“See you later!” Jeno waved and exaggeratedly blew a kiss to Jinsol from across the road. He walked Jinsol to her part-time job at a nearby Chinese restaurant and left for his own schedule for the day. Jinsol gave him a small wave in return, turning red from her embarrassing boyfriend. He blew Jinsol another last kiss and she shooed him away in response, bringing a pout to Jeno’s lips. Clearly knowing what Jeno wanted as a response instead, Jinsol scanned the crowd and made sure no one was paying attention before blowing him a kiss and running into the restaurant at the speed of light immediately without even looking at his reaction.

Work went on smoothly as usual, except a little more warnings from the manager for always checking her phone for (Jeno’s) messages. But Jinsol knows the manager has a soft spot for her so she could get away easily with just a smile.

After the longest eight hours she ever spent in the kitchen, Jinsol was finally on her way to the changing room when the manager called for her to answer a phone call, making her walk all the way back to the counter of the restaurant. And she never ran out so fast, without even changing out of her uniform.

The door burst open and Jinsol headed straight for the emergency room. Jinsol ran towards it in hopes of good news but all of Jeno’s friends were still waiting worriedly outside. Taking slower steps, Jinsol approached them as calmly as possible even though she wanted to grab the closest person by the collar and demand for Jeno’s current status like the situation was not obvious enough for her to infer. After letting out a deep breath, Jinsol asked in her shakiest voice ever, “H-how’s Jeno? Is he hurt really badly? What exactly happened... how long has he been there wh-”

“I don’t know,” Renjun cut her off.

If there’s any medicine that could cure all sickness and every bad thing in Jinsol, it would be Jeno. His voice, his smile, him. Jeno knew her like an old math textbook, easy and difficult questions have all been solved after 3 years of dating. It was almost automatic for him to overreact and pamper Jinsol like she’s a 5 year old. And for that, Jinsol is extremely thankful.

The first time Jeno held her hand at the ice skating rink, it was cold and rough at first; Jinsol felt the calluses on his fingertips due to his frequent playing of the guitar. Then she held it long and close enough and realised that she never held anything warmer. Her heart would jump every time Jeno gave her hand a light squeeze and she would shyly squeeze back, thrilled and new to the feeling she got from him.

The first time they kissed was in a random classroom. The couple was caught sneaking a guitar out from the music room at 9pm when they were supposed to be in the library for night study and ended up hiding in the furthest classroom of the corridor. They were both breathless behind the door and their hearts were beating so fast from all that running. The two were too damn scared to look out for if the teacher found them or not and just huddled close to each other. Jeno then found himself inching his face closer and closer to Jinsol’s and his hand soon found its way to her cheek. Cupping her face gently, Jeno softly pressed his lips against hers and Jinsol swears; she felt herself burst into fireworks like how novels always described kisses.

The first time they fought was exactly 2 months after their first date, 2 days prior to Jeno’s birthday. As understanding and forgiving Jinsol tried to be, she couldn’t bring herself to feel okay about the night he raised his voice at her for the first time. She knew whatever mean words Jeno spat at her that night were mere angry words because she saw his remorseful face before he excused himself out of her apartment yet she couldn’t help but feel hurt.

On the night of 22 April, Jinsol stared at her phone with Jeno’s chat open. It was 11.58pm, exactly two minutes to his birthday. This was the first birthday they were going to celebrate together as a couple and this just had to happen. A minute later Jinsol typed ‘happy birthday’ and went back to staring at her screen again. Three minutes later she pressed send and threw her phone across her study table and went to sleep. Who expected the birthday boy to crash in thirty minutes later?

Jeno was Jinsol’s so many firsts; her first boyfriend, first kiss, first person she went ice skating with, and many more. He was everything to her. All of her happy and sad moments, all her smiles and tears were because of him. Jeno was Jinsol’s world, her entire universe. But now he’s gone. 1000 days later: on the first day of the fourth season.

It was the first day of winter;

At the first whisper of the snow that fell, she entirely lost her mind.

“He didn’t make it.”