The first time I met Myungsoo, I saved his life. Myungsoo doesn’t like me telling this story to other people. He thinks it’s embarrassing. But there’s a very simple way to speak without Myungsoo noticing it, so without him knowing, I always tell our story anyway.

It was in the waiting area at a small train station that I first saw him. I didn’t pay much attention to him at first, I was tired from having traveled over the weekend and wanted nothing but to get home quickly and rest before the work week started again. He was standing in front of the two TV screens showing all departing and arriving trains and I walked up there too, my footsteps coming to a halt slightly behind him and my eyes were scanning over the departure list for a train to Seoul when I heard three loud noises behind me. A gun firing, a thud, and someone screaming. Naturally, I turned around. It’s a reflex. You hear a noise, you turn to look for its source. That’s what any normal human being would do. However, I would soon come to realize that not everyone acts in par with what I considered to be normal.

I saw the woman first. A pretty girl in her early twenties lay on the floor, her blouse slowly changing color from light blue to red as she was struggling to breathe. Then my eyes landed on him. The offender. With a ski mask covering his face and a gun in his hand, he was the spitting image of how a child would imagine a criminal.

“Everybody get down on the floor!” He screamed at us, pointing his gun at one person at the time. We were only four people there, five if you counted the lady who already had a bullet in her chest, and three of us obliged, but one person did not follow orders and this quickly came to all of our attention.

Scchlurrp!

The unmistakeable sound of someone slurping up the last of their beverage through a straw resonated through the otherwise quiet room. I silently prayed that it had gone unheard, closing my eyes as if that would be of any help to muffling the sound, but of course everyone had heard.

“You there!”

The barrel of his pistol was pointing ever so slightly to the right of me, where half a meter behind me this rebellious man was still standing.

“You think this is a joke!? Get down now!”

The man, who I’m to this day not sure if he was a robber, trying to hijack a train, simply crazy or what he was trying to do, warned him with a stern voice signalling that he was not one to be toyed with. I dared not to get up in fear that he would move his aim and end my pathetic life right there and then so I stayed squatting down on the floor, but I turned my head slightly and looked at the man next to me, hoping to see him quickly laying down. He did not. Without flinching even the slightest he stood there as if he was some kind of model for a travel brochure. Earphones plugged in, looking at the departures board and leisurely sipping what at one point must have been some sort of beverage but was now only a small pile of ice at the bottom of a plastic cup. I have to say I was impressed with how calm he was, but his calmness was stressing me out. He was either very brave or very stupid, and in either case I couldn’t imagine this ending well. So I reached up, grabbed a hold of his wrist and pulled him down. At the same time an ear deafening blast was heard along with the sound of glass shattering. I didn’t see it, but the bullet must have hit one of the TV screens behind us, passing by only centimeters above Mr. My-drink-is-more-important-than-my-life’s head. Had I waited even a few milliseconds longer, it would have gone through it.

This is when I realized what I had just done. I had denied a potentially crazy killer the joy of blowing this guy’s brains out. Would I instead be the next victim for defying his words and pulling his target out of harm’s way? I know from reading the newspaper later that we were only in there for about two minutes in total, but at the time waiting for his next action felt like it took an eternity. First he seemed at loss for words. He hadn’t anticipated that I would in. To be honest, neither had I. It wasn’t that I wanted to save this guy, I wasn’t that kind of person. I wish I could say that I was brave and selfless enough to do something like that, but I really wasn’t. I was a scaredy cat and that’s why my actions came as surprise even to me. I didn’t even think about what I was doing, saving him wasn’t a conscious choice. It just happened.

The shooter kept staring at us, and for some reason I kept eye contact with him. I wanted to look away but my eyes wouldn't listen to me.

“That’s better,” He finally said, somewhat pleased that we were all down on the floor, and I drew an internal sigh of relief despite him still pointing his gun at us.

He stared us down for a moment and then he turned his back towards us and fired a bullet towards the information desk, breaking the protective glass wall around it. He looked at us again and then hurried towards the desk. This was my chance. Without looking back, I started running. I ran and I ran and I ran out of the building, as far as could until my legs gave away and I slumped down behind the corner of another nearby building. The other boy ran with me, he had no choice but to since I was still holding on tightly to his wrist. We stayed seated on the ground in silence for a while, him peeking around the corner and me resting my back against the cold wall, closing my eyes tight and focusing on my breathing. If I didn’t, it felt like I might forget to breath at all and suffocate to death. Inhale. Exhale. I only opened my eyes at the reassuring sound of sirens and finally relaxed. Had I hoped for it to all be a dream and to be back in my cozy bed at home when I opened my eyes? Yes. But this was fine too. The police was here. We were safe. The world was coming back to me. I could hear birds chirping, I could smell spring in the air, and outside of the little shady slice of ground we were sitting on, the sun was shining brighter than ever. I dared to speak again, and maybe it was all the built up fear being released, but I not only spoke, I yelled.

