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Youngjo was having a very bad day.
Okay, to be honest? It wasn't bad from the get-go. He'd woken up at the wee hours of 11 am after he spent most of the night composing. He'd met up with Geonhak for lunch and endured an hour of lectures about his health and diet, but that's normal for a Saturday. After bringing home groceries, he took Sunny out for some playtime at the park near his house, and it effectively erased all his stress from the past week. Everything was going perfectly… until dinner.
It started raining right after dusk. Youngjo cursed under his breath as he rushed towards the corner store. How did he forget to buy soy sauce earlier? Thankfully, the store was deserted and he was in and out in a matter of minutes. He was happily on his way back home, dreaming about the fried rice he was going to make, when he heard a voice calling out from the alley next to the store.
It was a call for help, he thought, frozen still on the sidewalk. It could be a trap, it could be a robber trying to lure him into the dark alley and loot his possessions. Or… maybe someone really needs help.
There was no one else around. No one else to help.
No one but Youngjo.
— 🕸️ —
The stench from an overflowing dumpster hits Youngjo’s nose as soon as he steps inside the alley. It makes his empty stomach churn with unease. He takes another crunching step. The damn alley was full of broken furniture. “Hello?”
The sound of crying stops. As his eyes get accustomed to the darkness, Youngjo can just make out the silhouette of someone sitting crouched behind the dumpster.
“H-help me!” the voice rings out again.
“I'm here to help,” Youngjo soothes. “What's wrong? Are you hurt? Should I call an ambulance? The police?”
“N-no! Please don’t! Just help me get home, please!”
Oh, there goes dinner, Youngjo thinks mournfully as he helps the crying person - a teen girl - move out from behind the dumpster. She's all decked out in brand clothes, but quite dishevelled. Tear tracks are prominent on her small face.
“Sure you don’t want me to call the police?” Youngjo prods kindly. She shakes her head, letting go of his hand to lean against the filthy dumpster.
“My purse,” she says abruptly, pointing towards some piled-up trash bags. “I think I lost it there. Can you please find it for me?”
“Yeah, of course,” Youngjo assures her, already moving. The trash bags stink horribly, but Youngjo manages to spot a white bag wedged between them.
“Wow, is this the Gucci Marmont bag?” he says, awed. The small bag is worth his entire year's cost. And somehow it ended up in the garbage!
“Yeah, it is,” the girl says from behind him. She doesn’t sound on the verge of tears anymore, Youngjo thinks, turning around with a smile. The last thing he sees before blacking out is the petite girl swinging a chair at him.
— 🕸️ —
“– don't have to do this to a –”
“– why you care? You don’t even know –”
“–re wrong!–”
Bits and pieces of conversation float into Youngjo's ears, piercing through the heavy waves of pain hitting him one after the other. He opens one eye. The other seems to be covered entirely with something sticky. Blood? Certainly smells like it.
He's lying on his stomach, hog-tied with rope. The room, or what he can see of it from his very uncomfortable position, looks expensive in a careless way, as if whoever lives here doesn’t really care about the hi-tech fridge being splattered with sauce, or the monstera in the corner dying from thirst.
“You can't just abduct someone from the streets!”
It's a man's voice, clear as a bell and full of anger. Youngjo blinks. He feels like the voice is… familiar somehow.
“I just did though,” another voice says carelessly. This one, Youngjo knows. It's that girl.
Wait. Was he abducted?
He remembers the pain of being hit on the side of his head with a whole chair . What happened after that? Did she drag his body to…. wherever this place is.
“You know it's wrong,” the man continues. “He's hurt! He needs medical–”
His voice abruptly cuts off as a loud crack echoes through the room.
“I told you, Seoho,” the girl says, her voice shaking. “I told you not to think of anyone else but me!” Her voice morphs into a shriek at the end.
Despite the pain and trepidation, Youngjo slowly shifts his head to the other side, and stares at the other two people in the room.
The girl is standing a few feet away, back to him. She's changed into dry clothes while he was out cold, Youngjo thinks bitterly. Meanwhile, he's still cold and wet and probably stinky. The girl's back seems to quiver with silent sobs.
In front of her is a man, tied to a chair. His head is tilted to a side, the visible cheek reddening alarmingly. As Youngjo watches, he spits out blood onto the pristine white floor. He doesn’t make another sound, but the vitriol in his eyes as he looks up at her speaks volumes. Youngjo is startled again as the girl starts shaking with laughter.
“Oh, never mind,” she says, voice barely heard above her hysterical shrieks. “You'll be mine soon anyway!”
