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“Madam, the guest from room 704 left an item.”
Jang Man Wol did not look up from her cellphone. Such was her concentration in whatever she was scrolling, brows slightly furrowed, lips slightly pursed, that you’d be sure she was studying an important document or even reading a curious article, but Gu Chan Seong, no ordinary man, had clearly seen a familiar glint in her eyes not ten seconds earlier, had promptly told her to stop looking at cars, and was swiftly ignored. The CEO gave manager Choi the same regard she gave her hotelier; a flick of her wrist and a displeased turn of her lips.
“Put it with the others,” she said, the tip of her tongue suddenly rising to the corner of her mouth in obvious interest, causing Gu Chan Seong to let out an indignant “Hey!”, which was returned with a glare.
“Oh! Me! I’ll take it!”
The ever-cheerful receptionist waltzed in, eagerly holding out both hands to the rooms manager, and Gu Chan Seong, dedicated to his mission of saving money but accidentally distracted by the preppy offering, watched as manager Choi gave Hyun Joong a gold key-chain.
“We keep lost items?” He asked Man Wol, eyebrows raised. “From the dead?”
Man Wol sighed deeper than was absolutely necessary, harshly putting her phone down (he caught a glimpse of her screen and yes, he had to admit he too found the car color horrid so he couldn’t blame her for her annoyance, even if he did blame her for everything else).
“Don’t go in there,” she said, inspecting her nails, missing the way Hyun Joong was motioning Gu Chan Seong to follow him exactly there. “You’re faint-hearted and I’m not letting you out early.”
Faint-hearted.
“As the hotelier of the Hotel del Luna, it is of upmost importance that I know every nook and cranny of the establishment,” Gu Chan Seong said with feeling, head held high. Man Wol, all teeth, let out a hearty, deep-throated laugh that almost made her sound all the thousand years that she truly possessed.
“Oh, be my guest, then.”
The man nodded, needlessly adjusting his suit jacket, and followed the receptionist through the brilliant halls of the Hotel del Luna.
Gu Chan Seong was absolutely certain that he had been around those parts before, that he had checked every room on that floor. But every floor looked exactly the same, no matter day or night, and the higher the moon was in the sky, the more confusing the architecture became, and rooms he suspected were on higher floors could be found on lower floors instead, so he was intrigued but not surprised when Hyun Joong led him towards a door he had never seen before. The small, antique plaque above the door read Lost and Found.
“Can the dead really leave things behind?”
“They’re not real things,” Hyun Joong said, scratching his head. “Sometimes they’re holding something when they died but they forget it in the hotel before they board away. Or their family can give them offerings!” He added, pointing a finger in the air, but the words not real kept running through Chan Seong’s mind as the door opened.
It was very much a storage room — but a storage room at the Hotel del Luna could hardly be called ordinary. The lights were flickering, sure, and dust rose once Gu Chan Seong stepped in, threatening to suffocate him with what could possibly be deadly bacteria (then again, there were places at Sanchez’s that had the very same effect), but the wallpaper shone like the rest of the Hotel, pearlescent, rich, speaking of glorious times long past. The shelves were littered with objects and ornate boxes, some glowing under the weak lights as if they were the most precious trophies, while here and there were empty spaces with nothing but ghosts of what once was someone’s treasure, just a clean shadow of memory speaking from its form in the dust.
While Hyun Joong placed the key-chain on what could be only called a random place on a random shelf, Gu Chan Seong, carefully treading the room, noticed a big chest in a corner, covered with a tattered piece of red velvet cloth that failed to hide away the engraved crossed circle on the wood that he knew so well from his dreams — the symbol of the Full Moon.
He took slow, somehow apprehensive steps towards it, bravery and fear fighting a burning fight in his blood, when his fingers — outstretched, as if he were walking on tightrope without even realizing — brushed against one of the tiny boxes on the shelves and a voice filled the room as if it came from everywhere, from the very core of the Hotel,
“Don’t touch anything.”
Chan Seong whipped around towards the entrance, to the omniscient image of Jang Man Wol. Arms crossed, hips tilted to the side, filling his vision, walking closer, heels against wood, loud, firm, long, purple dress scraping against the dirt like it was nothing, because everything inside was her and her own, and only her hand slapping against Chan Seong’s could break the trance he sometimes inevitably fell into when it came to the immortal CEO.
“Ow,” was his smartest answer, retracting his hand and pressing it close to his chest, almost too dramatically; he ought to spend less time with her. “These aren’t even real things!”
“Some of them are, Harvard,” she said, adjusting the box he had touched milliliters to the left. Chan Seong moved his lips in mute grumbling. “Mischievous objects we find and secure. Best to keep them safe from you and you from them.” To that, she added a pointed look that made him feel even more like a misbehaved child and, in turn, he cleared his throat, ready to regain the upper hand in their dynamic.
