Death

On the first day after I died, my boyfriend brought his first love back home.

They kissed passionately on the sofa I bought, acting as if no one else were there. They ate the celery dumplings I had made by hand and played with the gaming console I had given him.

One day, his first love asked curiously, “Where’s An’an?”

My boyfriend’s voice was calm. “We had a fight a few days ago. She applied for a business trip with her company.”

Oh, he still doesn’t know that I’m dead.

In our village, there was an abandoned Brick Kiln rumored to be haunted.

During my first year of middle school, a few classmates and I went to the kiln for an adventure. We unexpectedly stumbled upon a swarm of rats worshipping a wall, all of them throwing themselves against it until they died…

In that moment, I realized there was truly something in that kiln that shouldn’t be provoked.

Unfortunately, it was already too late. From then on, my friends began to die one after another.

Until one night, that thing finally stood at the head of my bed…

When I was eighteen, I didn’t dare push open that door. Behind it, my best friend was playing adult games with the male writer I secretly loved.

I remembered that moment for ten long years. In that decade, my friend died, the writer stopped writing, and my life was ruined.

I respectfully composed a letter and mailed it to the man I had once loved from afar: Chen Song.

I caught COVID. When my fever hit 102 degrees, I saw my boyfriend.

But he’d been dead for years.

That meant what I was looking at was a ghost!

I held up the talisman on my chest and screamed, “Evil spirits, get the hell away from me!”

“What a powerful spell!” He clutched his chest, stumbling back step by step.

Then, with slow and exaggerated movements, he collapsed onto the floor.

“Oh no, I’m done for… I can’t go on…”

I stared at him. “Are you… mocking me?”

He stood right back up. “Haha, totally got you!”

I rolled my eyes.

It was definitely him.

My boyfriend had been just as much of a dork when he was alive.

It has been ten years since I died.

After a decade, I have finally seen the first person to come and pay their respects at my grave.

It is a man, limping as he walks toward me.

It is my father.