took her apron off. “What happened to you?”

“Oh nothing. Just got chased but I’m awesome so I saved myself.”

“In short you ran away,” Nicole filled in and then laughed. “Hey, I need to run an errand, is it alright if you watch the shop for now?”

Chanyeol stood up straight, wiping his sweat. “Yeah, sure sure,”

“Thanks,” Nicole said while grabbing her things from the counter. “I’ll be back later!”

Chanyeol dropped his bag on the counter as Nicole disappears behind the door. He started organizing the data and records of the flowers sold before he came in and is pretty pleased with the results. He also started passing orders for the customers who bought online and stomped them one by one on stacked papers, complete with details and expected time and dates to be delivered.

He heard the door open but didn’t look up, being too engrossed on his work. The door opened again, and again, and he glanced quickly to see customers roaming around the shop, scrutinizing each flower. There is one, however, who have caught his attention. It’s a boy, sporting brunette hair, kneeling in front of the dandelions, smiling and talking to them as if he’s actually talking to a normal person. He crooked his eyebrows when the boy slightly touched the petals. Then the boy stood up and started walking, neck craning to see each flower he passed by until he finally looked in front and their eyes met. There was a peculiar feeling. They didn’t even look away from each other. There’s that fuzzy feeling Chanyeol couldn’t really explain but the boy made him feel so refreshed.

Finally, Chanyeol cleared his throat. “Have you found anything you liked?”

The boy didn’t answer, instead he turned his head behind him and then back to Chanyeol. “Are you…talking to me?” He asked in hesitancy, so obvious it’s kind of disturbing Chanyeol.

“Uh, who else would I talk to?”

The boy gasped and leaned forward. “YOU CAN SEE ME?!”

Chanyeol gave him a look. “Were you hiding?”

“But I—“ The boy didn’t have time to finish when a woman, another customer, walked through him, slightly distorting his body projection, to inquire about the flower.

“Dear, how much is this?” The woman asked.

The boy looked up front and saw Chanyeol standing frozen in shock and fear, his lips changing from red to pale.

“Dear?”

And then he fell to the ground, unconscious, out, just like that.

 

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“Chanyeol?"

God, is that you?

“Chanyeol!”

Am I dead?

“PARK CHANYEOL!"

Chanyeol bolts up in pain after Nicole had mercilessly kicked his torso. “What the hell?!”

Nicole shakes her head as she stands beside him, watching him painfully stand up. “What happened here?”

“Uh,” Chanyeol idled for a moment and then he remembered the events before he out, although vaguely. He leaned to the counter for body support and looked around the shop to find the boy’s eerie presence but found nothing, not even a strange feeling, only an obvious sign that night has fallen. “I don’t know?”

Nicole sighed heavily. “You’re hopeless. You must be exhausted. You should go and rest. I’ll watch the shop,”

Chamyeol blinked, trying to sort out his vision. “Okay. Just knock if there’s any problem,” He grabbed his bag and walked to the door, feeling lost for a moment. The cold damped on his skin like an ice and he carefully made his way upstairs to his apartment. He still felt a little lost even after feeling safe inside the four corners of his apartment so he stalled to the bathroom to take a shower and probably clear his mind of all the weird things that happened to him today.

He felt slightly refreshed and energized after taking a bath and hummed his way out of the bathroom to his closet to find a new set of clothes, obliviously unable to notice the ball of figure sitting on top of his bed, watching him. It was only until he opened his closet, with the wood covering his left side, did he realize there’s actually something close to a living human figure sitting on top of his bed. And he doesn’t want to start imagining things because the only conclusion for that is that he’s crazy but there’s no way that is normal. He breathed deeply and gathered his courage and after a moment, slapped the closet close and felt relief when he saw nothing on top of his bed.

“Get a hold of yourself, Chanyeol,” He murmured. “You’re only imagining things,”

But as soon as he opened the closet again, he’s greeted with a face smiling at him and he immediately fell to the ground in shock, yelling various profanities to feed his fear, as he crawled to his bedside table and rummagesd through his drawer with his whole body trembling and eyes close to tearing up. Then he finally pulled out a knife and pointed it on the said figure, breath hitching and hands shaking violently, as his face displayed all kinds of emotion associated with fear.

“A knife, really?” The figure said, sounding a bit disappointed.

“W-W-W-W-WHO ARE YOU?!”

“You do know I’m like transparent right?”

“Y-Y-Y-Y-YOU CAN TALK!”

