#unlocked

At first, he’d been perfect. Sweet, disarming, the kind of boy who could make you laugh just by flashing that smile. You met him your freshman year of college. Both of you were lost on campus, fumbling with maps and schedules. You’d been rushing to find your class when you slammed into him so hard you almost dropped your books.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” you blurted. “No, that was me,” he said, and then he smiled. That smile, that bright, boyish, so easy to fall for. It was the first thing you noticed about him. Back then it was your favorite part of him. Now it was the reason you woke up screaming. 

You tried to edge past him, but his hand clamped around your upper arm. Tight. You froze. He laughed, nervous, like he knew he was being too forward. “I know this is weird,” he said. “But… would you like to go out with me sometime?”

The question knocked the breath out of you. You stammered, cheeks burning, “Yes. I’d love to.” You exchanged numbers. You walked away smiling. And if you’d known, if you’d had even the slightest glimpse of what that moment would grow into. The suffocating nights, the panic attacks, the bruises hidden under sleeves. 

You would have run. But you didn’t. And now the pills are working, and the bag is waiting, and the clock is ticking down to the moment when you’ll finally risk everything to claw your way out.

You turned, your eyes darting to the bed. He was still out. His chest rising, falling. A monster made harmless for once. Every step had to be silent. You pressed your weight onto the balls of your feet, tiptoeing toward the closet. 

The duffel was right where you’d hidden it. You wrapped your fingers around the strap, eased the bag out. You exhaled through your teeth and crept out of the closet and into the hall. One hurdle down. The worst is still ahead.

Euijoo lived to control you. Every move, every word, every thought. He owned them all. He had the money for it, the power. A brilliant optics engineer. A ruthless businessman. And when you disobeyed, your body paid the price. 

Slaps. Hair yanked hard enough to burn your scalp. Bruises that bloomed under your clothes like poisonous flowers. The bedroom door clicked shut behind you. You hurried to the garage. Fingers shaking, you pressed the button. The heavy door groaned, rattling, every sound of a blade against your nerves.

The cars gleamed under the harsh lights. You wove between them, careful not to touch the paint, careful not to breathe too loud. The alarms were hair triggers, and one shriek would bring him running. You were almost clear. Then a scrape. The duffel brushing against polished metal. 

The car alarm detonated, a scream that split your ears. From somewhere deep inside the apartment, you heard your name screamed with a fury so thick it echoed through the walls, vibrating with rage 

Panic slammed into you. You bolted, feet pounding concrete, bag bouncing against your hip. The gate loomed ahead, the metal bars trembling in the night air. You hurled the bag over. It hit the ground with a heavy thud. You grabbed the bars, climbed, fingers slipping. 

Behind you, Euijoo stepped out of the garage door. His eyes found you. Locked on. That was all it took, the adrenaline burned through your veins. You clawed your way up, threw yourself over, dropped to the other side. Pain shot through your knees but you kept moving.

Down the hill, down to where Yuri’s headlights burned through the dark. You flung yourself into the car, slammed the lock down, screamed, “Go! Go!”  your eyes caught hers instead. Her face, pale, confused and fumbling with the wheel. 

You were staring at her, begging, when the world cracked apart. Euijoo. Right there. His face against your window, his fist pounding the glass. You shrieked, jerking away, and the look in his eyes filled with hatred, pure and blinding freezing the air in your lungs.

“Get the fuck out of the car!” he roared pulling at the door’s handle, his throat corded, a vein straining along his neck. He bent down, snatched up a rock, smashed it against the window. Glass exploded, showering your lap. 

His hand darted inside, fast, brutal, closing around your throat. Air cut off. Pressure. His face inches from yours. Hate searing in his eyes. You bit down. Hard. Copper flooded your tongue. He howled, grip loosening. You shoved him back, Yuri slamming the car into drive. Tires screamed, the car lurched forward, leaving him in the middle of the street, bellowing your name into the dark.

“What the fuck was that?” Yuri shouted, her voice breaking. You couldn’t answer. Your chest heaved. Your throat throbbed where his fingers had been. You just stared straight ahead, the road blurring into darkness. 

You didn’t realize you’d made it to Yuri’s apartment until her hand touched your shoulder. The sudden pressure jolted you out of the trance, your body flinching like she’d burned you. Somehow, impossibly, you’d gotten away.

Months of planning, getting the pills, rehearsing the lies, convincing your friend to pick you up in the dead of night without a single explanation. You couldn’t tell her why. Couldn’t risk dragging her into the orbit of a man like Euijoo. 

The less she knew, the safer she was. At least, that’s what you told yourself as you packed your bag in secret, as you practiced how to breathe without making a sound. But the truth was a knot in your stomach, safety was a lie. 

Because Euijoo never lost. He didn’t know how. He’d always been the one with the money, the power, the control. And men like that didn’t just sit back and watch you leave. They come after you. 

The months blurred, stitched together by sleepless nights and Yuri’s steady hand pulling you through the wreckage. Therapy had become a lifeline, even on the days when stepping outside felt like stepping into a trap. 

Some mornings, you couldn’t even step outside to get the mail. The thought of open air, of being exposed, left you shaking. Certain he’d be there. Waiting. Lurking. Ready to drag you back into the nightmare you’d barely escaped. 

Luna was the kind of therapist you hadn’t believed existed. Patient. Sharp. Unyielding in a way that didn’t scare you. She chipped away at the rubble he’d left behind, laying the foundation for something stronger. Something that felt dangerously close to hope.

“Today’s session was really good,” Luna said, walking you to the door. Her smile was kind, but not pitiful. “Call me if you need anything.” “Thank you,” you managed, though the word felt too small. 

Yuri was in the waiting room, like always. She stood when she saw you, wrapping you in a side hug that smelled like her shampoo, warm and safe. For a heartbeat, it was like you were both back in high school, careless and safe. 

“What should we get for dinner?” she asked, easy and casual, as though you hadn’t just spent an hour scraping open old wounds. “Pizza,” you said, a small laugh catching in your throat. “Always pizza.” “Yes,” she grinned, steering you toward the exit. 

