Archive of Our Own ^beta

It’s hard to say the world has ended when the planet continues to turn and the sun continues to shine, but for Gahyeon, the world ends on a Tuesday.

The beginning of the end starts with a bloodcurdling scream.

Gahyeon doesn’t even have time to register where it’s coming from when fresh cries of pure terror swallow that initial outburst. They’re soon followed by more shouts, then more and more and more until reality is smothered by pandemonium that Gahyeon struggles to make sense of. She stands there, locked in a confused stupor as the hairs on her arm rise from some unidentified peril until she’s abruptly shoved out of the train a stop early.

She turns around just in time to see the door close on Siyeon.

“Run!” Siyeon cries, and Gahyeon can only watch in shock as the train begins to pull away even as a bloodied man claws his way into their compartment from the back. Siyeon raises her arms to defend herself as the man grabs her, her face contorted with fright. Perhaps it’s a trick of the light, but Gahyeon thinks she sees Siyeon glance at her before she’s pushed out of view and carried away on steel rails leading to hell.

That’s the last time Gahyeon ever sees Siyeon.

(The last time they really talked, Gahyeon’s certain she would have said more had she known it would be the last time they really talked.

Siyeon deserved better.)

Gahyeon doesn’t know how she makes it up the stairs. Maybe it’s her body moving on autopilot for self-preservation’s sake, maybe it’s pure adrenaline feuling her even as her brain is reduced to static, maybe it’s her heart seeking out safety before it collapses under the encroaching realization of what’s going on. Regardless, despair fights direly for Gahyeon by reminding her of the cruel truth with every step she takes with an empty space at her side.

It doesn’t take long for the mob to break out on the streets. The movies aren’t too far off; panicked masses flee for their lives as rabid monsters wearing human corpses pour out of the subway like a nightmare come true. It’s surreal, witnessing it all, but fear and something a lot more painful forces Gahyeon to keep running along the street. 

Minji finds her first.

Gahyeon almost doesn’t believe her eyes when she sees a familiar figure going against the flow of traffic. She almost doesn’t want to, considering what lies an untold distance behind her. It’s only an ‘almost’ though, for Gahyeon doesn’t have to look all that deep in her heart to know that the one emotion that supersedes the rest is the twisted, bone-shaking relief of having someone come rescue her from this inescapable dream gone wrong.

Minji wastes no time in taking Gahyeon’s hand upon reaching her. 

“Where’s Siyeon?” she asks. 

Gahyeon shakes her head, exertion and anguish sealing her voice. Minji’s face twists for a second to mirror Gahyeon’s expression, but then she murmurs something to herself that reignites her resolve. 

“Let’s go,” Minji orders.

“Unnie–”

“We have to go,” Minji says, this time more gently. She gives a soft squeeze, one that Gahyeon clings to. “The others are waiting for us. We don’t have much time.”

Gahyeon barely manages a nod before she’s all but dragged onwards. Her lungs are on fire, but Minji doesn’t allow much choice of pace as they head towards the cafe where all seven of them were supposed to meet. All around them, the chaos spreads virulently as cars screech past pedestrians begging to be let inside buildings. A squadron of helicopters soar towards the heart of the city, but even they’re not enough to drown out the deathly chorus of the horde starving for flesh. 

Minji suddenly pulls Gahyeon into a side alley. She moves with purpose and turns corner after corner despite panting quite a bit herself, and the tension leaves her shoulders when the back of a nondescript, black van comes into view.

There’s a crash from behind.

Gahyeon turns to see a woman leaning against a trash bin. Her head is low, and she cradles one of her arms to her chest as it dangles awkwardly. For a brief moment, Gahyeon considers turning back to help, and she feels Minji pause next to her too.

And then she realizes that there’s no humanly possible way for that woman’s arm to be bent like that.

The woman lifts her head to reveal cloudy eyes devoid of the vivacity of life.

“Shit,” Gahyeon hisses.

“Run!” Minji shouts, that word already becoming far too familiar. 

Letting go of Minji so that the two of them can sprint properly, Gahyeon’s heart sinks as she realizes she’s falling behind. She just doesn’t have the strength anymore, not when every muscle is protesting every movement, and not even the rapid footsteps behind her are able to push her any faster. 

Of course, Gahyeon’s left foot chooses that moment to give out. 

Gahyeon lets out a cry as her ankle twists, pain shooting through her leg. She stumbles, and although she manages to keep from crashing to the concrete floor, she comes to a dangerous halt as she’s brought to her knees. The snarling behind her gets closer and closer, and Gahyeon looks imploringly at Minji when she turns around. 

“Go,” Gahyeon urges, tears threatening to leak out. “Just go, unnie!”

Minji doesn’t hesitate. 

She charges straight for the creature lunging at Gahyeon. 

Across the alley, the van roars to life. Whoever is in the driver’s seat lays on the horn as they reverse in Gahyeon’s direction, and one of the passenger side doors slides open to reveal Bora with Yubin and Handong in tow. They jump out of the vehicle before rushing forward, Yubin stooping to pick up a discarded bottle before storming into the fray.

The struggle ends with an inhuman screech that’s cut off by a gurgle.

Minji hurries back to Gahyeon.

“Are you okay?” 

“... You should have left me.”

Minji smiles and pinches Gahyeon’s cheek.

“How could I?”

Bora carries Gahyeon to their car on her back, Handong keeping her hand on Gahyeon’s shoulder the entire way. Yubin and Minji converse in hushed voices behind them, but Gahyeon shuts her eyes and closes her ears when someone’s name is mentioned. She clings tighter to Bora, letting go only when they’re all finally in the safety of the van.

“Welcome aboard!” Yoohyeon greets with a grin that both warms Gahyeon’s heart and drives the knife deeper inside it. She reaches haphazardly around her headrest to pat Gahyeon’s head. “It’s okay, Gahyeon. You’re safe now.”

Gahyeon bites her lower lip.

She lets Handong tend to her, the older girl turning to the wisdom of the internet for first aid advice. Up front, Minji points to her own phone as she discusses something with Bora and Yoohyeon, Yubin occasionally interjecting. Gahyeon picks up more snippets of their conversation this time, the enclosed space of the van forcing her to listen to how the metro system has been sealed, the military has been deployed, and the government has put out multiple conflicting statements about the situation.

“We should leave the city,” Yubin suggests. “Less people, and it probably started here anyways.”

“I agree,” Yoohyeon nods. She mimes flexing her muscles.  “Let’s pick up Siyeon-unnie and get out of here.”

“Where is she anyways?” Bora asks with a frown. “She hasn’t answered any of my texts or calls.”

Minji opens her mouth, but she’s too slow. 

Five faces turn to Gahyeon, a familiar view that will forever remain incomplete.

The tears refuse to stop once they start. 

A deep, chest-wrenching sob forces its way out of Gahyeon’s lungs. It leaves her struggling to breathe, and try as she might, Gahyeon can’t hold down the grief surging from within. It pours out of her in the form of cries that turn into a pained wail especially when Yoohyeon gasps and turns away with her own tears. Someone, probably Handong, pulls Gahyeon into her arms, but the usual comfort of such an action crumbles under the fact that Gahyeon can feel her shaking.

Gahyeon falls asleep at some point, the weight of reality too much to bear. What she manages to remember of her dream is much more pleasant in comparison: a field, flowers, and a face that’s already begun to fade.

The next time she wakes, skyscrapers and concrete towers have been replaced by trees and open sky. A falcon soars past the backseat window, and Gahyeon idly envies how it seems to have no care in the world save for where the wind is going to take it. It soon disappears out of sight, and Gahyeon turns to her other side to see Minji resting. She sleeps, unmoving and paler than usual, but Gahyeon doesn’t blame her. Minji did put her life on the line for her, after all. 

Twice.

Gahyeon quietly slips her fingers in between Minji’s, and the back of her throat closes up again when Minji subconsciously tugs her just a bit closer. Blinking rapidly to clear her vision, Gahyeon looks up just in time for the car to come to a stop.

Minji jerks awake. 

“Where are we?” she asks.

“Somewhere safe, hopefully,” Yubin grimaces as she unbuckles herself.

Yoohyeon stays in the car with Gahyeon as the rest of the group exits the vehicle. Gahyeon’s heart threatens to jump out of her chest with every step they take towards a small structure situated in the middle of nowhere. She wonders how they found this place; there’s nothing but dirt and dead trees as far as her eye can see, and the only thing breaking apart the monotonous brown is the cracked black of the asphalt they used to get here. 

Gahyeon’s thoughts are interrupted by silence. 

Yoohyeon stops drumming her fingers on the steering wheel as Bora walks up to the front door, her knuckles turning white with how hard she’s gripping it instead. Gahyeon’s pretty sure neither of them are breathing at this point, for all they can do is watch while Bora pushes the door open and steps inside. Minji, Handong, and Yubin all follow behind, and all four of them are soon swallowed by darkness.

Gahyeon jumps when a light flickers on inside the building before sputtering out.

She’s never been so relieved when Handong comes back to fetch them.

“There’s not much here,” Handong says, her lips set in a hard line. “No electricity or food, but at least there’s water.”

“We still have what we picked up from the gas station,” Yoohyeon points out. “We can look for more food and somewhere else to stay tomorrow.”

“I’m just glad it’s not winter yet or we’d all just freeze to death,” Bora grumbles as she dusts off a couch that looks like it’s been there since the dawn of time. 

Gahyeon half-expects it when she gets sentenced to the couch after a shared meal of beef jerky and trail mix. It’s rather hard and crusty, and Gahyeon almost feels like it’ll crumble under her weight, but she doesn’t complain. She can’t, not when the rest of her friends are resigned to using their jackets and each other as pillows on the uneven, wooden floor. It takes a while, but Gahyeon eventually finds herself dozing off to the sound of Yoohyeon yelping about how cold the water is and “Unnie, you really think anyone can shower like this!?”

