Chap 50 : The Girl Who Fell From the Sky (Pt 6) : The day everything changed
The day everything changed
Minjae had borrowed a book from Sera. She had insisted he read it—part of their ongoing sibling rivalry. Sera had dared him to read it just to try to scare him. It was a horror novel about a foreign maid hired by a Chinese family in Singapore, only to discover that the ghost of the previous maid haunted them every year during the Hungry Ghost Festival, the seventh month of the Chinese calendar.
Minjae found it hilarious.
He could relate. After years of seeing ghosts himself, he knew exactly what the maid was getting herself into. The book didn't frighten him; it made him feel oddly understood.
The ability started after that night. When he was saved.
Or maybe it had always been there, dormant, waiting for something to wake it up. Either way, Minjae woke up in the hospital with a new kind of sight.
He could see ghosts. Not all ghosts. Not all the time. But the ones that had something left to say—the ones that were tethered to the living world by unfinished business, by regret, by love that had nowhere to go.
He saw them in hallways. On street corners. Standing at the foot of hospital beds, watching over people who didn't know they were being watched.
He learned to ignore them. He had to. Because when he didn't ignore them, when he made eye contact by accident or reacted to something they said, they knew. And when they knew, they talked. And when they talked, they never stopped.
"Please tell my daughter I'm sorry."
"I didn't mean to leave like that."
"Can you see me? Can you HEAR me?"
"Help me. Please. Please help me."
He couldn't help them.
He was just a kid. A kid who had barely survived his own life. A kid who was still learning how to be a person instead of a target. So he learned to look through them. To walk past them. To be blind in a world full of things that only he could see.
It was easier that way.
It was the only way.
He forgot to give Sera’s book back.
Not on purpose. He had meant to return it after class, but then Professor Kang had called him over to ask about his essay. Then the bell had rung. And then Sera had been talking to Jaehyun—
Jaehyun.
The boy she really liked.
She had told Minjae about him once, during a break in Professor Kang's class. A strange moment when the professor had needed to use the toilet, leaving the classroom empty except for the two of them.
"There's this guy," she had said, her voice soft, her eyes looking somewhere Minjae couldn't follow. "I think I like him. I think I've always liked him. I just... I don't know how to tell him."
Minjae had smiled and told her to go for it. Because that was what you did for people you cared about. You encouraged them. You pushed them toward the things that made them happy.
And Jaehyun made her happy.
Minjae could see it in the way she looked at him—like he was the sun and she had been standing in the dark for a very long time.
So when Minjae saw Sera with Jaehyun after class, he made a decision. He would text her. Tell her he would drop the book off at her place after work. Give her space. Let her have her moment.
He pulled out his phone and typed quickly:
"Forgot to give back your book. I'll drop it by your place after work. Okay?"
Her reply came a minute later: "Ok."
Short. Simple. Distracted.
She was probably talking to Jaehyun.
Good.
Minjae smiled to himself and headed to work.
Work ended late.
One of his coworkers had called in sick—his mother was in the hospital. Something serious. Something that meant Minjae couldn't say no when the manager asked him to stay.
He didn't mind.
He didn't have anywhere to be.
Except—
Sera's book.
He had promised.
By the time he clocked out, it was past eleven. The streets were quiet. The air was cool. The sky was dark, heavy with clouds that hadn't yet decided whether to rain.
He walked to Sera's neighbourhood, her book tucked under his arm, his thoughts elsewhere. And every time his mind was left to wander, it wandered to the same place: the girl with the purple hair.
He was always thinking about the girl with the purple hair.
What was she doing right now? Did she exist somewhere, in some world beyond this one? Had she survived the fight with Vexis? Had she—
A flash of lightning.
Then another.
Then a roar of thunder that shook the ground beneath his feet.
Minjae looked up.
The sky was angry. The clouds were churning, swirling, like something was happening up there that shouldn't be happening. The wind picked up, tugging at his clothes, pulling at his hair.
He hurried toward Sera's place, hoping to pass her the book before the downpour started. But as he was opposite ger house, that was when he saw her.
Sera.
Sera climbing out of her window. Her hair was tied in a high ponytail. She was wearing a white boyband t-shirt and ripped jeans. She was climbing out of her window in the middle of a storm—and holding onto metal pipes.
"What the—" Minjae started.
That is a bad idea.
Before Minjae could call out to Sera—
The lightning struck.