Narrator’s POV

Onew watched the girl in front of him from under his bangs. She was completely absorbed in eating her food. Like always. Since the time SHINee had slept over at Jonghyun’s apartment, Onew and Ha Neul had eaten together several times. Usually, they’d ‘accidentally’ meet in front of the cafeteria or Onew’d ask her to accompany him because s had all mysteriously disappeared…

And Ha Neul always happily accepted because she felt very comfortable in his presence. Also, she didn’t know that many people from SMent yet with whom she could have eaten lunch. She wasn’t the type of person who made friends easily.

So, the facts that she’d become friends with him and that he was the one who got to see her during lunch made Onew feel even more special. The mere thought of that conjured a broad smile on his face.

“Eat a little slower, won’t you?” He told her gently. “No one’s going to steal it from you.”

Ha Neul looked up. “But I’m already eating slowly!” She pouted and looked away.

And that’s when she spotted a familiar figure amongst the hustle and bustle of the cafeteria. He was obviously searching for a place to sit. Ha Neul wanted to call him and invite him over but then she noticed the lady walking behind him. And like every other female in the room (and we’re talking about the cafeteria of SMent here!) Ha Neul felt immediately intimidated by this lady.

Because first of all, she was beautiful. Ravishingly beautiful. Yes, she was wearing make-up, but only light one. And yes, her clothes looked branded and unaffordable, but they had style. In fact, Ha Neul guessed this lady had designed her clothes herself.

But what made people clear the path for her was none of all that. What demanded utmost respect and admiration wherever she went was the way she conducted herself. Her whole composure emanated superiority. To Ha Neul, she appeared like a person who’d spent hours and hours on perfecting every minuscule detail of her movements.

Onew, who had been watching Ha Neul all along, quickly followed her eyes to see too what had caught her attention. But even without following her eyes, finding the subject of her interest wouldn’t have been hard either. Because the whole cafeteria seemed to be focused on that one table anyway!

And as soon as Onew recognised the people sitting there, he also knew why. Goodness gracious, what was South Korea’s most successful fashion designer doing back here in Seoul?! And why the hell was HE eating lunch with her?!!

Ha Neul registered Onew’s shocked face out of the corners of her eyes. She quickly glanced over the other people in the cafeteria and judging from their expressions and behaviour, everyone except her seemed to know who that lady was, too.

“Who is she?” She thus asked Onew.

He just gave one short, curt, answer. “Lee Jae Hwa, Jonghyun’s mother.”

Ha Neul’s head snapped back to the woman sitting opposite to her roommate. His mother?!!!

Well, that at least explains his only with difficulty hidden strained expression… Ha Neul thought. Jonghyun was wearing his perfect poker-face but even from the distance Ha Neul could tell there was a storm raging underneath it.

Her heart wanted to run over and yank him out the cafeteria with this tense atmosphere. But her logical reasoning told her that it would only cause more trouble. And being the scientist that she is, she chose the latter.

But until Jonghyun had finished his lunch, got up, and left the cafeteria and his mother without a word of goodbye – he hadn’t actually said a single word during the whole ordeal as Ha Neul observed. Until then, Ha Neul would not let her eyes leave his face. Even when Onew asked her why she was this interested in the two, she just shook her head and continued staring. Somehow, this whole situation caused an uneasy and worried feeling in her gut.

And the moment Jonghyun exited the cafeteria Ha Neul sprang up from her chair, excused herself to Onew and sprinted after him. But once outside, Jonghyun was already nowhere in sight anymore. She cursed and just randomly ran down the next corridor.

Ha Neul’s POV

After I had run through the whole building for about half an hour without finding even a trace of him, I slumped on one of the chairs outside the cafeteria.

“Are you an idiot, Hwang Ha Neul?!” I reprimanded myself. “What was that just now?! Since when do you solve problems by trying random solutions?!! You have ing FIVE lessons of data structure and algorithm development every week! And this is the result?!! Are you crazy?!” I took a deep breath. “Okay… Now think! Use your stupid brain with an IQ of supposedly 168 for something useful for once! Where would that Alien Terrorist have disappeared to? A recording studio to sing his feelings away? No, he’d probably feel suffocated in there… Then, to the dance studio? No-no, he’s not the type… He wouldn’t have left the building, would he?!! … No, he’s got an important schedule later; he’s not that irresponsible… But, then where???”

By the way, why do I care so much? Ever since Onew told me that that woman is his mother, I’ve been acting out of it…!

But the expression he wore whenever he talked about his mother; I just couldn’t get it out of my mind… He looked so… so forlorn…

And the thought that he was now somewhere looking like that again let an anxious and suffocating feeling spread in my chest.

Either way, where was he???

I looked out the window into the green of the Rooftop Park.

“Can’t you at least tell me which way he went, Mr. Tree?” I asked the tree standing right next to the window. Yes, I was kinda desperate! “You must have seen him run past for sure!”

…

“That’s it!!! The Rooftop Park!”

