Chapter Text
<Day One>
KIM SOLEUM POV
I’m going home.
I felt my body enveloped with a flash of warmth. I was no longer in Sekwang Special City. I was home.
The ground of the apartment complex I’d always lived in before entering that world is sickeningly familiar. I stood up, my body free of the tattoos that adorned my skin during my time in that world.
Now, there were no ghost stories.
The comfortable, newfound silence was shattered by a shriek next to me.
“Wh–what the f*ck!?”
BAEK SAHEON POV
This shouldn’t be happening!!! I had let him use my points for him to go home, not go with him! I had only given them because he was a little… pitiful, to say the least.
Definitely not because I cared for him.
Kim Soleum himself appeared surprised as well, eyebrows rising and lowering themselves deliberately in a flash. “Baek Saheon?”
“Did you seriously– wait, no, that was supposed to reflect your wish right? Why the hell am I here, psycho?” I snapped.
“I don’t know,” he retorted. “You think my wish was to bring you back home with me? And psycho, hm?”
A shiver climbed down my spine. “...Sir,” I corrected myself. “So, what, this is supposed to be normal or something? Is your home full of aliens or what?”
“No, it’s the most ordinary home you can find. Ghost stories don’t exist here.” Kim Soleum replied.
“What?”
I didn’t realise I spoke out loud until he answered.
“That’s right,” he said with a slight smirk. “You have no form of identification here. So unless you want to spend your nights on the streets, you’ll cooperate.”
That was basically a threat… no, it was a threat! And I’d rather not be homeless. “...Fine, whatever.”
KIM SOLEUM POV
And here I thought I could live a peaceful life at home. Now there was Baek Saheon living in my apartment too.
At least I was able to finally see my family and friends.
“It’s rundown,” he commented when I let him into the apartment, which totally ruined the nice nostalgic feeling I’d been having.
“It’s the average price for an apartment here…” I muttered. “Take your shoes off. You’ll sleep on the sofa.”
Baek Saheon obeyed, moving to remove his shoes. “The sofa? It’s small…”
“What, do you want to sleep on the bed with me?”
“Actually, it’s good enough!”
What a greedy bastard.
I stepped into the small kitchen. I wanted to make something to eat before thinking about why Baek Saheon came with me too.
“Where are you going?” he asked me, which was replied to by “Kitchen”. Baek Saheon trailed after me.
“Your fridge is almost empty,” he noted.
“Your demeaning comments about my home are never-ending, even while homeless.” I noted, which was answered by a sharp glare from his single eye.
“Ugh, whatever…” Baek Saheon seemed to think of something. “Oh—could I help with the cooking?”
“Sure…” I agreed. He probably volunteered so that I wouldn’t think he was useless then kick him out. “I’ll go change for a moment. Don’t burn down the kitchen.”
A small hum of acknowledgement reached my ears as I watched him take a few things out of the fridge, but I didn’t stay any longer as I entered my bedroom.
It was a good feeling. It was so perfectly mediocre that I was moved. I’d had enough of weirdness.
I locked the door and quickly undressed before pulling on a comfortable black hoodie and sweatpants. I tried wearing grey before, but my mom liked to tell me I looked best in black.
Which… I didn’t know whether that was good or not.
I came out of the room after washing up and found Baek Saheon in the middle of what seemed to be an elaborate cooking show. The aroma of something warm and homemade wafted through the air, making me almost drool. I wasn’t sure what he was making since I decided not to peek in the pot for spoilers, but it damn smelled good.
“I didn’t know you were good at cooking,” I said as I took a seat in one of the two chairs by the table in the corner, elbow pressed against the armrest with the rest of my arm hanging off it.
“You don’t know many things about me.”
No, I’m pretty sure I do.
“By the way, where are the plates?” he asked. “Your cabinets are a mess.”
That was because I didn’t cook very often…
“The bottom cabinet at the left,” I answered casually, ignoring his last comment. “Hurry up.”
Baek Saheon sped up. Did the psychopathic act still work or something? I thought he’d loosen up a bit in a world without ghost stories that I could just drop him in.
Baek Saheon presented two bowls of mouth-watering beef stew. “The beef in the fridge was about to spoil.”
“It looks good.” I praised it, which earned a confused glance from Baek Saheon.
I grabbed a spoon and tried it. It was delicious with flavour bursting in my mouth. How was this made by the meager ingredients I had in my fridge…?
After we ate a little bit, I spoke up. “Could you remove your eyepatch?”
“What, why?” He glanced at me suspiciously.
“To see if the eyeball still works here.”
Baek Saheon hesitated but finally complied, pulling off the strap of the eyepatch, opening his usually-closed eye to reveal the black and purple eyeball. “...! I can see out of it, but it’s not showing me danger.”
“So it’s just a normal eye now,” I noted. “Did you bring any other items?”
“My shoe had that… pen.” The one that had nearly killed me in the school.
“Then we’ll see later.”
Baek Saheon gulped and returned to eating his stew.
<Night One>
BAEK SAHEON POV
After trying everything we could, all my items were rendered useless. The only good thing was that the eyeball still sort of worked, just not as a functioning item.
The psycho had been a bit tamer today though. Was it because he was home now? Well, anyone would be relaxed if Darknesses didn’t exist anymore.
I still flinched when he glanced over at me though, as I was curled up on his sofa.
(Note: Kim Soleum was currently thinking, Is this his home, wearing my clothes and sleeping on my couch with so many pillows?)
