How to Fix a Psychopath

Chapter 16

 

How to Fix a psychopath Episode 16

 

I had a dream.

 

I was walking along the same road as yesterday. However, there were no streetlights standing regularly along the road, and there was no moon. It was an endless darkness, as if someone had put up a blackout curtain around me. It was eerie. The air was damp and humid, so much so that it wouldn’t have been strange if ghosts or monsters had jumped out around me.

 

It would be normal if I couldn’t see anything, but I was trying to find my way in the dark. And someone was chasing after me. Could it be a person? The footsteps were low and rough, like a person’s. The heavy sound was the man’s footsteps.

 

Stalker.

 

I was being stalked. I knew it, but I didn’t bother to look back. Is it because I already knew who it was? Or is it because I wanted to run away first? He followed me closely behind without even making a sound.

 

Huk, huk, is that the sound of my breathing that I can hear in my

 

ears or the sound of me panting? Or is it my stalker who is already hugging my back, clinging to me?

 

“… … Soyoung. Soyoung… … .”

 

The owner of the voice that was clinging to my back and crying was Lee Eun-woo.

 

It was a bad dream. The lower body of Lee Eun-woo, who was rubbing my waist, felt strange, as if she had been directly hit. The large arms and hands that were tethering me from behind. The voice that called me like a child searching for his lost mother.

 

I was so scared to wake up from my dream that I lifted the blanket from my dorm room.

 

“it’s annoying…….”

 

On days when I had bad dreams, my period would come like this. As if it were some kind of jinx, Lee Eun-woo appeared in the dream. In some form or another, Lee Eun-woo would creep out from somewhere in the dream. It would be nice if he disappeared in the same way, but even in my dreams, Lee Eun-woo appeared in unpredictable forms.

 

Like the owner of the shadow that followed me quietly yesterday.

 

I thought he was going to stalk me now. He wasn’t going to confront me head on.

 

I got out of bed, grabbed a change of underwear and a sanitary pad, and headed to the shower. Luckily, today was Saturday. I had just finished washing the blankets, and now I had to do it again.

 

How can the timing be this bad? When I was really sensitive and nervous, or when I was really stressed out mentally, I would often miss my period. Because of Lee Eun-woo, I was always so nervous, so I thought I wouldn’t get my period this month either. But my body still wouldn’t help.

 

Or maybe I’m just getting used to this situation and adapting to it.

 

As soon as I got to the shower room, the music blared out loud, waking up the students in the dormitory. Even that sound was startling enough to make me shiver. The disturbing dream felt like it was a dream that had not happened the night before.

 

Ki-ki-kik, I turned on the slightly outdated shower head in the old dormitory, and it made a creepy sound just like the bizarre shadow I had seen the night before. Swish- warm water poured down directly over my head.

 

 

One by one, I heard the other students slowly entering the shower room at the sound of the alarm. I quickly finished showering and came out after hand-washing my blood-stained underwear and pajama pants.

 

* * *

The morning free time is over.

 

As the bell signaling the end of free time rang in the dormitory study room, I heard students getting up from their chairs one by one. I also stopped studying and closed my book.

 

I dragged my carrier out the front door, a little nervous because of the previous night’s events. There was no unpleasant stare that I thought I would feel right away. My shoulders, which had been slightly raised due to nervousness, relaxed and dropped. Still, I didn’t forget to look around just in case. I felt like a herbivore that was far from the group, wary of carnivores to drink water.

 

Before entering my studio, I looked up at the window of my studio. The iron bars that I had deliberately put up were still intact. I sighed in relief and walked over to the door lock.

 

I covered the front door of the studio with my whole body so that no one could see it and typed in the password. When I heard the sound of the door lock being unlocked, I quickly entered the

 

studio and climbed the stairs. My floor was the third floor. The sound of my footsteps quickly climbing the stairs echoed loudly in the marble hallway.

 

I went up to the 2nd floor, turned around, and went up to the 3rd floor. I found a box in front of the door and looked around the hallway again. Was it a delivery?

 

After what happened last night, I called my aunt on the pay phone on the first floor of the dormitory about my cell phone. Can a package like this arrive in just one day?

 

I bent down and picked up the box. It wasn’t a small box, but it was quite heavy.

 

“There is no sender.”

 

It was definitely a delivery box, but the sender’s address was blank. On the other hand, the address of my studio apartment was written perfectly. It was even printed on computer paper and pasted on.

 

I felt uneasy.

 

I was stuck in the hallway, unable to go into my room.

 

The delivery method for the one-room apartment was that the

 

package was delivered to the owner’s house, and then the owner’s wife delivered it again according to the number of rooms. Yes, this one-room apartment was off-limits to outsiders anyway. Since it was so strict, even the delivery person was not allowed in.

 

But the delivery service also doesn’t provide service if you don’t write the sender name. So… … it means that it was given straight to the landlady.

 

“Let’s ask.”

 

The landlady might know. I left the box back in the hallway, which I was too embarrassed to open, and opened the door, while dragging the carrier inside.