Gahyeon awakens with dried tears on her face the next morning. 

Her lower back is rather sore, proof that yesterday’s events weren’t just a nightmare. She takes her time in sitting up, mindful of her ankle, until she suddenly becomes aware of how empty the room is.

No.

No, no, no, no–

“Gahyeon?” Bora is by Gahyeon’s side in a flash with a reassuring smile ready to go. “Hey, you good?”

“Where– Where are–”

“Yoohyeon, Yubin, and Dongie are all sleeping in the car,” Bora answers calmly before pretending to huff. “Kids these days… Can’t handle sleeping on the floor. Meanwhile, Minji here seems to like the floor a bit too much, if you ask me.”

Indeed, Minji barely moves as she sleeps against the wall. Only the faint rising and falling of her chest gives any indication that she’s alive, and in retrospect, Gahyeon should have realized then.

She should have realized during breakfast too, when Minji of all people hardly ate anything. 

She realizes it right when everyone is about to get in the car and Minji stops.

“Yoohyeon,” Minji calls out.

Yoohyeon immediately bounces over.

“What’s up, unnie?” 

Minji smiles and slowly raises her hand to cup Yoohyeon’s cheek. Her smile widens as Yoohyeon leans into her touch, and Gahyeon’s world falls apart a second time when she sees the crescent-shaped wound barely hidden under Minji’s sleeve.

“I’m sorry we wasted so much time,” Minji whispers. “There’s so much I would have liked to have done with you.”

Yoohyeon’s eyes widen.

“Why are you talking like that?” she asks, her voice starting to tremble. “Why are you talking like–”

“Bora, can I have a word with you?” Minji says as she turns away. 

The two of them head to the back of the shack.

Only Bora returns.

(They used to joke about the lengths Minji would go to take care of everyone. The ends of the earth, Siyeon had suggested with a laugh. 

Gahyeon would have been fine just knowing that. She had never wanted to see it.)

It rains as they leave.

It’s a light shower, not nearly enough to cover up the sobs, but Gahyeon would like to pretend that the sky is mourning with them as they drive away from the city they once knew, away from the people they still love.

Yubin runs out of tears first. She didn’t shed very many from the start, but Gahyeon knows better; the way she keeps her gaze locked on nothing but the road says it all, and a few last traces of wetness on her knuckles glimmer under the weak rising sun as she takes them all northbound. Handong occupies the passenger seat next to her, motionless save for the occasional rise of her shoulders each time she sighs while resting her head on the dashboard. 

Bora mirrors Handong’s pose in the seat behind her. She’s been hugging her knees with head down for the last hundred miles and then some. The weight of what she had to do with her own hands must be immense, and Gahyeon doesn’t blame her for turning into a statue just to bear it. 

If they had shared the burden, would it be any easier to carry?

Probably not.

Gahyeon is pulled out of her musings by a water bottle cutting across her vision.

“Drink,” Bora says, her voice hoarse. She looks over to Gahyeon with red-rimmed eyes. “You have to stay hydrated.”

Gahyeon wipes her nose with her sleeve.

“You have to drink too, unnie,” she mumbles. Nonetheless, she takes the bottle as instructed and takes a sip before glancing to the back row.

It’s so empty.

There’s only Yoohyeon there, and she looks smaller than ever with how she’s curled so tightly around Minji’s jacket. She sleeps, sniffs and whimpers escaping every now and then, and whatever dream she’s having compels her to clutch the jacket so tightly almost as if she’s trying to sink into it, disappear into it for a world kinder than the one she will wake up to.

Gahyeon wishes Yoohyeon didn’t have to hurt so.

She wishes none of them had to, but this must be the price of all those years of laughter together.

Tired of thinking and tired of feeling, Gahyeon exhales slowly before casting her gaze outside. It’s quiet, the steady crunch of gravel the only accompaniment to the view of trees passing by. They grow denser and denser the further they go, and Gahyeon vaguely recalls Yubin saying something about a friend’s mountain lodge yesterday. She has half a mind to check how much longer it’s going to take or at least put on some music to ease the ride, but she knows she can’t be that selfish. They all agreed to turn their phones off to conserve energy in case of emergency, and so Gahyeon resigns herself to listening to the sounds of everyone’s breathing to pass the time.

Out of the blue, something dances through the trees.

Gahyeon promptly sits up in her seat on full alert. Her eyes scan the woods for further signs of movement, and she’s just about ready to convince herself that it was a trick of the light when Yubin abruptly slams on the brakes. 

The tires screech, but it’s too late.

There’s a sickening thud that’s immediately followed by the crumpling of metal and glass shattering. 

Gahyeon is thrown in her seat as the car jerks to a halt, her seat belt digging into her shoulder painfully. Someone shouts and someone screams, but it all seems so far away as Gahyeon struggles to reorient herself. Her blood pounding in her ears, Gahyeon blinks once in a daze before forcing herself to snap back to reality.

“Guys!” she yells, frantically scanning the van. 

Thankfully, everyone is relatively okay. Yoohyeon does clutch her head in pain, but she’s lucid enough to follow Bora as she exits the van. Handong likewise unbuckles herself with a grimace, though Yubin alone remains in the driver’s seat. 

“Shit,” she curses. She smacks the wheel with an angry fist. “Shit, shit, shit!”

Yubin strikes the wheel a couple more times, frustration clear with every hit. There’s an undercurrent of despair in her actions too, one that’s highlighted when she runs out of steam quickly and gives up by resting her forehead on the now-deflated airbag. 

“Unnie…” Gahyeon tries reaching out. 

“I’m fine,” Yubin answers tersely. “Just… Just give me a sec.”

Gahyeon nods. She steps outside the van, her heart sinking when she sees the entire front of the vehicle completely wrecked. Something large lays off to the side, probably a deer, but Gahyeon doesn’t have the strength to look any closer. She doesn’t have the strength to even cry at the misfortune that has befallen them, a heavy weariness settling on her shoulders. 

“God, can we get a fucking break?” Bora hisses into her hands. She then shakes her head and turns to the group. “Alright, guys. I guess we’re… I dunno, walking now.”

Yoohyeon wordlessly puts on Minji’s jacket before collecting the rest of their belongings from the back of the van. Handong, meanwhile, squats on the ground and pinches her nose while waiting for her phone to turn back on. 

“Okay, what the hell,” she says flatly after a few minutes of tapping at the screen. 

“What now?” Bora sighs. 

“The internet’s dead,” Handong reports. “Nothing’s connecting.”

“Welcome to the end of the world,” Yubin says sarcastically, now standing outside with everyone else. “At least we’re close to a rest stop. I remember passing a sign that said there’s one soon.”

“Define soon?” Bora asks, glancing at Gahyeon. 

“Soon as in it’s better than standing around waiting for nothing.”

“My ankle is fine,” Gahyeon says when Yoohyeon also turns to her with a concerned look in her eyes. “Probably,” she amends, trying to hide her wince when she puts a bit too much pressure on it. 

It’s a small mercy that the pain doesn’t worsen as they begin their trek alongside the road leading onwards. It’s more of a slow march than anything, everyone trudging along in a silence that leaves Gahyeon yearning for happier days that now feel like a lifetime ago. Her chest aches, thinking about another time when there had been seven people strolling along a street and Yoohyeon had accidentally bumped into Bora, who had taken it as a personal affront and started a rather entertaining albeit public fight. 

Now, the usual moodmakers of their group aren’t even walking together. Bora leads the pack at a careful pace whereas Yoohyeon lags behind in the back. The taller girl keeps her head down, and Gahyeon wishes yet again that she could take her friend’s pain away. 

It’s only when Gahyeon stumbles and Yoohyeon automatically reaches out to steady her that Gahyeon realizes that perhaps Yoohyeon is staying in the back for a whole other reason. She looks to Yoohyeon both in gratitude and as a question, and she receives the faintest of smiles in return. 

Gahyeon grabs Yoohyeon’s hand, holding on tighter when she feels a reassuring squeeze. 

The sun has long passed its apex by the time civilization comes back into view in the form of a run down gas station. It looks like it came from a whole other decade, the sign made of wood covered in peeling paint. Even the gas pumps could have been pulled out of a retro movie, and the lone truck parked near the entrance seems to be made entirely out of rust. 

“… Let’s take a break here and buy some supplies,” Bora suggests. 

“We can ask for directions too,” Handong says, and they all step inside the building to prepare for the next leg of their journey. 

It’s dark and dingy inside the shop, and there really isn’t much on sale. The place almost reminds Gahyeon of the shack they slept in last night, and she nearly jumps out of her skin when she sees the man behind the counter. Had he not moved to flip a page of his extremely outdated magazine, Gahyeon probably wouldn’t have seen him, and she instinctively gives him a wide berth as she browses rows of probably expired candy. 

“Granny, look, lots of pretty unnies!”

Gahyeon gives a start for a second time when a little girl appears out of nowhere to beam up at her. Her grin is filled with gaps where teeth should be, but something about the earnest sparkle in her eyes has Gahyeon making the effort to smile back. 

“Hi,” she says. 

“Hi there!” the child greets. “I’ve never seen so many people here before!

“Welcome, welcome,” an elderly woman calls out. She hobbles out of the back door with a cane that she uses to tap her granddaughter’s shin. “Come along now, you know you’re not supposed to be out here.”

“But I wanna help Daddy help the pretty unnies!”

“Maybe when you’re older, dear.”

“I don’t think they have any idea what’s going on,” Yubin murmurs as she steps next to Gahyeon to examine a set of skis. “That’s a good sign though, I suppose. The lodge isn’t far from here.”

“So it should be safe,” Gahyeon concludes. 

Safe. 

It’s only been a day since everything changed, and yet that word feels strangely foreign on Gahyeon’s tongue. Being dunked into a nightmare with no warning does that to you, she figures, and she can’t wait for when they can all settle down somewhere where they don’t have to fear for their lives. 