“Can you put the knife down? As much as I’m offended right now, human, I’m actually concerned you hurt yourself.”

Chanyeol just stared at him, eyes wide, it almost looked like his eyeballs are going fall out of their sockets. Then he lowered his head and he saw the figure’s feet above the ground, not touching the concrete at all. “YOU’RE A GHOST?!”

“Hurrah,” The figure said simply and groaned. “What are you so scared of?! I’m not going to hurt you! I can’t even touch anything!”

With that said, Chanyeol slowly lowered the knife, though he still has his guard up. “So…you’re really a ghost?”

The said ghost snarled and crossed his legs on air. "Humans actually use that term? You know, where I come from, we don't call ourselves ghosts. We call ourselves...'spirits'. It sounds better, don't you think?" Chanyeol just stared at him. "I mean, you look fancy and I'm fabulous, maybe you could clear up your vocabulary AND WOULD YOU PLEASE STOP LOOKING AT ME LIKE THAT!?!?"

"HOW DO YOU SUPPOSE I DO THAT?! YOU'RE A GHOST! IT’S YOUR FAULT!"

"STOP YELLING! IM A SPIRIT! AND THIS ISN'T MY FAULT OK?! I DIDN'T WISH FOR YOU TO SEE ME!"

"NEITHER DID I! BUT WHY CAN I?!"

"How should I know?!"

"D-d-d-d-does this mean my third eye is open?!"

The spirit snorted. "Please, there's no such thing as third eye. What are you, Cyclops? You humans are stupid."

"Then why can I see you?!"

"I don't know! The only way humans can see spirits is that if they have something, like an object, that the spirit used to possess before its death!” The spirit explained immediately. “We call it the 'link'. It's something that binds spirits to the human world."

Chanyeol, again, just stared, still overwhelmed by everything.

"I told you to stop looki--"

And then he out.

"Great. He fainted. Again." The spirit sighed.

 

--

 

Chanyeol woke up an hour later, feeling slightly cold given that he hasn’t put on any clothes yet, and found the spirit nowhere in sight. His room is completely empty, and the only sound he can hear is the clock ticking. “He’s not here,” He concluded after a minute. Was it a dream?

“Nope, still here!” The spirit exclaimed and Chanyeol saw him staring at him from above with his body upside down and his immediate reaction is sinking into the corner of his bed, shocked but only half as scared as he was earlier. The spirit spun his body around so he can stop scaring the out of the human. As much as he wanted to have fun, he still has a heart, though literally he doesn’t have one. “You know, for someone as tall as you, you don’t really do justice to your body. You’re such a !”

Chanyeol gulped as he continued to examine the spirit’s appearance—he’s sporting brunette hair, his skin really is transparent but not that obvious, his color is pale and the only clothes he has on is an oversized polo shirt that reaches until on top of his knees. And then he movd up to the spirit’s face, noticed how his facial structure is majestic and how his eyes have some different glow in it—like he’s dead but his eyes were alive.

“Hello?”

“Oh God, it’s real…”

The spirit gasped. “You think I’m some kind of 4D projection or something?!”

Chanyeol ignored him for a moment then walked to a wall to bang his head, immediately screaming various profanities due to the pain and regretting even making that kind of decision. He curled into the floor with his hands wrapped around his head as he tried to suppress the pain of his stupidity.

“What are you doing?” The spirit asked, not even amused.

"Just...trying to prove I’m not dreaming." Chanyeol replied simply.

The spirit rolled his eyes. "YOU PASSED OUT ON ME TWICE AND YOU STILL THINK YOU'RE DREAMING?!"

Chanyeol looked up. "I’m sorry okay but this is just so weird for me!"

"I don't like this either you know!" Baekhyun yelled back, trying to sound more offended.

Chanyeol leaned on the wall as he feels his stomach growl in search for food. “Do…ghosts—“

“Spirits,”

“Do spirits eat?” Chanyeol rephrased.

The spirit glared in exasperation "Are you insulting me? I'm a spirit! My whole body is almost transparent! Of course I don't have a digestive system!"

"Good. That means I don't have to offer you anything." Chanyeol said while walking out of the room.

"I could use some hospitality." The spirit murmured while following Chanyeol outside, floating around behind him.

“Okay, uh, what’s your name?”

“Baekhyun.”

“Welcome to my house, Baekhyun.”

“You’re stupid.”

“Thank you.”