— 🕸️ —
The girl is walking around the room, which is actually a modest studio apartment. She's lighting candles on any flat surface visible, all the while muttering under her breath. At one point, she walks over, wipes her palm against Youngjo's throbbing head, and walks away to draw some symbol on the wall using the sticky blood.
Calling her unhinged would be an understatement.
And for some reason, the other tied-up guy - Seoho - keeps trying to apologise to him.
Moving is difficult and incredibly humiliating. Youngjo shimmies and twitches and twists to end up near Seoho's chair.
“What, exactly, are you saying sorry for?”
Up close, Seoho looks battered, stressed, and guilty.
“It's my fault you’re here,” Seoho says, eyes downcast.
“I'm here because she-” Youngjo points with his chin, “- decided to lure me into an alley and hit me with furniture before abducting me. What's your story?”
Seoho grimaces as Youngjo mentions the furniture. “I was just ambushed,” he says tiredly. “She was hiding in the house already when I got back this afternoon. I didn’t notice, and she got me with a cloth soaked in something… probably formalin.”
“So… this is your house?” Youngjo says gently. Poor guy, being tied to his own chair.
Seoho nods. “She said she's a fan-”
“That's right. I'm your biggest fan.”
Both men flinch at the sound of her sickly sweet voice. She has tied up her hair and rolled up her sleeves. She's holding a bunch of papers. Youngjo briefly wonders what those are before his attention is caught on the cleaving knife in his other hand.
“I've been following him since his debut,” she continues, pacing around the room and turning lights off. “I've been devoted to you for so long, Oppa,” she says in a whine. “I'm literally the perfect for you, but you just don’t see it! So I'll make you see it.”
As she keeps pacing, Youngjo makes a horrible discovery.
He's lying on a circle. Specifically, a circle with a lot of weird looking symbols, drawn on the tiles with something like permanent marker, so even Youngjo's vigorous crawling didn’t fade any of it. His heart sink.
“Am I-”
He has to cough twice to make his suddenly dry throat work.
“Am I a virgin sacrifice?”
— 🕸️ —
For a second, both Seoho and the unhinged maniac look floored.
“I don’t think a virgin is strictly required…” she mutters, scanning the papers again. “Just a sacrifice. Alive, healthy, preferably male.”
“Y-you can't just decide to sacrifice me!” Youngjo says indignantly. “What about my rights?”
“What about them?” she says dismissively, throwing the papers on a corner table. “Don't worry, it won't hurt much.”
Youngjo splutters as she approaches him with the knife and grabs one of his arms.
“Wait! I don’t want to die! Think about my parents! My dog is home alone! I'm–”
His protests go unheard as she slices open a long cut on one of his hands, and then the other hand. The pain is sharp and impossible to ignore. She starts up some sort of chant, kneeling by the side of the circle.
At least she used a knife, not needles…
“What's that noise?”
Seoho's whispered inquiry distracts Youngjo for a second. But that second is enough to notice the eerie humming noise that seems to come from all around them; the girl's shrill chanting a disjointed companion to it. The humming rises, rises, rises.
Youngjo can feel it in his skull.
Or maybe he's hallucinating from too much blood loss.
He closes his eyes, suddenly tired. The room is dark, aside from the faint orange glow from the candles. The girl is done chanting, it seems. She's now saying stuff in a pretty demanding tone. Something like a soul sacrifice, a love potion, an evocation, a demon, etc, etc.
Consciousness is swimming away from him, fast. The humming is so bad it’s almost an earthquake. Youngjo is so cold. He wishes someone would offer him a blanket. Sunny, would you get hyung a blankie?
Right before he falls unconscious asleep, he thinks he hears Seoho scream.
— 🕸️ —
Why is this my life? Can’t I get one weekend without this summoning bullshit? I’m not even old enough to go on assignments, I–
Help me… Help me… Help me…
Oh. Oh, you’re very desperate, aren’t you?
Please, please, please…
Kay. I'll help. But you'll need to pay me. I don’t make the rules.
I'll give you anything! Just help me! She's going to–
I know, she's a piece of work. But you really shouldn’t offer ‘anything’ to someone like me, dumb human.
Please, I don’t want stalkers in my life…
Okay, fine. How about you feed me some delicious food?
Yes yes, I can! I will! Just please–
Deal.
— 🕸️ —
Someone is cooking.
Youngjo smells butter, first. Then he hears the distinct crack of eggshells. A little bit later, the sizzle of a pan is followed by the smell of grilled onion, mushroom, and bell peppers. His mouth waters even before he opens his eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling.
Whose couch did he fall asleep on? And why is there a suit jacket covering him? He doesn’t own one of these.
