Revenants and Hallucinations

29 - Presence of the Undead

When Chan woke up he looked at the glaring clock to reveal that it was 3:06 am. In front of him on the bed, was a single slip of paper.

He unfolded it to reveal a letter, written by Minho to say that they stayed for an hour to make sure he was okay, and then left at around 4 to give him 'some peace and quiet.' It was sweet, but Chan was worried about the fact that he was alone in the house for about 3 hours. Evidently, nothing happened but the boy shivered at what could have happened.

There was no way Chan was getting back to sleep now, so he turned and lifted the covers off, only to jump back at the sight of the pale little boy. There was a moment of fear before Chan remembered that this one couldn't actually physically hurt him.

He thought back to what his neighbours had said. How their witch friend was trying to help the dead by gaining this ability and it got Chan thinking.

"Do you need my help in some way?" He asked, tilting his head. The boy stared back, small legs crossed in the middle of the floor.

"I can help you if you want? Depending on what it is I guess" Chan shrugged and waited for a reply. He sighed when he realized he probably wasn't going to get one and proceeded to look away as he got out of bed.

"Mum" Chan flicked his head back to the boy with wide eyes. He'd actually talked, directly to Chan, because he'd initiated the conversation. This is progress.

"Mum?" Chan faced him again, the boy was still in the same place as before but Chan was finally getting somewhere.

"Mum" the boy repeated and Chan sat opposite him, mirroring the position and frankly, quite confused as to what this boy wanted.

"What about Mum? Can I help you in some way?"

"Mum likes flowers" he spoke in quite a deadpan way, and Chan was really trying to decipher the boys wants.

"Does she? What kinds?"

"Any. Died in forest" the kid really wasn't making much sense but Chan desperately wanted to try and understand.

He looked away from Chan to stare at the wardrobe, looking back to Chan and then back to the wardrobe, as of trying to accentuate a point. Chan got the hint, and walked over to the wardrobe.

He looked back at the boy.

"Open" Chan did as he was told.

"Under"

"Under?" Chan muttered as he started to look under things, finding absolutely nothing.

"No, under"

"What do you mean under?"

"Under" this kid wasn't very helpful. Chan started to look at the bottom of the wardrobe, moving the storage boxes away before discovering yet another section of the floor that peeled up.

"Great" Chan muttered, pulling it up to find a folded bit of very evidently aged paper. There seemed to be a lot of hidden places in his room and Chan was honestly quite terrified as to what could be lurking in his walls or floor.

He arranged everything back into place before turning around to face the boy and match his position again.

"Open" Chan unfolded the paper to reveal a map, almost like an 'x marks the spot' kind of thing. There was a broken red line making its way to another forest not that far away from Chan's house. At the end of it, was a little cross.

"Never got a chance to put flowers by mums grave" it was then that Chan realized the little cross was probably his mother's grave. He wanted Chan to put flowers by it because he couldn't do it himself.