The bell at the door jingles. 

Gahyeon glances over to see a man walk in. He’s clearly from the city as well, the fibers of his suit broadcasting ‘expensive’, though it’s torn in several areas. A woman and boy follow behind him, and he steps protectively in front of them when he catches sight of everyone else in the store. He narrows his eyes, fists clenched until Bora gives him a respectful nod. 

“We were just leaving,” she says calmly. 

“I– I see.” The man clears his throat, his guarded body language easing a bit. “Um… Good luck.”

“You too.”

They all follow Bora outside like a line of ducks following their mother. She’s armed with a shovel now, one whose head is larger than her own, but she doesn’t even walk ten steps before handing it over to Handong. 

“Geez, why is this thing so heavy?” Bora complains, and the shadows clinging to Gahyeon’s spirit loosen their grip just a bit when a shared chuckle ripples through her friends. 

“Wonder if Mr. Fancy would let us hitch a ride,” Yubin comments as they walk past his SUV. 

“It’s big enough to fit all of us, right?” Gahyeon asks, peering into the back. She blinks when she spots a little girl sitting in one of the seats. 

A little girl tied to one of the seats. 

“What the–”

Gahyeon nearly falls over when the girl suddenly throws herself at the window. Her teeth are bared, and she bites the air several times as her neck strains forward in hunger. Even through the tinted window, her eyes are unmistakably that telltale shade of infected white. 

As the realization hits her, something hard presses against the side of Gahyeon’s head. 

“Back away. Now,” the suited man orders. Gahyeon has no idea when he rushed outside, but she has no time to think about it as she puts her hands in the air and takes a generous step backwards. 

“Hey!” Bora shouts from a couple feet away. “Put the gun down.”

The man immediately turns it on Bora. 

“I did not come all this way for a bunch of kids to try and tear my family apart,” he snarls. 

“Look,” Bora says firmly. “We’re not looking for trouble, okay? Just put the gun down, and we’ll go on our way.”

“Lies! I know what you’re all thinking of me right now,” the man spits, his speech hurried with a desperate hysteria. “I know you think I’m crazy! But this is my daughter!”

Bora’s expression hardens. 

“Sir–”

“We understand,” Yoohyeon interrupts, finally speaking for the first time in hours. Her eyes are somber as she gazes at the man. “You’re just trying to do your best for your loved ones. So are we.”

The gun shakes in the man’s hand. 

“I… Not a word,” he says through gritted teeth. “Don’t say a single word to anyone you see. Swear it.”

“We swear,” Bora promises. 

The man lowers his gun, and Gahyeon lets out the breath she didn’t know she was holding. She quickly rushes over to Bora’s side, mumbling an apology when she reaches her. 

“It’s not your fault,” Bora says quietly. She reaches up to adjust a couple strands of Gahyeon’s hair. “Let’s just get the hell out of here.”

The man seems to share the same sentiment. He runs up to his wife as she comes out of the shop and grabs her by the arm. 

“Honey, we have to go,” he says before frowning. “Where’s Hajoon?”

His wife doesn’t answer. 

“Honey?” he asks again, his voice taking on a panicked note. “Where’s our son?”

She still doesn’t answer. 

“Hey, say something!”

The woman groans. 

And then she attacks him. 

Gahyeon doesn’t even have time to start running when there’s a crash. She instinctively turns to look, and her blood runs cold when she sees the shopkeeper breaking through the glass of his own door to launch himself at the man. Behind him, a boy with red all around his mouth hobbles forward, though his target appears to be a shocked Handong.

The gun goes off, and everything descends into chaos. 

Rather than stopping any of the three monsters in their tracks, the gunshot sends them into a frenzy. The man screams as he’s devoured, his own son changing course to him as well. Gahyeon can’t help but feel a warped relief at the knowledge that this is their chance to run, but it’s short lived when a horrible snarl fills the air. 

To Gahyeon’s absolute horror, a large dog comes barreling out from the back of the gas station. It’s covered in blood and part of its neck is missing, but that doesn’t stop it from making a beeline for the last remaining humans. 

They’re no match for its speed. 

The dog easily overtakes Yubin, pulling her down with a tackle. She hits the ground with a grunt and quickly begins kicking to defend herself, but the dog’s jaws continue to snap at her relentlessly. Bora rushes over to help, but she nearly gets bitten and is forced to retreat. 

Handong takes the shovel she was entrusted with and swings. It connects perfectly with the dog’s skull and sends the animal flying before it lands in a heap, legs twitching. There’s not even a second before it’s on the move again, its head bent nearly backwards as it lumbers forward once more. 

So this is it, Gahyeon thinks bitterly when three more figures stumble out of the store with their arms raised in search of prey. A sense of defeat washes over her; there’s no way the five of them can fight off seven—eight if you count the man in the suit—things that both refuse to know death and refuse to allow life. They have no weapons save for one shovel, and all it takes is one, single bite for it all to be over. 

As the grandma and little girl from before start sprinting her way, an idea comes to Gahyeon’s mind. Shivers travel up her spine as it forms and solidifies, but she ignores the part of her begging herself to stop by telling herself that this makes the most sense. She’s already injured, after all, so for her to be bait–

Bora beats her to the punch. 

“Guys,” she says. “Remember to keep our promise, okay?”

She spins around without waiting for an answer and runs straight for the ravenous mass. 

“No!” Gahyeon screams as she tries to turn back too. She’s all too aware of what Bora is doing, and she lets out another throat-tearing scream when several hands grab her and hold her back. “Unnie!”

“Stop. We have to go,” Yubin says, her voice gravelly and leaving no room for argument. 

Even so, Gahyeon tries. 

“Unnie, come back!” she yells at Bora’s back. “Bora-unnie!” she cries as Handong and Yoohyeon pull her away. “Please!”

Her words fall on deaf ears. 

Bora lets out a war cry as she punches the grandmother square in the jaw. The old lady’s body falls to the floor, but she immediately resumes scuttling at Bora, who is now struggling with the suited man who’s no longer human. She shoves him off only to be grabbed by what Gahyeon can only assume is the shopkeeper’s wife, and at that point, Gahyeon can’t bear to look anymore. 

She stops fighting her friends and, once more, she begins to run. Yubin leads them this time with Handong guarding the rear, and Gahyeon can see Yoohyeon crying silently out of the corner of her eye as she keeps pace with her. 

The growls and screeches get further and further away as Bora refuses to go down without a fight. It’s so easy to imagine her, arms and legs flailing and kicking for the sake of securing yet another second of survival. I’m alive!, her every action would scream, and Gahyeon knows that it’s that vivid vibrancy of hers that’ll keep the monsters drawn to her so the rest of them can make their escape. 

“Oi, over here, you expired beef jerkys!”

Gahyeon chokes back a sob of a laugh as she continues onwards and leaves a piece of her heart behind. 

Of course those would be Kim Bora’s last words.

(She always lit up every room, every heart, every life she came in contact with. 

The world feels so much darker now.)

They walk. 

They walk and walk and walk and walk. 

Gahyeon’s sure she’s never felt this sort of exhaustion before. It sinks into her skin from every pore, down through all her muscles and ligaments, penetrating each and every bone to settle deep within her organs and what feels like her very soul. 

And still they walk. 

Sunlight fades between branches as the four of them move underneath the cover of trees that have yet to lose all their leaves. Dusk dyes everything in a red that once used to be beautiful but now only feels oppressive and threatening as it pretells the inevitable darkness that always comes with night. 

Gahyeon doesn’t have the energy left to be scared. 

She barely has the strength to hide her limp; her feet are starting to drag, and she’s woefully out of time with everyone else’s footsteps as she shambles forward in pain. 

With a leg like this, worsened by rush of their escape, Gahyeon really should have been the one to–

Well, it’s too late now. 

Bora’s gone. 

And so they walk. 

Yoohyeon is the one who stumbles first. 

Only half lucid thanks to her tiredness, Gahyeon misses the moment when Yoohyeon loses her footing. She just suddenly feels someone pull her arm with a sharp tug, and the next thing she knows, her body is jerking sideways as gravity tries to claim both her and Yoohyeon. It almost wins, Gahyeon’s spare arm flailing about uselessly, but Handong comes to a rescue with a firm grip on Yoohyeon’s jacket. 

“Careful, you two,” Handong murmurs once she’s steadied them both. 

“Thanks,” Yoohyeon replies before turning to Gahyeon with a small, apologetic smile. “Sorry about that, just grabbed you out of instinct.”

“It’s fine, unnie.”

“We should probably stop here,” Yubin calls out from a couple feet further ahead. She scrutinizes the group as she doubles back, her eyes lingering on Gahyeon’s leg. “We all need rest.”

“Here here?” Handong frowns. “Like right here in the middle of this forest?”

Yubin crosses her arms. 

“This is what happens when you pick out a lodge in the middle of nowhere,” she says, a layer of ice slowly permeating each word she speaks. “You end up in the middle of freakin’ nowhere.”

“Yeah, but–”

“The sun is about to set too, in case you haven’t noticed.”

For a scary second, Handong’s eyes narrow. Gahyeon feels Yoohyeon stiffen next to her, and she quickly opens her mouth to interject before anyone says something they won’t be able to take back. Luckily, Handong’s expression smooths out before Gahyeon is able to utter a word. 

“You have a point,” Handong concedes after a long, weary exhale. She pinches the bridge of her nose and glances around. “At least it’s relatively safe, right?”

“Should be,” Yubin nods, her tone calmer now. “When you pick out a lodge where nobody's around… Well, we haven’t run into anybody—or anything—for the last few hours.”

The veracity of her statement brings about an uneasy relief. While it’s true that they haven’t seen another soul (or lack of soul) since they left the gas station, Gahyeon still can’t help but tense up whenever the shadows surrounding them move a bit too much and the wind chasing them blows a bit too hard. Nevertheless, she sinks to the ground when Yoohyeon volunteers to take first watch after a quick meal. 

