3 weeks later

“Helloooooo, Seol! Earth to Seol!” Eun-Taek waves his hands in front of my face.

I snap out of my daze. “Sorry.”

“What’re you thinking about? You’ve been so out of it lately!” Eun-Taek takes a bite out of his donut.

Bora hits him on the arm and gives him a dirty look. Eun-Taek almost chokes on his food. “Hey Seol. What do you want to do today? Let’s do something fun!”

Eun-Taek, Bora and I were sitting in Renaissance on a Saturday afternoon. The sun was shining and the weather was finally getting warm. I had returned to school the week before and things were starting to feel as normal as can be. I had gotten a new bodyguard, but my dad decided I didn’t need one anymore and have been without one since for the past week or so. I should have felt liberated, but I didn’t.

The hours and days went by, but there was still no word from Jung. I mistakenly saw him everywhere I went. I missed him and it killed me to think that I might never see him again. When I missed him a lot, I would go to the basement where his room was and almost expect to see him there.

The front doors of Renaissance open and I quickly look over. It’s In-Ho. I try and hide my disappointment. I know there’s no reason for Jung to be coming here, but a part of me hopes that he misses me too and that he’ll show up one day. Since I went back to school, In-Ho and I have been talking again. The first couple days were a little awkward, but he initiated an apology. I apologized, too and we agreed that although it’ll take some time, that we could be friends again, which I was really happy about. Despite everything falling back into place, I still felt empty.

“Hey guys.” In-Ho sits down at our table.

“We were just seeing what Seol wanted to do today.” Bora said.

“What do you want to do?” In-Ho asked.

Just then, the song “Love Sick” by 4Men comes on the radio. It brought me back to when we were lying on his bed, and when he was opening up to me. The warmth of his body close to mine is still so vivid and familiar that I instantly well up in tears and I can barely breathe.

“I’ll be right back.” I say as I quickly walk out the front door of Renaissance.

I walk around to the side of the café and lean against the wall. I break down again. I’ve been doing this a lot lately at random places. Whene