Chapter Text
There was a guy outside his door.
Jaehyun knew this, because the guy was staring at him through the peephole with his arms raised, ready to start banging at his door again. He stared right back at him with the same intensity, perplexed that this had happened to him not once, but twice.
Last time it had been some drunk who couldn’t even tell left from right, much less recognize that his flat was next door. This time, Jaehyun concluded, it was probably a new neighbour who got lost. He couldn’t even blame the guy, because all the doors down the hallway were painted the same bleak grey.
Mustering up all the strength a scaredy-cat like him could possibly get at 1 AM, Jaehyun twisted the door open to a guy who looked straight out of an emo grunge Pinterest board. He was wearing a black graphic tee with some rock band on it, ripped jeans and accessorized with so many chains that rattled everytime the guy so as much as moved an inch.
He felt horribly underdressed in comparison, wearing an unbranded hoodie and a random pair of pants with a teddy bear print Woonhak had given him for Christmas last year.
“Hello?” Emo Guy was the first one to speak, because Jaehyun had embarrassingly been caught staring for the second time.
“Hi!” He managed to squeak out, taken aback by how handsome the guy was up-close. Emo Guy’s facial features were sharp, so sharp that it almost made him look cold and broody if it wasn’t for him lifting his pinky to the corner of his lips and pulling at them into a smile.
Jaehyun let out a nervous laugh and smiled back, uncertain, “How can I help you?”
Emo Guy’s hands fell back to his sides, and that was when Jaehyun noticed the long spaded tail wrapped around the guy’s leg. There was something about the tail that made it look nonplastic, like it wasn’t meant for Halloween horror fun. He couldn’t keep his eyes off of it, and his heart jumped up to his throat when the tail twitched.
“You’re coming with me.”
“What?” Jaehyun took a step back, his grip on the door handle a little tighter, just in case. He felt a rush of dizziness when the tail proved itself to be undeniably real by flicking away behind Emo Guy like it had a mind of its own.
“I’m here to pick you up. You sold your soul, remember?” No, Jaehyun did not remember. He would think something as life-changing as that would have made itself known to him. “No, I didn’t,” he said instead, hoping his voice wouldn’t do something stupid like tremble.
“No, you did,” the guy insisted, “I got the right address. I double-checked.”
Jaehyun tried and failed terribly to suppress the terror that was flaring up within him. He crossed his arms, tightly hugging himself and shrinking his shoulders in an attempt to appear smaller. Emo Guy didn’t seem like the type to bully a defenseless dude, maybe.
“You heard me, we need to leave soon if we want to make it in time,” Emo Guy explained, completely unaware or indifferent to Jaehyun’s bewilderment.
“To where?”
“Hell, of course.” Emo Guy replied, matter-of-fact.
Jaehyun blanched at the word ‘Hell’, and in a moment of overwhelming panic, tried to forcibly close the door in the guy’s face because inviting some kind of demonic creature into his home wasn’t on his bucket list, ever. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Emo Guy had the decency not to contribute more to his panic by repeating the word, wordlessly sticking his foot out to stop Jaehyun from closing the gap between the door and the hallway.
“Haven’t your parents taught you about ‘stranger danger’?”
“I’m Taesan,” Emo Guy, or ‘Taesan’ now, said with a smile in his voice. “See, now you know my name.”
Touché, Jaehyun thought, aggravated.
Maybe it was because Taesan was taller, but Jaehyun belatedly realized it was useless to fight against brute strength and let go of the door handle. Immediately, he grieved the barrier that was blocking him from standing face-to-face with a literal demon. “Dude, this isn’t very funny. I didn’t even know mythical creatures existed until a few minutes ago, and now you want to bring me to some made-up place?”
Taesan snorted, retorting, “So you’ll believe in demons, but apparently the concept of Hell is too much for you to handle?”
“Stop saying that word!” He hissed, and when Taesan merely shrugged in response, Jaehyun made a low groan of frustration from the back of his throat, moving to return to his bedroom. “Whatever, suit yourself, I’m going back to bed.”
