Youngsaeng found an unknown incoming call on his cell phone screen that morning. He was on the dining table together with Seungyeon, feasting on his breakfast that he made for both of them. He answered it without much concern.

“Yeoboseyo, Otter Ahjusshi? It’s me Nicole. I got your number from Gyuri unnie. Are you with Seungyeon now? Just answer it with yes or no.” exclaimed that girl immediately after Youngsaeng pressed the answer button.

He took a glanced at Seungyeon who was eating with no appetite across of him before answering.

“Yes.” He answered.

“I’m going there now. Please message me the address details. And please don’t tell Seungyeon about this.” And Nicole cut the call before Youngsaeng could say anything. He stared at his cell phone LCD for a while with confusion and started typing his address after that then sent it to Nicole.

Did Gyuri ask her to take Seungyeon back home?

Nicole appeared in front of his door twenty minutes later, dressed in a pair of jeans, a weird necklace, plain t-shirt and a coat that the colors didn’t match at all. Her short untidy hair was hidden under a baseball cap and fake glasses rested on the tip of her nose. She saw the weird stare Youngsaeng had on his face then casually commented on it with, “I paid more attention to my breakfast in the morning rather than to my clothes,” and went it passing him by just to find the freaking out Seungyeon.

“If you’re here because Gyuri unnie told you to take me home, then you better go back home Cole. And no, your chocolate won’t even work.” She said coldly then walked away to Youngsaeng’s room, slammed the door shut in front of Nicole’s nose.

Nicole inhaled a much amount of air into her respiratory tract. “It won’t be that easy.” She mumbled to herself then took a turning to Youngsaeng who was all this time standing a few feet behind her watching that just happened scene. A little bit surprised to see that image of Nicole who was usually very random and bubbly but getting all serious now.

“Can I get some water?”

***

“What do you want to drink?” Youngsaeng asked while walking to the fridge with a glass on his hand.

“Just plain water, please, I ate too much chocolate while talking on the phone with Gyuri unnie this morning that I might turn into a pig if I get my self anything other than plain water today. Argh, I’m craving for some milk though.”

Youngsaeng heard Nicole groaned and complained all by herself while filling the glass with some water. She was still the random Nicole after all, he thought to himself.

“Thanks.” Nicole said when Youngsaeng handed her the glass that was filled with plain water, just as what she had requested. Just in seconds that girl gulped down all the water inside it and put the glass to the counter in front of her.

“These two siblings, why do they always hide things from each other that it would always end up like this?! Wae wae wae wae wae?!” Nicole snorted hard, knocking herself down she rested her head on the counter. Youngsaeng watched her in silence, confused on how to response to her words.

“But really Gyuri unnie,” She abruptly lifted her head up, “why does she have to fall in love with that person? She’s a goddess, but he is- just like what Seungyeon said- an alien! Why it must be him out of all the guy populations in our country?” Nicole hit her fist to the counter. Youngsaeng can’t help but laugh at her remark.

“Why is he an alien?” He asked, curiously. He had heard Seungyeon called him alien too before but just getting the chance to ask on why.

“Why?” Nicole looked up to the ceiling, puckered, thinking pose. “Because he’s obsessed with it and he acts like alien and maybe looks like alien too. Just like how you look like an otter.” She answered, innocent for real.

“It’s useless.” Youngsaeng mumbled, he gave Nicole a ‘whatever’ glare with his eyes to sweep the topic off also to give an indication to that girl to stop talking nonsense. But it seemed like that girl still had something up on her sleeve that she started to talk again. But this one, rather than an irritation like before, it gave Youngsaeng a heart attack, made him scared the crap out of him.

“Anyway, Otter ahjusshi, when will you confess to Seungyeon?”

Youngsaeng was shocked, got speechless on what she just asked to him.

“What do you mean?” He asked, playing innconet.

“You like her, Seungyeon. I can see it, you know.” Nicole said it with a massive amount of certainty but still in a cozy way as if it was just a normal ordinary fact like the earth is round and one plus one equals two.

“Well, in any case I’m more experienced than Seungyeon in this kind of things. So you don’t have to bother yourself thinking of some denial words.” She added when Youngsaeng kept not giving her any response for her previous statement. “Do you want me to give you some advice? You better make some move before Kyujong gets back.” She continued.

“Yes, he’ll be back for sure.” Nicole spoke again as Youngsaeng gave her a plain look, but somehow Nicole could read the unspoken atmosphere of confusion in his eyes. “I’m really sure of what I said just now. Seungyeon maybe is just too naïve and drowned on her own feelings that she couldn’t see it. But, I’ll tell you something, Kim Kyujong, that guy has a certain feeling for Seungyeon.  Despite all the bad things that he did to her and all the pain that he caused her, I’m in no doubt that he still loves her and he’s going to be back sooner or later. So I suggest you once again, you should move fast if you don’t want to lose her.”