“Goodnight, guys,” Gahyeon mumbles into her jacket that’s a poor excuse for a pillow. 

“Goodnight,” three voices answer, and Gahyeon closes her eyes to prepare for what she’s quite certain will be the worst sleep she’s ever had in her entire life.

Seeing familiar smiles in her dream only makes it hurt all the more.

They all rise before the sun on the next day. 

As predicted, Gahyeon gets up from the dirt with much protest from her body. So many things ache, both inside and out, but she keeps her complaints to herself as everyone moves out for another endless hike through the woods. It’s much slower going this time, the gradually increasing incline of the ground beneath them working against their favor. Her ankle of course suffers the most, fatigue and the harshness of their journey exacerbating it, and eventually Gahyeon is forced to use the shovel sometimes as a cane, sometimes as a crutch. 

How pathetic. 

Gahyeon tells herself to not dwell too much on how she’s dragging everyone down as she follows Yubin and Yoohyeon up the mountain. It’s comforting to see them walking side-by-side, shoulder-to-shoulder, a familiar view that makes it easier to pretend that they’re all just on a weekend camping trip and nothing else. That fantasy is easily shattered, however, all thanks to the voice in the back of her mind that keeps reminding her of who’s not here. 

Si. Yeon. 

Min. Ji. 

Bo. Ra. 

Their names rattle in Gahyeon’s head to the rhythm of every uneven, lopsided, unbalanced step she takes. Like a ceaseless current, they wear away at her soul with each incoming tide, mountains giving away to cliffs giving away to rocks giving away to sand. Gahyeon can already feel her heart trembling, crumbling again under the longing that she doubts will ever ease and the yearning she knows will never stop. 

Si. Yeon. 

Min. Ji. 

Bo. Ra.

… Why?

A hand touches Gahyeon. 

She immediately whirls around and nearly falls over in her moment of panic only for someone to catch her with a worried frown. 

“Hey,” Handong asks gently. “You okay? You stopped walking for a second there.”

“Oh. Did I?” Gahyeon blinks. “Sorry.”

Handong slowly moves her hand from Gahyeon’s elbow up to her shoulder. She gives a small squeeze there before letting go, fingers lingering by Gahyeon’s cheek for a second until she cups her face. 

“You were thinking about them, weren’t you?” Handong asks. She uses her thumb to wipe away a tear Gahyeon didn’t know had fallen. “Our unnies…”

Gahyeon sighs and leans against the warmth offered through her skin.

“Yeah,” she admits. “I… I miss them.”

“Me too.”

Si. Yeon. 

Min. Ji. 

Bo. Ra.

As Gahyeon resumes walking with her arm looped through Handong’s, her chest tightens at the thought of more names being added to that already too long list. She can’t imagine what it would be like for yet another friend to be stolen from her out of the blue, and the fear of regret pushes her to reignite the conversation. 

“Hey, unnie…”

“Hm?”

Gahyeon bites her lower lip. 

“Please don’t get too mad at Yubin-unnie when she’s, um…”

“When she’s kind of being a jerk?”

Gahyeon winces.

“I’m sure she doesn’t mean to be,” she reasons. “It’s just that… She’s trying to take us all somewhere safe, you know? Which kinda–”

“Puts her under a lot of pressure?” Handong gives a wry chuckle. “I know, don’t worry. We talked last night. She apologized.”

“Oh.” Gahyeon blinks, taken aback by this quick resolution. “Did she really?”

“Yep,” Handong confirms. “She said she felt kinda bad about how she acted, plus I think she talked to Yoohyeon too? Either way, she told me she’s sorry, so there’s nothing for you to worry about.”

“There better not be,” Gahyeon mutters, a pout naturally forming on her lips. “I don’t want to see you guys fight.”

Something in Handong’s eyes softens. 

“I don’t want to fight with her either,” she says, and her gaze turns to the hazy sky where the sun’s radiance can barely be seen. “After all, we only have each other now.”

“… Yeah,” Gahyeon nods. She has to swallow down the tightness at the back of her throat before she can speak again. “It’s– It’s just the four of us now.”

Handong’s smile never vanishes, not when she leans over to dab at the corner of Gahyeon’s eyes again, and not when she pulls back to wipe her own face. 

“Let’s keep going,” she says, and Gahyeon follows. 

Yubin calls for them a minute later when she checks to see Gahyeon and Handong trailing behind her by several yards. Her eyebrows furrow, but there’s no acidity in her next words, a teasing inflection present instead as she asks, “Oi, what are you two chitchatting about back there?”

“You,” Handong immediately retorts, and when Yubin’s only response is to shake her head with a fond grin, Gahyeon finds herself thinking that maybe, just maybe things will be okay in the end. 

Of course, things go awry mere hours later when a thick fog settles over the mountainside. It obscures all vision, wrapping their surroundings with an ominous white that reminds Gahyeon of smoke and ghosts. She shudders at that imagery, her skin crawling from unease, and she nearly screams when an indiscernible shape abruptly comes into view. 

“Oh shit,” Gahyeon gasps when she realizes it’s a car smashed against a tree. 

“Oh shit!” Yoohyeon yells when a torso pushes its way out of the shattered windshield and starts crawling towards them. 

Handong makes quick work of it thanks to the shovel.

They come across an abandoned motorcycle a few minutes later, and Gahyeon knows they’re all fearing the worst when they finally reach the only village in this isolated mountain. It’s deathly quiet, especially with the fog still masking anything beyond a few feet, and Gahyeon has to bite back a protest when Yoohyeon offers to scout ahead. 

Both relief and dismay flood Gahyeon when Yoohyeon returns with her hand over her mouth and tears running down her face. 

“They’re all… They’re all…” 

Handong sinks to the floor in despair. 

“… What do we do?” she asks Yubin, her voice shaking. 

In contrast, Yubin’s answer comes so resolutely and without hesitation that Gahyeon is taken aback by the rush of hopefulness that she thought she’d never feel again. 

“We continue to the lodge,” Yubin declares, and she doesn’t waver when three pairs of confused and doubtful eyes turn to her. “It’s several miles from here, which should be a safe distance away,” she explains. “My friend said they restocked the place over the summer, so all we need to do is make it there and bunker down.”

“Is your friend going to be there?” Gahyeon asks. 

A somber look crosses Yubin’s face. 

“She stopped replying to my texts after the first day,” she says quietly, and Gahyeon knows not to pry any further. 

Of all the ordeals they’ve been through as of late, skirting around the village has to be one of the most nerve-racking things they’ve done to date. Gahyeon has to fight the urge to vomit from sheer anxiety as they move through the trees as silently as possible, giving the village as wide a berth as they can while trying not to get disoriented and lost in the woods. Every breath seems too loud, every footstep too heavy, and Gahyeon has to swallow back a scream whenever she hears a twig snap or a leaf crunch underneath them. At some point, however, the fatigue returns in full force to numb the fear, and Gahyeon uses that twisted mercy to carry her exhausted body away from the infestation. 

Gahyeon all but collapses when they finally, finally, finally reach their destination. She waits with bated breath as Yubin and Yoohyeon enter the lone cabin standing there in the wilderness courtesy of a hidden key. Her nerves chewing away at her sanity, Gahyeon’s certain that if the lodge turns out to be a den of darkness where only death resides, her heart will surely give up. 

They can’t have come all this way for nothing. They simply can’t. 

As Handong feverishly prays under her breath next to her, Gahyeon waits. 

And waits. 

And waits. 

The front door slowly creaks open again. 

Yoohyeon steps out. 

She smiles. 

“It’s safe.”

Safe.

Gahyeon passes out. 

Embraced by a timeless darkness, she floats in a void that has no beginning and no end. There’s no feeling, no existing, no anything at all for an eternity that could be contained within a blink of an eye. Given the choice, Gahyeon would consider staying in this harmless and painless and everything-less state, but she’s not even here; she’s nowhere, her spirit drifting in the emptiness of oblivion, lost in a sea of nihility. 

Gahyeon returns to being at the insistent call of her name. 

“Gahyeon. Gahyeonnie~ Wake up!”

It’s easier said than done as Gahyeon struggles to reconnect to her senses and motor functions. The abyss she’s crawling out of continues to cling to her, dragging her back into its murky depths despite the husky voice trying to rouse her. 

“Gahyeonnie… Gahyeon!” A pout. “C’mon… Don’t make me go get Bora-unnie. We’ll both go deaf if I do.”

“Yah, Lee Gahyeon!”

“See? You better get up before the neighbors file a noise complaint. Right, Minji-unnie?”

“Mhm. Gahyeon-ah, you should wake up. We’re waiting on you, you know.”

“Argh, we’re gonna be late! You have one minute before I get over there and–”

Gahyeon’s eyes fly open to the most nondescript ceiling she’s ever seen. It’s that classic, off-white popcorn stipple texture worn by hundreds and thousands of buildings all over the world, the kind that seems vaguely dated and would probably rain down asbestos if poked the wrong way. It’s mind-numbingly plain, and Gahyeon almost starts fading away again, her eyelids fluttering shut until she remembers reality and jerks to full awareness. 

Gahyeon bolts upright, throwing the covers off of her as she sits up. She’s immediately answered by a throbbing pain in her leg, and she looks down to see a rudimentary splint bound around her left ankle. 

Something throbs in Gahyeon’s chest, low but light. It has the airy scent of nostalgia but the earthiness of gratitude, both entwined with some sort of nebulous remorse Gahyeon doesn’t know how to disengage. It hangs over her like a cloud, weighing her down with its mere presence, and Gahyeon is forced to combat it the only way she knows how: by seeking out the only three people that matter anymore. 

