RUMI'S POV – FIRST PERSON, PRESENT TENSE
The first time I hear him, I'm in a convenience store, two blocks from our HQ, waiting in line to buy cough drops and strawberry milk.
It's just past midnight, the fluorescents are flickering, and the air smells like ramen powder and floor cleaner. I'm staring at a rack of keychains shaped like chibi sea cucumbers when his voice brushes the edge of my mind.
"You still drink that stuff? All sugar, no soul."
My fingers freeze on the plastic bottle. My breath catches. I don't turn around. I know there's no one behind me.
I know that voice.
It's Jinu.
Not a memory. Not some echo in a dream. Real. Crisp. Casually annoying. Him.
I hear him when I'm not trying to. That's the worst part. Not when I'm asleep. Not when I'm singing. Just… folding laundry, brushing my teeth, scrolling through fan messages. That's when his voice slips through. Not as imagination. Not grief pretending. Him.
"That top makes your shoulders look like you fight demons for a living. Oh wait—"
I nearly drop my drink. I grip the bottle so hard the plastic warps under my fingers.
Outside, the street hums with neon and midnight drizzle. I walk home in a fog. I don't speak. I don't think. I don't sleep.
He's not supposed to be here. I saw him vanish. I felt his soul leave—into me. Into the song. Into the Honmoon. That's what Celine said. That's what I said, through tears and broken lyrics. So why does it still feel like he's teasing me from across the room?
Why does it feel like he's still here?
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The others think I'm spiraling.
Zoey has started making me herbal teas with names like "Mind Mellow" and "Soul Detox," dropping the bags into my mug like she's low-key staging a spiritual intervention. She keeps suggesting spa playlists and energy-cleansing baths.
Mira doesn't bother with subtlety. She just stares at me when I forget I'm talking out loud, mouth open mid-conversation—with myself. Her silence has shape now, sharp at the edges. Like she's trying to hear what I hear. Like she's bracing for the day I finally crack.
But Celine is the worst.
She watches with that war-weary gaze, like she's lived through this before, or worse, caused it. She doesn't ask questions. She just studies me—every skipped meal, every lyric scribbled and torn up, every time I laugh at something no one else heard. She doesn't say it, but I know.
She's waiting for me to confess it first.
And I want to. God, I want to scream it until the walls echo back.
I'm not crazy.I just… I think he left something behind.
But I don't say it. Because saying it might make it real. Saying it might make it permanent.
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Instead, I slip away to the rehearsal room. HQ is quiet, everyone either asleep or pretending not to hear me unravel. I lie on my back, right in the center of the polished floor, arms out, legs slack. The tile is freezing against my spine. The cold soaks through my sweatshirt like a question I can't answer. The silence in here is different. Denser. Heavier. It buzzes in my ears like a premonition. Or maybe tinnitus. Hard to tell the difference lately.
I stare up at the lights overhead, too white, too bright—fluorescent judgment. My eyes sting, but I don't blink. I let the artificial glare slice into me until my vision prickles and stars form at the edges. Still not enough to drown him out.
So, I hum.
Just one note. F sharp. The one he used to tease me for over-relying on. My fallback. My musical safety blanket. The sound curls in my throat like muscle memory. Familiar. Hollow. And then it happens.
Another note. Soft. Subtle. It twines under mine like a thread catching in fabric. Softer. Deeper. His. It doesn't echo. It responds.
My whole body goes still. The note lingers for a beat longer than natural. It's him.
Jinu.
He's there.
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I refuse to close my eyes and wait patiently. That's how horror movies start.
Instead, I sit stiff and stubborn on my bed, hoodie zipped to my chin, tea forgotten beside me. My laptop hums softly, displaying a blank project file I've stared at for two hours.
And sure enough, in the pale hush between 3 a.m. and regret, I hear it again.
"Your falsetto's gotten worse."
I don't scream. I don't flinch. I just kind of... implode.
A laugh bursts out of me, except it's jagged and wet and dangerously close to a sob. My heart is a live wire under my ribs. I press the heel of my hand to my forehead.
"I'm hallucinating," I say out loud. "Too much caffeine. Sleep deprivation. Demon soul feedback loop. All very logical."
"You're also pitchy in D minor. Want to blame that on caffeine too?"
I nearly kick the wall.
Instead, I slide into the studio like a ghost auditioning for a midnight exorcism. No lights except for the faint red ring of the standby mic, glowing like the devil's mood lamp.
The air smells like old wires and lemon water. The chair creaks as I lower myself. The mic waits, still warm from yesterday's rehearsal, like it knows something I don't.
I reach out. Touch it like it might shatter or maybe scream.
"Jinu?" My voice is a thread.
Silence.
My palms sweat. My knees feel like soup.
"If you're in here… in me… just—don't make me beg."
"I don't want you to beg. That'd be weird for both of us."
I nearly fall out of the chair.
He hums—a single chord, playful, unmistakably him. It blooms under my skin like heat from a lit match. I feel it in my chest first, then my throat. Like someone else is breathing inside me. Like a second pair of lungs.
I open my mouth and sing.
He sings with me.
It's not a duet. It's not possession. It's resonance. His voice wraps around mine—not overpowering, not leading. Just there. Warm. Familiar. Home.
My arms tremble as I clutch the mic. The world tilts, too full, too intimate. I sink to the floor, my back against the studio wall, my chest heaving like I've run a race and survived a storm in the same breath.
Mouth open. Heart wide.
There's something sharp and glittering in my chest that might be affection. Or delusion.
"Jinu," I whisper. "You're still here."
"Took you long enough."
"I thought you were gone."