And Nicole stopped her saying there. For a while her face remained serious but a few seconds later she came back to her usual self, smiling brightly. A strange twinkle showed on her eyes just like someone who just got conscious after being taken over by some kind of spirits.

“Ommaaaa, I’m starving.” She said, making a fake crying face. “Do you have some chocolate?” She got up from her seat and walked to the fridge, rummaging inside it to her heart content as if it was her own house and then shrieked joyfully when she found a bar of chocolate of Jiyoung on one shelf.

While Youngsaeng was still sitting quietly on his seat, staring blankly at Nicole who had started devouring the chocolate with a vengeance although she hadn’t asked Youngsaeng for agreement whether she could eat it or not. There were questions that he really wanted to ask to Nicole but his tongue was tied. Seemed like he was still shock because of Nicole’s statement or maybe he was afraid of the answer that he would get.

In the end he stood on his feet and dashed off to his room where Seungyeon stayed after previously telling Nicole that he would try again to convince Seungyeon to go back home.

*****

Youngsaeng walked stepping down the flight of stairs of his campus building in hurry. He just completed the last class the he had for that day, it was two days passed after he finally succeed in making Seungyeon changed her mind and went back to her home after agreeing that she would talk to Gyuri and listen to her explanation. He glanced at the watch that encircled his wrist anxiously. Fifteen more minutes, he muttered to himself. He had an appointment with Seungyeon that afternoon.

His feet that were clad in a blue sport shoes finally stepped on the last step of the staircase after approximately one minute running down dozens of stairs from the third floor to the ground. He again rushed walking through the corridor between the classes, he didn’t want to be late, didn’t want to make that girl waiting for him. But a guy appeared in front of his face and stopped him as he made a turn in the last corridor to the lobby.

“I have something to talk with you,” said the newcomer, an uninvited guest for him.

Youngsaeng took a quick look on his watch. “Another time, I’m in hurry now.” He answered then walked passed that guy by. But the next name that guy uttered stopped him in his tracks and made him turned around again.

“Seungyeon. It’s about Seungyeon. I have something to talk with you about Han Seungyeon.” And that guy, Kim Kyujong he was, smiled deviously.

***

Seungyeon sat uneasily at a nearest bus stop form her campus, the place where Youngsaeng had promised to pick her up. Fifteen minutes had passed away from the exact time of their appointment but he hadn’t even showed himself at all. It made her worried, Youngsaeng was never later before.

She rotated the cellphone on her hands, checked it once in every few seconds hoping that there would be a call or a short message coming from that guy. Her heart jumped when her cellphone finally beeping, a message had been received. She opened it with a high anticipation. Did he cancel their appointment that day? Did he forget about it? She thought, guessing, and then became upset.

No. Not because that was Youngsaeng for real saying that he forgot about their promise or that he couldn’t come. But more because the message was not from that guy but Nicole who sent a ‘have a nice date’ message with a lot of heart signs. She sighed then replied to it half heartedly; it’s not a date.

Again, another five minutes had passed by, but he really hadn’t show up yet. Some terrible thoughts had come emerging through her mind. Did he get an accident? Or had he became bored and tired for always taking care of her each day and decided to stay away. She shook her head hard after that, convincing her self that Youngsaeng wasn’t that kind of guy.

Seungyeon lifted her cellphone again, pressing some digits of number that she had remembered clearly and put that thing on her ear. For nth times that day, she got no response. She had sent a short message too before but she also got nothing from it. She became more anxious.

Fine, I’ll wait for five more minutes. If he still hasn’t come, maybe I should just go back home.

Luckily, right just before that five short minutes ended when she was preparing herself to go back home, a familiar car stopped in front of the bus stop. Finally feeling a little bit composed but quite annoyed at the same time, she went into the car where Youngsaeng waited behind the wheel.

She was ready to hurl the phrase sense of worry and upset that she felt for him for being late and moreover because he didn’t let her know just a bit of the news that he would be coming late. But when she had shut the door close and put her seatbelt on then turned to face him, she could sense something different. There was something weird with Youngsaeng. Whatever it was. She just felt that guy was in a trouble, frustrated.

So she kept shut close, refraining. Letting Youngsaeng drove his car in silence and in an unusual speed. He was naturally calm, always driving his car cautiously whenever he was with her. He would ask about her day or maybe would just stay peacefully quiet; it was different with this one, a comfortable silence. But she didn’t say anything, she knew it wasn’t the right time to ask him about what had happened that affected him that bad.