Taesan gave him an unimpressed expression, a raise of his eyebrows and hands in a placating gesture. “I don’t want to scare you or anything, but there’s going to be problems if we get locked out of Hell,” then after a beat of silence, “no offense, by the way, but you have zero survival instincts. Who goes to bed with their doors unlocked?”
“You’re in the way!” Jaehyun exclaimed, and against his better judgement, reached out to grab Taesan’s forearm and yank him into his flat. “I’m telling you, I think you’ve got the wrong person because I’ve never sold my soul to anyone.”
Taesan let out a sound of disbelief, then with a clap of his hands caused a stack of papers to materialize out of nowhere. He held it up, looking at him straight in the eyes, and began to recite, “Myung Jaehyun, Korean, 20 and the youngest son of a Chaebol family. So why did you sell your soul away?”
Jaehyun purposefully ignored the mention of his family, instead choosing to overexaggerate his annoyance and whine, “I didn’t! That’s the point.”
“Nonsense, you must have done something. Hell wouldn’t want you otherwise. That’s immoral.”
“Immoral?” Jaehyun burst out, aghast. “You’re a demon! What can you tell me about morals?”
“Hold onto my hand,” Taesan interrupted all of a sudden. “Don’t let go, whatever happens.”
The first thing that Jaehyun noticed was how comically large Taesan’s hands were, how they covered his almost completely. It made him feel safe, which was ironic considering the guy was a hellspawn. Then when their hands interlocked, how slender and bony Taesan’s fingers were. They were different from Jaehyun’s, which according to other people that had held his hands before, were always warm and soft.
Taesan did not even let the words sink in before proceeding to whisper something, and suddenly the ground cracked and they were falling. Lightheadedness descended on him like a suffocating fog as purple light overwhelmed his vision and gravity no longer existed around them.
He heard distinct laughter from beside him, and then a voice directly in his ear, “Dongmin. If you get lost, tell them you’re here with a Han Dongmin.”
With that, Jaehyun was left on his own.
Jaehyun gained consciousness on the ground to a barely visible wispy shape hovering over him. He immediately scrambled away as far as his body allowed him to in its fatigued state, and had long forgotten the mannerisms drilled into him since young with the way his jaw had dropped, eyes wide. He felt bad for gawking at a stranger, but it was hard not to react that way to a human who looked just about see-through.
“You’re new, I suppose? You look new, anyway,” the stranger said, cautious, sympathetic, and from the looks of it, definitely pitying him. Before Jaehyun could attempt to clarify anything, the stranger pressed a bouquet of white chrysanthemums into his arms. “You’ll need it.”
“I’m sorry, I have to go.” He bowed in apology, turning away and looking out in the open space. They were at a train station, except Jaehyun hadn’t been lying down on the railway platform, but on the actual train tracks. His first instinct was to freak out for the second time, because what the actual hell was wrong with Taesan?
“You needn’t worry,” the stranger caught up to him again, “there are no trains here.” Which made sense really, because there were about a dozen train tracks branching off this one station like it was a crossroad of sorts, and there was no telling where it started or ended.
Jaehyun stood uselessly in a frozen state for a few seconds and was rudely brought back to reality when the sounds of a bell ringing from afar intruded his little daydream, then the intercom crackling to life.
“Tartarus to be closed! Tartarus to be closed!”
“Have some confidence in yourself,” the stranger advised him. “The worst thing you can do is doubt yourself here.”
Jaehyun squeezed his eyes shut, ignoring the way his heartbeat was racing so quickly in his chest it seemed to stutter in a rush of fear. He let out a measured breath, palm moving to rest on his chest in futile efforts to slow his heart down.
“You can do this, Myung Jaehyun,” he said aloud to himself, and sprinted down a train track that felt the most ‘right’ with his heart still thudding away in his ears.
Not even a few steps forward, Jaehyun staggered and was tossed into an entirely different dimension altogether, crossing boundaries into another realm. Dizziness overwhelmed his senses as an invisible force tugged at his limbs, making him tilt backwards, then the feeling of solid ground beneath his feet disappearing.