 

--

 

Chanyeol sat uncomfortably on his chair—even after he put clothes on, he still felt and unsecured with a ghost roaming around his house like it’s a ing museum. It would’ve been okay if Baekhyun was walking but he wasn’t—he was floating, ing floating, completely defying the law of gravity. Nonetheless, he’s hungry so he has no choice but to put up with the strange feeling and feed his appetite.

“You live here alone?” Baekhyun asked.

There was a moment of panic for Chanyeol but quickly faded—he had to get used to this, actually he doesn’t want to. “Yeah,”

“Isn’t it lonely?” Chanyeol opened his mouth to talk but immediately closed them when Baekhyun stood—floated, whatever— in front of him. “You know, as a free spirit, I roam around on my own since no one can see me and I feel lonely every time,” Baekhyun told him and it took Chanyeol a moment to finally notice how soft Baekhyun’s voice was as it rung in his ear.

“I still have friends in my school. I’m not that lonely.” Chanyeol answered while grabbing a piece of bread from the plate.

Baekhyun merely shruged and then went back to roaming around. He reached a table full of picture frames and stared at them with an obvious hint of curiosity in his eyes. “Are these your parents?”

Chanyeol turned to look and nodded at the only picture he has of his biological parents—it was already faded and torn but Chanyeol can still perfectly describe their features. 

“Your mom’s pretty,”

“It runs in the blood,”

“Please. Don’t flatter yourself,” Baekhyun chuckled. When he turned around, he noticed Chanyeol blankly staring at his food so he decided to approach him. “What’s wrong? Does it taste awful?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “No, it's just that...I still can't believe there's a ghost hanging around my house and I’m actually talking to him,”

"That makes two of us," Baekhyun replied. “I mean, I can’t believe I’m actually talking to a human.”

"Wait, you said earlier that humans can only see spirits if they have something that ghosts used to possess?” Chanyeol inquired and Baekhyun nodded. “I can see you. Does that mean I have something that used to be yours?”

Baekhyun spun around slowly, playing with his ability to defy the law of gravity. “That has to be the case. It's the only explanation right now,”

Chanyeol watched him spin around. “Okay uh...do you want it back?”

There was a dead air and Baekhyun stopped spinning, his body landing into a slanted angle. “I can't," He said, tilting his head.

"Why not?"

Another silence.

"Because...I don't know what that object is."

Chanyeol slammed his fists on the table in surprise. "HA?! What do you mean you don't know?!"

Baekhyun puffed out in fear and then reappeared behind the fridge, hiding. "Stop yelling…"

Chanyeol massaged his temple to keep his temper under control. "Okay, I’m sorry. I didn't mean to yell." Baekhyun floated out slowly.

"Look, I don't remember anything about myself when I was still alive. The only thing I remember is how I died –I banged my head on a concrete and when I looked up, I saw a roof of a gazebo and that's it."

Chanyeol crooked his eyebrows. "So spirits can have amnesia too?"

"No," Baekhyun said sadly. "It's just me. I couldn't cross the gate to heaven because of this. Suho said I need to find that link that’s keeping me here and destroy it.”

"Who's Suho?"

"Oh, that spirit who guards the gate. I tried sneaking up a lot of times to get pass the gate but he said I wouldn't even make it five steps before I burn and end up in hell." Baekhyun cringed.

"You really want to go to heaven?"

"Hm. Look at it this way. Let's say you want to get to this prestigious university. But then you failed one subject. So you have to take it again and repeat a year. And then you failed again. And again and again and again. You really wouldn't like that right?"

“Touché,” Chanyeol replied. "Well, if I have it, it wouldn't be hard to find right?"

“Oh yeah destroy everything you have then we'll know," Baekhyun replied mockingly. "I told you, I don't have any recollections of my life before I died. I wouldn't know what kind of things I had."

"Then how will we know?"

"Suho said we'll know if we can find my memories."

Chanyeol paused to think. "So I suppose the only way to do that is for me to help you find it?"

Baekhyun crossed his arms and nods. "Uh-huh. Unless you want to make both our lives miserable and refuse to help me."

Chanyeol nodded slowly. "So my life of slow pain and agony starts here..."

"Please, spirits have a lot of fun!"

And by fun it means having to play some detective slash necromancer? Because that is definitely where this was going. Having a ghost—or a spirit—as a companion—and a loud one at that—wasn’t really how Chanyeol imagined fun but he guessed he can deal with this for now, see where it ends. Besides, you don’t see a ghost coming into your shop every day, asking for your help, right?

 

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WORD VOMIT