It’s a challenge just leaving this tiny bedroom. Gahyeon nearly falls flat on her face the instant she tries to stand up, unaccustomed to having to put all her weight on one foot. There’s no choice though, not with the sorry state of her injury. It reduces her to having to rely on the wall and anything else within arm’s reach for support as she staggers into the hallway. 

“Hello?” she tries to call out, but her words are trapped by invisible thorns that have taken residence in her throat. They burn with thirst, and Gahyeon wonders how long she’s been out as she limps towards what’s hopefully the kitchen. 

There’s only one person sitting at the dining table there, though ‘sprawled’ is more accurate of a term considering how they’re slouched over. Their face is tucked out of view, hidden in their arms, but Gahyeon doesn’t need to look to know who it is.

“Yubin-unnie,” she croaks. 

Yubin lifts her head up, her eyes dull until they light up with recognition and relief. 

“You’re awake,” she breathes out before immediately rushing over to guide Gahyeon to the closest chair. She vanishes from Gahyeon’s side for a second only to return with a bottle of water. “Here, drink,” she orders, and Gahyeon doesn’t have to be told twice. 

“How long have I been out?” she asks once her voice no longer feels like it’s being dragged through hot coal to produce sound. 

Yubin starts to comb through Gahyeon’s hair, gently untangling any knots she comes across.

“It’s been almost a day,” she murmurs. “You passed out yesterday afternoon—scared the crap out of us, by the way—and now it’s afternoon again.”

“I’m sorry–”

“Don’t be.”

Gahyeon bites her lower lip before looking over her shoulder to meet Yubin’s ever patient gaze.

“Where are…?”

The last few strands of her hair slip through Yubin’s fingers as the older woman steps away. 

“They’re outside. Talking,” Yubin says with a casual shrug, and Gahyeon wonders if she imagined the tiny sigh she heard punctuating Yubin’s sentence. There’s no time to ask though, for Yubin begins to rummage through a cupboard with her back to Gahyeon. She quickly pulls out a can and sets it near the stove, which springs to life with a loud click and the hiss of flames. “Let me get you something to eat, and then I’ll go tell them that you’re awake.”

It takes Yubin a surprisingly long while to return. In fact, she still hasn’t come back, not even after Gahyeon has demolished her meal. Granted, Gahyeon practically inhaled the bowl of chicken noodle soup as soon as it was placed in front of her, but it’s been nearly ten minutes after that and there’s still no sign of Yubin, Handong, or Yoohyeon. 

It doesn’t take much longer for the anxiousness to start crawling underneath Gahyeon’s skin. It feels almost like an electric tingle, one that envelops her whole body with a restlessness that threatens to upend everything she just ate. Even sitting feels nauseating, and Gahyeon decides to just get up and find them before her emotions fall apart like a flimsy house of cards. 

Not even three steps forward and her leg gives out. 

Again. 

Gahyeon catches herself on the closest chair, and the tears start to build up right as the door finally opens. 

“Gahyeon!?”

Yoohyeon is by her side in an instant, helping her back into her seat. Out of the corner of her eye, Gahyeon notices Handong whispering something to Yubin, but then Yoohyeon tucks Gahyeon’s face into the crook of her neck as she squeezes her in an embrace. It’s warmly suffocating, and Gahyeon forgets everything else and melts into Yoohyeon’s arms. 

That is until Handong suddenly raises her voice. 

“It’s the truth!”

Gahyeon jumps in Yoohyeon’s hold. Her head snapping to the source of the commotion, she turns to see Handong standing with her fists clenched as Yubin glares back at her. 

“It’s the truth,” Handong repeats, this time speaking through gritted teeth in a more controlled but no less upset tone. “We all saw! She can barely stand.”

Gahyeon flinches. 

“Sorry–”

“It’s not your fault,” Yubin interrupts Gahyeon’s apology quite sharply, her gaze still locked with Handong. She crosses her arms. “You can’t blame her for–”

“I’m not blaming her, I’m just stating the truth!” Handong shouts. “There is no way she’s making it back down this stupid mountain like this.”

“Wait.” Gahyeon detaches herself from Yoohyeon as icy fear begins to inch towards her heart again. “Why are we talking about leaving already?”

Nobody answers her. 

“Guys!” Gahyeon demands. “What’s going on? Is it not safe?”

Yoohyeon swallows visibly, and the weariness that crosses her face makes her look as though she’s aged years in the span of seconds. 

“It’s safe, but…” Yoohyeon pauses to sigh, and Yubin takes that chance to cut in. 

“I’m going outside,” she announces, and without waiting for an answer, she storms up to the front door, wrenches it open, and shuts it behind her with a slam. 

“… Unnie?” Gahyeon prompts the now silent room, her voice trembling. 

Yoohyeon sighs again, though this time she’s unable to fully hide what it really is: a cut off sob. 

Handong, deflated and defeated, answers for her. 

“There’s no water,” she says flatly. “Apparently the owners of this lodge only come by once or twice a year, so the town shuts off their water until they come back.”

Despite just having eaten, Gahyeon feels an emptiness deep in the pits of her stomach. 

“By town you mean…”

“The place we passed yesterday, yep.” Handong gives a humorless laugh. “We found a note saying to call down there to have the water turned back on, but as we all know…”

Gahyeon grabs a fistful of her own hair as the entirety of the situation hits her. The crinkled bottle she completely drained just minutes ago sits on the table in front of her, mocking her.

“S– So what do we do?” she asks. “How much water do we have left?”

“Not enough,” Yoohyeon says quietly. “About three or four days, maybe? There’s four of us here, so we’ll have to leave this mountain to find more water sooner or later. Problem is…”

“Problem is that walking back down is going to take almost a week, and that’s if and only if we walk at a normal pace,” Handong finishes, the hopeless hypothetical looming over them all. 

Gahyeon closes her eyes, suddenly wishing she hadn’t woken up. 

What’s the point? she wants to ask. What's the point of waking up to nightmare after nightmare, disaster after disaster, loss after loss?

Even crying feels useless and wasteful now. Weeping like an inconsolable child would just squander the water she’s already consumed, and, as Gahyeon has learned these past few days, tears accomplish nothing. Plus, she’s already enough of a burden as is without acting out. A part of her does want to lash out in unjustified anger, but it's not the unnies’ fault that nothing has worked out, it’s really not. Besides, who is she to point fingers and lay blame when even now she’s still half-expecting, half-wishing for Yubin to come through the door with a new idea to save them all?

How pathetic. 

Almost as if directly rebuffing Gahyeon’s parasitic selfishness, Yubin spends the next day avoiding everyone. She drifts about from room to room, never sharing the same space with another soul for more than a minute. She can’t seem to meet anyone’s eyes either, and Gahyeon thinks not for the first time that responsibility is such a cruel chain. 

Yoohyeon, bless her heart, is the one who corners Yubin in the end. Gahyeon is somewhere in between dozing off and passing out that night when she hears murmurs through the wall. She’s unable to catch any of the words being spoken, but the soothing intonation and rhythm of Yoohyeon’s voice is recognizable anywhere. It’s soft, lilting like a song, and Gahyeon finds her body sinking into a comfortable darkness. 

She falls asleep to the sound of Yubin finally allowing herself to cry again. 

Gahyeon misses when Yubin and Handong have their reconciliation, but the two of them are talking again by the subsequent afternoon. In fact, they’re glued at the hip for most of the day, speaking in whispered undertones. Perhaps it’s the emptying hourglass that has pushed them back together; forgiveness seems easier to find under a time limit. 

Gahyeon receives her apology in the dead of night. She almost chokes on fear when the door inches open with a squeak of the hinges, but the shadowed silhouette cast against the opposite wall is one she recognizes. It lingers by the doorway, unmoving, and Gahyeon likewise pretends to be asleep. 

“Gahyeon-ah.”

Yubin’s tone doesn’t seem to ask for any response. 

“I just wanted you to know… I’m sorry. I tried. I wouldn’t have led us all here if I knew it would end up like this. Sorry.”

Don’t be.

The two syllables rise to the tip of her tongue, waiting to be returned. Gahyeon turns in her bed, mindful of her leg. By the time she manages to flip over, however, the door has already shut. 

Heart heavy but warm, she resolves to say something tomorrow. 

The morning has come and gone by the time Gahyeon wakes up. It might even be two or three in the afternoon when she finally forces her uncooperative body out of bed. A part of her makes note that she’s been sleeping in more and more with each passing day, but a larger part of her just doesn’t care anymore. 

What’s the point?

Gahyeon rubs a crusty eye before limping sluggishly into the kitchen. One of the last few remaining bottles of water (Gahyeon prays it’s not actually the last) sits on the table, glinting under the autumn sunlight, but she ignores it. Her friends will probably force it on her sooner or later, judging by how they’ve unevenly rationed their dwindling supplies (Gahyeon has a feeling Yoohyeon will go delirious with thirst first), but Gahyeon doesn’t feel like giving in just yet. Her parched mouth protests, but she continues ignoring it in lieu of heading outside. 

The last thing she expects to see when she opens the door is two people walking away into the tree line. They move with purpose, each step deliberate and determined, and Gahyeon watches with an absentminded curiosity until an errant suspicion strikes her like a bolt out of the blue. 

They’re abandoning her.

“H– Hey!” Gahyeon calls out, panicked desperation beating the rawness in her throat. 

The figures continue moving away. 

“Guys!” Gahyeon tries again. She grabs her defunct leg with both hands and literally drags it with her as she attempts to chase after her friends before it’s too late. As expected though, she can’t keep up, and one misstep sends her tumbling to the ground. 

Handong and Yubin pause, and Gahyeon takes the chance to get back up and try again. 

“Gahyeon, stop.”

Yoohyeon’s voice is hoarse, but her arms are unyielding as she traps Gahyeon in a hug from behind. 

“What do you mean ‘stop’!?” Gahyeon struggles, pushing against Yoohyeon but to no avail. “Unnie, can’t you see that they’re leaving?”

“I know.”