“And what’s that?” He pointed to the center of the room.
“Ah,” came out of Man Wol, and Chan Seong could have sworn she sounded delighted.
The box itself looked rather simple, but its importance was betrayed by the glass case that protected it; there was no other box so meticulously kept.
“This,” Man Wol spoke as she lifted the glass and pulled the box in her hands, the preciosity of it speaking in all of her movements, slow and deliberate, “is the oldest item in the room.”
Gu Chan Seong would bet his entire fortune that the chest with the Full Moon symbol was the oldest thing in the room but said nothing, afraid of pushing her away and losing all the progress he had won so far. Saving that fight for another day, instead he glanced at the contents of the box she held, his eyes barely blinking.
It looked simple enough, although not without its merits. The white jade of the flower still held its shine, the metal was purposefully faded, and none of the red berries had fallen off. It was a pretty hairpin and he nodded in approval, but nothing about it spoke of jewels of old and importance.
“This,” Man Wol said, with blatant pride, “is the hairpin given to Gwangjong’s lover, tracing back to the 10th century.”
“Gwangjong had a lover?” Chan Seong frowned. “Wasn’t he too busy killing his brothers?”
“He was a pretty ruthless fellow,” Man Wol agreed with a nod. “But he was actually pretty, so I don’t doubt it. Sent his entire personal guard after me when he saw me at the palace, though, I still don’t know why.” She shrugged, as if it was of no consequence that one of the country’s most bloodthirsty emperors almost killed her (keyword being almost, he could hear in his head).
“So... What’s keeping you from selling it?” He raised a perfectly skeptical brow.
“It’s filled with spiritual energy,” Man Wol said simply as she put the box back in its rightful place under the glass.
“Resentful energy?” He asked, frowning, having felt no discomfort before or after setting eyes on the hairpin.
Jang Man Wol shook her head, turning around to face him.
“Gu Chan Seong,” she said, enunciating every syllable of his name.
He felt the urge to swallow, wet his lips, take a step back as Man Wol took one forward. She held his gaze as if it was her own possession, the room around them all but fading to black as she wordlessly commanded him to focus on her, her back straight, her chin lifted, her hands scheming behind her back.
“Have you ever loved someone so much that it consumed you?” Her breath was on his face, and it smelled of wine. “Have you ever had someone be everything to you, so much that you could lose everything, even your life, as long as you still had their love?”
His footsteps made no sound, but hers were like rumbling thunder.
“Have you ever had someone you’d follow into the next life, and the next, and the next, that the heavens couldn’t break you apart even if it wanted to?”
She tilted her head to the side, smiling a devil’s smile.
“And have they ever loved you the same?”
He said and signed nothing. The question that burned and turned to ash in his tongue was, Have you?
Hyun Joong sneezed. Chan Seong blinked and, inexplicably, Man Wol seemed to be several steps farther from him than she had been just a breath ago.
“That kind of energy,” she concluded with a smirk.
“Ah,” Hyun Joong called, sounding closer than Chan Seong had felt him to be. “Guests have arrived!”
“Go greet the guests, Gu Chan Seong,” said Jang Man Wol, walking past him, the center of her gravity letting go of his peace of mind, moving away with her long, swishing hair.
Gu Chan Seong dusted his clothes off, straightened his back and composure, and walked out of Lost and Found to greet the recently departed.
It was still dark when Jang Man Wol woke up and she was at a loss for a couple of seconds. Certain that she had not overslept, she held her silk robe tighter around herself and walked to the window, eyebrows rising in wonder at the solar eclipse that greeted her.
“Is that what you had been waiting for?”
There was no one in her room but that box. Polished, simple wood carrying a universe of lost love inside.
“Which one is it?” She asked, a playful, lopsided smirk blossoming on her face as she opened the box and picked the hairpin up. “Is it her? Is it your master? Why today?”
The hairpin, naturally, could not speak; it only shone in the dim light as she caressed it, lost in thought.
“Ah,” she breathed, smiling to herself. “The homeless man, he should know. But I think I saw him walking perfectly fine the other day, organizing some sort of exhibit?”
She tapped her lips as her eyes moved to her closet.
“I wonder if paeha is a chaebol these days? Like in that drama?”
She giggled, a sound that could chill Gu Chan Seong to the bone.
“Come,” she said to herself or to the ancient love in the room, her hands pulling her hair into a bun in which she pinned the jade lotus hairpin, her companion. “Let’s see what future you’ll unfold in this lifetime.”
And Jang Man Wol rummaged through her clothes, trying to find something befit of a queen.