Her car was parked close, right by the entrance because she knew. Because she understood that wide-open spaces still made your skin crawl.

You slid into the passenger seat. The door clicked shut. And just like that, the night of your escape came roaring back, his hand on your throat, the window shattering, the sound of your own scream. 

Your chest clenched, vision tunneling. The burn of his breath in your ear, the slam of Yuri’s door closed jolting you back. The car was warm, safe, her presence steady beside you. You forced a smile, buckled your seatbelt. “Okay,” you said, forcing the words past the lump in your throat. “Let’s head home.”

She looked at you and smiled back. Not the kind of smile that said everything was fine. But the kind that told you she’d be right there, no matter how many times you broke. For the first time in months, you believed her.

You pushed through the front door, shoulders heavy, ready to collapse into the comfort of the night. Every step carried you toward your room, each one echoing too loudly in the quiet apartment, like the walls were watching as you tried to settle in. 

“Shower time,” you muttered to no one, you stripped, skin prickling with the cool air, and twisted the shower handle until steam began to roll across the glass. Before stepping in, you caught sight of yourself in the mirror.

For a second, you didn’t recognize the face looking back. Not the hollow-eyed shell Euijoo had carved out of you. This version of yourself looked different, eyes brighter, a spark there, something stubborn and raw. Hope. The will to fight.

A sharp noise from the bedroom. You jumped so violently your elbow clipped a bottle, knocking it to the floor. The sound ricocheted off the tiles, yanking you backward in time. A plate slipping from wet hands. Shattering on the tile. His shadow stretching long behind you. 

Euijoo’s hand wrapping around your waist, grip vice-tight, breath hot against your neck. His laugh is low and cruel. The yank as he dragged you from the sink, bending you over the counter. The fabric of your dress is tearing upward. Pants never allowed. “Easy access,” he’d said once, smiling as he reached for his belt. 

“Hey!” Yuri’s voice snapped through the fog of memory. “You want pineapple on the pizza?” she called from the kitchen. Your chest heaved, lungs dragging in air that didn’t want to come. You forced your voice out, high and too quick: “Yes, please!” Silence returned. 

Just the hiss of water heating behind you. You turned back to the mirror. Your reflection stared, pale and shaking. You braced the counter, met your own gaze, and said it out loud, voice trembling but firm, “He can’t hurt you anymore.” 

The words cracked something loose inside you. You exhaled, long and shaky, then stepped into the shower. The hot water hit your skin, and for the first time in years, it felt like you might finally be washing him off.

You stepped out of your room, skin still damp from the shower, hair clinging in strands to your neck. The steam clung to you like a second skin. For a moment, you felt clean. Safe. 

Yuri was already in the kitchen, a box of pizza in her hands, smiling like it was just another night. “Table or TV?” she asked, tilting her head. “TV,” you muttered, your voice low, already moving, your body heavier than you realized. 

The floor seemed to pull at your feet as you dropped down onto the carpet, sinking in, ready for nothing. An uneventful evening. Quiet. Normal or you wished it was. The screen flickered alive, bathing the room in a pale glow. Static. A news anchor’s voice droned in the background, the sharp edge of the broadcast cutting through the smell of pizza. 

Yuri reached for the remote, already about to change the channel until his name stopped her cold. “Byun Euijoo, the wealthy optics engineer and businessman, was found dead in his home tonight. Authorities are calling it a suicide—” The screen went black. Yuri’s thumb jammed the button hard enough to crack plastic.

He’s dead. He’s dead. The thought pulsed in your skull like a hammer, drowning out the world. Your stomach pitched. The air thickened. You couldn’t swallow. Couldn’t breathe.

Yuri glanced at you, her mouth opening like she wanted to speak, to explain, to soften the news. The phone rang. Your body went rigid. The sound filled every corner of the room, every nerve in your skin. 

When Yuri lifted the phone to her ear, the room seemed to still, every sound swallowed whole. Her eyes flicked to you as she listened, her knuckles tightening white around the receiver. Her voice was steady when she finally said, “Okay.” Click and the line went dead. 

Yuri set the phone down too carefully, like it might explode. “That was Euijoo’s lawyer,” she said quietly. “He… left you money in his will. Since you were technically still his wife, you have a claim to his estate. He didn’t have a family. You were the closest thing he had.” 

Her words landed like blows you couldn’t block. “His lawyer’s name is Koga Yudai,” she added. You knew exactly who it was. The one person Euijoo had never bothered to hide his true self from. The memory clawed at you, sharp and unrelenting the night he had forced himself on you in front of Yudai, a so-called lesson in “manners,” as he’d cruelly put it.

And all you could remember, burned into your mind like acid, was Yudai’s smile. The way he had watched you break, watched you be wrecked, as if it were entertainment. Your chest tightened, stomach dropping into a pit that never seemed to end.

The next day, you walked into the building with Yuri beside you. A shadow on your shoulder. A body to hold you upright when you weren’t sure your legs would carry you. 

The elevator hummed too loud. The hallway is too long. Yudai’s office door gleamed, polished and cold. Inside, the air reeked of coffee gone bitter and papers stacked too neatly, the kind of order that dared you to disturb it.

Yudai stood behind his desk, tall, severe. His suit was pressed sharp, but his eyes were dark and flat that cut deeper than a knife ever could. He didn’t offer condolences. He didn’t even sit before dropping a thick folder onto the desk. 

“Euijoo always knew where you were,” Yudai said. His tone wasn’t soft. It wasn’t kind. It was a blade, honed and deliberate. “He thought, foolishly, that you’d come back to him. He waited, hoped and when you didn’t…” Yudai’s lips tightened. “He blamed himself. He let it eat him alive.”

You flinched at the words, but he didn’t slow. He shoved the papers toward you, the folder sliding across the desk like a shove to the chest. “He left everything to you. Everything. His estate. His wealth. His name. It’s yours now.” 

