Outreached hands are poised behind Sungyeol’s back. Slow and silent, Woohyun steps over to the clueless boy and with a roar like thunder, slaps it down on his shoulder.

Sungyeol’s shriek is piercing and Woohyun’s laughter is rambunctious.

“I hate your stupid scares.”

“Well I love them.” Woohyun’s eyes sparkle with mischief. He glances around at the forest around them. “Where is everyone else?”

“Still eating at Myungsoo’s,” Sungyeol says. They both sit at the riverbank.

“They’ll hear the plan later then. I thought of a great idea.”

“The only great idea I want to hear is the one where you get pushed into the river.” He laughs and Woohyun rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, great joke. But I’m talking about for Dongwoo’s birthday.” He tells him his plan and Sungyeol cackles when Woohyun finishes.

Perfect.”

. . .

Myungsoo leaves the grassy riverbank after he complains about the “ugly weather” and Woohyun watches him. Moisture from the ground has soaked into the back of his cotton t-shirt and the occasional bug skitters across his hand but Woohyun doesn’t mind it. It starts to rain harder and he welcomes the cold pricks of liquid. It melts off the ever present smile on his face, the facade that tells everyone he’s okay.

It numbs everything.

He stares at the river and his expression is bitter.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs to the waters. “So sorry.”

. . .

When the others learn of the idea, they look at one another, smiling and nodding. Sunggyu rubs his hands together.

“I can’t wait to see the look on his face!”

The only skeptical one is Hoya who has his eyes furrowed and lips pursed. “I don’t know guys; it seems kind of cruel.”

“We already made him cry last year,” Sungjong says. “Let’s scare him for this one.”

Hoya replies, “Trust me when I say he’ll be scared enough to cry. There’s more than enough time to buy him that Versace cologne from last year again.”

“Are you kidding?” Woohyun exclaims. “The tiny bottle cost us so much! I couldn’t afford to buy juice during lunchtime for two weeks!”

“And I’m sick of that lemon, roses, sage, pepper and cedar smell,” Sungjong adds. “Ugh!”

. . .

Woohyun stands. He swallows down the memory turned lump in his throat. His face crumples. Rain continues to pelt down at him and it plasters his hair to his forehead. It’s hard to tell the difference between tears and rain. He drags his feet towards home, empty and listless.

The memories of his childhood spent walking the grounds with the other six boys stings. There’s him playing hide and seek. Him being naive enough to believe that the other boys wouldn’t see him if he just curled up into a ball. There’s him and the other six boys playing tag under the dappled shades of the trees. There’s Sungjong, wild as ever, falling from one of them and twisting an ankle. There’s Sungyeol turning bright pink when he confesses he likes a girl in their middle school class. Hoya and Sungjong announces they’re now brothers. Woohyun’s fight with Sunggyu over something stupid. Moonlit talks with Sunggyu over life in the village, graduating high school and maybe moving to the city afterwards together because the flower life isn’t their path. Sungyeol’s dejection after he got rejected from a girl. Group hugs. Memory after memory replays in his head.

Until it arrives at the one he always tries to avoid.

This one doesn’t sting like the others, it burns.

. . .

Hoya and Sungjong are safely hidden away behind a bush somewhere near. Sungyeol had decided to play spectator in a tree. Woohyun squints. It’s a clear, moonlit night but the thick foliage overhead blocks out most of the light.

“He’s coming,” Woohyun hisses. He examines Sunggyu’s… outfit for the upteenth time that night. The eldest is dressed up as a female ghost. Ancient white bedsheets from his own house had been smuggled out days ago and the other boys helped him dye the ends a reddish brown with autumn leaves, a technique they learned from the village aunties. A long black wig they’d went out of their way to buy in the city is fitted over Sunggyu’s head and it obscures his face. Myungsoo had gone the extra step to steal his mom’s makeup to smear glittery black eyeshadow on Sunggyu’s face.

“You’d look pretty dang scary from far away,” Woohyun admits. He points a forefinger up at a tree with sturdy, low-hanging branches. “Now climb.”