Sitting up is a tedious process. Lightheaded, Youngjo's hand automatically goes to his head and encounters the roughness of gauze.
Memories rush back, making him dizzy enough to lie back down.
There are bandages wrapped around his forearms too… places where the insane girl cut him. Okay, so it wasn’t a weird dream?
“Oh Seoho, your guest is up.”
Youngjo looks at the man exiting the kitchen with a large bowl held in both hands. He's tall and lanky, wearing a full formal ensemble minus a jacket. He smiles kindly at Youngjo before putting the bowl of stir fried beef and vegetables on the table.
Belatedly, Youngjo realises the food is still steaming, and the man is holding the bowl with his bare hands. He scoots backwards on the couch, a nameless unease curdling in his gut.
Seoho comes out of the kitchen as well, holding a tray of smaller bowls and dishes.
“I see you've met Keonhee,” he says to Youngjo, throwing a slanted look at the taller man who's sitting down on the armchair opposite to the couch. Seoho sits down next to Youngjo.
Keonhee exchanges a very pointed glance with Seoho, who sighs.
“I hate Introductions,” he complains. “But, okay. I'm Lee Seoho. I’m a solo vocalist, and the girl is a fan who is also a low-level employee at the agency I work at.”
Seoho leans forward, serving the food in a few small bowls, handing one to Keonhee and one to Youngjo. He plates his own last.
“She’s been stalking me for a while, but the agency kept brushing it off as regular fan behaviour. I later found out she’s the daughter of one of our wealthy investors. The agency can’t afford to piss him off.
“I don’t know how many people she had to bribe, but she managed to sneak into my apartment last night, and managed to overpower me. She probably also has my bodyguard and manager in her pocket. And then she dragged you in.”
Lee Seoho. Youngjo can finally tell why the voice sounded familiar. He's a moderately popular ballad artist. His songs come up on Youngjo's spotify once in a while.
Seoho's looking at Youngjo expectantly. Right. Introductions.
“Oh, I’m Kim Youngjo. Got back from my military service earlier this year, now interning at a talent agency to become a composer,” Youngjo offers. “I was just on a late-night grocery run when all this happened.”
Seoho nods, looking guilty again. He’s got to stop doing that.
“What even was she trying to do with all the voodoo stuff?” Youngjo has to ask. It was all so creepy.
“She was trying to summon a demon,” Seoho says, looking shifty. “She thought she could offer your soul as a sacrifice and obtain a bottle of love potion to feed me.”
Youngjo is flabbergasted. “Wow, some fans really don’t take no for an answer huh?”
Keonhee coughs, looking amused as both Youngjo and Seoho turn to look at him.
“It’s my turn, I think,” he says, smiling broader. The same unease from before twists in Youngjo’s stomach again. His smile is full of too many teeth .
“You may call me Lee Keonhee. The girl was trying to summon my brother, Geonhak. But she messed up the hanja , and got a hold of me instead.”
— 🕸️ —
All that blood. The chanting. The symbols. The crazy girl actually managed to summon a demon.
Youngjo feels like fainting again.
Distantly, he feels Seoho pat his shoulder. “It’s okay, he won’t hurt you.”
Youngjo turns at the other man in disbelief. “He’s a demon!”
“A demon that already made a deal,” Keonhee says, waving a hand dismissively. “There’s absolutely no point in hurting you. Either of you,” he says. “Now can we get back to eating?”
The food is simple but tasty, Youngjo's been hungry for hours, and his plate empties quickly. Seoho notices and piles more food on him.
“You lost a lot of blood,” he says, sounding like a prim and proper host. “You need protein.”
“I won’t get into the intricacies of summoning a demon,” Keonhee says through a mouthful of prawn. “But I really wasn’t supposed to be summoned. I’m not even old enough to be legally summoned.”
Legally , Youngjo mouths. Demons have laws?
“Pity you were out cold,” Seoho says, “Keonhee threw a mean tantrum.”
“I do not throw tantrums!” the demon looks offended. “Imagine how you’d feel if you got summoned by mistake three times in the same month! And she didn’t even have a good reason for it! Do these kids have no life? Where are her parents? She should’ve been home, studying!”
Seoho puffs out a little laughter. Youngjo frowns. Something still didn’t add up.
“Still. By mistake or not, she summoned a demon. So she should’ve gotten her wish, right? Why am I still here? And where is she?” he demands.
“About that…” Seoho starts. Youngjo has a bad feeling about this.
“She started the ritual. But it wasn’t her who made Keonhee appear. It was me.”
Youngjo stares at the seemingly demure, harmless man sitting next to him. The man who has apparently summoned a demon.