“You’re just going to let them?”

Dead leaves crunch under Yubin’s shoes as she returns a few paces back to Gahyeon. 

“I’m sorry,” she says. “It’s better this way.”

“Better?” Gahyeon echoes in disbelief. “Where are you going to go? Where can you go?”

“Anywhere but here,” Handong replies with an unexpected venom that has Gahyeon reeling back. She’s the coldest Gahyeon has ever seen her as she stalks back to the group with shovel in hand, and she fixes Gahyeon with a harsh gaze filled with ice. “Do you really expect us to just wait to die here?”

Right.

Of course. 

Gahyeon’s fighting spirit is extinguished in one fell swoop as understanding descends upon her like a weighted mantle holding her down. She should have expected this, honestly; Handong had already spelled out what it would take to survive, and like she said, does Gahyeon really expect for them to die here with her?

Weren’t Siyeon, Minji, and Bora already enough?

Gahyeon surrenders all strength in her body, and Handong takes that as her cue to grab Yubin by the elbow. 

“Let’s go,” Handong says. “We’ve wasted enough time.”

“I’m sorry,” Yubin apologizes again. To whom, Gahyeon doesn’t know. 

A question springs to mind as Gahyeon watches two of her most cherished friends turn their backs away while her last remaining companion holds her upright. 

“Wait– Wait,” she calls out weakly, and by some small mercy, Yubin and Handong do stop in their tracks to listen. “Why aren’t you taking Yoohyeon-unnie with you?”

Yubin looks over her shoulder, and to Gahyeon’s surprise, she’s smiling. 

“It’s better this way,” she says. 

Like a stone sinking into the ocean, Yubin departs with Handong into the forest gloom. Mist enshrouds them bit by bit, blurring their outlines, but Gahyeon forces herself to bear witness to every step they take out of her life. At some point—far too quickly—they become indistinguishable, and at another point—far too slowly—Gahyeon comes to the realization that there’s nothing there anymore. 

They’re gone. 

The absence they leave behind is haunting. There’s so much emptiness and silence, so much dead air that’s supposed to be filled by two (five) more people. Instead, there are only long shadows and longer sighs as Gahyeon curls up on the couch and listens to Yoohyeon breathe. 

It’s a reminder that she’s not completely alone. 

In and out, in and out, in and out… Gahyeon idly tries to match with the timing of Yoohyeon’s exhales in a bid to keep her mind from straying to more painful places. She actually manages to build up quite the streak until slumber begins to claw at her, though the rumbling of her stomach and the dryness of her mouth keep her half-awake. They trap her in an in-between of partial lucidity, one where thoughts go off on their own tangents with no regard for how much it would hurt. 

Will a day come when reminiscing will no longer ache like this?

A strange sound breaks Gahyeon out of a random memory of Handong crying after an amusement park ride gone wrong, much to everyone else’s entertainment. It’s dark outside, a fact Gahyeon dimly registers as she lifts her heavy head and listens more closely for whatever pulled her out of her bittersweet reverie. 

There it is again, a peculiar spurting sound. 

It happens two more times before there’s a sudden rush of noise from the kitchen, and Gahyeon can only stare in uncomprehending amazement as water comes gushing out of the faucet in an unending tide. 

Yoohyeon immediately leaps into action. It’s almost as though she was anticipating this spontaneous miracle, for she wastes no time in grabbing nearby bowls and discarded bottles and shoving them under the tap to collect everything that comes flowing out of it. There’s no hesitation in her actions, no confusion, and that’s what pushes the puzzle pieces together for Gahyeon. 

“… You knew.”

Even from behind, Gahyeon can see how Yoohyeon stiffens at the accusation. She lifts her head from where she was drinking directly from the tap, wipes her mouth with her sleeve, and turns off the water all without ever turning around. 

Her silence says enough. 

Gahyeon clenches her fists, a sudden surge of emotion welling up inside of her. It’s fiery hot, burning her lungs and stinging her eyes, and this time she lets her unbidden anger explode outwards. 

“You knew. You knew this was going to happen,” she states, and once the words start coming, they don’t stop. “You knew the water was going to come back. You knew they were going to try to turn it on, didn’t you? Which means you knew Handong-unnie was lying. You knew they weren’t leaving to save themselves. You knew they were leaving to go out there with those things… And you’re okay with that!?”

Yoohyeon spins around with tears rolling down her face.

“Of course I’m not!” she yells. “How could I possibly be okay?”

“Then why didn’t you stop them!?”

“Because we promised!” 

“Promised what?” Gahyeon screams. “What else did you guys decide without telling me!?”

Yoohyeon’s entire expression twists in anguish. She takes a second to compose herself, sucking in a breath, and despite her best efforts, it takes another couple attempts before she’s able to speak in a steady enough voice.

“We all promised each other that we’d do whatever it takes to protect you.”

Gahyeon falls to her knees. 

“Why?” she whispers. “Why me?”

Through the pain, Yoohyeon offers a familiar smile.

“Why not you?”

Gahyeon stares. She stares at the face that has always comforted her, stares at the existence that has always given her hope, and she stares at the person who shouldn’t be standing there alone.

“Yoohyeon-unnie,” she calls out brokenly. “Handong-unnie and Yubin-unnie… They’re coming back soon, right? Right?”

They never do. 

(They’ve always been there for Gahyeon, Yubin and Handong. They were there from day one to day one hundred to day one thousand, and they were supposed to be there for her for thousands more. 

Now, Gahyeon wonders how a house is supposed to stand without its pillars.)

Gahyeon doesn’t talk to Yoohyeon for days.

She stays locked in her room, confined to her bed, trapped by the sorrow that’s been consuming her now that there’s time to think and time to feel courtesy of Yubin and Handong’s parting gifts of a lie and their lives. Thanks to their sacrifice (Gahyeon hates that word now), there’s no need to go anywhere anymore, and so Gahyeon remains, rooted in place and stagnant. 

As inert as her body may be, her mind doesn’t get much rest. She rotates through nearly all stages of grief on a regular basis, though she finds herself somewhere in between anger and depression the most. In comparison, acceptance is so far away it might as well not exist, and Gahyeon doesn’t know how she’s supposed to live with the fact that she never got to tell her friends goodbye. 

And yet time goes on. 

The sun relentlessly rises and sets in its never-ending cycle, uncaring of the plight and suffering of those under its radiance. On the contrary, Yoohyeon is as kind as ever, wordlessly bringing Gahyeon three meals every single day even as Gahyeon avoids her. She never pushes, never intrudes, and always has a smile ready on the rare occasion she’s outside the door when Gahyeon opens it. There are times when it looks as though she’s about to say something, but she never does and merely takes away Gahyeon’s partially finished food without a word. 

After the fifth time they have a silent run-in, Gahyeon starts to suspect that Yoohyeon lurks outside her room just to catch that glimpse of each other. She’s almost as sure of the fact that it’s guilt that she keeps seeing in Yoohyeon’s eyes every time she turns away, which is quite ironic. 

Gahyeon is the guilty one here. 

It should have been her five times over, and yet here she is, doing nothing and being deadweight again. 

It’s thoughts like this that keep Gahyeon up on one particularly quiet night. The wind is calm for once, leaving nature’s denizens to fill the air with their muted nocturnal commotion. Another sound accompanies them: poorly muffled sniffs passing through the walls as they have been every night since Yubin and Handong left. 

Gahyeon sighs and closes her eyes, her energy nonexistent despite having done nothing all day. Her own tears start to form, and she almost wants to laugh derisively at how the two of them are hurting so much, even if they’re both hurting in different ways. A flash of anger rips through her once again at the reminder that Yoohyeon knew, but it easily dies down as Gahyeon tells herself that knowing surely comes with a price Gahyeon will never truly understand. 

And of course, there goes the guilt again. 

Gahyeon is tired of it. 

She spontaneously throws her pillow aside as she rises out of bed, stumbling a bit as she goes. Luckily, she’s quick to catch herself this time, and now that she’s finally moving, she reaches the door in a matter of seconds. 

Entering Yoohyeon’s room takes considerably longer. When Yoohyeon lets out a long whimper, however, Gahyeon steels herself and practically throws the door open. 

“G– Gahyeon!? Sorry, did I wake you? I didn’t mean–”

“Move over,” Gahyeon orders. 

“H– Huh?” 

“Move over,” Gahyeon repeats, already sliding under Yoohyeon’s covers. “It’s cold.”

Yoohyeon scrambles to make room on the tiny bed as soon as she registers Gahyeon’s words. Her eyes are wide with surprise, which Gahyeon ignores. She doesn’t have the energy to hold a deep conversation, and it seems that Yoohyeon doesn’t either. She simply stares for a solid minute before slowly, cautiously lifting an arm in Gahyeon’s direction. 

Gahyeon makes it easier for the both of them by snuggling right up to Yoohyeon. 

“M’sorry,” she mumbles. 

“So am I,” Yoohyeon murmurs as she pulls Gahyeon closer. 

Although her injury makes it difficult for the both of them to be a hundred percent comfortable, Gahyeon finds herself being lulled to sleep by the rhythmic rise and fall of Yoohyeon’s chest. It’s warm in her arms, warm like summer sunshine and memories of better days, and Gahyeon can only hope she’s able to provide even a breath of that in return. 

It’s safe to say she did when Yoohyeon greets her in the morning with a grin so wide that it has Gahyeon looking forward to tomorrow for the first time.

Autumn dies as Gahyeon eases back into the world of the living. Life at the cabin is quiet, their daily routines marked only by breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Their meals are humble, sufficient but not filling, and, likewise, showers are rare for the sake of being conservative with their resources. Electricity and gas, on the other hand, they’re forced to use regularly as the days grow shorter and the nights grow longer, bringing in a cold that only the heater and stove can fend off. 

