"Ohh! Look! It`s the..." Luisa said but Seunghyun quickly shushed her, smiling. The little girl understood that ‘Mr. officer’ was about to surprise Liana and she quickly turned towards her colleagues signaling everyone to hold their mouths.

"Oh Lord…” Mariana’s only thought widened her eyes when the same perfume she smelled back that day in Liana’s bathroom took over her nostrils. She inhaled deep once again to make sure she wasn’t confusing or imagining thing, but even the soft fragrance of expensive cigar was exactly the same like the one in the bathroom, and right now it was passing by her really nonchalantly.

“Yah! You think I can’t hear you laughing and shushing?” Liana tried to make them talk to her by pouting. “I can hear youuuu! Where are you little puppies?” she stretched her hands out as far as she could, at the height of a 7 years old. She even unnoticed the sweet scent coming towards her, or better said she set it down to her hallucinations and as soon as she felt something coming closer to her hands, she quickly tried to grab it. Strangely enough it felt like some sort of denim… she touched it a little better to try figure it out what she actually grabbed when the uncontrollable laughers of the little ones stopped her.

“Wha…” she tried saying but two warm hands grabbing her wrists really froze her.

As if words could move things, that soft yet deep “Annyeong* ” made the scarf on her eyes fall off. Well, actually it was one of his hands uniting it, the other was still holding one of her wrists. She forgot how to blink or even breathe for a couple of seconds, just until her brain managed to remake the connections to her ears and the noisy kids brought back all of her senses. Firstly, her eyes lowered to the denim - like - fabric her fingers were still attached to.

“Yah!!” she yelled pulling her hands and placing them at her back like a child who’d just got caught at the candy jar.

“What you’re yelling at me for?” Seunghyun couldn’t hold back his laugh. “You’re the one who grabbed me first…” he chuckled loudly, really enjoying her red face.

"Nappeun namja*…” she seemed to hum gluing her eyes on the floor, making him look for her lips to make sure he heard her right.

“Did you just…” he wanted to ask her but the sudden dozen little arms made him kneel down and give a really big hug to every child that he could reach.

“Hello, Mr. Officer!” all the kids said at once.

“Want to play with us?” other questions came flying in.

A hand on her shoulder brought Liana’s eyes back up.

“Mister officer…?” Mariana asked still holding onto her.

"Mwo*?... WHAT?.... “ Liana quickly rushed to clear up the …situation. “…He …This is the one who found Luisa and Mark…” she almost managed to speak without too much babble.

“Aah… Now I get it…” Mariana smiled stepping once towards the children, but suddenly stopped to face her.

Liana looked at her with big eyes but merely for a half of a second until Mariana’s voice buried them, including her heart and her embarrassment:

“If I were you I would’ve never let him leave my bathroom” she said smiling, then she continued her path towards the children to save poor ‘Mr. Officer’ who looked like he’ll soon get eaten up by them.

“Everybody, that’s not a way to behave with a guest” she used her “teachers voice” pulling Luisa’s hand from Seunghyun’s shoulder.

The kids took a step back so he could at least get back up.

“Hello!...” he took a short bow at her and, the next second his eyes started searching for Liana.

Mariana smiled pitifully at their lack of discretion and just answered back with a soft smile.

"Come on, let’s get inside! It’s quite cold already!” she took Luisa by her hand and everybody just followed them, laughing or waving good bye to Seunghyun, some of them even trying the Korean good-bye. He smiled widely and took a deep bow, teaching them the ‘Annyeong haseyo’ again.

Liana knew she just gave herself away but she just couldn’t, didn’t know how to react and she simply turned numb, without being able to even blink.

Seunghyun waved to the last child and smiled brightly. He turned to face the frozen Liana and took a few steps to reach her.

“Umm…” he was about to start when her sudden mood swing took him aback: she grabbed his sleeve and dragged him away from any door. The big, broad tree from the back of the terrace looked like the perfect place. She took him there and suddenly pinned him to it.

“What the actual fu…” she was about to say the f-word but his big bright eyes made her clench hers for just a half of a second and change it to a really rough “DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?!”

