Nothing much had changed about breakfast the next day; despite the icebreaker from the night before, everyone was just as quiet around each other as before (except for Donghyuk and Junhoe, who argued throughout breakfast in often-unintelligible mutters. Anna eventually realized their whole spat was about how Junhoe never made his bed in the mornings.)

“Any plans for the day, Saerim?” Mrs. Kim asked as they did the dishes together. Mrs. Kim had tried refusing Anna’s help, but she wasn’t to be deterred.

“Uh…not really,” Anna replied with a shrug. “I wanted to finish cleaning the attic as soon as possible, but maybe if we take a break in between, then I’ll go out and get acquainted with the neighborhood.” She knew the area around Lydia’s apartment like the back of her hand—they’d spent many a summer there growing up—but this was a completely foreign part of Seoul to her, and she figured that in the long run, it’d do her best to learn the area.

“There isn’t much to the neighborhood, unfortunately,” Mrs. Kim commented. “You’ll figure out the roads right away, too. And I think there are a couple markets about a quarter-mile hike west.”

“Great. Are there any groceries you need picked up? I can stop by while showing myself around later.”

“Really? It’s great that you offered because I’ve been thinking of making ddukbokki for a while but never had time to grab some rice cakes from the market. Would you mind buying about four packages and maybe a handful of garlic cloves? We can have it for dinner tonight.”

 Anna smiled, organizing the dishwasher. “Sure thing, Mrs. Kim.”

Once all the dishes were finished, Anna and Mrs. Kim headed up to the attic to resume cleaning. Just in case there was a repeat of the spider incident, Anna made sure to steer clear of anything that looked even remotely cobwebby or excessively dusty…which unfortunately left Mrs. Kim to handle basically everything that had to be moved around to continue cleaning.

About an hour and a half of diligent cleaning in, Jinhwan joined them upstairs, holding a phone. “Mom, it’s Mrs. Yoon. She wants to know when she can stop by to return the bowl you gave her the kimchi in.”

“Oh, right!” Mrs. Kim peeled off her gloves and got to her feet. “I’ll be right back, Saerim.” She left the attic, taking the phone with her. Anna and Jinhwan exchanged awkward nods of acknowledgement.

“Do you need any help?” Jinhwan asked, sounding like it was more out of courtesy than a true desire to help.

“I think I’m good,” Anna blinked at the rag in her hand. “Uh…how’s the furniture that you guys took downstairs?”

“Almost clean. It’s gonna be a pain to bring back up, though.”

Anna forced a chuckle. “Yeah, I bet. I’ll help.”

“Thanks.”

A moment of silence later, Jinhwan abruptly his heel to leave the attic, and Anna was left cringing at the tension. Ick. Why can’t I be more relaxed like Bobby when it comes to talking to strangers?

“I’ll be right back,” she said, heading back downstairs in search of some gloves and a mop. Anna continued scrubbing at a certain stain in the wall that looked ominously like the remains of a bug that met its unfortunate death in a match against its eight-legged foe. Swallowing her disgust, she scrubbed with renewed vigor.

“Already back at the cleaning?”

Anna glanced over her shoulder to see that Bobby had joined her in a loose white t-shirt and a pair of grey sweatpants. “Unfortunately so. What’re you doing up here?”

“Mrs. Kim said you might need some help.”

“Oh, yeah. I’m sure your bug-killing expertise will come in handy plenty around here.”

Bobby’s expression soured. “You have no right to make fun of me when you were no better. Actually, you were undoubtedly worse.”

“I have a bug phobia. And I’d gone into shock after seeing all of them pour out of that bag!”

“And what do you think happened to me when I came up here to see all those spiders out of the bag?”

Anna huffed in irritation. “This is getting nowhere. Can you get this stain off the wall? I’ve been trying for the past five minutes, but it’s not coming out.” She offered him her rubber gloves, which he squeezed his considerably-larger hands and forearms into, before he tackled the stain.

“What do you think this stain is?” Bobby grunted, using as much strength as he possibly could against the wall without breaking through it.

“Probably bug guts or grease maybe? I don’t know.”

“Huh. And, uh…what’s this cleaning solution?” he asked, frowning after a solid minute of fruitless scrubbing.

“Um…it’s bleach, so probably hydrogen peroxide?”

“No idea what that is. Is it organic or inorganic?”

“Since it has no carbon in it, it’s inorganic.”

“Uh-huh.” Bobby looked in the basket of assorted cleaning solutions and selected a clear bottle of rubbing alcohol. “Not that I’m a chemistry PhD or anything, but doesn’t isopropyl alcohol get out organic stains better? Something about ‘likes dissolve likes,’ or something similar?”

“Oh, my God.” Anna stared at the bleach she’d been using to attack the stain. “You’re right. Why didn’t I think of that?”

Bobby gave her an infuriatingly smug grin. “And I thought you were the chemistry expert around here.”

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