Young Writers Society

Arya was on the verge of throwing her phone against the wall, but considering the fact that she might not have the money to buy a new one of the same brand, Arya decided to refrain herself.

"She picked up yet?" Han asked. Like Arya, he was also on his phone, trying to contact Dae. His face was twisted with worry and fear, making Arya's heart leapt with jealousy. Would he act the same way if she was the one missing. She doubted it. She just wasn't as important as Dae to Han.

"No," Arya replied.

"Damn it! Where the hell did that freak take her? What if he hurt her? What if he takes advantage of her? What if she has those pain attacks again? What if-"

"What if he is a good guy?" Arya interrupted.

"Seriously, Arya?"Han asked with disbelief, "If he is a good guy, why can't we contact Dae by now?"

Arya shrugged and went on to study her nails. For some reason, she felt that Dae wasn't in much trouble. From the live video taken during the incident, Arya saw that the guy appeared to be escaping for his life. From the news, she knew that he was Jay Kim, successor of one of the leading film industries in the country, and he had no reason to feel threatened at the doorsteps of his own company. But then again, some rich kids never want to be rich in the first place. She bet Jay was never proud of his father and the company.

"What are you thinking?" Han asked, looking straight at her. Arya avoided his eyes and stared around her coffee shop. It needed a little makeover. She felt that the wooden chairs are a bit old fashioned and the flowers on each table are a bit dull.

"Arya?"

Arya finally looked at Han and raised her eyebrows.

"Why are you like this? This isn't you," Han said, causing Arya to choke with laughter.

"She didn't even react three days ago when we told her we met her grandfather," Arya murmured, "She didn't even care about her own blood, so why would she care to pick up calls from us? For all we know, she could be enjoying her time with the rich man's son in the middle of nowhere."

Han stared at her with disbelief and Arya looked away in shame. Of course, she didn't think Dae would do that, but her mouth couldn't help but spill out nonsense about her best friend. They were worried sick about her, but she didn't even care enough to call them.

"I can't believe you, Arya," she heard Han whispered as he got up and walked toward the exit.

She laughed. "I should be the one saying that to you."

"Excuse me?"

Arya turned to Han, glaring at him with anger and disbelief. Her eyes were red from unspilled tears. "Why are you putting it on me in the first place anyway? You just barged into my shop and started yelling and accusing me of everything as if I was the one responsible for her disappearing!"

"I was-"

"You're worried," Arya cut him off. She was crying now and her voice was cracking from as if pains were forcing its way out of the confinement of her chest. "But don't you ever consider that I am also worried about her? I am her best friend, Han, of course I would be sick with worry. You don't have to yell at me and accuse me of not caring enough for my friend."

"Arya, I'm sorry"

"If it were me, would you act in the same way?Would you go around accusing Dae? Of course you won't! You would be busy caring for her feelings. You don't give a freak about me or how I feel because in your eyes, you only see her!"

Han didn't say anything. Instead, he just shook his head and went over to the door and walked out. Arya cried harder and sank onto the floor, hugging her knees. She didn't know what was wrong with her but she knew she had just lost two friends in one day. She had never felt so alone and vulnerable, and for the first time that day, she wished she was the one dying from a chest pain and getting kidnapped by a guy who was about to inherit a fortune. She wished she lived with a grandfather who seemed to care less about her safety than his relationship with a witch in the middle of nowhere. Maybe if all of these happened to her instead, people would start to pay attention to her, to take her feelings into consideration.

"I never hate you this much Dae," she whispered in a shaky voice, "I never thought I could feel this way about you."

"Hate is such a strong word. I prefer you use it with caution, especially if the person is really important to you," a cheery voice said, interrupting Arya in the middle of her sobbing.

Startled, she looked up and saw a young man in a suit grinning down at her merrily, his dimples shining brighter than the sun itself.

"Hi," he said, "May I order a cup of coffee?"

*****

Dae couldn't stop yelling.

The voice was taking over the rest of her body, starting from her brain, and it wouldn't stop whispering to her. Dae had locked herself in the bathroom and outside, Jay was pounding on the door.

"I didn't mean to," she whispered.

You were supposed to. Open the door. Open the door and let him come in.

"No...no."

Open the damn door. Didn't you feel it? He is your soulmate. Open up to him and be happy with him.

"I don't love him!" Dae yelled, punching the mirror in front of her. Her fist bounced off the surface uselessly and Dae caught her reflection in the mirror. Her hair was a mess, and she was wearing a bathrobe. Her neck and a bit of her shoulder were exposed, revealing trails of hickeys and reminding her what happened between her and the stranger standing outside. Dae grabbed her hair and screamed, punching the mirror again repetitively.

"Get away from me!" She screamed "Stop telling me what to do! Get away from me!"

The door slammed open and a pair of strong hands grabbed Dae's waist and carried her away away from the mirror.

"Are you crazy?!" a familiar voice asked and Dae looked up to see Jay in his bathrobe, cradling her and squeezing her fists. Blood was oozing through his fingers and a sharp pain told her the blood was hers.

"Look, i'm sorry for what happened, but you don't have to scream like that and hurt yourself," he scolded, grabbing a clean towel from the rack and gingerly touching her wounds with it. All the screaming and punching had drained all of her energy and Dae could do nothing but watched as Jay cleaned and dressed her wounded knuckles. After he finished, he looked down on Dae again who was leaning against his chest.

