Yuurei 1/?
Jonghyun. . .
Jonghyun. . .
A boy no older than sixteen frowns to himself, "Five more minutes mom."
You can have all the time you want to sleep later, but it is time.
"Time for what- breakfast? In a second. . . Five minutes."
No reply. Jonghyun smiles to himself and cuddles up in to his feather like blankets. They feel extra soft today. Mom must have cleaned them, he thought. He grabs another handful of blankets and something irks him. He shifts again, fluffy cotton bursting in to his face.
"Aish mom what kind of sheets did you put on my bed-"
He opens his eyes slowly and carefully sits up. The first thing he notices is he's not in his room, that's for sure. There were no walls just orange and yellow streams of color around him. It looked like. . . The sky?
"Okay I must still be dreaming let me just get back in my bed- WHERE'S MY BED?!"
His legs were engulfed in a fluffy white substance along with his arms.
"That would be a cloud," a high pitched voice says. Jonghyun looks to his left to see a little girl with long green hair smiling at him. Her eyes are large and curious.
Jonghyun feels dizzy and decides he must still be dreaming. He lays back down and hopes the girl will just disappear.
"Silly, ghosts can't sleep!" she laughs and Jonghyun's eyes snap open. He cranes his neck towards the girl with a sick grin. "G-ghost?"
"Yup," she chimes and pokes his cheek, causing him to yell. Jonghyun tries to run but stops when his foot touches pure air.
"Elaborate?" he squeaks and the girl jumps up with bright eyes.
"You've reached acceptance already? At such an early stage of death too! Ah we're making such good progress! Well you see. . . You kinda got hit by a bus."
"Kinda?! There's no kinda about getting hit by a bus! You either get hit by a bus or you don't!"
"Hehe, sorry! Anyways, here you are!" she smiles.
Jonghyun's face falls, "There's no way I'm a ghost. Absolutely not. I'm just having one of those long dreams that takes mom's loud voice to wake up from. Now run along and play with dolls or something like little girls do," he grins and waves a hand out.
"I certainly don't play with dolls! If by dolls you means souls? I love playing with damned souls! Oh do you know any games? We can play one if it will help you recover! This is the first time a dead person wanted to play games with me!"
"NO I DON'T WANT TO PLAY GAMES WITH YOU. ARE YOU STUPID?!"
Jonghyun took in a deep breath and sat down on the cloud. The girl looks up with a purse of her lip.
"Look let's say I am a ghost," he notices her face light up and quickly adds, "let's just say I am! Then what do I do now?"
"Three options," she puts her tiny hand out. "One: Roam the Earth forever."
Jonghyun nods as she puts another finger up, "Two: Pass on to Heaven."
"Alright, number three?"
"Damnation."
Her eyes become very serious and Jonghyun feels like he's not dealing with a child anymore. He stretches and puffs some stress out. "Since I have a few more hours to kill before school I'll play along. Let's say I believe you. What am I supposed to do? How do I pass on or whatever?"
"It's not a 'whatever'! Passing on is very important. Don't ever think of staying on Earth for any reason, don't ever! Staying on Earth is," she closes her eyes, "horrible." There's a small pause until she gets fired up again, "I'm going to help you pass on so don't worry about that, got it? It's pretty simple actually, the pass on process!"
"So what is it?" he asks, going along with her game.
"All you have to do is grant someone true happiness."
The air between them grows stiff. Jonghyun burst in to laughter and the girl reaches back and punches him across the cheek. "I'm trying to be patient but it's really hard. Teenagers are the worst souls to be assigned to! Look, all you have to do is help someone on Earth reach the peak of pure happiness and you can pass on to heaven. Got that?"
Jonghyun squirms around making choking noises. Did that child just punch me?! Augh that actually hurt, she's got a strong arm.
"Look," he says and sits back up, "I don't really understand all of this but I'll do it. Whatever it takes to wake up. You better not punch me again or you'll be sorry!"
The girl squeals, "I'm so happy! Now I don't have to resort to other measures! Come come, let me show you who you're going to be attached to for the next few months!"
I wonder what the other resorts were.
--
"Here we are," she smiles and turns around. Jonghyun tries to catch his breath, "As fun as flying around is, I'm not exactly liscensed for it! Go slower next time!"
"Ah we're just in time! There-!"
Jonghyun follows her gaze. There's a boy taking the trash out far below them. It's obviously late, the moon is high and hardly any neighborhood lights are on. The boy has dark hair that shadows most of his face but Jonghyun can't tell anything else from their height.
"It's a guy?"
"So what? Were you expecting some hot princess to fall in love with? Don't push your luck!"
Jonghyun glares at her and looks back down but the boy's gone. He sighs, "I've had enough of this. I'm heading home."
As he starts to float away he hears her whisper, "good luck."
Hah luck? What kind of character did I dream up? This sucks, out of all the cute girls it had to be some brat!
--
"So you came to apologize?" she asks with a smirk and Jonghyun crosses his arms. The sun was starting to rise and it occurst to Jonghyun that he was awake all night without getting tired at all.
"What's the big idea? Why am I not sleepy?"
They sit on the roof of his house, the sky flaring up with oranges, yellows, and pinks.