Jaehyun caught himself from falling face-first forwards, though not without letting out a yelp so loud that it scared away a flock of blackbirds from a nearby tree. The flower bouquet was not so lucky, flying straight out of his arms and sending long stems scattering onto the ground. Upon contact with the grass, the chrysanthemums wilted, leaving behind dead, shrivelled up petals.
He blinked down at the withered flowers, scuffing one with the heel of his sneaker to confirm what had transpired wasn’t a figment of his imagination.
Jaehyun shook his head to remind himself that this was probably just some kind of ordinary for this world and there was no point in overthinking it.
As Jaehyun looked around, it became apparent that the sky had dumped him into the middle of a forest. A few feet away from him down a short staircase was a tunnel, its appearance clearly weathered with time. Vines and ivy wind their way around the crumbling stone bricks, engulfing the structure whole.
He slowed to a stop in front of the tunnel, swallowing thickly at the black infinity beyond the entrance. His whole body was screaming at him not to go, to stay rooted to the spot and perhaps find another way back to his own world. He couldn’t bring himself to move his feet though. His gut feeling was telling him this wasn’t a gimmick and Taesan wasn’t bluffing either. More than anything, Jaehyun was done running away.
Without delaying the inevitable, he stepped into the pitch darkness of the tunnel.
Weightlessness washed over him and the ground cracked once again, hurtling him into yet another realm in a swirl of purple light, this time exploding in vibrancy beneath his eyelids.
Jaehyun was sure his frail heart was going to betray him one of these days if the sky kept tossing him around different realms like a ragdoll.
Taesan peered down at him, a smirk tugging at his lips, “You made it.”
Jaehyun groaned, “Hardly.”
“No time for breaks, we’re on a tight schedule,” Taesan said, extending his hand to pull him up. Jaehyun had never been so grateful to be holding someone’s hand before. “Don’t let go.”
“Wasn’t planning on it—” Jaehyun barely managed to say when Taesan broke out into a run. He was yanked along, arms flailing for a moment as his legs stumbled to regain balance. Just how much running and falling was Jaehyun going to do today?
“This is the Bridge to the Afterlife,” Taesan explained without a break in his voice despite the pace they were going at. He did hasten though when the bells from the distance rang a tad bit louder. “Where all the dead go.”
All around them was permeating pink mist, and Jaehyun twisted his head to look up at the outstretch of horizon all around them. The sky above them sat at a gorgeous shade of ombre purple, aglow with a blanket of stars that glittered and twinkled like the brightest city lights. He imagined this was what Heaven looked like, but apparently this bridge was only some kind of intermediate that connected the living and the dead.
“Hurry.” Taesan gritted out, which caused him to quicken. Either time flowed differently here, or the distance of the structure itself was misleading, because they arrived on the other side in no time.
Silver iron gates fenced off what was presumably more realms beyond his understanding. People loitered around in front of the gates, faces unusually grim, their figures fading in and out much like the stranger at the train station. They were all carrying a single lonesome stalk of white chrysanthemum, except unlike Jaehyun’s, the flowers were all in full bloom.
He tore his eyes away, allowing himself to be steered towards another direction by Taesan. Now that his attention wasn’t on the spirits, Jaehyun finally noticed the other person who had joined them at some point.
Another demon it seemed, except the guy didn’t have a tail but a set of horns. Horns which sprouted from a head of messy, brown hair. Horns which were slightly curved and ended in a definite sharp point. Jaehyun quickly looked away, embarrassed, when the guy caught him gaping.
Taesan tugged at his hand, sighing, “Myung Jaehyun, you have the attention span of an easily distracted puppy.”
Taesan’s friend chuckled at that, which only made him pout harder.
They were nearing the front of the queue now, and Jaehyun was truthfully starting to feel a lot more anxious. He had forgotten part of selling your soul meant, well, actually giving up your soul. As in, Jaehyun was going to die and there was nothing anyone could do about it. Not him, not Taesan, not Taesan’s friend.
There was a lump in his throat now—one that just wouldn’t go away. He spent his whole life being someone else’s chess piece, a puppet, and now that Jaehyun had finally tasted some semblance of freedom, he was losing it all over again.
The queue led up to a box office.