His eyes never left your face, the weight of his gaze pressing down harder than his words. “Do as you please with it. Burn it. Spend it. Waste it. Doesn’t matter.” The pen rolled toward you.

Your hand trembled when you signed. Each stroke of the pen felt like an accusation. The room was suffocating, Yudai’s silence louder than his voice had been. The second your signature hit the page, Yudai snatched the folder back. 

He closed it with a snap that echoed like a door slamming shut. “Get out.” The words hit harder than the pen, harder than the papers. Spat like venom. No courtesy. Just dismissal. You stumbled back, Yuri’s hand on your arm, steering you toward the door. The air in the office clung to you, heavy, choking, as though Euijoo’s ghost lingered in the walls and Yudai had made sure it followed you out. 

It had been weeks since you signed the papers. Since Yudai slammed the folder shut and spat you out of that office. Weeks since the words he’s dead have settled into your bones like ice. But the uneasiness never left. It grew. It crawled across your skin at night, in the silence, when you swore you were alone. 

A prickle at the back of your neck. The shadows that seemed to move in ways shadows shouldn’t. Euijoo was a genius. Everyone knew that. A mind that bent light and glass and truth itself. Dangerous in ways you only half understood. You wouldn’t put it past him to cheat death, to build something that could crawl its way back from the grave.

The first time it happened, Yuri was gone, her backpack slung over her shoulder, off to her night class. The apartment was yours alone. You were in the kitchen, barefoot, the hum of the refrigerator filling the quiet. 

Dinner was nothing complicated. Just grilled cheese. You pulled bread from the cabinet and set it on the counter, reaching for cheese in the fridge. The light from the fridge spilled across the kitchen floor. When you turned back, the bread was gone.

Your chest seized. You froze, cheese clutched in your hand, staring at the empty counter-top. You knew you’d set it there. You remembered the weight of it, the plastic crinkle. You scanned the counter, the floor, the sink. Nothing. Heart pounding, the cheese slipped from your fingers and landed on the counter with a soft slap. 

You opened the cabinet again, hands shaking, and there it was, the bread. Sitting in the same place you’d taken it from. Sitting exactly where it had been before. Slowly, carefully, you pulled it out again, your eyes darting around the kitchen, every shadow suddenly too deep, every corner too dark. 

The silence was crushing. You weren’t alone. You knew you weren’t. The certainty rooted in your gut, cold and absolute. 

The next morning, you told Yuri. Your voice was low, half-expecting her to flinch the way you had. Instead, she laughed it off, sliding her coffee mug across the table. “You probably just forgot to take it out. Happens to me all the time,” she said lightly, easy and unconcerned. You nodded. Forced a smile and let her have the last word. But you hadn’t forgotten. You knew. And the feeling didn’t go away. 

After seeing Luna, your nerves finally eased. She had a way of doing that pulling you down out of the storm in your head and planting your feet back on the ground. Her voice was sharp, logical. “Euijoo was just a man,” she reminded you. “He can’t come back from the dead.”

Simple. Final. And you believed her, at least for a while. The panic dulled. The shadows stopped looking like claws. For the first time in weeks, you felt something almost alien in your chest. Relief. You started living again.

First you sorted through his accounts, his cold strings of numbers on screens that still carried his name. Two of them, both heavy with money. You didn’t want it. Not really. It burned just to look at it. 

So you decided to send it somewhere good, to children’s charities, to animal shelters. A chance to scrub something clean out of all the filth. The transfer would take a week to verify. You told yourself you could wait. Next came the house.

That house was a wound. His house. Your prison. A scar carved into your nightmares. You couldn’t stand the thought of walking through those rooms, of sleeping under that roof, his absence heavier than his presence ever was. 

You didn’t hesitate. You put it up for sale and didn’t give a fuck what it sold for. You just wanted it gone. There was freedom in that. Sharp, bright, intoxicating. You even offered to pay for Yuri’s college, to shoulder some of her weight after all the ways she had steadied you. 

She smiled, shook her head, stubborn as always. In the end, you compromised, half. And for the first time in what felt like forever, you were happy. Actually happy. You laughed without hearing an echo. You slept without waking up in the dark screaming, listening for footsteps that weren’t there.

“Hey, we should go watch that new demon slayer movie that just came out,” Yuri says as she bursts into your room, not even pretending to knock. Her voice was bright, like a burst of sunlight through storm clouds. You look up, startled, and the yes leaves your mouth before you can second-guess it. 

Her eyebrows lift, surprise flashing across her face, then she grins like she’s won something. Minutes later, you’re buckled into her car, the seatbelt biting into your chest as she guns the engine. She drives like she’s racing an invisible clock, like something’s chasing her down. Five minutes, maybe less, and you’re skidding into the mall parking lot. Your stomach is still climbing up your throat.

“That’s a new record,” you laugh, stepping out with wobbly legs. “Shut up,” she snaps, laughing. It feels good. Normal. Ordinary. Maybe even happy. The kind of night that tastes like freedom. You walk side by side into the theater’s neon glow, buy the tickets, balance greasy popcorn and syrupy sodas, and slip into your seats. The lights dim. The previews roll. The movie begins.

For the first time all week, you breathe. Yuri leans in with whispered commentary that tickles your ear, and you almost forget yourself. Almost. Then the seat beside you shifts. Your stomach knots. 

You know it’s empty. You saw it empty. Every row has gaps, people scattered, nowhere near you. Still, the cushion sinks under invisible weight, pressing down like someone just sat next to you. A breath touches the side of your neck. 

Your head jerks to the right, so fast your spine cracks. Nothing. Just shadows, air, and that screen flashing bright against the dark. You rub at your neck, skin tingling, your pulse screaming. The breath is gone, but you feel it anyway, ghosting along your skin. The movie goes on. Pretend. Pretend it’s the AC. A faulty seat. Anything that makes sense. 