“Don’t blame him,” Keonhee says cheerfully. “It’s not like he planned it.”
“How did that even happen?” Youngjo demands. “How did you accidentally summon a demon?”
“Because her blood wasn’t spilled, mine was, and that’s apparently a big deal for demons,” Seoho says, shrugging.
“I mean, if you don’t even have the guts to spill your own blood to summon a demon, are you even worthy of his attention?” Keonhee laments. “Youngjo’s blood was also spilled. But he was out cold, I couldn’t communicate with him to strike a deal. So I chose Seoho.”
“What deal?”
His question gets another wide smile from Keonhee. “That I would help him, and in return, he would treat me to a delicious meal.”
Youngjo waits for the other shoe to drop.
“Wait, that’s it?”
“Apparently,” Seoho says.
“What happened to the girl? Did you hand her over to the police?”
Seoho squirms. Youngjo looks at Keonhee, who shakes his head.
“She would’ve come back,” Seoho says quietly. “You have to understand. My agency would never do anything to stop her.”
Understanding dawns on Youngjo, and he stares at Keonhee. “Did you take her instead of me?”
“Yup,” Keonhee confirms. “Routine procedure. I also made it look like she ran away from home, so Seoho doesn’t get implicated.”
It’s a lot to digest. Youngjo feels a little bad for her… but then remembers that she tried to sacrifice him in the first place.
She deserved it, probably.
“To a stalker free life?” Keonhee says to Seoho, raising his bottle of soju in a toast.
Seoho snorts. “That’s unlikely, but one can hope,” he mimics Keonhee.
Youngjo takes a long swig from his own bottle and secretly wishes to wake up from this bizarre dream.
— 🕸️ —
One month later…
“I still don’t understand what he’s doing here,” Youngjo hisses at Seoho, looking over at the man sitting hunched on the floor of his minuscule living room. Youngjo’s flat was about ten times smaller than Seoho’s studio apartment, and Keonhee’s limbs take up most of the floor space.
“I really don’t know,” Seoho sighs, looking through takeout containers. He looks flustered. “Apparently feeding him delicious food as a payment was not a one-off thing.”
Youngjo curses under his breath then jumps in place as Keonhee chimes in with an “I can hear you!”
“Whatever,” Youngjo mutters, deciding to leave Seoho alone in the kitchen. In the last month, he's found out that Seoho likes doing things by himself when he's stressed.
“It wasn’t my choice to show up,” Keonhee grouses as Youngjo sits next to him on a cushion. “I did not expect the deal to extend either. Apparently, I’m obligated to deal with anyone who’s stalking Seoho, and he’s obligated to treat me to a meal every time that happens. Geonhak said I’m dumb for not using more precise words when I was offering the deal.”
“And I wasn’t in the right mind to worry about wording,” Seoho appears, nudging Youngjo with his toe. “Scoot over, hyung.”
There’s barely space for the three of them and their food. Keonhee’s pointy elbow keeps knocking into Youngjo’s stomach, and he narrowly refrains from screaming at the demon.
“Why exactly are you at Youngjo's place,” Keonhee asks Seoho, shifting again to find a more comfortable spot on the floor. “I thought you two were strangers.”
“We were. Not anymore,” Youngjo says. “Seoho needs friends. Real friends, not just co-workers and fans with questionable intent.”
“And this is what being ‘real friends’ means? Eating takeout on the floor?” Keonhee muses. “Alright, I’m in.”
“What do you mean you’re in? I didn’t invite you,” Youngjo says indignantly.
“Hyung,” Seoho interrupts mildly. “He did save our lives.”
“Fine,” Youngjo says begrudgingly. “And we’re not just eating takeout. We were talking about music and got hungry.”
For a few minutes, there’s nothing but the peaceful sound of chopsticks scraping against takeout containers. Sunny makes a sleepy grumble from the bedroom. Keonhee gets elbowed from both sides for taking the last egg roll.
“Wait, does the deal mean you gotta throw all of Seoho’s stalkers into the… hell or whatever you’re from?”
“Of course not,” Keonhee sighs, rubbing his stomach. “That was one time and extenuating circumstances. This time, I pulled some strings to move the girl and her entire family to a different country.”
“Impressive!” Youngjo praises.
“It's hard work,” Keonhee says, preening.
“Wait,” Youngjo says, suddenly remembering something. “Seoho is going on a world tour soon. What if….”
“Oh no…”
“... What if he gets multiple stalkers from each performance… in a foreign country…”
Keonhee freezes and then lets out an anguished wail.
“Why is this my life?”
— Fin —