Jaehyun noticed right away that something was terribly amiss at the sight of red curtains being drawn shut inside the booth. He knew before it happened, a sense of apprehension washing over him, making him sick to his stomach.
It was as if things were in slow motion.
Somewhere far away, lightning struck. Jaehyun looked up at the sky, startled at the jagged streak that illuminated purple for a brief moment until it appeared blinding. Hope blossomed in his chest as a booming clap of thunder accompanied shortly after with so much power it felt like the ground itself shook.
There was an ear-splitting sound of metal against metal screeching now, and then somewhere the resounding bang of something being slammed shut.
Taesan’s grip tightened, the rings on his fingers pressing indents into Jaehyun’s skin. It probably wasn’t intentional, but the pain provided a sense of grounding from the dizzying sense of anxiety bubbling up in his chest.
“What’s going on? We’re not late.”
People around them seemed equally as confused, some of them surging forward in waves towards the gates, clawing at the bars in distress. The tension in the air was palpable, hanging heavily like a cloud over all of them.
“I’ll go see what’s up,” Taesan said right away, unafraid always. “Stay right here, okay?”
They watched as Taesan scurried away and disappeared into the crowd.
“So,” Taesan’s friend gave him a not-so-subtle once-over, making him tense up. “First time?”
Jaehyun laughed a little, the knot in his throat loosening a fraction, “I sure hope so. Unless you can die twice?”
The guy grinned, shrugging his shoulders a little, “You never know.” and then, “just in case we ever meet again in the future, which I’m sure we will, you can call me Leehan. I’m Taesan’s roommate.”
Jaehyun wiped the palm of his hands on his pants, offering it to Leehan. “I’m—”
“—Myung Jaehyun, I know. Taesan has been researching you for a while,” Leehan interrupted. “You should see our place. There’s fact files of you everywhere.”
Jaehyun didn’t know what to do with that information, keeping his gaze trained on the floor, heat spreading to his cheeks. “Sorry, I guess?”
“Millions of people are being locked out, and you’re telling me it’s because that man felt like it?” Taesan’s voice echoed back to them, harsh, shattering the quiet between the two.
“You know we don’t get a say in this,” someone replied in disapproval.
“Hyung, look at all these people here! They’re now going to wander around as lost spirits,” Taesan sounded genuinely angry. “Couldn’t you speak some sense into him?”
“That’s enough,” the person snapped, “this is no way to be talking to me.”
“I’m right, and you know it—”
Jaehyun exchanged one-sided glances with Leehan, who to his surprise, didn’t look as relaxed anymore and just about ready to intervene if necessary. “Taesan is really stubborn sometimes,” Leehan told him, eyebrows furrowing in worry as the bickering increased in volume. He started to walk away towards the source of the bicker, which broke Jaehyun out of his daze.
Between the time it took them to walk over there, the other person in the argument had left, leaving Taesan behind. Standing by himself there, he looked almost lost and not as invincible as Jaehyun once thought. Jaehyun decided immediately that it was weird seeing him like that.
Leehan goes up to his friend, bumping shoulders lightly. Taesan startled, the vulnerability in his demeanor melting away instantly.
“So… what does this mean for me?” Jaehyun began, cautious.
“What does this mean? It means I’m bound to you for exactly one year starting from today, until Hell opens up again.” Taesan answered, sounding much more nonchalant now that his anger was subdued. His jaw was still clenched though, so hard that Jaehyun thought it must have hurt.
“I don’t think I caught that,” he heard himself say through the shock.
Taesan sighed, tired already, “It means I’m going to be your unpaid, unwanted babysitter for the time-being.”
The ground was beginning to shake again, a low rumble of thunder in the distance. Almost like the world around them was… collapsing.
People were screaming now, except they didn’t translate into human voices but wails. High-pitched, ear-splitting wails of despair as spirits swarmed the gates. It was unsettling. Everything about this was unsettling.
Taesan grabbed his hand again, saying to Leehan, “We’ll get going now.”
We?
Leehan waved them goodbye in high spirits, totally unfazed by the chaos behind them. “Don’t have too much fun without me!”
And then they were off.