When the credits finally roll and the lights snap back, you stand, forcing your legs to move. But then you see it, the seat beside you is upright again. Empty. As if someone just stood and left. You can’t move. Your blood has gone to ice, your chest locked. 

Yuri collides into your back, laughing. “You okay?” she asks, voice light, unaware. You nod too fast. “Yeah. I’m fine. Let’s get out of here.” But your skin still burns with the memory of breath that doesn’t belong to anyone you can see.

A job interview, that’s the next step. You came in ready. For once, your hands didn’t shake when you smoothed your jacket. The elevator ride hadn’t felt like a march to the gallows but a climb toward something that could finally be yours. Independence. 

Your portfolio sat heavy in your hands, organized to the point of obsession. This was it. The interviewer’s smile was professional, clipped, but you matched it with one of your own. You shook her hand, steady, firm. When she gestured to the chair, you sat tall. 

“So,” she said, uncapping her pen, “tell me about your design process.” Easy. You leaned in, voice steady, like you’d rehearsed. “I usually begin with sketches to unlock concepts, then expand into digital drafts. Once I have three strong directions, I refine them to match the client's brief.” She nodded. She was listening. You were good. You had this. “And you’ve brought samples?”

“Yes.” You smiled and opened the folder with a small flourish, already picturing the polished case studies, the neat tabs, the proof of your competence. Empty. 

The breath stopped in your throat. Pages missing. The entire section is gone. Blank sleeves where your work should have been. You blinked hard, once, twice, as if that would conjure them back. “I—I had them,” you stammered, throat tightening. Your fingers scrambled through the folder, too loud, too desperate. 

The room magnified the sound. The pages flapping, plastic crackling, your pulse pounding. The interviewer’s face changed. The patience drained, leaving something thinner, sharper. “You don’t have your samples?” Her voice was even, but the pen tapping against her notepad snapped like a whip. Your tongue felt swollen. “I—I must’ve—I checked before I left, I—” The words stumbled, tripped, turned to gravel in your mouth. “Alright,” she said flatly, closing her notebook. “Let’s move on.”

But you couldn’t move on. Your confidence leaked out with every second of silence, every glance she gave that folder that now mocked you, gutted and useless. She asked another question, sharp, simple, something you could’ve handled blind. But your answers twisted, fell apart, broken phrases that made you sound small, unprepared, stupid. 

Her smile thinned into dismissal. “That’s all I need.” The interview was over. You stood, the chair shrieking across the floor, a graceless noise that branded you. Your apology came out strangled. She didn’t bother to reply. Outside, the street air felt like punishment. 

You clutched the empty folder to your chest, as if it might still save you. But it was gutted, sabotaged, wrong. You’d checked those papers. You knew they were there. 

Home should have been safe. The one place where your humiliation couldn’t follow. But the moment you opened your  bedroom door, the air tilted. Your papers were there. On the bed. Stretched out neat as corpses, waiting. You froze. 

They weren’t just lying there, they were staring at you. You tore through the room, hands shaking, searching every corner, every drawer, waiting for the other shoe to drop. But nothing else was wrong. Nothing else was touched. Just the papers. You picked them up. The pages were smooth, organized, unmarred.

By the time Yuri came home, your stomach was already a knot. You told her. Every word spilled out in a rush, raw, desperate about the missing files, about how they’d appeared on the bed, how you weren’t crazy, how you knew you had put them in your folder. She listened. Her eyes soft, her hand grazing yours like she was smoothing the panic out of you. 

“Babe,” she said gently, “you’ve been under so much stress. Maybe you misplaced them. You probably just overlooked it.”

You wanted to scream. But her voice slid under your skin, and the certainty began to crumble. Had you really checked? Had you really seen it? Maybe you’d been too nervous, too careless, too desperate. Maybe the shame was your own fault. 

You sat down hard on the bed, the papers clenched in your fist, your heart thrashing. The room felt smaller, closer, as though the walls were bending toward you. The cycle was back. Doubt tightening its leash. 

Because what was worse that you were losing your mind? Or that something else was moving your world around, piece by piece, just to watch you break? After that, you started to doubt yourself. You thought death would fix everything. His death. 

You thought the moment he was gone from the world, the air would feel lighter, your body would unclench, your mind would stop replaying every bruise, every threat, every whispered promise of what he’d do if you ever left. You believed like some idiot child, that freedom would heal you like magic, like flipping a switch. But you know better now.

He still had you in a chokehold. A grip you can’t break. Every time you think you’re clawing your way up for air, it drags you under again, hand on the back of your skull, shoving your face into the past. All the progress you’d made with Luna dissolved the day you stopped answering her calls. 

The day you let her voice go to voicemail. She had been the only one who could pull you out, the one who sat with you through the panic attacks and made you eat when food felt like ash. But then the shame crept in the fear of being too much, of bleeding on someone who had already patched you up too many times. 

So you stopped. You told yourself she’d be better off without your chaos soaking through her days. When Yuri asked if you were still talking to Luna, you lied. You smiled, the kind of smile that stretches too wide and makes your cheeks ache, and you said yes. The lie hung in the air between you, sour and heavy. 

First it had been the bread. You told yourself you had  forgotten, but you remembered the exact way you’d left it. Gone, as if someone had been standing over your shoulder waiting for you to turn away.

Second, it was the incident in the movies, the seat shifting on its own, leaving you raw and unsettled.

Lastly, it was the papers. The ones you needed. The ones you’d checked and rechecked before the interview. Gone. A blank space in your folder, not just absence but erasure. Like someone had reached in and stripped them out, wanted you to fail.

You tried to be reasonable. Told yourself it was stress. Forgetfulness. Madness creeping in at the edges. But the whispers wouldn’t stop. It’s him. 

“Are you sure you are going to be fine?” Yuri asked worried, standing by the door. She was late, her mother was sick and you could feel her guilt dripping through every movement, the way she fussed with her coat, her bag, her keys. 