“How could you just stand there!? You could’ve died!”

I know, who was I to scold him? I wasn’t his mother, I didn’t even know the guy, but for some reason his reckless behaviour angered me. Maybe he was still too shocked to speak, or maybe he was simply embarrassed, but he didn’t answer me or even look at me. I took a few more deep breaths and calmed myself.

“Do you think we should go back there? I’m sure the police will want to hear what we have to say,” I suggested with a bit softer voice.

Again, no answer. Then he turned away from the corner and for the first time, he looked at me. This is when I realized I was still holding on to his wrist and I quickly let it go, feeling a bit embarrassed. You could see the marks from my hand etched in his skin. I felt sorry about grabbing him too hard, but I thought I would only make things more awkward if I apologized for it so I said nothing.

“Thank you,” He half whispered.

“No problem,” I answered. “I’m glad you’re alright.”

This is when I started noticing that this guy was a bit odd. He wouldn’t look me in the eyes, but he never broke his gaze away from my face. I don’t know what he was looking at, but wouldn’t stop staring for the entire time I spoke to him. It was a bit uncomfortable, but I just figured he was shocked and probably not in his right state of mind and pretended not to notice anything.

“I’m Sungyeol, by the way,” I don’t know why I felt like I had to introduce myself, it wasn’t like we were going to see each other again, but I didn’t know what else to say and this was an experience I wasn’t soon to forget so it was nice to at least know each other's names, wasn’t it? “And you are?”

At my request to know his name, he bit his lip and furrowed his brows a little, seemingly reluctant to answer. Did he not want to reveal his name, even after I totally saved his life?

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that. Your name is…?”

“It’s Sungyeol. Lee Sungyeol,” I answered with a small smile. But he didn’t seem too happy about it. In fact he seemed rather anxious, squirming up his face even more.

“Lee… Sorry, one more time?”

“Lee Sungyeol,” I repeated my name a third time, enunciating each syllable as clearly as I could.

“Could you maybe write that down?”

He hesitated as he said it, and he did sound sincerely apologetic about making a request like that, but write my name down? I was flustered to say the least. What was he playing at? It was like elementary school all over again, when some kid would pretend not to hear what you said and make you repeat it over and over again just to annoy you.

“Ehrm, I don’t….have any pen or paper.”

He held out his hand to me, palm facing upwards.

“You could write it in my hand.”

I thought it was strange, but I complied. I held his outstretched hand steady with my left hand and with my right pointer finger I slowly traced my own name. This almost tickly sensation went through my finger and I was wondering if he felt it too when he interrupted my train of thoughts.

“Ah, Lee Sungyeol!” He exclaimed, finally smiling. “I’m Myungsoo. Kim Myungsoo.”

“Myungsoo? That’s a pretty name.”

He smiled bashfully and dimples appeared on his cheeks.

“Thanks. I think the police is here, we should probably go and testify what happened, right?”

“Yeah, we should.”

I wanted to add “I know, that’s what I told you two minutes ago,” but I kept those words to myself and we walked back to the crime scene. We had run further than I thought so it took a few minutes. I looked around as we walked, scared that someone was suddenly going to pop up and attack me. Myungsoo, on the other hand, looked only at me. Again, I pretended not to notice. I didn't seem nice to tell someone they were being really creepy, even if they were.

At the train station it was swarming with people. Police, reporters and curious citizens were all over the place. At first they wouldn’t let us in, but the middle-aged couple who were the two other witnesses confirmed that we had in fact been at the scene of the crime and we were let through.

There was no woman on the floor anymore, but a small pool of blood showed where she had been. Also on the floor, was a plastic takeaway cup with half melted ice. I can’t explain in words what I felt when I saw it. Had it not been for me, there would probably have been a pool of blood there too, wouldn’t it? The police asked us a few questions, and then they asked for our contact information, explaining that we might need to come in to the police to testify some other time.

“Please text me if you need anything. Don’t call,” Myungsoo said as he handed over his number, and that was the last thing I heard him say. We did ride the same train up to Seoul, but I was unsure of whether I should sit next to him or not. After all, we didn’t know each other, but we weren’t complete strangers either. I decided to leave the decision up to him and boarded first so that he would have to chose whether or not to sit next to me. He must’ve went the other way when he got on because I didn’t see him after crossing the threshold to the train, and so we parted without even saying a word of farewell.