"You okay now?" He asked and Dae shook her head. The voice was still inside her head, laughing with pleasure at the sudden contact with Jay. It was as if Dae's body was possessed by two things, her own soul and someone else's soul.

A demon's soul.

And that demon soul was craving for the man right beside her, using her to get close with him. It was as if she was under a love spell but her soul was fighting it's hardest against the spell to stop her from being controlled and as a result, the spell and her soul became two different entities living inside of her.

"Let's get out of here," Jay said and picked her up in a bridal style. He walked out of the bathroom and into the bedroom where he placed Dae gently on the bed and sat down beside her.

"I'm going crazy," she muttered.

"I can tell," Jay replied, "Any normal girl would throw the pillow at me in the face and slap the hell out of me for what I did last night. But you? You took revenge on my mirror."

"I am not me," Dae continued, ignoring Jay completely.

"That I can also tell,"Jay commented again. He studied the girl closely and almost laughed at how funny the situation was.

This was the most dramatic one night stand relationship he had come across, but then again, this was his first time sleeping with a girl as pure as her. She looked like someone who would do everything to follow the protocols of a traditional Cambodian lady, one of them being staying a virgin until marriage. It was something Jay would frown upon and would roll his eyes at, but then again, tradition is tradition and he got to respect it.

"Look," he started, gingerly turning her to him so they could look at each other in the eyes, "I know what I did last night was wrong. You didn't even say yes. You didn't even say anything, which doesn't mean yes, so I'm still in the wrong. I'm sorry, ok? Yesterday was a shitty day. I...I...well just know that I let my emotions control me and like most spoiled brats do, I took advantage of you

...right after I forced you to come here with me."

Dae still looked at him blankly and Jay sighed, running his hands through his hair.

"I'm sorry," he said again.

Silence.

"I'm sorry too," she finally replied in a quiet voice.

"Huh? No, you did nothing wrong."

Dae shook her head. "I ruined everything. I'm the one responsible. You don't have to apologize."

"Dae, what are you talking about?" Jae asked, freaking out, which was weird because normally he was so contained.

Dae looked away and touched her heart. "I finally know why. The chest pain. The voice."

She looked up at Jay and smiled sadly before saying, "When I first visited the witch, I remembered she said the leaf doesn't fall far from the tree. You know what this means?"

Jay shook his head. He didn't know anything or anything words coming out of her mouth.

"It means she knows me. She knows about my past. The pain I was having before I met you was caused by her. My friends, or at least Arya must have realized it when she told me she had revisited the spell caster."

Jay said nothing to this. He figured out sooner or later the girl would go back to normal and all of this craziness would end. However, not only did it not end, it just kept getting crazier.

"When Arya was on the way to the witch's cottage, she decided to ditch her journey because she saw my grandfather coming out of the path leading to the cottage," Dae continued, "She tried to follow him, but she lost him on the way."

"So your grandfather knows the...the witch?" Jay asked, saying the word witch slowly in a disbelieving tone.

"Yes."

"And how is this related to you?"

"I am currently under a spell. A love spell to be exact," she explained.

"Who are you supposed to be in love with?" he asked.

"You."

Jay started at her in disbelief and bit his lips. He was trying to hide his laughter, but it still came out and he started laughing like a maniac. Jay got off the bed and laughed some more, making him question who the crazy person was in this situation. Him or her?

"So you're telling me I escaped my father's stupid welcoming party, dragged along a journalist, slept with her only to realize she was a a young girl with a heart problem and is at the same time betwitched to fall in love with me?" He asked in the middle of his laughter.

Dae nodded. "You think a girl like me who knows enough martial arts to hurt a guy like you would be willing to kiss and sleep with the same guy who kidnapped me?"

"Well, I was told I am irresistible," Jay replied with a shrug and a small smirk.

He is, a small voice that wasn't hers echoed, making Dae winced.

"Well, I don't care whether or not you believe me," she announced, getting up to gather her clothes that were laying shamelessly on the floor, "But you still owe me a lot for what you did to me."

"You said before it wasn't my fault," he protested.

"I changed my mind."

Jay fell face first onto his bed and groaned. She was getting onto his nerves, which was nerve wracking because normally he was the one who got onto people's nerves.

"What do you want?" He asked.

"Take me to Siem Reap," he heard her reply, "I need to visit my grandfather."

"And if I refuse?"

"If you refuse, then the spell would take full control of me and I would have no choice but to fall completely and utterly in love with you," she said, "And I would rather die trying to reverse it than to be forced to fall in love with you."

Jay sat up quickly and turned to her with a frown on his face. He gave her a middle finger as she walked towards the bathroom and slammed the door shut.

"Try not to punch my mirror this time!" He called.

For the first time, he grabbed his phone and opened his data. Hundreds of notifications bombarded him the moment he turned it on, but he only scrolled down to find Minea's messages:

Jay groaned as he read the messages. He felt guilty for making her worry, but he had no choice. A friend of his father was also his enemy. However, he didn't want to leave her hanging either, so he quickly wrote back,

With that, he placed his phone down and stared at the bathroom door. Suddenly, his eyes lit up and he quickly grabbed his phone and typed:

Nearest and best quality mental hospital in Siem Reap.