ethereal. [c.ew]

;02;

Park Sunmi knew something was off as soon as she felt a cold breeze hit her face. Her room had no windows, so a breeze was impossible, but she ignored her gut feeling and turned over.

The next thing she knew, she was awoken by someone shaking her shoulders. She abruptly sat up, ready to complain to her mother about waking her, but instead ended up headbutting someone.

“Jesus Christ.” A male's voice exclaimed.

The voice made her eyes snap open in shock. That was definitely not her mother.

“Where the hell am I?” Sunmi questioned, not even looking at the man before beginning to panic.

“You're in an alleyway. I saw you and thought you may be hurt.” He replied, rubbing his forehead.

She finally ripped her gaze from her surroundings to look at the man.

“Oh my god, I must still be dreaming right now.” She said, pinching herself in the process.

The man that had awoken her looked exactly like her Eunwoo. The Eunwoo that was currently half drawn on her desk. The Eunwoo she had created 5 years ago. She gazed in awe at him for a few moments.

“Are you really that stunned by my looks?” He chuckled.

“What the hell, no.” She scoffed.

“What do you mean no?” He asked, taken aback by her answer.

“I mean no.” She replied, attempting to stand.

“I'll have you know, I've been told more than once that I look ethereal.” He defended, smirking to himself whilst holding out his hand to help her up.

“Of course you do, I created you.” Sunmi sighed, grabbing his hand and lifting herself up off of the ground.

Judging by how much her body hurt, this was definitely not a dream.

“Wait, what?” His smirk turned into an expression of confusion.

“Nevermind, Eunwoo.” She shook her head, trying to cover up her mistake.

If this really wasn't a dream, she knew it was best not to let him know, at least not straight away.

“Eunwoo? How do you know my name?” He said, even more confused than before.

Sunmi panicked, looking for something that could possibly explain her knowing his name but calmed down slightly after noticing that the boy was wearing a name tag on his uniform shirt.

“Your nametag. You're wearing a nametag.”

“Oh. I thought that maybe you were psychic or something for a second there.” He smiled.

At that moment, her heart stopped. There it was, the smile she had drawn, the one she fell in love with as a 12 year old. It was just like how she imagined, nothing could compare to how the corners of his lips turned upwards, baring his perfect white teeth and how his eyes turned into crescent moons. He was simply beautiful, almost unreal.

Sunmi snapped herself out of the trance his smile had out her in. Of course he looked unreal, that's exactly what he was. Not real.

“So, what are you doing here...?” he began, trailing off when he realised he didn't know the girl's name.

“Sunmi. Park Sunmi. I don't know what I'm doing here, I barely even know where I am.” She grimaced.

“Sunmi is a pretty name for a pretty girl.” He smiled once again.

His comment made her blush, but as she was about to speak, he piped up again.

“Does that mean you have amnesia or something? I mean, if you can't remember where you are or how you got here...” Eunwoo suggested, trailing off.

Her eyes lit up. It was the perfect excuse, nothing would have to be explained to him if she simply just didn't remember.

“All I can remember is my name and a few other things.” She lied.

Eunwoo was silent for a moment.

“Well, I can't just leave you here on your own. Alright, my friend and I share an apartment together, you can stay with us a while until you remember something, but there are conditions. One, I can't let a stranger live in our home, so we'll have to know more about each other and two, you change your clothes. You were asleep next to trash, you smell horrible.” He offered.

She had expected him to give her this offer, it was how she had created him to be. He was caring and did his best to look out for everyone, even people he barely knew. Eunwoo had a huge soft spot for people in need.

“Seems good to me.” She nodded, knowing she had no other choice.

“We have to walk, but it's only about 2 minutes away from here. I'll give you some of my clothes to change into and we can talk when we get there.” He began, walking out of the dark alleyway. “I don't know if my friend will be too happy about this, though.”

Sunmi followed, she knew MJ would find her suspicious, she created him to be the least trusting character of the webtoon. He was a good judge of character and knew when something was off. If anyone eventually found out her secret, it would be him. She decided that she'd have to be extra careful when he was around.

After walking the promised 2 minutes, the pair ended up infront of a tall apartment building.

“This is it.” Eunwoo said, walking inside and heading to the elevator.

Sunmi looked around in awe, the building was exactly how she had drawn it. Everything was. She followed Eunwoo into the elevator as he pressed the button to go up. The short trip was silent, both of them slightly worried about how MJ would react. The doors opened and the two stepped out and walked up to Eunwoo's apartment door.

Sunmi heard a small sigh coming from him before he unlocked the door and stepped in.

“I'm home!” He shouted.

Footsteps were heard approaching them.

“Eunwoo!” A male voice rang out, presumably MJ.

Sunmi hid slightly behind Eunwoo.

“Hey-” Eunwoo was cut off by MJ's confused voice.

“Who the heck is she?”