~ It was her way to say I’m grateful to you, too.

It becomes a habit. Visiting her, whenever Younghyun has a little time which he barely has because of their new comeback around the corner. Once he fit his last version of the lyrics with the instrumentation, everything sped up. Endless practices and overwhelming shootings; their lives became a neverending circle of music, caffeine and Jae’s lame jokes that helped them overcome the constant weariness. It feels like déjà vu – with one, tiny yet significant difference.

This time, he couldn’t find peace between his pillows.

Anyway, after five hours of toilsome smiling and chatting with a director who knew nothing less than perfection, the musician’s tired figure crosses the threshold as he steps onto the sweet room full of flowers and pink balloons. His small bouquet of rosy azaleas looks pathetic when he puts it into an enormous vase made of crystal and rubies.

The grimace on his face widens when he takes a step backwards and sinks into the details. With his head tilted to right, he can’t brush aside the urge to hide his gift behind the others. Therefore, he leans close to the bedside table, fidgeting around the flowers, expensive chocolates and plastic ropes.

First, he doesn’t even notice it, the faint knock of the purple book that falls onto the ground. Then, it starts tinkling in his ears and doesn’t stop until the loud noise of his heated blood outroars its annoying sound. He should have been more careful.

Younghyun’s heart skips a spare beat due to the sudden movement that he sees from the corner of his eyes. Then, it catches up the speed in a twice as fast rhythm, torturing him boldly. Beside his desperate monologues and hopeless prayers that he knew he wouldn’t get an answer to, he’s never talked with the girl who almost died in his arms. He stayed in the shadows on purpose. To protect the young practitioner who helped him, his mates and himself. To avoid Bomi’s parents and nosy friends. To get used to her presence until he finds the right words.

He doesn’t know what to say.

’Sorry. I didn’t intend to wake you up,’ Younghyun whispers in a voice so faint, his jaw drops when the girl puts her thoughts into a soft reply. As she sits up, her back leans against the cosy bedhead that looks just as comfortable as the padded benches on the corridor.

’I wasn’t sleeping,’ she says with a distant smile on her pretty face. She sounds cold and icy like a broken doll who has been thrown away and it becomes worse as her gaze meets the dead scenery of the starless sky.

Lacking of any better idea, Younghyun clears his throat and bends down to pick up the fallen diary that’s opened up on a random page full of dark lines and unrecognizable words. It’s nothing but a mess, circles and waves everywhere, yet the hidden confession of her buried feelings leaves the musician in awe.

It looks like he’s not the only one who’s haunted.

’You cannot sleep, can you?’ The man closes the book then puts it onto the bedside table. With his long fingers, he takes a nap on the silky cover before he turns towards the girl. Bomi, Younghyun reminds himself. It feels strange, knowing her name despite of the fact she’s never introduced herself. It’s like violating her rights with breaking into her personal space.

’No. No, I can’t,’ she says when Younghyun starts to lose his hope of getting an answer. With his left hand that is already on the handle, he halts and turns back to the fragile beauty whose gaze stuck on the window frame. As she speaks, her starry eyes are much more cryptic than the universe itself. ’I’m confused. There are these crazy memories in my head. Like flashes. Feelings I shouldn’t suppose to feel.’ Younghyun’s eyebrows knit as he loses the track of their conversation. Yet, he stays and awaits for her completion, an explanation or something that chases away the clouds that blur his mind. ’Love for a man, I have never known. Guilt for a crime, I have never done. And grief for a sister, I have never had.’

The girl closes her eyes, diamondlike drops falling onto her dotted robe. She looks lonely and miserable as if her friends would be all fictional and her pathetic appearance makes the musician’s heart ache. Suddenly, he cannot find the power in himself to leave.

Younghyun opens up the white door and brings a chair inside from the corridor before he closes it for good. He puts it next to the bedside table in an arm length from the wealthy girl’s bed. Then, he sits down and his lower lip before he groans out the first thing that comes to his mind.

’It’s okay,’ he says while he tries to decipher the pitch blankness in his mind. Truth to tell, he’s never been good at comforting others nor accepting other people’s kindness therefore this situation makes his stomach hurt in an uneasy way that pushes him to his limits. As the first drops of sweat appears on his forehead, he balances at the edge of fainting and throwing up.

