The Next Life (다음 생에 만날래)

The Mansion

"Enjoy your dinner," I said to the patrons, bowing with a smile. The patrons in question barely acknowledged me, their focus solely on the fresh meat served to them. At least, as fresh as frozen, stored meat can be.

Tucking the tray under my arm, I turned to head to the counter. My heart dropped into my stomach as a face appeared directly in front of me. A single eye stared back into mine, the other eye socket a gouged-out hole of dried red on its sickly blue face, framed by unruly strands of hair. It took quite a bit of willpower not to vocalise my shock upon seeing it; not only would I have been fired, but the thing standing in front of me would've known I could see it, and that was something I very much preferred to avoid.

My eyes darted somewhere else in the restaurant, and I walked past the moving corpse to my original destination. Once at the counter, I looked back at the table I'd just waited and watched the ghost shamble away, off to who knows where.

I took a moment to gather myself and catch my breath while I placed the tray onto its stack. Reacting to everything I saw while at work would be digging my own grave. How would I pay my half of the rent if I lost my job? Seeing these things shouldn't have even affected me all that much, since I practically grew up seeing them. I turned around, ready to serve another table.

"Gah!!"

"Is there something on my face, Mr Jang?" My manager folded his arms in disapproval.

Heart still racing, I placed a hand on my chest. "No, sir. Just startled. I'm sorry."

"Get back to work then. I don't want to see you slacking off anymore, got it?"

I nodded and bowed in apology. A sigh snuck out as he walked past me, back into his office. I looked around the restaurant, and luckily not many of the patrons had noticed my outburst. Maybe they just didn't care.

"I'm surprised he hasn't been fired yet."

My head swivelled, following the direction of the whisper. Two of my coworkers stood next to each other, one giggling in reaction. They barely took notice of, or just didn't care about, the fact that I was looking right at them. Peering out from between the two was the ugly, disfigured face of the ghost I had just seen. I could use it to scare them, I thought to myself. But that wouldn't end well. Either I'd be called crazy, fired, or both. It isn't worth acknowledging the ghost for a few minutes of fun.

The rest of the work day flew by without incident, and before I knew it, evening arrived and along with it, the end of my shift.

I did my best to keep my eyes down to avoid making eye contact with anything lingering around on my walk home. It's what I'd always done, even at the orphanage. Needless to say, it was this sort of behaviour which led to my self-isolating nature. After all, who would want to be around a guy who sees ghosts? It was an existential crisis waiting to happen for anyone around me. Well, almost everyone.

A shudder ran across my spine. Not from the autumn breeze. Something primal. I stopped dead in my tracks. Something was watching me, I could feel it. Whatever it was, it definitely wasn't a ghost. A ghost would feel familiar. This was different. What I felt in that moment was malevolent, as if its sole purpose was to cause pain and suffering.

Slowly, I lifted my gaze. Nothing in front of me. My head swivelled, looking for the source. A man stood on the other side of the street. His clothes, expensive-looking, giving the vague impression of a biker, were torn and tattered. My skin turned to ice as my eyes met his. From here, I couldn't tell if they were bloodshot or completely red.

I didn't give myself time to find out. It was bad enough that I'd made eye contact with that thing. Putting both hands into the pockets of my coat, I resumed my journey home, not looking up again.