forgot to update this... whoops. thank you to the one (1) person who reviewed. no, you, dear anon, are a gift to this fandom in 2020. thank you for giving me attention kmdfhkjff
Rin's alarm honked obnoxiously at 6am, and she threw herself out of bed in a panic to find her phone.
It was buried under a pile of clothes that needed to be put away, although she had no memory of putting it there (or putting it anywhere for the matter).
After texting Miku to reassure her she was still living and breathing, she went to the bathroom to take a shower. She stripped off and glanced up to check her reflection in the mirror.
Instead of her face, she looked at the words go away smeared across the glass in red.
Rin gasped, but then snapped her mouth shut, reminding herself she didn't have time to panic. The footsteps from earlier that morning flashed through her mind, but a part of her questioned, Why would someone break into your apartment to vandalise your mirror and not steal anything?
Or, well, maybe they did steal something, but she hadn't noticed yet. That was something to deal with when she wasn't getting ready to go to work, though.
Her stomach churned with unease and she squinted at the letters, before lifting a finger to rub at it. The writing came off surprisingly easy, and she brought her finger to her nose to sniff it. Her gaze then dropped to one of her red lipsticks discarded on the bench.
Rin frowned. It was one of her expensive ones, too.
Damn it.
She put the lipstick back into her makeup bag and wiped the glass down as best she could with some wet toilet paper, sighing at the smudges left behind. It would need to be cleaned better later.
Miku responded to her texts during the day, mainly asking if she'd slept okay and if any other weird stuff had happened. Rin responded to them during her lunch break. She wondered, for a brief moment, if she should tell Miku about the suspected break-in, like the footsteps and the lipstick words on her mirror.
But instead, she opted for, Slept okay, and nothing major happened, although it does sort of feel like someone's watching me in the apartment.
Rin checked her messages again when she left work, seeing Miku had taken the bait. I told you it's haunted! her message read.
She rolled her eyes to herself, before sending back, Or maybe some pervert installed cameras in the apartment and is watching my every move? Lol.
Miku called her when she arrived at her station, and they chatted idly on the phone while she walked home. She gushed on about how Gumi got a promotion at work, and now they could save better for their overseas-eloping-strategy.
"Seriously, nothing else strange happened after I left at your place?" she asked when Rin mentioned she'd reached her apartment building. "I find that hard to believe. Are you just lying to make me sound crazy?"
"Miku," Rin said as she dug through her bag for her keys, "you are crazy. I'm telling the truth! It was fine. No problems at all." She jabbed the key into her lock and pushed the door open with ease. "I haven't even had any problems with the front door."
Miku huffed into the receiver. "Maybe the sage worked," she said, sounding somewhat hopeful.
Rin slid inside, almost tripping over a bag left in the middle of the entrance, before slipping off her shoes and dropping her things on the kitchen counter. "Maybe," she echoed. Everything seemed relatively normal in the apartment, much to her relief. "Where did you leave that, by the way?" She hadn't seen the bundle of sage since yesterday, when Miku had been using it.
"I don't remember, maybe on the kitchen bench?" Miku suggested.
She looked over the bench, trying to spot any green among the clutter, but was unsuccessful. "I don't know," she said. "I haven't seen it there. Maybe I moved it without thinking?"
"Um… yeah. Probably."
Rin walked into the bathroom, switching on the light and tucking the phone between her cheek and shoulder. "It'll turn up eventually. I probably lost it in the madness of yesterday." She noted her makeup bag was open, and her lipstick was sitting beside the sink yet again, lid missing.
An exasperated sigh escaped her as she wrenched her gaze up to the mirror.
Like the morning, someone had scrawled across it in angry red letters, go away.
Miku heard her. "What's wrong?"
"Oh, nothing," Rin lied, packing away her makeup. She found the lid to her lipstick on the floor near the toilet, which was gross, but she was too shaken to care. "I should probably have dinner, now, anyway. I'll call you back later, Miku, alright?"
"Are you sure everything's okay, Rin?" Miku asked. That girl was too good.
"It's fine," she assured. "I'll talk later. Bye." Before her friend could protest, she hung up, setting down her phone beside the sink.
Rin ran a hand through her hair, musing. Thief or not, it was irking her a little by whatever game they were playing. She turned away from the sink and leant her back against it, drumming her fingers against her upper arms.