“M… Mwo” he barely could speak because he tried to much to not laugh at the image: he was glued to the tree and she was just 2 inches away from him, her palm also on the tree, above his head.

Liana’s fire turned down a little when she also acknowledged the unnatural situation. Her biggest mistake was to lower her eyes and try to revise her attitude, because he grabbed her lowering hand and the back of her head, pinning her on the tree this time. He reduced the 2 inches distance between their faces to 1 inch and looked at her. She either was very bad at learning things, either she making mistakes, because she just did it again: she thought she could win over the deep black eyes staring at her, and opened up to fight with him, but surprisingly (NOT), no words came out. Seunghyun misinterpreted her behavior, actually he knew it all too well, so in order to overcome it, he covered her lips with his. At first he was a little scared that she might still fight back, but when her free hand gently hung onto his jacket, easily pulling him closer, he cupped her face and even deepened the kiss. It lasted for quite a while until they both ran out of air.

“Noona…” Seunghyun smiled the brightest, but the loud slap that followed shook not only him, but also the lost Daesung who came looking for his hyung after Jiyong had sent him.

“Hyung?...” he whispered when he narrowed his eyes to get a better glimpse at the couple kissing behind that tree. His first urge was to go and save his friend, but he froze in place when Seunghyun grabbed the girl’s hand again and kissed her back, even more greedily. She looked like she was trying to speak, but he wouldn’t allow it. He got closer, but no one seemed to notice him.

“Kid… please… stop it… “ Liana wanted to say but every time she’d open , he’d cover it with a long kiss.

“If you call me ‘kid’ one more time…” he said before kissing her again “…I’m really not going to stop… ever” he kissed her again.

Liana’s mind wanted to push him away but her body wouldn’t yet listen, so she grabbed him in her arms, forgetting for an instance who he was, who she was and even where they were…

Suddenly a noise was heard like someone stepped on the leafage. The spell was finally broken – Liana’s hand stopped on Seunghyun’s chest and pushed him back.

“Choi Seunghyun, stop!” she pierced his eyes and soul. “It’s not good… What you’re trying to do…”

“Mian*, noona, but I’m not going to give you up… not now, not ever…” he said getting close to her again when she took a step away from him, towards Daesung she just noticed.

grabbed her hand again but he remained motionless when Daesung appeared from behind Liana.

“Mianhaeyo, hyung…” Dae barely whispered, without knowing if he should just run away from there or step up front.

Seunghyun quickly let Liana go, but this cost him another loud, sharp slap.

“This is how you plan on not giving me up?!!” she yelled at him even if her words choke her.

“Noona…” he mumbled a little lost.

"NO, kid! Just… No!” she stopped him from following her and she hurried inside the hotel, speaking in her mother tongue and frankly… it was no need to know the language because it was pretty obvious what kind of words they were.

“Um… hyung…” Daesung almost lost his voice.

“Hyung, hyung, hung!” Seunghyun snapped at him. “What now?!!” he shoot deadly glares at Daesung but wouldn’t wait for his answer. He pushed him away and went running after Liana.

“Noona! Lee-shi!” he shouted but of course she wouldn’t stop. He was about to reach her when he called her again and she suddenly stopped, making him almost hit her.

“What?!” she stared at him, but his hesitation put her on the walk again.

He really wanted to answer but the corner of his eye got a glimpse of teacher Mariana and two of the girls, so for just a short while lost his words. They seemed to walk towards them, but by the looks of it, she didn’t saw them just yet, so he quickly grabbed Liana’s hand to drag her away. He didn’t know where else to go and they hurried to the elevators in front. He quickly pressed all of the elevators push keys until one of them opened up. He mostly threw her inside. Just when he was about to explain his reactions, she grabbed his wounded shoulder, twisted his arm behind his back, making him kneel in pain. Before she could say anything, he managed to whisper “that teacher…” and Liana could clearly hear Mariana’s funny English asking them to hold the elevator.

“Push the button, noona…” he whispered again comforting his shoulder in pain.