I was wearing a soft, grey sweater that seemed quite old, but it was still nice nonetheless. I was also wearing grey sweatpants. He told me he apparently didn’t wear grey clothes much so I could wear them instead. Well, thanks for the leftovers, psycho!
“Saheon,” he called out. “Did you use my towel?”
“Well, what other towel was there?”
“You could’ve asked. Isn’t that unhygienic?”
“Ha, keep talking about hygiene.” I huffed, then wanted to kill myself as he launched into a decently long explanation on the correlations of sharing towels and hygiene. Was he a clean freak or what?
Also, did he just leave out the honorifics when calling me? Did he think he could disrespect me just because I was living under his roof?
Well, I guess I was leeching off him right now. Not for much longer though…!
“We’ll run to the store tomorrow to pick some things up for you,” he announced. “Make a list of things.”
He could be sort of nice when he wanted to.
“...Okay, thank you, sir.” I mumbled, fumbling for my phone.
My phone still worked but all the contacts I had with people in my original world were unknown numbers now. All except for Kim Soleum, of course.
I clicked on the Notes app.
things the psycho needs to get for me
-
Towels
-
Clothes (underwear!!, pants, shirts, jackets, sleepwear, shoes)
-
Toothbrush
-
Medical eyepatch set
-
Charger
-
Transportation card
-
Water bottle (reusable)
-
More ingredients (List attached)
And I accidentally sent him the entire note including the title.
psycho (kim soleum): the psycho?
psycho (kim soleum): bold words for someone living in my apartment
Aaaaaahhhhh!!!
<Day Two>
Kim Soleum POV
Had I been too lax with my act?
I had no idea—but since Baek Saheon decided to come with me after he angrily shouted at me in the morning for accidentally waking him from his beauty sleep, he probably wasn’t as fearful anymore. Or maybe he was scared I would forget him.
Baek Saheon re-wore the clothes from the night before. The sun was shining brightly but there were lots of white fluffy clouds in the sky and a nice breeze, so the weather was great today.
I’d have to head to work on Monday though… Well, good thing I wasn’t employed at Daydream Inc anymore!
Baek Saheon was oddly quiet as we headed for the subway, his body sticking close to mine as we weaved through a crowd. Was he anxious?
“Oh, you need a transportation card.” I said as we approached, pointing to the machine. “Come here.”
Baek Saheon did as told. We made the card and topped it up with some money before handing it to him.
“Don’t go off losing it,” I warned him.
We entered the crowded subway. And wow, it was seriously packed. As soon as we stepped in, Baek Saheon was swept away.
“Saheon!?” I called out in a fit of irrational panic.
“Urnnngh.” Baek Saheon groaned as he waded his way through the crowd back to me. “It’s so f*cking crowded, I can’t even walk properly!”
“Yeah, I can tell.”
I ignored his glare and went on my phone, holding onto a pole to keep steady. People kept bumping into us because for some reason, nobody knew how to stay still.
The next stop is ****. Please get off at the left exit. The doors will close in 30 seconds.
A sense of deja vu washed over me before I realised it wasn’t deja vu—that exact line from the Abyss Transpo…!
Nausea made my stomach feel like it was doing somersaults.
“Come on, let’s get off already.” Baek Saheon grunted, looking as if he was in agonising pain from being around so many people.
Honestly, I was glad he was here. I probably would’ve had a panic attack… and maybe even thrown up.
We got off and left the subway station.
“Here’s the store,” I announced, met by a “Yeah, I know.”
Well, gee, sorry for letting you know! You almost passed it without a second glance!!!
“You nearly walked past it,” I retorted with a pointed tone as I stepped in.
“No I didn’t.” Baek Saheon instantly defended himself.
I gave an exasperated sigh and side-eye.
“Go look for your clothes. Nothing too expensive,” I clarified. “I’ll look for a towel and a toothbrush.”
Baek Saheon nodded and disappeared into the aisles.
Well, where to start…
I collected a fluffy white towel with a small black paw print emblem at the bottom and a simple black toothbrush.
“Saheon?” I called out. The store was a bit too big to find each other easily, but since there was no response, I looked around for a bit before finding Baek Saheon in a… predicament.
“...Saheon?” I repeated blankly as I found him trying to stuff an embarrassingly giant fluffy puppy plushie into the shelf again. “What are you doing?”
“N-nothing!” He clearly lied between his teeth. How could someone be so obvious…?
“Did you get some clothes?” I asked him as he managed to get it in, the head of the doll bending at an odd angle.
“Yeah… yeah, I did, it’s in the cart there.”
“Let me see,” I said as I strided over to the cart to look through. It seemed alright, but Baek Saheon tried to kick me. “What was that for?”
“...” He looked away with a slight red tinge to his cheeks, before I realised he probably didn’t want me to see what kind of underwear he bought.
“You got the other things too, that’s good.” I smiled, which seemed to irk him. “Let’s head to the counter to ring these up.”
“Whatever,” Baek Saheon mumbled as he followed me.
We passed a few aisles before reaching the cashier. Baek Saheon was eyeing a notebook that was in the little display section.
“I want the notebook,” he finally spoke up.
“For?” I hummed curiously.
“...Writing…”
Well, it wasn’t expensive, so I paid for it too.
I then realised Baek Saheon had put a small puppy doll with green eyes into the cart. Wad that what he had wanted to hide? I would definitely tease him later about it.
Or what about now?
"A doll, hm, I didn't know you were so soft."
"...Might as well get a souvenir." he huffed, his cheeks red.
“Not going to say thank you?” I asked once we got the things in a large bag.
Baek Saheon shot me a glare before gritting his teeth and mumbling a “thank you sir”.
He was fun.