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Would you trade souls with the devil to save someone you love, even if it means he'll have you forever?
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I NEVER MADE it to my uncle's that night.
Instead, as the realization sunk into my skin like icicles, piercing the veins webbing my beating heart, I spun around on my heel and began to run.
Run, in search of the nameless man who knew my own.
And so I weaved in and out of the crowds, pushing amongst the mass of humanity in winter coats and knitted scarves, eyes frantically roaming the streets for one dressed in crimson red attire.
Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted him.
Dread coursed through me as the silver-haired stranger turned his head to the left, allowing me a glimpse of his partial smirk - as if he knew I was on his trail. As if he enjoyed the chase.
For a short second, his gaze flickered to meet mine, and this time there was no hesitation.
His eyes flashed a vivid emerald, as green as summer grass.
Holy -
Heel-encased feet spun, and so he began to move again, drawing up the sides of his coat to hide his face. As if he belonged to the air, his lithe body slipped amongst the crowds once more, lost to the ebb and flow of people's nine p.m shadows.
Adrenaline rushed through my ears, the blaring panic still pulsing in my blood making it hard for me to focus. Still I moved, my movements mirroring his as best as I can, elbows and bags digging into my sides as I chased after him.
But my vision was obscured by the crowd, and it didn't help that I was shaking all over with growing anxiety. This all seemed to slow me down as the stranger drifted in and out of sight; the more that I ran after him, the faster he seemed to disappear.
More than once, he would ever-so-slightly tilt his chin towards me, as if marking my progress.
Cat and mouse, predator and prey, hunter and hunted. We continued the game for another street or two, my breath growing hoarser by the second, until he slipped around a middle-aged woman pushing a pram and completely blinked out of sight.
"What even-" I cursed, gaze flittering around in panic as all traces of him left the surroundings. Maybe he's running now.
So I did as well, my legs exerting physical effort they haven't been accustomed to for years now. But by the time I'd reached the nearest intersection, he was nowhere in sight at all.
For a moment, all I did was stand there, feet apace and lungs begging for air.
Disappointment came in quiet, relentless waves as I let the maelstrom of snow decorate me in bone-white flakes; let the red yellow green of changing streetlights flicker like ghost lights in the background as I continue to catch my breath.
Where did he go? Who was he?
Brows furrowed, my anxiety knotted into a clump of thorny roots in the base of my stomach. The one question I've been dreading rammed through me like an arrow.
How did he know my name?
Sure, I had lost some of my memories of when I was a child; this I know for certain. Whenever I try to summon up even the barest flicker of my childhood house or elementary school, my mind draws a blank. Like a canvas that's whitewashed; lines scribbled on a wall that has been painted over by multiple coats of overlays.
As if my memories were still somewhere underneath the surface, but I couldn't reach them, even if I wanted to.
Yet, even with the black hole in the recesses of my memories, my gut told me that I'd never met that silver-haired man in my life, ever.
Not only would I have remembered such a fatally mesmerizing face, I would definitely have recalled the strange, otherworldly aura that had surrounded the man.
So how the hell did he know me?
Spinning.
My thoughts were spinning like an alcoholic's slurring words, coming in rushes so fast that I couldn't make sense of what I was even feeling. Flashes of sinful lips and words the stranger had uttered kept repeating in my head like a broken cassette. With each flashback, I could feel my body convulse with heat, panic bubbling up like lava.
Home.
Tears pressing up against my eyelids like branding iron, I blindly stumbled back towards the nearest subway, letting my feet use their muscle memory to guide me back home.
Home, where the friendly old tenant will greet me as I enter the building. Home, where Bo is waiting for me to fill her bowl with cat food.
Home, where all is safe and nothing is unknown, and life is a mere passing-by of predictable events with no ash-grey men nor lusting touches that can bring my knees to falter.
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Nighttime trains had always been my favorite to ride on.
Maybe it was the way strangers seemed to crowd around in shared subdued quiet, or maybe it was the way in which the metal box glided smoothly through Busan's intricate tunnels with a speed that managed to put my nerves at ease.