It’s even harder to ration power when Gahyeon finds a charging cable in a cabinet one day. She immediately plugs it into her phone, her fingers trembling as she waits for the device to light up. She jumps when it does, only to deflate when she realizes it’s just the empty battery symbol indicating that her phone is absolutely out of juice and needs time to revive itself. Her disappointment doubles when it finally turns on just to say that there’s still no reception nor any local internet connections to establish. Feeling ever so cut off from the rest of the world, Gahyeon sighs and lets her thumb drift across the screen. 

The Photos application opens, and Gahyeon is promptly seized by a chest-crushing ache. It leaves her torn between crying and smiling, the needle between the two bouncing back and forth like a metronome with every picture she swipes past. 

The pain wins out in the end. Yoohyeon finds Gahyeon on the couch, sniffling pathetically as she replays a video of the seven of them setting a grill on fire. Yoohyeon freezes when she peers over just in time to see Minji laughing merrily as a piece of lettuce burns to a crisp, but rather than joining Gahyeon with the waterworks, she simply puts her hand on Gahyeon’s shoulders and gives a squeeze. 

A week later, the two of them venture outside. They don’t stray too far, staying well within the cabin’s perimeter as they search for sticks and stones. Yoohyeon remains on guard the entire time, eyes peeled for any suspicious movement while Gahyeon focuses on assembling everything into neat piles. It doesn’t take too long for her to make five little monuments, and snow begins to fall right as she puts the final rock in place. 

“Hey, are you guys watching?” Yoohyeon asks the sky. Her voice wavers a bit and the tears at the corner of her eyes build up enough to sparkle like snowflakes, but she powers through to offer a smile. “I hope you guys are having fun up there.”

“But not too much fun,” Gahyeon adds for old times’ sake. She sniffs and wipes her nose. “Don’t forget about us, okay? Because we won’t forget about you.”

A flock of birds choose that moment to alight, ascending into the air as one. They circle the clearing once, then twice before climbing higher and higher and higher. Gahyeon watches them go, her tears flowing freely now, and next to her, Yoohyeon raises her hand. 

“Bye,” she whispers, and then the birds are gone. 

Winter passes like a dream. 

The days blend together, Yoohyeon and Gahyeon keeping each other occupied as an indefinitely infinite amount of time goes by. With all their necessities taken care of, ennui becomes their biggest opponent as they wait without knowing what they’re waiting for. Even sleeping becomes boring at some point, and Gahyeon habitually checks her phone for any sign of change. In the meantime, board games and playing cards left behind by the cabin’s owners are a godsend, though Gahyeon has to issue a silent apology when they get tired of playing poker for the nth time and wind up stashing cards in random places for each other to find. 

Of course, Gahyeon and Yoohyeon talk. They talk, sometimes about innocuous things like how all their gaming apps depend too much on the internet, sometimes about more serious matters that leave them on the edge of arguing. Knowing that they only have each other though, and knowing that Yoohyeon is one of the kindest people she’s ever met, Gahyeon finds it hard to stay mad at her for too long even if some of the wounds related to them still refuse to heal. In the same vein, she gradually gets used to walking with the limp she’s sure she’ll have for the rest of her life.

Time can’t fix everything.

In an attempt at closure that they try to frame as a search for hope, Gahyeon and Yoohyeon make one excursion to the nearby village. They move slowly, anticipation outweighed easily by caution and dread, and judging by the way Yoohyeon keeps biting her lower lip out of nerves, Gahyeon knows she’s not the only one half-wishing they’d turn around the closer they get. Still, there’s a chance that the world has moved on while they’ve been hiding away, and maybe, just maybe they’ll find a pair of familiar smirks asking why it took them so long to get back here.

… Gahyeon doesn’t really think they will.

The actual village turns out even worse than expected. The nauseating stench of death and rot fills the air even before the first building comes into sight. Yoohyeon has to stop against a tree, her hand clamped over her mouth, and Gahyeon likewise finds her guts twisting with more than just nerves. 

In the end, they’re forced to retreat when something under a dusty car lets out a rattle of a groan. A silhouette of an incomplete, dessicated hand reaches out from under the bumper, and at that point, Gahyeon’s panic kicks into full drive. She grabs a frozen Yoohyeon, turns around, and runs.

They don’t dare stray from the cabin after that. It’s for the best, especially when the two of them hear a creature skulking around outside a few nights later. One of its feet drags along the dirt at an uneven rhythm more lopsided than even Gahyeon’s gait, and it seems to have something metal in tow judging from the sharp crunch of gravel accompanying every step it takes. Gahyeon loses at least a year off her life when another creature suddenly bangs on a window on the other side of the lodge, and she barely dares to breathe as she hides under the table with Yoohyeon clinging to her with a vise-like grip. They wind up falling asleep like that, and by the time they wake with sore necks, their visitors have long departed, leaving behind a sense of dread and a clear reminder that the world is still a nightmare. 

Nonetheless, spring arrives. 

The forest gradually comes back alive. Birds return to sing their songs, tiny critters emerge from their burrows, and Gahyeon and Yoohyeon decide to take down the string of cans they had tied around the perimeter of the cabin as an alarm system when a deer wanders into the line. Gahyeon jokes about catching it and cooking it, but that idea is vetoed by Yoohyeon bringing out the puppy eyes and whining about Bambi never being born.

Food will become a problem sooner or later though, Gahyeon knows. Aside from indulging themselves on their birthdays (‘their’ including Yubin and Handong), they’ve been careful with their stockpile of canned goods. Even so, the pantry is a lot emptier than it was when they first got here, and it’s only a matter of time before they’re forced to look outwards for supplies. 

Their sign comes in the form of a loud yelp echoing through the hallway one lazy afternoon. 

Gahyeon bursts into Yoohyeon’s room armed with a frying pan hot off the stove. She raises it above her head, ready to clobber any sign of a threat, but all she sees is Yoohyeon clutching her phone with her eyes wide. 

“Unnie,” Gahyeon says exasperatedly, lowering her arms. “Just because you got stuck in Solitaire doesn’t mean—“

“No, look!” Yoohyeon urges as she clambers out of bed to shove her phone in Gahyeon’s face. 

—City, where the provisional government is offering food, shelter, and medical attention. All survivors are welcome, though you will be subject to a fourteen day quarantine upon arrival. Weapons must be surrendered at the military checkpoint, and— 

Gahyeon snatches the phone out of Yoohyeon’s hands. She scrolls up and down the page several times, eyes flying from word to word as she processes just exactly what Yoohyeon has found. 

Salvation. 

“I was just messing around when I suddenly got a signal,” Yoohyeon explains. “A lot of sites are down, but the bigger ones all link to resource pages like this one.” 

Gahyeon sucks in a breath before letting it out in  a shaky, hopeful chuckle. 

“So society’s still out there, huh?”

The two of them unanimously decide to leave within a month. They plan their journey as carefully as they can; the stronghold listed on the site isn’t too far away, but it’ll still be days upon days of walking. Gahyeon jury-rigs a backpack out of some bedsheets, while Yoohyeon cobbles together a portable tent out of thicker curtains. The curtain rod gets converted into the shaft of a walking stick, which Gahyeon then ties a knife to for good measure. They pack up the remainder of their food and water, timing it so that they leave with as much as they can carry and as little as possible left to waste in the lodge. 

“I think I’m actually going to miss this place,” Yoohyeon says wistfully the morning they depart. 

Gahyeon glances around the cabin. She lingers on the windowsill that Handong would have claimed as her own, the porch view that Minji would have undoubtedly loved, the kitchen that would have been Bora’s domain, the couch that Yubin would have lounged on with a book open, the table Siyeon would have sat at while she sang for all to hear… 

“I’ll miss this place too,” Gahyeon agrees. She grabs Yoohyeon’s hand before they can take the final step outside. “Hey, unnie…”

Yoohyeon tilts her head. 

“Hm?”

“Let’s make a new promise,” Gahyeon says. She waits until Yoohyeon turns to fully face her before she continues. “Unnie, let’s promise that no matter what, the two of us are going to go home someday. Together.”

“Together,” Yoohyeon echoes with a soft smile. “Let’s go home together.”

Once more, with much in their hearts, they walk.

Gahyeon loses track of the days. They pass endless fields and forests, crossing countless roads and rivers, traveling under the open sky until evening falls and shrouds the world in darkness. At first, it’s strange being so exposed to nature after months of living indoors, but Gahyeon adjusts surprisingly quickly. 

It helps that Yoohyeon’s here to share every step of the way. 

“Oh my gosh, did you see that rabbit family?” she asks one sunny morning. “If Pie were here, she’d be a kite,” she jokes during a gusty afternoon. “Hey, I think that’s Orion’s Belt,” she says on a starry night. “Goodnight, love you,” she mumbles as Gahyeon watches her go to sleep. 

Eventually, after a fortuitously uneventful journey, the two of them arrive at the outskirts of a city. It’s a far cry from the bustling town it used to be, nothing but the wind blowing through deserted streets lined with abandoned cars. Plants have yet to reclaim the land; Gahyeon supposes they’re still a few years too early for the classic, overgrown, concrete-jungle-meets-actual-jungle look often portrayed in movies and games. She’s personally in no rush to see such a thing come to pass. 

Gahyeon’s idle thoughts are interrupted when they come across a set of giant metal shipping containers blocking the street leading into the heart of the city. Path impeded, they take a detour down another block only to find the same thing. Their third try is ruled out by a line of buses parked sideways, and after another half hour of finding no way forward, Gahyeon’s hunch is confirmed. 

“They’re using these as barricades,” she informs Yoohyeon as they stand in front of yet another shipping container. “They’ve probably set up a whole wall of these.”

“So where’s the entrance then?” Yoohyeon frowns. “You’d think they’d put up some signs or something…”

Alas, there are no directions, and the two of them are forced to check street after street for some sort of opening. The notion that they’re so close to finding safety has Gahyeon’s skin tingling with anticipation, and an unscratchable itch starts to form at the back of her mind with every dead end they come across. 