During the short drive, she entrusted her whole life to that guy. Even though she was a little bit afraid to see the speed of the car or whether she was confused to where he would bring her. But again she kept herself quiet till the end she found herself was brought entering the area of Han River.

Youngsaeng stopped his care in one side that directly opposite the river bank. Turning off the engine, he sat for a while leaning his back fully to the seat behind his wheel then opened the door and walked down outside by himself toward the front side of the car without saying a thing to her.

Until in the end she decided to follow him outside after a moment passed by with her staring intensely at his back. Leaving her bag inside the car, she walked closer to Youngsaeng that was in the middle of looking up to the sky, his both eyes shut closed. He knew from the sound of the gently footsteps of Seungyeon touching the ground that the girl was already standing beside him.

“I’m sorry.” He said out of sudden, still with his eyes closed and head up to the sky. But then he took a long deep breath and opened his eyes next staring forward to the river that ran in front of their eyes.

 “It’s okay.” She answered, now leaning to the front side of the car. In her understanding that guys was apologizing for his late coming which was not fully right or wrong at the same time.

Silence again overwhelmed them. Both didn’t know of what to say or maybe they indeed felt that words were not really necessary at the time like that.

Then it just happened like a flash of the light. Youngsaeng pulled her, Seungyeon, into a tight embrace with no space separating them.

“W-w-what-Youngs-”

“Just for a while,” he cut her off. “Please, let it be like this just for a while.”

And she dropped her hands that had been hanging in the air due to the shock that she got from the sudden hug, indicating that she agreed to stay in that position. It wasn’t the first time for her being hugged by Youngsaeng. But it was surely the first time he held her so tight that she almost felt out of breath, the first time she felt that guy was in a weak condition and that he needed her to stand by him and also for the first time she felt her heart beating so fast in an abnormal tempo when she was with him.

But she was too shocked to digest what the real meaning behind it all. The hug that felt awkward but gave her access to sense all the worry that he felt, and the heart of her that was thumping loudly against her knowledge about her own self.

Later when she got back to the comfortable shade of her home and bedroom, she kept remembering that thing and started questioning that natural reaction of her self.

*****

Youngsaeng watched Seungyeon’s back as she walked farther away under the dim light of the street lamp toward the front gate of her house. That girl walked slowly then stopped to turn back looking at the direction where Youngsaeng was safe covered inside his car from the chill weather of the still cold spring. Then she walked away again and disappeared behind the wooden gate of her house.

Still staring at the same spot where she disappeared before, his thought went wandering back to the episode that he experienced that day. The words that Kyujong said to him had successfully made him felt uneasy, insecure and worried about the danger of his existence being torn apart from her life.

He recalled how he had shown his insecurity to her. How he had embraced her with all his might and feeling, hoping that she could understand what he was trying to say. Even though in the end he knew for sure that Seungyeon still didn’t understand any single thing, even just a bit of the truth about the feeling that he had for her, the feeling that had started to paralyzed him.

He glanced at his cellphone that he put on the dashboard, weighed up the plan that appeared on his mind not long after the hug between him and Seungyeon that afternoon. One…two…three. Did he really have to do that?

He thought again, trying to imagine the possibilities that would happen if he chose one of the available choices. He didn’t want to be egoist, he didn’t want to hurt her nor did he want to make her suffer. But what he could see inside his mind that time was only the image of that Seungyeon smiling to him, the electricity that he felt every time their skin met each others, the fragrance of her that he smell whenever they were together, and more than anything the fear of losing her also the image of her not being in his life anymore, being close but could never be reached again.

All of it brought him into a decision in his mind. Yes, he had to do that, the only way that he had to make her stay by his side without making it too obvious that he wanted it for himself. Selfish indeed, but he didn’t care anymore, he was just too scared.

He took the cell phone and put some pressure to the touch-screen where it showed the number ‘two’, the speed dial that he had set for his mother. He heard the wait beeping tone three times until then his call was accepted.

“Omma, it’s me.” He said in a straight line. “Are you home now? I want to talk about some issue with you.” He paused for a moment, listening to his mom’s response from the end of the line.

“It’s…about me, and Seungyeon.” And he breathed a deep sigh.

********************************************************************************************

Author's note:

Finally! sigh. I can update this after a long time. I'm really sorry for all of you that have been waiting for this update. College life has just started again and I'm getting busier that it's kinda hard for me to find time to write T.T

Forgive me please you all lovely readers. For the late update and for the angst update (again). I'll try to write as much as possible between my free time. Don't forget to leave comments, some spare of your thoughts or critiques. Love Ya!