SARAH doesn’t know how many times she has rolled on her bed. And she doesn’t know why she’s doing it. After seeing Jino wearing Carlo’s shirt, the handsome shaman didn’t leave her mind.
“How could he manage to look so perfect in a simple gray shirt?” Sarah asked herself while staring at the ceiling. “When Carlo was wearing that shirt, he looked… he looked a commoner.” She laughed at her harshness to her ex-boyfriend. But she’s just telling the truth. Jino looked good in everything he wore. Sarah doubted if all the shamans in his batch were as handsome as him.
Ah, stop your weakness, Sarah! She scolded herself and looked at the wall clock. It was already five in the morning. Her neighbors are starting to get up and prepare for their dayshift jobs.
Sarah paused and suddenly felt sad. She was supposedly hurrying to the hospital now, but because of Carlo and her broken heart, she was suspended without hope of getting back to her position as a nurse. She’s still lucky because her license wasn’t dismissed; she has a chance to apply to other hospitals. Still, her credentials were already stained.
When she still couldn’t sleep, she sat up straight and looked around her room. Before she knew about the bad spirit that had been following her all around since she was a child, this room looked so peaceful to her.
But now… She paused when the curtains on her window suddenly moved.
“It’s just the wind,” she told herself and took a couple of deep breaths. “It’s just the wind, you scaredy-cat bitch!” She lay back on her bed and covered her face with a pillow. “Sarah, stop scaring yourself…”
But it didn’t do her any good. What’s on Sarah’s mind is that somebody is watching her sleeping. When she couldn’t take it anymore, she rolled down on her bed and crawled towards the door with her eyes closed. As soon as her head bumped into the door frame, she reached for the doorknob and opened it quickly.
“What are you doing?” Jino’s voice welcomed her when the door opened. “Why are you crawling on the floor?”
Sarah’s eyes lift open. She looked up at Jino and met his furrowed brows. “Ah…” Heat rose in her cheeks, and she wanted to disappear right here, right now. “I-I couldn’t sleep…”
Jino crouched to meet her eyes. “Why? Are you feeling scared?”
Sarah shyly nodded. “I don’t know, but I felt as if somebody was watching me while I was sleeping.” She sat up and leaned on the door frame. “Maybe I’m just not used to sleeping alone anymore…”
The man knotted his forehead. “It’s been a week since you broke up with your boyfriend, right?”
She paused and felt embarrassed. She didn’t expect that this shaman guy would take notes on everything about her. “Ah, yeah… I don’t know, I just felt scared.”
“Do you want to add another joss paper around here?” he asked. He was also sitting on the floor while talking to her. “Did you put rock salts on every corner too?”
Sarah wanted to roll her eyes. Why he couldn’t get that what she wanted him to offer was to be with her inside her room? Wait a second, what is he doing in front of my door?
“By the way, why are you standing in front of my door?” she asked, brows furrowed. “Did you see something here?”
He shook his head. “I just heard a noise as if something fell on the floor. So I went here to check on you.”
Sarah suppressed her smile, but she was sure that her blushing cheeks were revealing her to him. “Ah, Jino, may I ask you about something personal?”
The man raised both his brows as if wondering by her sudden question. “Sure,” he replied and smiled sweetly.
Sarah wanted to throw herself to him. This guy is so handsome that she feels as if her heart is going to explode because of too much fluttering. She tapped her chest to calm her heart. Why is she so weak to handsome men?
“Ah, I just wondered if you’re… single?” As soon as the last word left her lips, she held her breath and waited for him to answer him with ‘NO’.
It took seconds before he answered, but for Sarah, it felt like years. “Shamans aren’t suitable to have a romantic relationship,” he said, then smiled at her apologetically. “It’s not that we’re not capable of loving or feeling loved. It’s just that we don’t want complications.”
Sarah nodded slowly. “I see…” she replied, even though she didn’t really understand what he said. “So you’re single?”
“Technically,” he said and then heaved a sigh. “Being a shaman is quite exhausting. And, sometimes, it’s hard to shun bad spirits. Especially if they’re the ones that stayed in their humans for years.”
Sarah suddenly felt uncomfortable. She scooted closer to him. “Are you saying that you’re having a hard time getting rid of the male bad spirit attached to me?”
JIno cocked his head as if thinking. “We’ll be needing a lot of time and effort to pull him away from your body, finally. As what I observed here, the male bad spirit has learned to build his territory here.”
“Really?” Sarah looked around the house. “Then, what should we do to make him leave my house alone?”
Jino smiled at her. “We have to find a good spirit that could replace his position here,” he said. “In each house, there is one spirit that guards the house. If the resident of the house often experiences bad luck, the spirit that is guarding her house is a bad one.”
“Oh… So if the owner of the house often experienced good luck, then the spirit that is guarding her house is a good one?”
“You got it right,” he said and smiled. “So, do you want to find a good spirit?”
“Of course,” she responded quickly. “But how?”
“You have to find a new roommate that has a good spirit following him,” he said and stood up. “You don’t have to look anywhere, Sarah. The magnet of good spirits is right in front of you.”
****