𝐆𝐡𝐨𝐬𝐭 • ᵐⁱⁿˢᵘⁿᵍ

Everything Is Normal 17.5

"Mrs Seo." Minho says, coming round a corner in the storage room.

"Yes, Minho." She replies, humming.

"Would it be okay if I left an hour early today?" Minho hopes that she agrees without asking for a reason because he has none.

Minho's anxiety rises the longer she takes to answer before finally taps her clipboard and says, "Seeing that it's Sunday, I don't expect to be busy. So I don't see why not. Just make sure you note it when you leave." Her tone is calm while also stern, as if she was a teacher.

"Thank you." Minho gives her a quick bow then proceeds with organising the shipment on to the respective shelves. With moving the boxes for his house, Minho's gotten accustomed to the lifting heavy weights process and he strangely finds it a bit therapeutic. He thinks of it as he's helping someone else pack up their house and move on.

*

Changbin rubs his hands together after setting the final box down. Looking at the old boiler, he wonders why he never changed it before. When he first came down with Minho it was clearly, heavily rusted—the site of the water coming out of the pipes was a good enough example.

However, before he can do anything to the boiler, he needs to find the main water supply and close the valve. Usually he would do a chemical flush of the water, but because he's going replace some of the pipes, he's decided to do it afterwards. Tracing backwards the pipe from the underside of the boiler, Changbin follows it around the room and to under the stairs. The light doesn't full reach under the stairs, so Changbin takes out his head torch and puts it on while walking over.

With each step he takes closer, the room grows colder. He knows he's there. The boy. But right now he's focusing on fixing the boiler before he does any snooping. If his memories serve him true, then he may know more of what happened behind the scenes.

Acting like there isn't a pair of eyes on him, Changbin reaches up to the bright red valve and roughly turns it clockwise. The water may be shut off so normal flows into the house, yet whatever is currently in the boiler will still be there.

Changbin takes a quick trip to the kitchen and fetches the bucket Minho keeps under the stairs. He slips the bucket under the boiler just in case

Opening his tool box, Changbin takes a out a series of screwdrivers and tests them against those holding the boiler together, finding the right size. "Perfect." Changbin exclaims as he starts taking the front cover off to see the pipes underneath.

Changbin exhales a deep sigh. After a good few hours of struggle and swearing, he's finally managed to complete what he wanted to do. Even while fighting the urge to saw off his own arm when the bolts holding the pipes were refusing to coming undone. Apparently years of lack of attention and care can make rust so thick that even body builders would struggle to get off.

While screaming his head off until his face was bright red, Changbin was fully aware that he had an audience as he spoke indecently, and that was the one thing keeping him from actually tearing the house down. This house has to stay intact. Without it the boy would have nowhere to go. Somewhere, within this house holds the secretes what events took place and what happened to the missing body.

And now Changbin's curious if his memories are real or just a dream.