"I am. Technically. I'm soul-adjacent."
"Stop making up ghost vocabulary."
"You're the one hosting your dead maybe-boyfriend in your diaphragm. I think I've earned a little creative license."
I snort. Then cry a little. Then snort again.
I wipe my face on my sleeve, still laughing, still terrified, still desperately grateful. "I hate how smug you sound."
"You missed it."
"I did."
Silence. Soft. Mutual.
"You okay?"
"No."
"Want to sing again?"
I nod. The hum begins.
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At breakfast, I'm too quiet.
Mira notices first. Of course, she does. She's barely touched her kimchi and already glaring like she's about to stage an intervention.
Then a rice ball hits my collarbone.
My head jerks up slowly. She's already holding another rice ball, locked and loaded like this is breakfast warfare and I'm the enemy.
"Say something," she says.
I glance down at the untouched omelet on my plate. It's cooling into a sad yellow slab. The table wobbles every time someone laughs in the next room. Someone's playing a bootleg remix of our debut track. Badly.
I pick up my spoon. Then set it down again.
"I think I'm haunted," I say.
Silence.
Zoey chokes on a mouthful of seaweed and rice. Mira freezes mid-bite, chopsticks suspended in front of her face.
"Haunted," Mira repeats flatly.
"Like, ghost haunted?" Zoey asks, horrified. "Because we've fought actual demons, and this is still the weirdest thing you've ever said at a meal."
I wave a hand vaguely. "Not the vengeful-curse kind. Just... soul-haunted. Borrowed. Occupied?"
Zoey stares at me like she's trying to decide if I've cracked or if this is some kind of weird metaphor for burnout. Mira's eye twitches.
I sigh. "I think Jinu's in me."
The silence is louder this time.
Zoey's jaw drops. Mira blinks hard. Zoey leans forward.
"Okay, but like—romantically or exorcism-level?"
"Honestly?" I tilt my head. "Yes."
Zoey gasps. "Oh my god, like Moonlight Monks of Honmoon, episode twelve! When the fox prince's spirit gets sealed inside the heroine and they argue over who gets to use the body during the full moon!"
"Please do not turn this into a drama reference," Mira mutters, stabbing her rice with surgical precision.
Zoey ignores her. "Wait, does he possess your singing voice? Is it like... harmony by haunting? Because that's kinda hot."
"It's not hot," I mutter, hiding behind my tea. "It's inconvenient. He gives vocal notes during warm-ups. In my head. While I'm brushing my teeth."
"Is he shirtless in the headspace?" Zoey asks, leaning even closer.
"Do you have a filter?"
"Not for romance," she says proudly.
Mira finally sets her chopsticks down with a sigh sharp enough to cut glass. "So let me get this straight. You're telling us that you are currently possessed—lovingly—by the soul of a dead demon-pop-idol... and you thought now was a good time to mention it?"
I stare at her. "Would you prefer I announced it during a live stream?"
Mira points her chopsticks at me like a warning. "You're lucky I don't shove that rice ball down your possessed throat."
Zoey starts humming ominous music.
I reach for my tea again, stare into it like it might offer answers.
None come.
Just Jinu, humming the harmony to Zoey's fake horror soundtrack in the back of my mind.
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Celine doesn't look surprised when I tell her. Not shocked. Not skeptical. Just… tired.
She sets her tea down with a click that's louder than it should be in the quiet. Her hands don't shake. That almost scares me more.
"I was afraid this might happen," she says, her voice low, careful. "I've been watching the signs."
My mouth dries out. "You knew?"
She doesn't answer right away. Her eyes drift toward the window—toward the soft light bleeding through the clouds, the same shade as mourning paper.
"There were always rumors," she says. "Among the old hunters. That if a soul was given freely—completely—it could fuse. Not haunt. Not possess. Merge." She turns back to me, gaze steady, and it cuts like a blade. "But I've never seen it. Until now."
My heart stutters. "So… what, he's inside me?"
Celine's expression tightens, barely visible, like a thread pulled taut beneath the surface. She folds her hands, knuckles white. "The Honmoon isn't just a barrier. It's resonance. A song shaped by sacrifice. You opened it with your heart, and he gave you his."
I want to scream.
"I didn't ask for this," I say, the words cracking like dry branches.
"I know," she says.
"I can't sleep. I can't breathe. I'm not alone in my own head."
"You're not," she says quietly. "And maybe… you were never meant to be."
My fists clench.
"You keep saying it like it's beautiful," I snap. "Like it's poetic. But it's not. He's dead, Celine. And I'm singing with a ghost."
"No," she says, standing. Her voice sharpens. "He's not dead."
I freeze.
She takes a step closer. "He's not dead, Rumi. You're not haunted. You're linked. His soul lives on because you were the only place strong enough to carry it. To hold it without breaking."
I shake my head. "That doesn't make it right."
"No. It doesn't." She reaches for me, but I pull away.
"I didn't get to say goodbye," I whisper. My breath turns brittle in my lungs. I can't do this.
I can't be this, so turn and walk away. If I stay, I'll scream until the whole world shatters.
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Back in the studio, I slam the door and scream anyway. "Get out of my head, Jinu!"
"Can't. Lease agreement. No refunds."
I kick the soundboard. It hurts. Then I crumple.
"I don't know what to do with you," I whisper. "I miss you. But you're not even… you."
Silence.
Then: "I'm still me. Just quieter. Closer."
I cover my face with trembling hands.
He's not a memory. He's not a ghost. He's not a dream or a curse. He's in my voice. My rhythm. My ribs. Every time I sing, he sings too.
And maybe that's love but it could also be madness.
Too bad, I don't care.