“I will,” you lied, the words scratching down your throat. You wanted to tell her the truth. That you weren’t fine. That something was wrong in the apartment. That you hadn’t misplaced the bread or the papers, that they’d been taken, moved, stolen by a presence you couldn’t see. But you swallowed it. 

You wouldn’t put that weight on her shoulders. Yuri lingered with her hand on the knob. “I left my home number on the counter. If you need anything—” The rest trailed off into silence. She didn’t believe you would call. She knew you too well. And then she was gone. The door clicked shut, the echo reverberating like the lid of a coffin slamming closed. You were alone. 

Except you weren’t. The silence spread through the apartment, thick and oppressive. The lights hummed overhead. The refrigerator ticked. Pipes groaned deep in the walls. Normal noises. Harmless noises. But to you it felt uneasy.

You felt it watching. Like a set waiting for the actor to walk back on. The walls leaned too close. Even the shadows looked rehearsed, their angles sharp and deliberate. You wrapped your arms around yourself and walked into the kitchen, listening. The ticking of the clock grew louder, magnified until every second thudded in your skull. T

The apartment was too big with only you inside. The ceilings vaulted high, the windows yawning wide, the air stretching out into emptiness. Every sound you made came back to you, mocking. Footsteps echoed too long. Breathing bounced off the walls. Even the scrape of your nails against your palm sounded alien.

You told yourself you were safe. Yuri had locked the door behind her. The windows were closed, the security system blinking its tiny red eye. You repeated the words like a prayer safe, safe, safe. But your body didn’t believe it. The hair on your arms prickled. Your pulse throbbed too fast, too loud. 

You could feel that pressure at the back of your neck, the sensation of breath just barely brushing the shell of your ear. You spun. The kitchen was empty. Of course it was. But when you turned back, the knife block sat crooked on the counter. You didn’t remember leaving it like that. Your stomach clenched. 

You took a step toward it. The wood base gleamed under the light, every knife in its slot. Except…no. One sat out of place on the counter, impossibly precise, as if it had been placed there just for you. Every instinct screamed that it wasn’t supposed to be there.

You forced yourself to look away, to walk to the table, to sit down as if nothing had shifted. But the chair across from you seemed different. Pulled back a fraction too far from the table, angled like someone had been sitting there. You stared at the indentation in the cushion. Swore it hadn’t been there before. The silence pulsed. 

You wrapped your arms tighter around yourself and whispered, “You’re going to be fine.” But the walls listened. The air listened. And you knew that you weren’t fine at all.  You decided to keep busy. Better than thinking. 

The apartment looked like it had been torn apart by raccoons and you were the raccoon. By noon, you were elbow-deep in gloves, scrubbing plates like they’d personally wronged you. The radio murmured in the background, a too-cheerful voice that made the silence between songs feel nauseating. 

By three, you were dragging damp clothes from the washer, scolding yourself for letting the pile grow this high, the wet fabric heavy as guilt in your arms.

Time slipped away in pieces. Windows rattled when the wind picked up. A floorboard creaked, but you told yourself it was settling wood, nothing more. By the time you noticed the clock, it was nine. Your body ached from the chores, muscles leaden. You dragged yourself down the hallway, flicking off lights one by one. 

Darkness pooled behind you with every click, swallowing the apartment whole. Your bed looked impossibly soft, a siren’s call. You didn’t bother with your phone. Didn’t bother double-checking the locks again. You slipped under the blanket, eyelids heavy, breath slowing. And just before sleep pulled you under, you swore you heard movement at the end of the hall. A shift. A pause. Like someone had stopped the moment you started listening. 

But exhaustion won. You told yourself the apartment was empty. And let go. 

You’re asleep. At least, your body is. Heavy, sunk deep into the mattress, breath dragging slow and even. But somewhere beneath the surface of the dream, something is stirring. The room is still as if someone pressed pause on the world while you drifted. Something’s wrong. Even inside the dream, you can feel it. The air isn’t empty. It has weight. The sheet slips, a whisper against your skin. 

At first, you tell yourself it’s nothing. A twitch. Gravity dragging fabric. But it doesn’t stop. It keeps sliding, peeling down your legs until cool air licks at your ankle. Your eyes snap open at the touch of cold. You grab for the blanket, yanking it back. It resists. Not caught, not tangled. It was like it was fighting you, like another hand grips the far end. Your pulse pounds in your ears. Then, suddenly, the sheet lets go.

You sit up, every muscle locking in place, your body a trap sprung too late. The dark presses in. You don’t dare call out. You know if you speak, it will answer. The corner across the room isn’t empty anymore. Or maybe it never was. Something swells there, a density of shadow, black folding over black until it’s heavier than the others. 

Your gaze slides to the chair. That chair. That goddamn chair. Angled like someone’s only just left it. Or worse like someone never did. The longer you look, the more it breathes.

Your bare feet find the cold floor. You clutch the blanket like a weapon, ridiculous as that is. Your chest squeezes tight, breath scraping like sandpaper in your throat. You feel the weight of eyes. Not imagined, not paranoia. 

Eyes pressing down on your pulse, flattening the beat into panic. You creep forward, slow, cautious, calculating every inch, like the floorboards themselves might scream. You keep the space between you and the chair wide enough so it can’t reach. Wide enough that if it moves, you’ll have time. The sheet trembles in your hands. You fling it. A desperate reveal. The fabric flutters, folds. Collapses. Empty.

A laugh bursts from your chest, strangled and broken, relief jagged as glass. Too sharp, too sudden. Wrong. 

You stoop, gather the sheet again, but freeze when you hear a soft, low, a chuckle curling up from behind you. Your head whips around. The dark is blank, empty. Your eyes insist on nothing. But your skin… your skin screams something. 

You held the blanket tight, ridiculous though it was, a flimsy barrier between yourself and the unseen terror. Your hand shakes as you toss it forward into that space where your eyes keep snagging. For a heartbeat, the fabric clings to something solid. A shoulder. A chest. The outline of a man. And then it falls. Flat. As if nothing was ever there at all.