I hastily pushed open the door to the park and looked around. I didn’t see him but I hadn’t expected him to be waiting right next to the door either.

Luckily most of the trees and bushes had already lost their leaves and I could see rather far. But there was a small hill in the middle of the park which obstructed my view.

Thus, hoping to find that Alien Terrorist on the other side, I started my way around the hill.

And really, on a rock at the very edge of the rooftop, there he sat looking over the buildings of Seoul…

I felt a relieved sigh escape my chest. Found you at last…

I slowly walked over to him and sat down on the rock too; my back to his. But he didn’t seem to notice me. So I spoke up first. “And? Is the view enjoyable?”

I felt him spin around to me but I remained where I was; looking away from him.

“Who—?!” He started up. But then he realised it was me. “Ghosty?!”

“Present!” I said and raised my hand.

He sighed and turned back around. “You’d better leave again; I’m not in the mood for small talk right now…”

“I didn’t come for small talk though…”

He chuckled listlessly. “You didn't? Then what did you come for?”

Hah, good question… What indeed did I come for? The moment he’d left the cafeteria I just knew that I had to find him… No matter what.  But why, though??

“Actually, I don’t know either,” I answered truthfully.

“You don’t know? Haha, that’s good…”

“Then… If you could choose, what would you have me do…?”

“…Anything…?”

“Anything.”

“You know, you should never say ‘anything’ to a man,” he scolded me weakly.

“Are you really asking me for that?”

“…No…”

“That’s why I said ‘anything’ to you.”

After that he kept quiet for quite some time and I had already adjusted to the thought of just sitting here and keeping him company silently, when he spoke again.

“Listen.”

“Huh?” What did he say?

“Then, will you just listen to me?”

It took me a second to understand what he was talking about but then I nodded. “Sure.”

Again, he was silent for a while before he started talking.

“You were at the cafeteria too, right?” He asked in a monotone voice.

“Erm, yes…” He did want me to answer that, didn’t he?

“With Onew hyung, right?”

“Yes…”

“Did he tell you who that… person was?” Now his voice shook a bit.

“I asked…”

“So, you know…” He sighed.

I nodded. “Uh-huh…”

“That’s good…” I heard him mumble relieved.

He got lost in silence once again.

“My parent’s wedding was a Cinderella story.” He then continued. “My… mother was a poor tailor’s daughter from the countryside, my father the heir of one of Seoul’s biggest corporations. They first met when my dad’s car broke down in front of her village right beneath the tree my… mother had been picking persimmons on. My dad had just gotten his permit and his first car and it had been his first spin. He was nineteen, my mother sixteen. She had invited him to spend the night at their house because the mechanic wouldn’t be able to reach there before the next day. The day after my father returned to Seoul and for the next six years they wouldn’t cross paths again.”

He made a short pause before he continued. “When my… mother turned 23, she left her home and travelled to Seoul, hoping to realise her dream of becoming a fashion designer. But even though she had learnt a lot about cloth and its manufacturing and use from her father, good fashion schools cost a lot of money. Money that she didn’t have. So she applied as a waitress in a café. Coincidentally, it was the new start-up café-chain that my father had created. They met again and eventually ‘fell in love’.”

The last three words were said with dripping sarcasm. But I didn’t yet understand why …

“My father’s parents were against that woman marrying their son and only after my father stated that he’d leave the family if he had to, his parents gave in. They got married and barely a year later, Jinhyuk hyung was born. Two years later, my noona Won Yi-ah was born…”

I felt him tense up and guessed that it was from here on that their story went awry. I leaned back a little until I felt my back touch his. At first he stiffened even more, but then he seemed to relax.

“Your back is warm…” He murmured. Figures! It’s the beginning of winter and we are sitting on a rock on the roof without our coats on!

But I didn’t say anything. Strangely, I didn’t feel the cold anyway…

“But then… that woman…”

Without looking, just from the sound of his voice, I knew he was curling his fingers into fists right then.

“…Started an affair with some singer…! She said she ‘fell in love’ with that bastard!” He hissed and then sighed. “But I could accept that…! Maybe her heart changed, who knows! But!”

I felt his back shacking from anger and sadness against my own back.

“BUT! When my father wanted a divorce, she refused! Why? Because that witch loved being rich too much! Because even though that singer of hers was quite famous, he was as poor as a church mouse! Heh. She told my father that it had all been a ‘huge’ mistake and that she will regret it for the rest of her life! And being blinded by his love for her, my father believed her! She returned to my father’s side and that’s when I was born…”

He gave a self-ironic laugh. “As proof, so to speak! As ‘proof’ that she was back to his side! And my father believed that witch’s lie for another ten years. Well, thanks to that I got a seemingly complete family at least during the first ten years of my life…! I genuinely believed to live in a happy family with both a father and mother who loved me! But then my father found out that she had never cut off contact with that singer and that they actually had a ing SON!!! And he’s older than me! You know what that means?!! That I was not only a ‘proof’ for her false loyalty but also a substitute for the son she had with the man she loved! Tsk! Ironic, is it not?” He laughed.