 

As soon as the door closed, I took off my hat, which I had been wearing, and hung it on the rack before looking around the room. It was no different from when I left a week ago. But somehow, I felt something strange. Although I had only lived in this studio for six months, I had never felt it this unfamiliar. There was no way a house that wasn’t even attached could smell like people, but somehow it felt even more empty.

 

A cold chill seemed to rise from the floor.

 

“… … It’s my fault.”

 

 

I ended up muttering to myself.

 

Because of that stupid feeling, I didn’t see the long shadow. At some point, I was exhaling shallowly like a thread. I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone had come and gone in this house. I raised my hand and pressed the switch that I could feel.

 

With a thud, the dark interior with the blinds and curtains became bright. I quietly took off my shoes and went inside. I rolled my eyes hard to find anything that was even a little messy, but the windows were locked, and the bathroom and the small veranda were also unchanged. Lastly, the phone line that I had pulled out like a crazy person was still there.

 

I bent my knees in front of the living room cabinet and grabbed the phone cord that had been unplugged. Then I opened the cabinet where I had written down the landlady’s phone number. I took out the business card she had given me, telling me to call her whenever I needed to, and placed it next to the phone.

 

I could have just grabbed the delivery box and rushed to the landlady’s house, but I remembered that she had clearly told me to call before I came, so I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t be rude and make a big fuss over nothing.

 

I plugged in the phone cord that I had unplugged.

 

Ring ring-!

 

“omg……!”

 

A scream escaped my lips.

 

As soon as I picked up the phone, it rang like crazy and I hurriedly took a few steps back. I stared at the phone with confused eyes without answering it, and soon the phone became quiet.

 

I was surprised. I stood in front of the phone again as much as I had stepped back. It might have been my aunt who called because of my cell phone. My aunt alone knew when I was in the studio.

 

Judging from the fact that the call was hung up immediately after a few rings, it was clear that this caller was impatient. I reached for the receiver to call the landlady again.

 

Ring ring-!

 

And then the phone rang again. I paused, my hands stopped as I was reaching for the receiver. It seemed as if the phone rang as she approached the receiver. As if she had no choice but to pick

 

it up. The phone rang loudly, as if it was forcing her to pick up.

 

I hesitated and picked up the receiver. I had a strong feeling that it might be my aunt. Still, I was slow in putting my hand to my ear.

 

“……hello?”

 

-… … .

 

I barely held it up to my ear as I spoke, but I couldn’t hear anything. If a person was talking, I should have heard breathing or some kind of surrounding noise, but I couldn’t hear anything. I didn’t say anything either.

 

It was so quiet that I could hear a slight ringing in my ears.

 

I opened my mouth which had been shut for a long time.

 

“… … Eunwoo?”

 

Doo, doo, doo, doo… … .

 

The disconnected beeping sound repeatedly hit my ears. I stared blankly at the wallpaper in the studio apartment and then put my hand down.

 

The sound of someone putting down the receiver slowly, like

 

putting down an expensive and precious item, could be heard. The disconnected phone call was still ringing in my head and ears.

 

I must have unconsciously put strength into my hand that was holding the receiver, but my hand that was completely putting the receiver down felt numb. I quietly looked at the phone again. It was because I thought the call would come in as soon as I put the receiver down.

 

But the phone didn’t ring again.

 

In a situation where even the phone number was leaked, it was obvious that the person who sent the package didn’t even have to try to find out. I got up and opened the front door again. The box hit the door that was suddenly open.

 

Of course, I left it next to the door.

 

As the door opened, a box was caught to it. I bent down and picked it up. It was like a phone call when your hand is near the receiver, telling you to take the box, that you must take it.

 

What could it be? I had no idea. A threatening letter? Or something with a wiretapping device or CCTV?

 

I closed the door, went back inside, and put the box on the floor.

 

 

“Where’s the knife…….”

 

What are you trying to say? You already know where I am and which high school I go to. I wondered why Eunwoo was hiding and doing creepy stalking things. There must be something in the box that could give me a little bit of insight into Eunwoo’s thoughts.

 

I took a knife out of a nearby drawer and cut the tape sealing on the box. It split open slightly.

 

One, two… … three! The box was wide open.

 

“……candy?”

 

My eyebrows furrowed involuntarily. The box, which was not small, was filled to the brim with candies and chocolates. It was so tightly packed that when I shook it, the wrapping didn’t even make a sound.

 

“Why is this happening… … .”

 

I couldn’t understand it. There had to be something else. There had to be something more. I reached into the box and dug around. The wrapping paper rustled and ripped, but there was nothing I could grasp.

 

 

In the end, I picked up the entire box and poured it all out on the floor. Just looking at it, the sweet candies and chocolates poured out onto the floor. Then, something heavier fell to the floor with a thud.

 

“What?”

 

The thing that fell down heavy on its own was sealed separately in a transparent zipper bag. I immediately reached out and picked up the zipper bag.

 

“Cell phone?”

 

There was a cell phone inside. It was a new phone.