Or maybe it was because I'd always loved the feeling of going back home, even if home was just a small studio and an overweight tabby cat.
Tonight, though, something was amiss.
I realized it about three minutes into the train ride. Sonorous air hung heavy as strangers' chatter faded into background noise, interrupted only by the constant chirpy voice of the announcer per every stop. My gaze was, as usual, drifting towards the window panels, watching as sceneries flash by my very eyes. Hazy blurs of skyscrapers intermingled with greenery and city lights greeted me tonight - there were no stars in the sky, just darkness.
But starless nights weren't what made my nerves alert for the second time that night: it was the man sitting across from me, perched in his seat like a regal king.
And he has been staring at me unabashedly for the past few minutes now, the edges of his lips slightly pulled up.
As I took notice of him, my eyes meeting his, I expected him to look away. Maybe blush, even, given that his checking out a girl so blatantly - and on a train, of all places - has been caught in the act.
But he didn't.
The blonde-haired boy merely smiled, one edge of his thin, rose-tinted lips pulling up into a smile that was ever so slightly cold. Hooded eyes fringed with coal lashes held mine, and a defined nose along with a careless, dismissive expression took up the rest of his face.
Charismatic - that was the only way I could explain him.
He was sitting like a leader, too. Dressed in almost all black with only hints of white-gold sutures in his bomber jacket, his defined physique was obvious when pressed against the skinny jeans and teal blue shirt draped over his form. One of his legs casually rested on top of another, and his upper body leaned against the seat like only a confident leader would.
A strange spark lit up in me, so quiet I could barely feel it coursing through my veins. But it was there, and it was a whisper through my soul: obey this man, do whatever he wants.
Trying my best not to get caught up, it was all I could do to blink back my worries and returned his stare, furrowing my brows at his weird behavior.
This continued on for what felt like ages; his challenging gaze and my inquisitive one locked in a battle of will. Despite myself, anxiety began to wind around me once again, and I breathed in, out, trying not to show my fraying nervousness to the mysterious man.
Throughout the ride, the man would cock his head to the side and let his gaze roam my face, as precise as a painter would at an artwork when admiring its details.
Oh God, is this another stalker?
As if he heard my thoughts, the blonde-haired man smirked - a slashing of his lips that only strengthened the magnetic pull inside me.
Fuck, what kind of bad luck is this - to have two possible stalkers in one day?
Heart beating fast, I chewed on my bottom lip and averted my gaze, the hairs on my skin rising up in unease. This entire night had sparked an undercurrent of something wrong, something that was out of place; and the presence of this sleek, deadly man had only seemed to increase the tension.
Too little, too late - that one snowy day soon became the unraveling of everything to come. But I didn't know that just yet.
So, my fingers tightly gripping my keys tight once again, I rushed off the next stop as soon as the doors slid open.
A glance back as I hurriedly stepped off the train compartment allowed me a glimpse of the blonde prince-like stranger, whose commanding eyes were settled on me.
As if I was an artwork, and he had painted me in all my glory, and now I was his to admire all he wanted.
For an infinitesimal second, I wanted to be art, just for him.
Then the doors clicked shut - and as the train sped away, so did the strange feeling in me, leaving only exhaustion and confusion behind, both emotions a whirlwind in my soul.
That night, after feeding Bo and half-heartedly showering before bed, I stayed awake until four a.m, unable to drift off to sleep. Still shaken to the core, my eyes searched the low ceiling of my slanted bedroom as if it held the answers to my endless questions.
But of course it didn't, and all I ended up doing was tire myself out.
The last thing I remembered before I tumbled at last into sleep's embrace was the silver-haired stranger and his unnatural green eyes, still vibrant even in the dark.
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A/N: welp i'm supposed to be on a hiatus, but since i'd pre-written this chapter, i decided to edit the heck out of it and publish anyways bcs i miss wattpad a lot! i can't promise any replies, but i'll officially be back on by 29 June. until then, keep guesses on who the 'blonde-haired' stranger is! ;)
i hope you liked this chapter; it's unedited for now, so i apologize for draggy/long paragraphs in the first part. take care of yourself, and thank you for reading! ❤