Finding You

SPECIAL CHAPTER: SEHNSUCHT

An old ballad filled the head of a young woman of seventeen, subtly drowning the noise of the bustling crowd lined up at the side of the boulevard at lunchtime. The countdown of the pedestrian light was already halfway and yet - to her, at least - the seconds were dragging at an excruciatingly sluggish rate when all she wanted at that moment was to cross the busy intersection and look for a steaming bowl of ramen.

"Jin!" the shrill yell of another teenaged girl faded into the background, piercing through the sentimental melody that was coming from the wireless earphones.

The lady they called Jin gave the device a tap to pause the music and turned to her right where she saw two of her classmates - one with a curtain of long and straight hair and another petite teenager with an equally pretty face - running towards her direction.

"What in the world -?" Jin chided them as soon as they halted in front of her. "Hey, what's the rush all about?"

"Well, you told us to inform you straightaway if something bad happens, right?" Ji Won - the taller of the two girls - harked back in between pants. "That's exactly why we're here, mistress."

Jin closed her eyes and sighed, slightly wincing at the title her close friends mockingly conferred upon her. It was a nickname born out of her bizarre interest in fateful events - good and bad - which was an open secret between her and her two closest buddies. Much to her chagrin, twelve years have passed and they were still under the impression that she only had a penchant for the latter.

'Mistress of Catastrophe' - that was what they called her.

"Even now, I can't understand why you are obsessed with other people's misfortunes, Jin," Jung Hyun said as they took hurried strides back to the academe.

"It's because I'm not obsessed with them, okay?" Jin corrected her as she clumsily adjusted the collars of her coat, keeping it tighter against the bitter breeze of the first week of winter. "I told you so many times that I am intrigued with life's milestones - its beginning, its end, and the occurrences in between - but you keep insisting that I have an exclusive liking towards the bad things."

"I'm talking to you, Ji Won," she promptly added while shooting daggers at her other chingu.

Ji Won scoffed, consequently puffing breath vapors out of her mouth.

"Pssh... then why are we always squeezing through bystanders at an accident, then?" she countered.

Jin let out a heavy exhale - both out of resignation and exertion from their brisk walking - then asked, "Pray tell, President Uhm, what are the odds that we'll be seeing a woman give birth in the middle of the street in broad daylight?"

"Point taken," Ji Won concurred just as they ducked a corner about ten meters away from the school gate that led to a food stall alley which students frequented during breaks.

As soon as Jin saw the swarm of people gathering near the entrance of a condemned three-story building at the far end of the narrow road, her feet slowed down to a pace that was in sheer juxtaposition to her rapid heartbeat.

What if he's here? What if the supreme beings finally granted your wish to meet him again? she thought to herself as panic began simmering in the pits of her belly.

What then, Jin?

She stopped walking altogether as the ghost of the man who haunted her since that one afternoon at the countryside flashed before her eyes.

Five years ago, on the final day of her vacation in the summer of 2039, she dashed from the car back to their ancestral home at the last minute to retrieve a forgotten book. She went straight to the house's mini library, then took a quick detour on her way out to bid her grandmother farewell once more. However, when she reached the old woman's chamber, she saw a svelte female in an elegant black suit standing at the foot of her grandmother's bed through a slit in the doorway.