Like she was a remote control, Liana quickly turned her back at the elevator’s entrance and quickly pressed one of the many numbers on the panel.

Mariana was still asking for the elevator to be put on hold while getting closer and closer and getting surer that inside was indeed Liana. She couldn’t though understand why Liana pretended to not hear her, but when the kneeled man that looked like he was doing his shoe laces stood up, she suddenly stopped, right before she could touch the doors. Seunghyun got only to blink once before the doors closed in his face.

Mariana froze in place until Luisa pulled her sleeve.

“ ’Teach, the other one just came…” she said pointing to the next elevator.

Mariana smiled and shook away any naughty thought that might’ve flew over.

“Yes!” she finally answered “Hurry up! We don’t want to lose this one too!” she smiled and lead the girls to it.

“…I’m sorry…” Liana mostly whispered without turning to face him.

“I’ts ok…” Seunghyun answered barely.

“Are… are you all right?” she asked again, looking for a way to look at him without actually turning around.

‘Where the hell are the mirrors in this elevator? Who makes elevators without mirrors??’ she had a quiet quarrel with herself.

‘But why isn’t he answering me?... did he… Did he fainted??’ she feared when she couldn’t hear any noise from his side. She used just her eyes to try and glimpse at him, but she couldn’t find him anywhere in her eyeshot, so she quickly turned around to look for him on the floor. She didn’t find him there, but his two strong palms got both of her shoulders and he pinned her on the wall. He smiled widely and once again pressed his lips on hers. Now she couldn’t use the ‘I want to say something’ excuse, neither did she felt like she needed it anymore, so she simply opened up just enough to turn that innocent kiss into a hot one. Unfortunately, tears began falling from her eyes.

“Are you crying?” Seunghyun wiped them away.

“Why… why do you keep on doing this?” she asked without being able to look at him.

“Gat-i issgo sip-eo*…” he answered playfully looking for eyes.

She didn’t answer, she already knew from the tv-show she started watching that the words for ‘I like you’ were ‘joh-a hae yo’ but this didn’t sounded like that so she didn’t know how to react, she simply kept her eyes on the ground until his fingers grabbed her chin to force her look up.

“I did not curse on you” he smiled brightly. “I just said that…” he took a short break to kiss her again, judging that this would explain better what he meant rather than saying it with English words.

She took a quick step back when the elevator’s doors announced their opening. Luckily there was no one on the other side and she stepped out. Her eyes started getting wet again and she barely mumbled:

“But I am…”

“Ara*!” he got scared that she might actually say ‘married’. “Arayo…” he sighed loudly. “I … I am aware of it but… “he scratched the back of his head smiling shyly. When the elevator’s door started closing back in, he panicked and the only words he could spell out were: “But for now I just want to focus on… now…” he got to say before the doors almost covered Liana’s figure entirely. He was about to rush at the buttons to try open them again, when four thin fingers made de doors open leaving his hand hang in air.

“Nado*…” Liana said without being able to even put her eyes up. She just saw his shoes getting out of the elevator and felt his hands on her face. Because she still couldn’t gather up the courage to face him, he lowered his head enough for her to see his smile. When she finally answered back with a soft smile, he kissed her, taking it deeper and deeper with every step they were making towards her grey door.

Both of them looked like they decided on giving themselves a chance. Even though Liana’s brain was screaming as loud as it could, the sounds of their hearts beating hard at once, covered any of that annoying noise.

They entered the room, still kissing and holding on one to another. They stopped just for a second to seal this kissing truce with a deep stare. She grabbed the first button on his shirt and he took a deep breath.

“Are you nervous?” she giggled ing him.

“Yah!” he pretended to pout while gluing her onto his body.

"Oh, mianhae…” she smiled thievishly when his skilful hands made their way underneath her blouse.

__________________________________________

*Annyeong – hello!

*Nappeun namja – evil/bad man

*Mwo – what

*Mian – sorry

*Gat-i issgo sip-eo – I want to be with you (in a romantic way)

*Ara – I know

*Nado – me too