Sunggyu’s teeth seem to glow when he grins in response and complies.

They’re in Gukhwa’s local forest. The river runs through here right by the clearing in the forest and its strong currents splashes over tall, jagged rocks ominously.

Sunggyu was at the first branch when they hear Dongwoo’s tentative voice. “Guys?” A beam of light shines in the dimness.

Woohyun ducks and scrambles for a bush. He begins his part in the plan.  Under the shroud of darkness, he scuttles about, careful to only let Dongwoo glimpse a little of him. He grabs at the ground in search of twigs to snap and end up with a handful of them as well as dirt under his fingernails.

His smile is made of nothing but mischief.

. . .

“Why in the world are you all wet?” The burly man pushes the dripping hair out of Woohyun’s eyes and grips his shoulders. He examines the drenched boy. “Is it that good for nothing gang of yours? Did they make you do this? Or was it Sunggyu again? That boy is poison, son! Stop toddling behind him like he’s your savior!”

Woohyun pushes the hands off him, irritated. “But he is. We used to be the outsiders remember? When we first moved here, kids at school wanted nothing to do with me. The villagers were polite and welcoming but we were always outsiders! You always rejected their invitations and the only reason why we’re treated like we are now is because of Sunggyu and his family!” His voice crescendoes. Woohyun is shouting now. “He’s my first friend! My best friend!” The breaths come heavily. Woohyun blinks. Sighs. The tension in his body releases all at once. “I’m tired, Dad.” He brushes past the man towards his room. “Let me sleep.”

All the commotion lures out his mom and she begins to fuss over Woohyun. Both parents follow him to his bedroom until he closes the door on them. “Change your clothes, boy!” His mom cries. “You’ll wake up with a fever otherwise.”

Woohyun doesn’t change his clothes.

He simply collapses on the mattress and falls into a restless, nightmare-ridden sleep.  

. . .

“If—If the ‘present’ is to scare the crap out of me, you’ve already succeeded,” Dongwoo calls. “I am already about to piss my pants.”

Woohyun doesn’t stop. He continues to snap his twigs and inch as near to Dongwoo as he dared to without getting seen by the flashlight. He hears Dongwoo stumble backwards near the river and whimper, “Please don’t do this.”

Woohyun reaches the tree Sunggyu sits on poised to jump and knocks on the wood three times. He swiftly slides so that his back is to the tree when the flashlight sweeps over to where he was mere microseconds ago. His heart beats in his ears a fast, unsteady rhythm.

Hearing the signal, Sunggyu leaps off and the second the other five boys hear his feet smash the leaves, they all release long, spine-chilling howls. Someone decides to adlib and laugh a menacing witchy laugh that made even Woohyun’s arm hair want to stand on end.

Dongwoo’s rapid fire screams joins the howls. Sunggyu stumbles towards the terrified boy like he’s drunk, swaying and muttering under his breath. The white bedsheets flap in the wind and the brown stains look like dried blood in the dark. The wig covers his face.

“Get away from me!” Dongwoo shrieks again. He trips over himself and falls on his . Woohyun squints. It’s hard to see anything but the beam from the flashlight but he can hear Dongwoo scrambling backwards, getting closer and closer to the river.

With the wig covering his face, Sunggyu doesn’t seem to notice.

But Woohyun definitely does. His blood runs cold. Goosebumps rise on his arms.

Dongwoo doesn’t notice how close he is to the slope of the riverbank. Two more feet and he’ll slip down.

Woohyun bursts out from his hiding place and yells at Sunggyu to stop just at the latter lunges at Dongwoo who gets on his hands and feet, still watching Sunggyu. He’s too scared to scream now. Dongwoo stands hastily. He grapples at the grass. Still watching the oldest boy, he launches himself away from Sunggyu, not knowing that there’s no more level ground in that direction.

Woohyun screams. He hears Hoya, Sungjong and Sungyeol’s echoing his own.

Dongwoo tumbles.

He rolls and rolls.

The momentum drives his body straight into the dark, cold river.

Woohyun can’t breathe.

Dongwoo can’t swim.