You barely registered the floor beneath your feet as you bolted down the hallway, heart hammering like a war drum in your chest. Every shadow flickered, stretched, and leaned toward you, alive with intent. 

The fluorescent lights overhead hummed low, a sound too precise, too sharp, like static in your skull. Then it struck. Not a shadow, not a shape but a force. 

Your body lifted clean off the ground, slammed against the wall, pain flaring in your neck and back. Stars erupted behind your eyes, a halo of white agony. You spun, eyes wild, looking for the culprit. Nothing. Just walls. Just silence. The room mocked you.

Your hands pressed against the wall, knees trembling, searching for a grip. And then cold, invisible fingers tightened around your throat. The air vanished. Panic wrapped around your ribs like iron. 

You clawed at the empty space, desperate to breathe, as the force dragged you up the wall. Your feet scraped against drywall, your nails breaking, but it didn’t matter. You were weightless. Helpless. A slam. Your back collided with the kitchen counter. Pain exploded across your skull, your vision gone for a second. The knife, gleaming under the half-light. Shaking, you snatched it up, brandishing it into nothing.

You hit something. Solid. Real. The figure flickered into existence, glitching like a broken hologram, hovering just beyond comprehension. Your stomach plummeted. Your mind screamed. 

This wasn’t real. Couldn’t be. Its hands wrapped around your head, fingers like iron. Pain lanced through your skull as it slammed you down again. You saw stars, shapes, glimpses of yourself in the knife’s reflection.

You scrambled back, but the kitchen wasn’t safe. Cabinets slammed open and shut, the air growing thick, suffocating, alive. Every movement you made was anticipated, every breath stolen before it reached your lungs. 

You tried to steady yourself against the counter, but the invisible hands were everywhere on your arms, your shoulders, your legs pushing, pulling, taunting. You swung the knife blindly, slashing at air, and each time you felt it something solid, something wrong. 

It moved, danced just beyond the edge of sight, a shape in the corner, gone when you blinked. Your confidence, your courage, all dissolved into trembling fear.

The apartment had grown smaller, darker. Corners stretched. Hallways twisted. Each room seemed like a death sentence. You ran toward the living room, knife in hand, but the floor beneath you shifted, your foot catching on nothing. 

You fell, scraping your palms, but before you could recover, a grip locked around your ankle. A pull, hard, and you tumbled into the sofa, lungs burning, heart hammering, knife clattering from your hand. The air thickened. Your pulse throbbed in your ears. You can’t hide.

You dove for the knife, hands shaking, and swung. It caught something again. The figure flickered again, closer this time, glitching in and out, and a cold laugh or was it your own fear it shook the walls. 

It grabbed you again, lifting you like a ragdoll, and slammed you against the floor. Pain cracked your skull open, vision spiraling into white. You tried to scream, to fight, but everything was wrong, everything slipping. You were weightless, helpless, and the figure controlled every inch of the room. 

You dared to breathe. You were suffocating in disbelief, and the last thing you registered before darkness claimed you was the soft, impossible sound of something laughing.

You came to with your vision gone, the world reduced to darkness. Something black and heavy covered your eyes, pressing against your skin, sealing you off from everything. Panic clawed through you like fire and ice. 

You thrashed, pulled, tried to tug at the blindfold but your hands were trapped, tied to the chair as if the world itself had locked you in place and with every failed move it reminded you that you were utterly, irreversibly powerless. 

It was like your own body had betrayed you. You were desperate, trying to find even a shred of freedom, when a pair of hands settled on your shoulders. Firm, insistent, and terrifyingly familiar. 

“Shhhh,” a voice hissed into your ear. “Calm down. You’re safe.” The sound made your stomach drop. You knew that voice. It haunted your dreams, your nightmares, whispered in the corners of your mind even when you thought you were alone. 

The name slipped out of your lips before you could stop it. “Euijoo…” A low chuckle, warm and impossibly close, pressed into your skin. “Aww, I love it when you say my name,” the voice said, and suddenly all the shadows became solid, all the whispers real.

Hands moved along your arms, unsettlingly intimate, leaving heat and panic in their wake. Lips brushed against your neck. Every kiss, every whispered word, made your blood freeze in terror. “I missed you,” he murmured between kisses, and the words were a weight in your chest, impossible to ignore.

You were trapped, helpless in the darkness. Every nerve screamed, every instinct shouted escape, but the hands, they knew exactly how to hold you, exactly how to make fear feel like inevitability. 

The room was alive with him, and there was no way out. The blindfold lifted, and light stabbed your eyes, searing the last traces of darkness from your vision. You blinked, struggling to adjust, and your stomach plummeted. 

You were back. Back in the dining room where you had tried to escape, the one place you thought could never hold you again. The polished table stretched before you like a trap, every chair empty, every candle flickering with sinister patience.

And there he was. Euijoo. Standing at the far end, black suit sharp as a blade, every movement controlled, every shadow bending toward him. A demon masquerading in human skin, and somehow, impossibly, more terrifying because it was him.

He stepped forward, and before you could think, his hand shot out for your chin. Reflex screamed at you to pull away, and you did but he was faster. Fingers closed around your jaw, unyielding. 

“Oh,” he purred, voice low and lethal. “I missed you.” Your chest tightened. Your pulse hammered, and your hands flailed uselessly. His grip pulled you closer, so close you could smell him minty, sharp and inhumanly intimate.

His eyes bored into yours, black and endless, and his words crawled inside your skull. You look down and the breath leaves your body. The clothes you put on this morning are gone. In their place is red satin, an elegant dress that clings to you like skin. 

The fabric gleams in the low light, catching every line of your body, sculpting you into something you never agreed to be. You don’t remember changing. You don’t remember being touched. But you know he did. The realization settles like ice water poured down your spine.

A laugh slices through the silence, low and amused, curling into the room like smoke. “Oh, don’t worry, babe,” he says, his voice too close, far too close. “It’s nothing I haven’t seen before.” 