’No, it’s everything but okay,’ she protest and for the first time, she looks directly into Younghyun almond-shaped eyes. She observes every single feature of his, from the arc of his eyebrows to the edge of his jawline, and takes a deep breath as her mind acknowledges his presence. ’Just no one understands it.’

The girl looks away by instinct, her gaze glides onto her pale hands and the shape of her legs underneath the blanket. She acts as if she was embarrassed because of her thoughtless words about her mental condition. Her rosy cheeks become crimson then dark ruby before her whole face turns into a giant tomato.

’You mean, no one understands you? That’s why you ran away from home?’ Younghyun asks with a pinch of curiosity in his voice. He leans back on the chair and stretches his legs with a tired yawn before he closes his eyes to rest. He isn’t pretentious or willful hence the tone of his voice is soft like a melody, a long heard lullaby that his system craved for in  the last three weeks of insomnia.

’I didn’t run away,’ the girl replies with her arms crossed, mellow eyebrows knitted. Confusion and pride settle on her angelic features. She doesn’t understand what the hell the man’s talking about but she wants to know his reasons hence she brushes the blanked off of herself and sits onto the edge of her bed. Her neat nails grasp the metal and don’t let it go, not until she feels at ease, finding her balance.

’Then why did you steal my bag? You have everything!’ Younghyun raises an eyebrow as his calmness dissolves into thin air. His trembling knees crash into Bomi’s leg then each other in a lunatic way even God cannot keep under control. His dreadful nightmares, sleepless hours of fear and guilt, they all started after the thief’s accident. How can she talk about that night so nonchalantly? It changed everything!

’I didn’t intend to keep it. I just…’ she tries to tell him the truth but fails when Younghyun’s upset moan outplaces the end of her weak attempt of explanation.

What the actual ? She cannot be serious!

As he stands up, the chair slides backwards with a loud creak. Its hairsplitting sound tinkles in the girl’s ears while her eyes lose the track of the man, walking back and forth without an exact destination. He does it on purpose since it’s nothing but a desperate method of progressing the hatred that runs in his veins, poisoning his mind. He wants to calm down before he does something that will haunt him forever. Something that might has a bad influence on Bomi’s health.

’I didn’t want him to get into trouble just because he had no other choice,’ she says, fighting with the dizziness that consumes her entire body, starting with her already weak arms. Her hands slide off of the edge of the bed and her forehead crashes into the metal in the next moment, leaving a rosy patch behind.

’What are you talking about?’ Younghyun asks as the faint knock reaches his ears. He takes a step forwards and helps the girl with the blanket that seems to stuck between the mattress and the bedstead. He trembles when he feels the warmth of Bomi’s breath nestling the thin skin behind his ear.

’His name is Bogum. He’s twelve years old and poor like a rat,’ she says while her delicate fingers try to help the musician.

’I still don’t get it.’

Younhyun jerks the textile with clenched teeth and smile when he finally succeed. Then, when his satisfied laughter dies, he puts the blanket onto the girl’s petite body and sits back to the chair that he borrowed from the outside. His eager gaze brings back Bomi’s dizziness.

She has to take a deep breath or two before she states her reasons.

’Almost ten months ago, when I started hip-hop, I walked home all by myself. He stole my bag but one of my new friends got him and we called the police. It was the fifth time they took him to the police station.’ While she speaks, she totally zones out as if her mind took over control and reminded her of all the things she’s gone through.

’Why did you tell me all this?’ The musician leans forwards, resting on the white sheet that crinkles under his elbows. His dark, almond-shaped eyes are big, almost rounded, as his confusion spreads all over his body, forces his brows to knit. This conversation starts to flow out of his palms like those tiny grains of sand he always played with on the beach when he was nothing but a stubborn child. Then, he believed that he can keep them in his fist. Now, he knows his limits.

’I saw him sneaking behind your back so I stole your bag before he got his chance to do so,’ she says with a chaste smile in the corner of . Just as Younghyun guessed, she is lost in her memories of the nights, she treasured the most. Nights, when she walked home all alone, waiting for her crush to step out of the coffee shop. Nights, when she slowed down her hasty movements on purpose just to see him for en ephemeral moment. Nights, like the accident’s.

