Red String Over NamHan River

Kim Hana felt a chill run down her spine, quaking her bones as she stared at the bright sunny day. She wondered if she had caught a summer cold, but quickly dismissed it. She did not have the luxury of catching a cold at this time as she had to prepare to start her new job tomorrow. The summer graced her with the heat of the sun helping to dry her just-washed suit. She glanced across her small balcony only to meet the eyes of her neighbour on the balcony opposite hers and froze slightly before quickly gathering the empty buckets on the ground to leave.

She needed no telling that he must have been watching for quite some time as usual.

“Finished with washing, neighbour,” the scrawny man in a white t-shirt and football shorts asked. She quickly nodded, entered her apartment, closed the sliding door and shut her blinds. She quickly put away her cleaning tools and changed into a black t-shirt and jeans combo, picked up her shopping bag stepped out of her house. As she adjusted her white sneakers while locking her door, she saw her scrawny neighbour now wearing brown trousers in the same white shirt seemingly busy on the ground floor. For a moment she wondered if to say something about him, if she had experienced his behaviour enough to be able to recognize him waiting for her from the third floor.

She gripped her shopping bag and walked briskly down, dashing past him in a feigned hurry.

She did not look back to see what he was doing as she walked without slowing to a supermarket twenty minutes away. Her hurried walking had managed to cut the journey by three minutes, leaving her slightly out of breath as she walked in and grabbed a basket, just in time to notice her neighbour enter the supermarket after her. She froze slightly as he raised his hand to greet her.

“Neighbour.” he said, “Are you going shopping? Me too,” he said as he smiled through perfectly lined teeth. She admitted that apart from his build, he was a somewhat handsome man. But his obsessive eyes disturned her greatly.

“Oh,” Hana answered and started rummaging through her small cross-body bag hoping he would leave. She picked up her phone and placed it on her ear and proceeded to act as though she had received a call.

“What? Now? Ok.” she said, dropped the shopping basket and made to leave, only to be grabbed by the arm.

“Where are you going?” he asked with slight irritation and her flat expression dipped into a frown.

“What are you doing?” she asked and he released her arm as though he had touched something hot and his face strained to make a smile.

“Not shopping anymore?” he asked.

“No,” she said and left in a hurry. Because she would not receive her deposit back at this point, she would have moved away. She sighed when she walked for a while and looked back but could not find him. What was she to do now? She had just returned to this city and had no close friends in the city. She wondered if she should call her former co-workers but remembered how her last employment ended and stopped. She walked aimlessly to a bus stop and got on. Her unease only caused her to look around even more, worried she was being followed. She got off at a park and sat playing games on her phone. She had decided to wait a while before returning. As long as she waited a while before returning, he would leave so that she could run her errand and return to cook.

She had to cook for the week as she was not sure there would be time for her to eat a full meal, talk more make one when she started working. She had heard good things about the work experience at KM group, but she could not vouch for human character. There was no guarantee that she would get a good boss. She rotated between playing on her phone and watching children play, as time passed. She had only realised she should be leaving when the sun had started going down, she took a bus back and walked to the supermarket, a frown plastered to her face as she cursed at a wasted day. She wondered how long it would take her to finish cooking her weekly meal and go to sleep early enough to wake up well-rested for work.

Entering the supermarket, she looked around to make sure she was not being followed as she moved around shopping. The slow music from the speaker calmed her a bit so that she could do her task much more efficiently. Just when her tense shoulder had dropped, she felt a tremor dance through the supermarket, products toppled from the shelves causing her to hold on to a shelf behind her for stability. The lights flickered as she heard someone scream from the aisle to her left and her eyes dashed that way just in time to see the shelf fall onto someone. Just that moment, she felt the shelf behind her tilt and dashed away before it could fall. The flickering lights disoriented her, making it hard to see clearly that she did not even notice when her back slammed into someone behind her in panic. She spun instantly at the sudden contact, jumping back a few steps.

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” she said to the tall figure in front of her, looking up into ink-black eyes.

“It’s fine,” the man answered as they both grabbed onto a shelf as a second tremor descended. She felt her breath become erratic as her heart drummed in her chest. Just when she wondered if this was her day to die, the tremor seized. She paused for a bit before making to get up only to be stopped.

“Wait, the shockwave could return. Wait a minute first.” The man hurriedly stopped her and she paused in place. She tried hard to take in deep breaths but it was hard, as she could only manage shallow once frantically competing with her racing heart.

The man opposite her watched her for a bit as she tried to calm herself. For a moment she looked as though she was about to have a panic attack but noticed her forcefully calm herself.

“It should be fine by now,” he said to her as he stood. Hana looked around her, taking in the destruction before moving towards the window.

“Did the earthquake take out the electricity?” she asked, staring out at the darkness outside. The man walked over and looked out to no speck of light, not even a flicker could be seen outside.

“This store must have a backup generator,” he commented.

“I wonder if others are okay,” Hana said, remembering the scream she had heard before and walked back in that direction only to meet neatly arranged rows of shelves.

“Hey, how is this possible?” she asked the man left behind and he walked over till he stood beside her and paused at the lack of chaos before his eyes. Not even a product was out of place. They both looked back at where they came from.

“How can the shock not reach this far?” he asked.

“I definitely heard someone scream when I was here. The shelves fell on someone,” she said and for an unexplained reason started walking back the way they came towards the window, but behind them was not even one fallen shelf, talk less product.

“Something is wrong, we need to get out of here.” Hana felt the hair at the back of her neck rise. She knew this feeling. Someone was watching them.

“Let’s go,” he answered and they started walking. With the flicking lights to accompany them, they walked for more than thirty minutes in silence, none daring to utter a word. No matter how far they walked, there was no exit in sight, nor did the feeling of being watched disappear.

“There is no way Orange supermarket is this big,” Hana commented.

“What do you mean, this is just some small store on Sangam-dong,” he said.

“Sangam-dong? No, this is near NamSuk-dong, the bus stop is not far from here.” Hana said with a frown, one could hear a slight tremor in her voice.

At this point, he stopped and looked around, not a word in response. He pulled out his phone and found no signal. Seeing his action, she followed but was met with the same result, causing her to place it back in her cross-body bag.

“This has got to be a joke, right?”

“We are going in circles,” he said and she paused and looked around. The overwhelming feeling of being watched grew even more at this moment.

“Someone is watching us,” she whispered and he froze and looked her way, noting the direction she was staring at and following her gaze towards a shelf of baby products. He strained his eyes on that spot till a dark shadow dashed away quickly.

“Wait!” he called and made after him.

“No, don’t follow,” Hana hurried after him.

“Why did he hide? Wait!” She turned a corner and could no more see him and paused.

“Where are you?!” she called loudly.

“Run!” she heard his panicked voice from nowhere in particular and her legs moved before her brain could process the information. Her breath painfully tore through her lungs as she ran in no particular direction.