Chapter Text
Jisoo
Moving always feels louder than it should.
Even when the apartment is quiet.
Even when there's only one person standing inside.
Jisoo lets the door fall shut behind her as she enters the room. She listens to the sound that stays in the empty hallway outside, echoing once, then disappearing into the building like it never even happened.
Apartment number 403.
Her new place. At least, that's what she's supposed to call it now.
Her new home. And her first night here.
It doesn't feel like her, though.
Just another place she'll try to customize her life to. With people as neighbors she hasn't seen yet. People she doesn't know yet.
Maybe she's just running from real life once again. Maybe she's trying to escape the problems haunting her when she's alone. It's always the same.
Life gets hard. And she gets scared. Because she's a coward. There is no other way to put it. She doesn't face problems or difficulties. She runs from them.
Why making things harder and more complicated than needed?
Boxes are stacked unevenly in the corner of the living room, still taped shut. The furniture is minimal; whatever she could bring herself to move without overthinking it. A bed frame she assembled wrong twice before getting it right. A lamp that flickers for half a second too long before staying on.
It feels temporary.
Jisoo sighs and sets her bag down.
The silence of the apartment building presses down on her softly as she looks around. It's not uncomfortable, but it's unfamiliar. Old buildings like these always have that kind of quiet. It feels layered, as if sound used to exist here more often than it does now.
She tells herself that she's just imagining that, though. She always imagines more into a situation than necessary.
She opens one of the boxes and stops halfway through unpacking. Her mind is full, her head is aching from sleepless nights, and her body just wants to finally rest. But then...
... then there's this faint sound.
She listens in. And it stops. There is nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Jisoo shakes her head softly and exhales through her nose, continuing to unpack. It must come from the fact that her poor brain is sleep deprived. She hallucinates creepy sounds already.
She pulls out things she doesn't really need tonight. Plates. Books she used to love to read. Old sweaters. Her painting stuff.
Time passes by without asking her permission. It passes by while she does anything but sleep. Because...
Sleeping means dreaming.
And dreaming means not being able to hide yourself no more.
The sky outside still darkens, until the window reflects more of the room than it shows the outside world. Jisoo closes the shutters.
With that, she checks her phone without even thinking about it.
11:43.
It's such a specific time that it almost feels intentional. Like it was chosen rather than reached. Like it's not a coincidence that she opened her phone at this exact time.
But that's probably just her brain begging for sleep again.
She locks her phone and sets it down onto the counter of her kitchen. "First night," she mumbles, "of course everything feels weird."
She turns off the main light and leaves only the small lamp which shows her enough of the room without making her head ache even more. And that's exactly when she hears the sound again. Longer, this time. It doesn't stop like before..
It's soft.
A guitar...?
Her breath catches, and she doesn't even know why. Music this late in a building full of old people? That wouldn't make sense, right? The sound comes from upstairs - the roof, probably, since she lives right under it.
And it doesn't fade. It continues. Quiet, but steady. Almost careful, already.
Like someone is playing for no one particular.
Jisoo sits on her bed and looks up instinctively, even though she knows it makes absolutely no difference. Which is why she makes her decision.
She stands up and walks toward the door. The hallway outside her apartment is dimly lit, the kind of light that makes everything feel slightly distant. The building is older than she expected. The walls carry faint marks of time... paint slightly faded, corners softened by years of people who no longer live here. It feels almost nostalgic.
Jisoo locks her door behind her. The click sounds and echoes softly in the hallway while she walks to the stairs. And up. There is a door leading to the roof.
But she hesitates. Should she really disturb the person playing their guitar on there so peacefully?
Still, though, she is curious. Because the music is definitely behind it now. So, she reaches for the handle. But she pauses again.
She doesn't know why she's doing this. It's her first night here. She doesn't even know who lives in this building properly yet. She should go back downstairs, unpack more boxes and pretend that she didn't hear anything.
But the guitar is still playing. As if it's waiting for her. Not asking anything of her. It somehow... Just exists.
She pushes the door open and steps out into the fresh air. The rooftop feels empty. The city lights stretch in the distance. The wind moves gently across the surface of the rooftop - the only sound here beside the guitar playing.
But there is no figure sitting in her view. No movement. Absolutely nothing but the sounds of the soft guitar.
She feels a cold shiver running down her back, causing millions of goosebumps on her skin.
"Hello?" she whispers into the night, hopeful yet still kind of scared. But her voice just disappears into the open air. No answer comes. The guitar stops, too. As if no one was ever there, in the first place.
But she swears that the music was there. The soft sound of someone gently stroking the strings, placing their fingers for different chords.
And standing there on her very first night in a new apartment building, Jisoo has the strange, unsettling thought that something about this place already knows her.
Even if she hasn't met it yet.