The sound makes you wince, your shoulders hunching as if you could fold yourself smaller, vanish inside your own skin. You clutch your sides, fingers digging into the chair. It feels wrong like it’s mocking you. 

You wonder how long he stood over you while you slept, how long he watched, how long his invisible hands arranged every detail. The thought turns your stomach, but you can’t escape the image. 

You try to speak, but your  throat clamps shut. Any words would crack, betray the panic that’s already crawling out of you. He moves around you, the air shifts with him, brushing against your cheek, rustling your hair, pressing at your shoulder. 

He’s circling, admiring. “Red suits you,” he murmurs. “I always knew it would. Soft. Dangerous. Perfect for a dirty little whore like you” His tone curls with satisfaction, like you’ve proven him right simply by sitting here, trembling in the costume he forced on you.

The satin clings tighter as if it hears him, as if it wants to please. Your pulse hammers, loud enough you’re afraid he can hear it, too. He laughs again. Like this is nothing. Like you are nothing.

 “Don’t be shy,” he says, the words dripping warmth that burns like acid. “You don’t think I know every inch of you by now?” You flinch so hard your teeth clack. His breath grazes your ear, his lips brushing the air. “You’re mine in this. Always mine.” 

You squeeze your eyes shut. “I can’t wait to break you down again,” he whispered, brushing your cheek lightly, mock tenderness laced with threat. Then he released you, stepping back to the head of the table. He sat like a king surveying his dominion, the flickering candlelight outlining him as if the room itself bowed in deference. 

The table was set for a dinner that should have been romantic plates, glasses, silver but the elegance only twisted in your stomach, a trap dressed as civility.

You wanted to run. Wanted to vanish into the shadows, wanted to scream until your voice shredded. But the air itself pressed down, heavy and thick, charged with his presence. The room wasn’t just a room anymore it was a cage. 

He leaned forward slightly, gaze locked on yours. “So quiet,” he murmured. “So cute thinking you could get away from me.” The room seemed to pulse with him, every candle flicker a heartbeat in time with yours, every shadow bending to watch. 

You swallowed hard, the taste of fear rising in your mouth, and realized you were utterly, completely trapped. You stared at him, words scraping up your throat like broken glass. “So that was it? You decided to fake your death just to torture me some more by becoming invisible?” 

He laughed. The sound was low, cruel, too casual for the weight it carried. “No, love. I decided to kill two birds with one stone.” He reached for the wine glass at his side, swirling the deep red liquid before taking a slow sip, eyes never leaving yours. 

The motion was so elegant, so deliberate, that it felt obscene like you were watching a man toast to your suffering.

He set the glass down with a soft click that echoed far too loud in the room. “To test out the new optics experiment I was working on before your little getaway plans… and see what my darling was up to.” Your stomach twisted, bile rising hot. 

He tilted his head, the smile sharp enough to cut. “But I’ll admit, it was fun watching you try so hard to erase me from your mind. To pretend I was gone. But I bet your body remembers me quite well.” 

The wink he shot you felt like a violation in itself, a finger pressing against an old wound. Then his expression shifted, the smile thinning into something harder, crueler. “Of course, since you stabbed into the suit, I’ll have to make a new one.” 

His voice dropped almost bored. But the frown that pulled at his mouth was worse than rage, it was disappointment. And disappointment was always more dangerous. 

The silence dragged, stretching your nerves to the breaking point. And then, without warning, he smiled. That fucking smile. It was a slash of white in the dim light, a carefully constructed mask of innocence meant for anyone else, anyone who wasn’t tied to this chair, staring into his abyss, but you knew. 

You knew the real him lived in the cold, flat emptiness behind it. The smile never reached his eyes. That’s where he kept his demons, churning in the soulless black of his pupils, and right now, they were staring right at you. 

His gaze was a physical violation, a slow, deliberate crawl from your terrified eyes down to the frantic pulse hammering at the base of your throat, then lower, over the thin fabric of the dress he put you in. You could feel it like a brand. “So,” he said, the word a soft, lethal whisper that scraped against your nerves. “What should I do with you… hmm?”

The options were a study in terror. He leaned in, his voice dropping to an intimate, horrible murmur. “Should I fuck you on this table? Remind you who you belong to?” The image was immediate, brutal, degrading. 

Your stomach lurched. “Or…” he drawled, drawing out the syllable, savoring your panic. “Should I take Yuri? Show her what happens when she helps you?” Yuri. The name was a jolt of pure lightning. You jerked against the ropes, the coarse fibers biting deep into your wrists, a fresh bloom of pain you barely registered. “No. No, no, please, Euijoo. Don’t. She’s innocent!”

“Yudai is watching her right now,” he began, his voice slow, savoring each syllable like it was some private joke. “And he thinks she’d look so damn pretty with tears running down her face.” “No—Euijoo, don’t,” you begged, your words tumbling out in desperation. “She doesn’t deserve that—”

A smirk cut across his face, sharp and merciless. “You know how Yudai gets when he sees something pretty.” His eyes locked on yours, gleaming with mockery. “I could barely hold him back when he saw those sweet little tears on your face when I fucked you like a slut in front of him.” 

He laughed and the sound of it made your chest seize. You cried harder, the memory digging in deeper. 

“Alright, fine. Fine.” He waved a hand, dismissive, as though you were nothing more than noise. “I’ll call him off.” Then he leaned back, his voice dropping, almost playful in its cruelty. “But you know you might have to give him something in return.” He ended it with a shrug, like he was talking about the weather. Like it was the most casual fucking thing in the fucking world. 

The laugh that escaped him was a dry, rustling sound, like bones in a bag. He stood up, his shadow engulfing you. His hands went to the knot of his tie, pulling it loose with a slow, deliberate tug. Each step he took toward you was a lifetime of dread.

 “So if you want Yuri to be safe and sound,” he whispered, the word slithering into your ear as he walked behind you, his presence a dark heat at your back, “you better be a good little whore for me”

“I’ll be your whore Euijoo” The plea was ripped from you, a soft, desperate sound. You leaned forward, a useless, thrashing movement against the unyielding binds. You were offering submission, anything and everything. 