Finally, feeling a little stupid but somewhat indignant, she announced, "If you want to write stupid threats on my mirror, don't use my fucking lipstick. It's expensive. You don't know how many paychecks I had to save to afford it. Use something else—I don't care."
The only response that came was silence. Although she was expecting that, because she wasn't even talking to anyone, she still felt a bit like an idiot.
She dropped her hands to her thighs with a smack and turned back to the sink to wash up. As she did, though, her eyes caught the silhouette of someone standing behind her in her reflection.
Rin's head shot up to the mirror like a deer under headlights, but her reflection was normal. There was no one there. No one but her.
She bit down on her lip and finished cleaning up, before leaving to warm up dinner in the microwave.
After that first day, strange things kept happening.
At three in the morning, every night, she would hear someone pacing around in her room. Empty threats would occasionally appear on her mirror—whoever was writing it resorted to using tomato sauce from the kitchen as an alternative to lipstick. Things would mysteriously go missing, but turn up in random places later on—like the sage, which she found a week or so later in the trash while sorting through her rubbish. Sometimes her front door would jam, or a 'breeze' would slam it shut when she was leaving.
There were also the humanoid shadows in her peripheral vision, as well.
Rin knew it was all too coincidental, and she was past the stage of thinking it was a thief, but she didn't want to admit to it being paranormal. Whatever it was, whoever it was, was obviously just being a pain in the ass, and she didn't want to give it the joy of amusement.
So she refused to acknowledge it for a long time, or for as much as she could. She didn't speak a word of the strange and unexplained to Miku, who soon learned to stop asking about her apartment, anyway. If she ignored it, the less bad it seemed.
Eventually, everything going wrong just became normal to her.
Because of that, Rin didn't think twice when she came home piss-drunk one night in the arms of a work colleague, and she didn't think twice when they started undressing in her futon. For a moment, just a moment, the alcohol and the heat of the moment made her forget that her apartment had a mind of its own.
She wrapped her arms around Kaito—her colleague's—neck and leaned in to kiss him on the cheek as they straddled on the floor. His hands fumbled over her back, trying to unhook the band of her bra, his breath shaky.
It wasn't their first time sleeping together. Although Kaito claimed to be in an on-and-off relationship with someone else when sober, he would drink himself senseless and start kissing her after work outings. He wouldn't remember a thing afterwards, but Rin always did.
As she moved to kiss him on the mouth, he stiffened in her arms and dropped his hands to his sides. She pulled away to look at his face, noticing his sudden physical withdrawal from the situation.
"What's wrong?" she asked, noting his startled expression.
Kaito swallowed, the colour draining from his face. "D-dead…" was as much as he could choke out before tearing himself from her arms.
Rin's eyebrows shot up and she turned her head to search for whatever qualified as 'd-dead', but all she saw was the rest of her messy room and that one shitty little box window.
When she looked back to Kaito, he was rushing to pull his pants back on and button up his shirt, a whole lot of drunken fumbling. She handed him his jacket with a look of confusion.
"I don't understand," she said.
He refused to meet her eye. "T-there's a dead guy in your room, Rin, what the fuck," he spluttered, voice tilting with panic.
Just to be sure, she checked over her shoulder again, but nope, no dead guy.
"No," she said, perplexed. "There's not?"
Kaito grabbed for his shoes and bag, not even tying his laces properly. He whipped his head around to look at her, before his eyes shifted to something behind and he blanched, slapping a hand over his mouth.
As a reflex, Rin handed him her trash can to throw up in, but he pushed it away and kept his eyes to his feet.
"I can't," he said through his hand, already halfway out the door. "Sorry, Rin."
And with a slam, he was gone, leaving her standing in the hallway looking very lost.
Rin took a moment to process the situation, running the tips of her fingers along the fabric on her thighs. She didn't see any dead guy, but Kaito was adamant. He basically went ass-up out her door. God, and she was finally going to get laid after months!
Stupid apartment.
Pissed, literally and figuratively, Rin turned on her heel and marched (stumbled) into her kitchen, slamming her palms down onto the counter. She exhaled, closing her eyes and opening them, before spotting her phone sitting nearby.
She pressed the home button, checking the time. 1:19. Miku wouldn't mind, right?
Well, it didn't matter, because she was seething and horny. And drunk.
Really drunk.
Miku answered her phone on the sixth ring. "Rin? What's the matter?" she asked, her words slow and muffled. "Why are you calling me at this time? I was asleep, you know."
"Miku, this is an emergency."
"What? Rin, are you drunk?"