’You’re crazy,’ the young man states disapprovingly. He doesn’t understand how could be someone, who clings to life with tooth and nail, so stupidly reckless. She almost died, for God’s sake! And for what?

’The cops would put him into a reformatory regardless of his granny who has nothing but her precious grandson. He needs help but not like this,’ she protests firmly although the crimson patches on her cheeks take off the edge of her tantrum. Her long, inky locks stick to her sweaty forehead, desperately looking for a way into , that makes the man smile. She acts like a princess who misses her crown, yet he feels that she is so much more than that. She is a fighter, a girl full of mystery, someone who cares with her heart instead her head. Someone who could make a difference.

’You’re rich. Why…’ He doesn’t intend to hurt her feelings, really. But sometimes, no matter how hard you try, it happens anyway. So when it does, the only thing you can do to avoid the unnecessary debate is to let go. There are situations that unwished explanations just make worse.

Therefore, he takes aback, closing his eyes and mind, shutting out reality.

’I’m not rich,’ the girl says, not knowing any kind of antagonism. With that, she glides her gaze back onto the windows, sinking into the mesmerizing sight of the starless sky. Her voice is broken when she corrects the musician. ’My father is.’

Younghyun watches her trembling and her tears only make him feel miserable.

After Soonhee told him that Bomi’s surgery went perfectly well, like a child, all naive and confiding, he still believed in his redemption. But now, his soul grows up and sees nothing but the hell he lives in. He still destroys everything that he touches; he did that with Jiwon, too.

’I have to go. Visiting hours are over,’ he claims and stands up immediately.

His hasty steps are messy, their faint sound echos in the atmosphere.

’It didn’t bother you the last two weeks,’ she says and her words have edge on purpose. She doesn’t want him to leave and her clinging has nothing to do with her constant insomnia. After all, it’s her first time. First time with him, the boy of her dreams who was always so faraway and out of reach that she thought she would never have the chance to talk to him. The young man she fell in love with at first sight.

Younghyun’s hand halts in the air, halfway from the handle. He looks at the girl from above his right shoulder with his mouth open wide.

’I thought…’

’That I was asleep. But I wasn’t,’ she confesses silently as she sweeps a mop of hair behind her ear. She should think before she speaks. Did she just admit that she faked her sleeping whenever Younghyun stepped into her room? It’s so embarrassing. ’Nevermind. I just want you to know that it’s okay. You didn’t do anything wrong. It wasn’t your fault.’

And she means it. To be completely honest, she never blamed it on the musician, she just didn’t find the right time to tell him.

’But I…’ Younghyun tries his best to decipher the mess inside of him but fails. His tongue quits talking therefore he does nothing but stands there, slammering like a complete fool.

It makes the other smile. Genuinely.

’You shouted at me and I got scared. It happens,’ she replies with eternal kindness, using the exact words Younghyun craved for. With her starry eyes, she brushes away his heavy burdens, the voices in his head and the darkness that chewed him from the inside. ’Still, I was the one who stepped in front of that car. It wasn’t the driver’s fault, either.’

Bomi’s words take the musician off guard, panicking as he scolds his brain to work.

’I… thank you,’ he answers, with his palm resting on the door handle. He clenches it as if it would be the only strong point in his whole damn world, and maybe, it is. He feels fragile, lost. He has no idea what to say or how to say it properly although his mind plasters him with bomb shaped word vomits. He loses his control.

Bomi, on the other hand, finds confidence in her voice.

’I like lilies.’ Her smile is adorable as she tilts her head to right and her lower lip with a chaste blush on her face. The way she waves her goodbye turns her grin gummy.

’I’ll keep this in my mind,’ the musician promises with an equally broad smile before he disappears behind the door.

His clumsy see you soon echos in the girls mind for hours, before she finally falls asleep.

author's note
Here it is, their first conversation. Did you like it? To be honest, it was fun to write, I enjoyed it really, really much.
I would like to tell you again how grateful I am. Thank you for those who manage to read this chapter, too. Oh, and lyricalwritings, my ray of sunshine, thank you for your concern. Honestly, I fell asleep around half past two, so I am totally okay. I slept just enough (I'm from Hungary, so it's almost half past eleven here.) I wish you a wonderful day, too. 
Love you all xx