Accidental demon acquisition, that was what Jaehyun had gotten himself into by talking too much and being difficult.
Had they been there even a minute earlier, Taesan would have successfully gotten Jaehyun into Hell and gone on his merry way. Taesan hadn’t said that quite as straightforwardly, but the meaning was implied. Either way, it wouldn’t matter, because for the foreseeable future, Jaehyun was going to be living with him.
Out of all mythical creatures, Jaehyun just had to be stuck with a demon.
He unlocked the door to his flat, because they had ended up outside the hallway, and then dumped himself into a mountain of throw cushions on the couch that Woonhak had left from his visit last weekend. Taesan lingered near the entrance, and for the first time since they met, looked intimidated by his surroundings.
“I live alone,” Jaehyun pointed out as if it was not obvious enough already. “So don’t worry, no one will find out about your… identity.”
Taesan removed his sneakers, bending down and placing them on the shoe rack next to the door. He only took a few shy steps inside the living space when a nod came in his direction. Jaehyun could practically smell the introvertness from the guy.
“It’s not very big,” he continued with a strained laugh, and then immediately cringed from how flat it sounded even to his own ears. “But who needs a huge house when you’re alone anyways?”
Taesan’s gaze fell on him, making him shift uncomfortably. It wasn’t judgement, or pity, or anything. Just unspoken curiosity. “No, it’s charming in its own way.”
Jaehyun tried to see the apartment-complex through someone else’s eyes, but all that came to mind was how it was not much more than a lonely little dump. With its sinks cluttered with unwashed dishes from the previous meal and laundry baskets overflowing with weeks worth of dirty clothes, no part of his hovel was charming.
“You still haven’t clarified to me what you meant by being ‘bound’ to me,” Jaehyun spoke up, making air quotes.
“It’s complicated,” Taesan said, vaguely, like his intention was to tiptoe around the truth and soften the delivery of the news.
Silence enveloped around the room, the awkwardness making him want to squirm. Jaehyun was the first to speak up again, “Want me to make you something? We can talk over some food.”
“It’s 1 AM.”
“You tried to knock down my door at 1 AM,” Jaehyun rolled his eyes playfully. “So… Shin ramen?”
“Geez, you really are lucky, aren’t you?” Taesan commented all of a sudden, sounding impressed.
Jaehyun paused mid-chew in confusion.
“Congrats, you made it out of an unfulfilled contract without being cursed,” Taesan narrowed his eyes at the piece of paper in his hands. “Well, unfulfilled for the time-being, but still, most people who didn’t get in were all cursed.”
“Does me being somewhat lucky have anything to do with the fact I didn’t know my soul had been sold until very recently?”
“Maybe?” Taesan made a face at the paper like it had personally offended him. “Hey, I’m just as clueless as you are.”
“Okay, guess we’re going to have to find out together,” Jaehyun said cheerfully, trying to lighten up the mood. “But if you’re not supposedly bringing me any bad luck, then what are you here for?”
Taesan sighed, pushing the paper across the table to him. In big bold letters, Gothic script, it read ‘The Contract’. Then in smaller print underneath it:
1). Demon Taesan is obligated to protect mortal Jaehyun in order to ensure that his fate plays out the exact way it is meant to be.
2). In 1 year’s time, mortal Jaehyun shall give up his soul as required.
3). All relations between the two parties shall stay strictly business throughout the duration stated above.
“So you’re like my guardian angel,” was what Jaehyun concluded after reading and signing it. “But you’re a demon.”
“I guess you can say that,” Taesan replied with his eyes closed, leaning back in his chair at an angle that should have surely caused him to lose balance by now but hadn’t.
“So, how long have you been doing this?” Jaehyun asked, curious.
“Why do you need to know that?”
“I guess I just wanted to estimate how old you are,” he mumbled, embarrassed.
“That’s a tricky question,” Taesan sat back up. “I was 13 when I died. In human years I’m 19 now.”
Jaehyun let out a dramatic little gasp, incredulous, “I’m older than you?”
“By 1 year only,” Taesan huffed.
“I heard from Leehan you did a lot of research on me,” Jaehyun giggled. Taesan glared at him, and then downwards at the floor.