"No!" she exclaimed, before sighing. "Okay, yes. Maybe. But it's an emergency."
"Look, Rin, I'm not driving all the way into Tokyo to pick you up off the road because you missed the last train—"
"It's not that!" Rin exclaimed, flustered. "I want to know something."
Miku groaned. "What?"
"How do you kill a fucking dead person?"
Her friend was quiet, before repeating slowly, "What?"
Rin rolled her eyes, although she couldn't see it. "You heard me. A dead person. How do I kill them?"
Miku hesitated. "Do you mean, like, an exorcism? Or are you trying to dispose of a dead body? I don't understand."
"Yes! An exorcism!"
The room suddenly went cold, but Rin was too drunk to notice. She was also too drunk to notice the tomato sauce leaving her cupboard.
"Uh, okay—give me a minute—" Miku must've put her hand over the phone, because she heard some muffled speaking. She was probably talking to Gumi. The talking stopped and her voice returned. "Do you want me to call you an ambulance?"
"An ambulance?! I'm not the one who's fucking dead!" Rin smacked her hand into her forehead, exasperated. She added as an afterthought, "But I might be if I set this fucking apartment on fire."
A beat, and then, "Oh no." Rustling came from Miku's end. "Rin, I—your—I knew your apartment was haunted, but—oh god—what did you do?"
Why the heck was she asking that? "I did nothing! I was literally just kissing Kaito, but then he went all strange and ran away because he said he saw a dead guy behind me! I'm so mad!"
"Okay, first of all, why were you kissing one of your coworkers? Second of all, are you still in the apartment?"
"Kaito and I sleep together like every few months," Rin blurted, although her sober-self would probably have her by the neck for admitting that. "Also, yes. Of course I am."
"What the fu— okay, okay. Rin? Get out of the apartment."
"Why?"
Miku's voice went awfully high. "Are you thick? Well, of course you are—you're drunk. But I'm not letting my drunk best friend get murdered by some creepy ghostie in her haunted apartment! Get out!"
Rin scowled, turning to leave the kitchen. "Okay, whatever. I'm leaving." When she looked up from the ground, she came face-to-face with her wall, covered in tomato sauce letters.
It said:
for the upteenth time
GO AWAY
if you're going to fuck people in my apartment
GET OUT
"Ooh," she said.
"What is it?" Miku asked, alarmed.
"Tomato sauce letters," was all she gave away.
Miku said nothing, clearly too lost for words.
Rin reached for her shoes and paused when she spotted something green and familiar poking out of one of her boots. When she reached for it, it turned out to be the sage she put away in a drawer three weeks prior. She held onto it, deciding it would be a good weapon to fight a ghost with.
(Or whatever was in her apartment.)
When she attempted to open her door, she realised it wouldn't budge. Her keys were missing, too. The door had been unlocked moments before, though, so that wasn't the problem. It was jammed yet again. How coincidental.
"Oh jeez," she muttered.
"Rin, are you okay?" Miku sounded very concerned.
"Do you want the good news or the bad news?" asked Rin.
"Um… what?"
Rin didn't repeat the question. "The bad news is that my door won't open. The good news is that I found the sage again. It was in my boot!"
A silence stretched out between them, before Miku finally said, "Rin, are you… should I call the police?"
Rin spun on her heel away from the door, ready to look for something she could beat the door down with, but sucked in a breath when she noticed a figure standing at the end of her hallway. It didn't disappear when she blinked.
"Rin?" Miku repeated.
"Um…" she said, unable to tear her eyes away from the… thing staring her down. "Uh… Can I call you back?"
"What's happening? Rin?! Don't you dare hang up on me! I—"
Rin hung up on her anyway. She continued to watch the thing —the ghost? The demon? The monster?—as it stood in her hallway, eerily still and eerily quiet. She waited for it to move or kill her or something , but it didn't.
She couldn't see its face—or anything. It was just a shadow. Of a dude.
A shadow dude.
Rin remembered the sage in her hand and pointed it at the figure. She licked her lips, ignoring a sudden wave of nausea, and squinted at it. "I've got sage and I'm not afraid to use it!"
Silence.
She waved it around. "Be gone, demon!"
More silence.
It was around then, Rin bent over and vomited into one of her shoes. It wasn't in her plan of action, but when she looked up while wiping her face with the back of her hand, the shadow was gone.
But the room around her was getting awfully dark, all of a sudden.
She blinked once, then twice, and