He halted at your side, not touching, not speaking, just leaning in until the heat of his breath grazed your cheek like a threat you couldn’t see his lips brushing the shell of your ear, his breath hot. 

“I can’t wait to be inside you again.” The promise was a violation in itself. A sob broke free from your chest, the only weapon you had left. Hot, helpless tears carved paths through the grime on your cheeks. 

You felt the soft silk. He brought the tie over your shoulder, the fabric slithering against your skin like a threat made real. He drew it across your mouth, pulling it tight between your lips, muffling your cries, your promises, your very breath. He tied it at the back of your head, a brutal, efficient knot. 

Then he bent close and kissed the back of your neck, soft and impossibly intimate, and the tenderness was the worst kind of threat. 

He untied your hands with a swift, practiced tug, then kicked the chair out from under you.  The sound of the chair clattering against the floor was so loud in the silent, expensive room. Before the echo could die, his hands were on you, a brutal, familiar ownership that turned your bones to water. 

He bent you over the cold, polished wood of the dining table, your cheek pressed against the grain he’d so carefully chosen. His palms rubbed down your sides, a mockery of a caress, settling on your hips with a grip that meant to leave bruises. 

“There now,” he murmured, his voice a low, condescending purr right against your ear. The heat of his breath was a violation. “Look at that. Gosh, I almost forgot how perfectly you fit right here. Like you were made for it. For me.”

He didn’t wait for a response you couldn’t give. The fabric of your dress was flipped up, a sudden rush of air, then the sharp, stinging crack of his palm against your ass. You jumped with a choked squeal, the sound strangled by the makeshift gag. 

Tears of shock and humiliation instantly welled in your eyes, blurring the room. Spit dribbled from your stretched lips, a hot, shameful trickle down your chin. Your vision swam, desperately seeking an anchor, anything to pull you out of this moment. 

It found the chair at the end of the table. You focused on the intricate carving on it, a spiral, a vortex. You could fall into it. You could just… go away. You were so close to disappearing, the edges of the room dissolving into static, when you felt him. 

The blunt, insistent pressure of him at your entrance, a slick, terrible promise. “Oh, God,” he groaned, feeling the way your body was reacting to him. His laugh was a dark, filthy thing. “Still trying to play, darling? Still think you have any control here? Cute.”

He pushed in. This was his style. Hard and rough. A single, devastating thrust that stole the air from your lungs and drove you into the unforgiving table. Your hips hit the edge with every piston-like drive of his body into yours, a painful, rhythmic punctuation to his fucking. 

“This is what you needed, wasn’t it?” he grunted, the words labored but dripping with contempt. “All that pretending. acting like you could leave me behind. This is where you belong. Right here. You’re just a pussy for me to use.” 

He moved, his grip shifting. He grabbed your thigh, wrenching your leg up and planting your thigh flat on the table. The angle changed, became obscene, deeper than you thought possible. He plunged into you, and the sensation was a white-hot spike of pain-pleasure that shattered your fragile escape. 

You felt him hit your cervix, a deep, internal collision that made you see stars behind your eyelids. “Fuck,” he snarled, the curse a raw, guttural sound of triumph. “There it is. Right there. That’s mine. Do you feel that? That’s all for me. Remember it.”

The world narrowed to the splintered grain of the wood beneath your cheek, the cold press of the table against your rising and falling ribs. His arm wasn’t an embrace; it was a bar of iron pressing across your neck, brutal, unyielding, stealing every ragged breath. 

Your back arched against him, helpless, presented like prey. The memory hit you like a blade, the night you thought you could escape, the night you almost tasted freedom. And now… now you were back at the starting line, trapped in the same cruel cycle, every instinct screaming that there was no way out.   

A puppet master yanking his favorite doll’s strings. “That’s it,” his voice was a condescending rasp, a foul secret breathed directly into your ear. “Let me see what a desperate little thing you are. Chest all puffed up, begging for it. You’re not even a person right now, are you? You’re just a warm, tight hole for me to use.”

Each thrust was a punctuation mark on his ownership, a brutal, piston-like drive that slammed the breath from your lungs. Spit dribbled in a shameful thread from your gagged mouth, pooling on the wood. 

You could hear him, a raw, animal groaning that seemed to vibrate through your very bones, a sound that had nothing to do with you and everything to do with his own base, grinding pleasure. 

“Shit. You feel that?” he grunted, his voice thick and straining. “You feel how deep that is? I’m coming.” Your eyes flew wide. A silent, frantic plea. No. No. Not that. Your head managed a weak, jerking shake against the oppressive weight of his arm. The sound he made was a low, dark chuckle that curdled into a moan. 

“Awww, baby,” he crooned, the false sweetness laced with venom. He drove into you, a final, devastating plunge that stole the world. “If I want to put a baby in you, I will put one in you. This body? It belongs to me. Not to you. To me.” He moaned then, a guttural, broken sound against the shell of your ear. “Oh God… I’m seeing stars…”

And you felt it. A hard, final series of jerks, a hot, claiming spill deep inside you that felt like a brand. He came to a shuddering halt, emptying himself, marking his territory with a violence that left you hollowed out. 

As suddenly as it began, the pressure was gone. The arm left your neck. You heard the soft rustle of clothing, the definitive click of a belt buckle. The mundane sounds were almost more terrifying than the violence. 

Your vision swam, focusing on the chair at the end of the table. His figure came back into view. Calm. Composed.

He sat down in that very chair, the one he’d been sitting in before this started. He picked up his wine glass, swirled the blood-dark liquid, and took a slow, contemplative sip. His eyes never left you. 

He watched the mess he’d made of you, the trembling limbs, the tear-streaked face, the slow, shameful trickle already starting to slide down your inner thigh. A slow, possessive smile spread across his face. 

“Well, now,” he said, his voice smooth and horrifyingly conversational. “Aren’t you a pretty picture?”