“You’re an idiot,” he said without any bite.
Jaehyun laughed again, smug. “Anyways, I’m gonna go back to bed. You can take the guest bedroom, the one to the left of mine.”
Taesan tilted his head in confusion, and then realization hit him. “I appreciate the thoughtfulness,” he started, “but demons don’t sleep. Immortals generally do not follow the same rules as mortals.”
“But can you?” Jaehyun asked.
“I can sleep. However, that would be pointless.”
“C’mon, I’m showing you your room then,” he said, hopping up to his feet and tipping his head towards the hallway.
It was clear that it hadn’t been used for a long time, and Jaehyun himself had probably peeked in here twice since the flat was rented. The first time while being shown around by the landlord, and the second time because of a leaky ceiling. It wasn’t much, just a single mattress on a metal frame pushed up against the wall, a tiny closet and a dresser.
While his new roommate settled in, Jaehyun located his extra linens and pillowcase. The only new ones left were a deep navy blue, which wasn’t the same as black, but Jaehyun thought it would be a nice gesture.
He worked quickly in rearranging the bed so it was less bare and more comfortable to sleep in. By the time the pillow had a fresh pillowcase and a clean blanket draped over the mattress, the air outside was less still, the silence pierced by birds chirping.
Jaehyun came back into the room with a nightlight, plugging it into the socket next to the bed. He stood back to admire his handiwork, satisfied.
“Are you going to be okay on your own?” Taesan asked tentatively on the edge of the bed where his knees were bouncing.
“Why would I not be?” he replied lamely.
“I dunno,” Taesan pursed his lips into a thin line, “I guess I feel bad for putting you through everything without telling you anything.”
Humming under his breath, Jaehyun was more interested in fidgeting with the three rings Taesan had left on the top of the dresser. He let his fingers run over every ridge and groove sculpted into the rings, and marvelled at how those accessories seem to encapsulate Taesan’s personality.
“Don’t worry about me,” he said after a while, keeping his voice casual, “I think I would’ve still been in denial if I hadn’t seen it for myself.”
Taesan looked at him for a little too long, and then offered him a small genuine smile, “Goodnight, Jaehyun. Sleep well.”
Jaehyun did not, in fact, sleep well that night.
He was secretly ecstatic to have company again but it had felt odd not hearing piercing silence in the flat, to hear every little noise, whether that be from water trickling in the pipes to the faint cries of an infant from the floor below him.
Though the demon outside his room made little to no noise, the obvious squeaking of a mattress had him sitting up, ears twitching and heart pounding.
Jaehyun had never preferred to be completely isolated and alone, thriving off people’s energy. So why did it feel so strangely intimate having a person live in the same space as him again?
It wasn’t like no one ever visited him. His brother stayed over as frequently as a man in his position could make allowances for. But that was rare and often reserved for special occasions, so Jaehyun never complained. He was grateful that his brother was even willing to still come look for him after what went down.
Jaehyun used to have a stable inner circle of friends, all thanks to his family’s connections, but as soon as his decisions meant quitting the lavish lifestyle and packing his bags for what was deemed ‘running away’, they had all forgotten about him. Which sucked temporarily, but at least it saved him the efforts of cutting out all those toxic people from his life.
Jaehyun had gone on a selected few dates, some of which had surprisingly sustained for a few months. But the relationships had always ended in distaste one way or another, so what was the point in doing something over and over again knowing that it would never work out?
He considered getting a roommate at some point. It would’ve helped him out in meeting up with rent, and also give him someone to talk to. But the thing is, rumors of his previous identity had continuously crept up on him, so either everyone was too intimidated to even consider rooming with him, or they wanted to kiss ass.
Jaehyun slinked off the mattress, deciding that sulking would only make him more upset. He rummaged through his bag for any blank surface to jot down his thoughts on and was pleased to find a clean envelope that came with the water bill. He licked the nib of his ballpoint pen, and began writing.
As the streetlamp outside began to waver, a crumpled envelope found itself buried in the trash can. No longer restless, Jaehyun returned to the comfort of his bed to dream a dreamless dream.