under the surface prologue & ch01
PROLOGUE
"the higher up you are, the harder you will fall."
CHAPTER 1
Everything’s a weapon.
A razor, drawn across your wrist. A pillow pressed over your face. A rope around your neck. A bridge to jump off of.
And words, to push someone over the edge. But sometimes it’s the lack of words that could stop someone from pushing themselves over.
---&---
Yeeun waved goodbye to her friends before turning toward home. Her perfect friends. She loved them and they loved her too, but why was it still so hard?
She knew, of course. It was just that difficult staying at the top. People looked up to her in both jealousy and admiration. It kinda got that way, first, because two of the hottest guys at school were fighting over her, and second, she was pretty, and third, she had pretty friends who always had her back. So basically, from outside the window, Yeeun had the perfect high school life, and yet she still felt empty inside. She was a beautiful brick mansion, but with opaque glass windows too clouded to see inside to the broken furniture.
It was that feeling of worry and isolation. Should she fall from the top of the high school society, there were hundreds of hungry vultures that would fly up to take her place. And as much as she wanted to prevent it from happening, she knew it was always a possibility, a chance, a storm cloud hanging in a gray sky where things were never clear.
But there was a way to stop that. And Yeeun knew exactly what it was. She’d always known.
---&---
Chansung opened the door to another googly-eyed female and knew she was going to be just like the rest. He sighed and started the customary welcome line.
“Welcome to…”
On cue, the six other boys turned toward the door, holding up ten fingers each. “10 outta 10,” they shouted enthusiastically. Then they turned back to whatever they had been doing. Chansung watched as the girl suppressed a squeal under both her hands. All their customers got the same greeting yet it got to them every time.
Of course, that had to do with the fact that about ninety-nine percent of them were females under the age of twenty-five.
10 Out of 10 was by far the most popular hair salon place in town and Chansung guessed that ninety percent of the female population had visited it at least once. And for most of them, it was so that they could stare at whatever hot guy was giving them a haircut for an hour.
It wasn’t as if their haircuts were bad though. No, they were also among the best in town, but their reputation seemed to have been established as “the place where you can meet the hottest guys.”
Four out of the seven of them were cutting hair at the moment. Chansung was doing the welcoming duties, Jaebum was at the desk sorting out money and papers, and Nichkhun was leaning against the desk casually, talking to Jaebum.
Taecyeon’s girl hadn’t blinked for so long that her eyes had started watering. Wooyoung’s was shaking so badly that he was struggling to give her a decent cut. Junsu’s looked like she was going to cry out of sheer happiness. Well, this round of customers did seem to be particularly…enthusiastic about being here, Chansung thought. Only Junho’s customer was acting normal and that was because it was a guy.
Thank goodness.
The girl that had just entered looked hopefully at Nichkhun and sure enough, he turned around and gave her a wink, ushering her over to a seat before she might collapse.
---&---
Yeeun climbed up the fire escape, looking below her as the ground fell away. She was getting tired, but it would all be over soon.
---&---
Something was wrong.
Chansung could feel it heavy in the air, hovering, a tragedy waiting to happen. “Hey Jay,” he called. “Could you take over the door for a sec?”
Jaebum frowned at him but Chansung took off toward the back of the room before he could say anything else. He climbed up the stairs, past the apartment door, and scaled the ladder to the roof. He opened the hatch in the ceiling, poking his head into the crisp autumn air, and stopped.
On the edge of the roof was a girl, balanced precariously on her toes, her red-brown hair blending in with the leaves that swirled around her and her face turned up to a sun that wasn’t there.