"Because you're a ghost."
"I know, I know. Anyways, nobody at home would talk to me."
"Because you're a ghost."
"I know, I know! They couldn't hear me either! If you say "you're a ghost" one more time I swear. . . "
The girl just laughs, "you're a funny one!"
Er I wasn't joking, Jonghyun thinks. "What's your name by the way?"
"Miyo!" she shouts and jumps up. "At your service mr. Jonghyun! Today's work starts in less than two hours! What's your first job you ask? Go wake up your client!"
So she knows my name. . . "Wake up my-?"
Poof! Great she's gone! At my service?! Please!
"She could have at least reminded me where the house was! What a bad host."
Jonghyun sighs and digs through his memory until he finds the house from last night. It takes him almost an hour to remember exactly where they went. As he arrives, he knocks on the door and then laughs. "Crap they can't hear me. Should I just walk through? Worth a shot I guess."
He feels bubbles burst inside of his veins as he passes through the thick door. How cool!
The house is pretty dirty, trash laying in each corner and opened bags of snacks scattered on the couch. Jonghyun has an urge to clean but remembers he can't touch anything. Wait a minute, if I can't talk to anyone how am I gonna help this dude out?
He didn't have to look for long in the tiny house to find where the boy was. Here goes nothing!
Jonghyun passes through the door with uneasiness and glances around. The sun is fully up now and it's light bursts through the crack of an open window. It shocks Jonghyun how well kept and clean this room was compared to the rest of the house. It wasn't dark in here either. He reads the alarm clock on the bed and screams.
"It's already Eight thirty! Get up man! You're gonna be late- Aw crap. You can't hear me. . . Can I levitate objects or something? Something besides flying would be nice Miyo! Sheesh, being a ghost isn't as fun as I thought it would be. Can't I scare people or something? Like the ghosts from Casper?"
"If you're going to be noisy, can you do it somewhere else?"
Jonghyun jumps from the groggy voice. His eyes zone in on the bed next to the window, a head of jet hair puffing out from the top. He can hear me?
"Yo, you need to get up and go to school! You want to fail? You want to be a dropout!?" Jonghyun says, crossing his arms.
What am I shouting!? I used to skip school all the time! Oh well I'm having fun.
"I'm tired, go away."
Jonghyun soared to the side of the bed and reached out to jerk the covers off the boy but he passed through them. I can't make this kid feel happy if he won't even get out of the bed! Augh why did I have to get someone so stubborn?!
"Look at how pretty it is outside! Let's go to school and have a good day-"
"Shut up, Yesung! I told you I'm tired," the boy shoots up out of the covers and turns to look at Jonghyun. He has dark circles under his eyes, the lack of sleep apparent. His hair is messy and he's wearing a hoodie and jeans.
What is this kid a drunkie? Who sleeps with their clothes on?
"Sorry I thought you were my brother but that's. . . "
"Can you see me?!" Jonghyun yells. A few birds fly pass the window and break the silence.
The boy nods and Jonghyun looks around in panic. Is he supposed to be able to see me?! Miyo where are you?!
"I don't know if I'm dreaming or if you're some kind of creep but I'm tired, get out."
He falls back and buries his head in to the covers. Jonghyun's mouth drops and he isn't sure what else he's supposed to do. He grins smugly.
"If you don't go to school you're doomed! I have wicked powers and in a split second," he says, "I can curse you. Oooooooh~"
His ghost noises were starting to sound really lame when the boy's voice broke in.
"I don't care."
Is this kid serious? He must think he's still dreaming like I did! Alright then. . .
"The girl you have a crush on will give you a kiss at school today. Oh well, too bad you have to actually be at school for her to-"
"I don't have a crush," he responds in annoyance.
"You have a huge pop quiz that counts as-"
"Don't care."
"You're mom is going to-"
"Don't care."
Jonghyun's arms fall and a very strange feeling creeps from inside of him. He never thought it was possible to be that lazy. He floats back outside and sits on the roof silently.
"I can see you're not too good at this," that perky voice comes from behind him and he jumps.
"Miyo! You're really creepy you know!"
She laughs and watches him think. After a moment Jonghyun stretches, "I'm going home."
"Already?!"
"What's the point in making this kid find true happiness? He obviously doesn't even care about getting out of bed so why should I-"
"What did you expect? Some amazing guy who loves life? Oh no that would be far too easy. If that was the case then why would we ask you to help him find true happiness? This boy isn't happy so go make him happy!" she yelps and shoves him off the roof. Jonghyun doesn't fall off and hit the ground like he expects. He opens his eyes and notices he's still in the air and with a glare he whips around.
"This sucks! I don't care if this is real or not I just want to go home! Why should I have to do all of this for someone I don't even know? I didn't ask to die!"
"Neither did I," she frowns. They stare at each other for a while and Jonghyun feels a sudden sadness. The girl couldn't have been any older than ten when she died and yet she's far more grown up than he.
"Fine, I'll keep trying. I'm bound to wake up eventually. This sure is one hell of a dream though."
She smiles and disappears in a puff of smoke. Jonghyun stares at the open window below and sighs loudly. He could already tell this was gonna be a long dream. A very long dream.