It’s Yoohyeon who voices her doubts first. 

“They really don’t want anyone getting in, do they?” she sighs. 

“They’re trying to keep those things out,” Gahyeon mutters. She warily scans the various shops they’re passing by. “Who knows how many there are around here?”

She gets her answer when Yoohyeon accidentally kicks a can into a subway entrance. 

It all happens so quickly: the can rattles its way into the darkness down the stairs, it comes to an abrupt stop, a groan echoes up the stairwell, and then they come. 

Before the deja vu can fully hit her, Gahyeon runs. She yanks at Yoohyeon’s backpack as she bolts away, fear numbing everything except for the adrenaline pumping through her veins. She eventually lets go when Yoohyeon properly regains her bearings, and the two of them concentrate on sprinting away from the horde. 

To Gahyeon’s surprise, the crowd doesn’t seem to be catching up. She doesn’t dare to turn around and actually check, but the frenzied rasps and moans chasing don’t increase in volume. A part of Gahyeon wonders how long they’ve been there, wonders how much their bodies have fallen apart. 

And then they reach another goddamn dead end. 

“Oh, come on!” Yoohyeon smacks her own forehead in frustration. 

“What do we do?” Gahyeon asks hurriedly as she stares up at the rusted red of the container blocking their way. 

Yoohyeon inhales sharply before suddenly crouching down. 

“Hurry, I’ll give you a boost,” she says, hands cupped as a foothold. 

Their pursuers don’t give Gahyeon time to think about it. In the split second that she glances over, she counts a dozen of those monsters crawling and limping and dragging their broken, decaying bodies forward. The distance between them is rapidly closing, and so Gahyeon places her hand on Yoohyeon’s shoulder for balance, places her good foot in Yoohyeon’s grip, and jumps. 

Gahyeon manages to make it onto the top with that one try. She hoists herself over properly before immediately spinning around and lowering her arm. 

“Come on!” she calls out. 

Yoohyeon shrugs off her bag and tosses it up next to Gahyeon. She grunts with exertion when she leaps to grab Gahyeon’s hand, and she grunts again in surprise when Gahyeon abruptly lets go. 

“Back off!” Gahyeon yells as she reappears at the edge with her makeshift spear. She lodges it straight in the skull of the creature that was about to grab Yoohyeon before quickly reaching out again. “Unnie, hurry!”

When Yoohyeon fails to climb up a second time, Gahyeon sees it. She sees that familiar expression, that determined resignation, that defiant surrender she’s already seen far too many times from those she loves. 

“Unnie, no!” 

“Take care, Gahyeon-ah.”

“Unnie, you promised!” Gahyeon screams. Her fingers start hurting with how desperately she reaches for Yoohyeon even as Yoohyeon refuses to take her hand. “You promised me! You promised we’d go home together!”

“Sorry,” Yoohyeon chuckles. “I’ve never been good at keeping my promises with you, have I?”

The second monster latches onto Yoohyeon from behind. Gahyeon swaps back to her spear, but by then a third, fourth, and fifth assailant has already caught up. The sixth and seventh use the pile of bodies as leverage to reach for Gahyeon, but Yoohyeon yanks them down forcefully even as her face twists in pain. 

Yoohyeon looks up. 

“Go, Gahyeon. Live,” she says. 

Gahyeon will never forget that final smile for the rest of her life. 

(There’s a saying, that someone is too good for the world. 

Yoohyeon fits the bill perfectly; she’s too good for the world, too good for this world, and now she’s gone.)

A year passes. 

Then two. 

Then three. 

Then four. 

Then five. 

Then six. 

Then seven. 

Gahyeon misses the day that officially marks when the time she’s lived with them has been surpassed by the time she’s lived without. In fact, it doesn’t cross her mind until months later, her attention directed towards the day-to-day minutiae of surviving in a community instead. 

It still stings sometimes, how Yoohyeon was so close to reaching this place. Had she been able to make it through the wall in time, she would have witnessed soldiers rushing up to her. She would have been ushered into a truck as they shouted about that unsecured portion of the city, and she would have heard one of the captains make a promise that they’d do better for the sake of those risking the journey here. She would have been bored out of her mind in quarantine, and then she would have stepped into a world where nightmares are kept at bay as everyone tries to rebuild civilization together. 

She certainly wouldn’t have spent her first weeks here practically catatonic with grief. 

It took Gahyeon a while to integrate into this refuge. People were quite understanding—likely because they’ve all had their share of trauma and loss—and there wasn’t any pressure for Gahyeon to contribute to society. Instead, she eased her way into helping out, starting by offering to wash dishes for the woman who always brought her food. That eventually expanded into Gahyeon participating in meal prep in the communal kitchens before morphing into her doing what the woman had done for her: making sure newcomers are fed. It was hard at first, seeing so many weary and worn out travelers carrying countless ghosts, but out of a sense of kinship and sympathy, Gahyeon stood by her duty and ensured that they were all taken care of. 

And so life went on. 

The human population gradually increased, the city’s safe bubble slowly expanded, and step by tiny step, things have been returning to as close to normal as possible. 

A year into Gahyeon’s stay, she finally found the passcode to unlock Yoohyeon’s phone. She had tried all sorts of combinations ranging from Siyeon’s birthday to the date Yoohyeon saw her favorite artist in concert, all to no avail. It wound up being the day that Yoohyeon first got Pie, and, honestly, Gahyeon only half-remembered the occasion. She stumbled upon the rest of the code through sheer luck and promptly discovered a message dedicated to her right at the top of the Notes app. She’s since read it hundreds of times, going back to it whenever she’s sad, whenever she’s happy, and simply whenever she misses Yoohyeon, Handong, Yubin, Bora, Minji, and Siyeon. 

To our dearest Gahyeon, 

If you’re reading this, I am either no longer here or I forgot to delete this LOL

Either way, by the time you read this, a lot has probably happened, right? I hope you’re doing well, wherever you are and whoever you’re with. You’ve always been a smart cookie though, so I’m sure you’re fine. 

… There was a lot I wanted to say, but now that I’m sitting here in the dark and typing this while you sleep next to me, somehow the words just aren’t coming. 

You look really cute while you sleep btw hehe

We’ve talked about this before, but in case something happens to me, I just want to say this again: everything we did, we did for you. You might think of us as selfish and cruel for making you go on with us, but we did it because if there’s any light that should continue shining, it’s yours. The world needs your smile, Gahyeonnie, so I hope that one day you’ll be able to forgive us, understand us, and smile for us. 

We’ll always be watching over you no matter where you go, and we’ll wait patiently for the day we meet again, so take your time, okay? Even if you hear Bora-unnie yelling from the afterlife. 

We love you, Gahyeon. We love you more than you’ll ever know. 

Yoohyeon

“Gahyeon-noona, help!”

Gahyeon gives a start and turns off the phone’s screen out of reflex. She looks up to see a little boy standing at the entrance to her apartment room, a bucket in his hands. 

“Noona, help! I can’t reach the faucet,” he says tearily. “The puppies are gonna die if we don’t hurry!”

“Whoa, slow down, okay?” Gahyeon gently takes the bucket from the boy with one hand and pats his head with the other. “Let’s go get the water, and why don’t you tell me exactly what’s wrong?”

“If we don’t give the puppies a bath, they’re gonna be stinky,” the boy sniffs as he grabs Gahyeon’s sleeve and leads her down the hallway. “If they’re stinky, the mommy doggie isn’t going to love them anymore, and if the mommy doggie isn’t going to love them anymore, then she isn’t going to give them milk and then–”

“Okay, no,” Gahyeon laughs. “First of all, dogs don’t need to bathe every day like we do.”

“Really?”

“Really,” Gahyeon confirms with a wise nod. “Second of all, even if they stink a little bit, the mommy doggie is still going to love them.”

“Really?” The boy’s eyes widen like saucers. “But mommy always gets mad when I don’t take a bath…”

“But she still loves you, doesn’t she?” Gahyeon reminds him. “She tells you to take a bath because she loves you.”

The boy gasps. 

“Gahyeon-noona, you’re so smart,” he exclaims. 

“She is, isn’t she?” a familiar voice cuts in. 

Gahyeon looks up to see someone standing at the entrance of the apartment complex. It’s a friend of hers, someone she met when they first got here a couple of years ago. 

“Hey,” Gahyeon greets. 

“Hey,” Jungeun returns. She leans against the door frame as she asks, “You coming to karaoke tonight? Room 102 this time.”

“Can I come?” the boy immediately interjects. 

“Sorry, adults only,” Jungeun tells him before turning back to Gahyeon. “Dahyun’s going. She’d be very happy if you went too,” she adds, wiggling her eyebrows. 

Gahyeon rolls her eyes and briefly considers smacking Jungeun with the bucket. A gentle voice in the back of her head tells her not to be a bad influence though, so she merely touches the boy’s shoulder to prompt him to head outside. 

“I’ll think about it,” she says as she walks by Jungeun.  

“That’s a yes,” Jungeun snickers before calling out again. “Wait, one more thing!”

Gahyeon pauses right under the awning, a spring breeze cooling the shadows around her. 

“That place you were talking about, the shack to the northwest…” Jungeun says, her voice softer now. “They might have found it.”

“… Oh.”

“Joohyun-unnie’s team is heading out that way on Friday, if you want to join them.”

“I will,” Gahyeon nods gratefully. “Thanks.”

Another breeze chooses that moment to pass through the entranceway. It’s stronger than the first, pushing Gahyeon from behind, and she decides to let it bring her out into the light.

She takes a step forward.

We love you more than you’ll ever know. 

As the sun shines upon her, warming her skin with its soft caress, Gahyeon looks to the sky and smiles. 

She’s already planned what she’s going to say the next time she sees them, some day in the far off future: 

Thank you, I love you, and I know.