But I didn’t feel like laughing. In fact somewhere amidst his story my cheeks had morphed into the Han river…

But I kept quiet; he had asked me to ‘just listen’ after all…

“Well, at least that opened my father’s eyes. He threw her out and threatened to take her adultery to court if she didn’t sign the divorce papers and so she signed. The day she finally left was my tenth birthday… The story about that, you already know, right?”

So that was what his nightmares were all about…

“Hm-mmm…” I answered hoping to keep my wet face a secret. But he found out anyway.

“Are you crying?”

I didn’t answer.

“You are… Aisht! This is why I don’t like telling girls about this! They always end up creating a deluge of tears…!” He sighed. “Arasso-arasso, you want a hug?”

Me?! I wasn't the one who needed a hug...!

Although, he would never admit that... But if it was me who was letting him hug me, then maybe it could work...

So I nodded and waited until he wrapped his strong arms around me. I rested my chin on his shoulder and gently patted his back. Maybe it was just me but I felt there was something desperate about his hug...

I don't know for how long we had stayed in that position, when he let go again. He leaned back and lifted his eyes up towards the sky.

"You know, she had moved away twelve years ago..." He mumbled. "But she'd come back every now and then to see 'how her children were doing', as she called it. But those visits always coincidentally happen to be a few days after I'd have my debut, win an award, get chosen to participate in a well-known show... It doesn't take a genius to realise what this means..."

No, it didn't. Because even though I was a genius I didn't get what it meant. (Please note that this is not meant to sound braggy! It's just that the day we had tested our IQs in first grade I'd had to learn painfully that a person who got the test returned with a red number greater than 150 written on it was a lonely person given the title of a genius. Lonely because envy and admiration mixed together are not a good basis for friendship.) Thus, I just looked at him blankly.

Seeing my clueless expression he sighed. "It means she only came to look for me because now that I've become popular she hopes to profit from it and therefore attempts to get into my good books...!" He spelled it out for me with irritation apparent in his voice.

I didn’t know what to say. Because I just couldn’t imagine that a mother, no matter how materialistic she was, could see her own flesh and blood as nothing more than a tool to use for her own benefit. It went against my very definition of what a mother was. But I couldn’t very well tell him that.

Feeling his stare on me I lifted my head. And sure enough his eyes were on me, probably attempting to read my thoughts again. And he succeeded beautifully.

“You don’t believe me…” He stated coolly. But he wasn’t able to completely eradicate the sad tone from his voice.

“That’s not it…!” I hurried to disagree. “It’s just… I find it very hard to believe that your mother doesn’t care at all…”

“Which means you think I didn’t say the truth…”

“No!” I exclaimed. “It means I think you might have misunderstood!”

“What’s there to misunderstand…!” He scoffed.

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “But did she ever tell you straight to your face that she really only sees you like this?”

“You mean like talking about nothing else but my recent success and constantly repeating how proud she is to call me her son? And how much prouder she’d even be if I could mention her name here and there? Or even better, come to her fashion shows and model for her?!” He chuckled darkly. “Yes, she has. Plenty!”

I cast my eyes down; what could I have possible replied to that? I didn’t know his mother or the relationship between them well enough to even make assumptions on why things were as they were. And just saying some consoling words seemed inappropriate. It would have just come across as pity and that was probably the last thing he wanted.

The silence was turning somewhat awkward; something that had never happened with Jonghyun before, I realised. He had always thrown a random statement to start the conversation again before I would even think of awkwardness. But I guess today that was my job…

"Do you want me to take you somewhere fun?” I suggested timidly. Going somewhere and clear my head and forget about it was what I usually did in these kind of situations. But he probably wasn’t going to agree anyway. “Forget it. I was just—“

“Where to?”

“Huh?” I looked up, surprised.

“Where do you want to take me to?”

“You mean you want to go?”

“If that place is not too crowded…?”

“It’s not…”

“And I need to be back at half past seven; we have a radio show…”

“Sure. We can grab you something to eat, too. It’s only…” I glanced at my wristwatch…

And gasped. Holy Sh!t! Five o’clock already?! When did the time pass so fast?!! Super Junior would be here in about half an hour and I still needed to prepare some stuff!

Jonghyun leaned in to get a look at my wristwatch too. (And I got a whiff of his illegal perfume again…) “Two and a half hour is not enough?” I imagined that his voice had a disappointed tone to it.

“No, it’s more than enough… but…” I sighed.

“You need to go somewhere?” He guessed again and I nodded unhappily. Damnit, just when the atmosphere was getting nice…!

But I couldn’t drag it out any longer. I needed to get that software installed on their devices today!

“I’m sorry but I really need to go. The people I need to meet are only available today…” I looked at him apologetically. “But if you want we can go after your show… But I guess you’ll be tired then…” I thought for a second. “You know what? I’ll be at home anyway. So when you return, you can just tell me whether you want to go or no… How does that sound?”

“Good.” And for the first time this afternoon, I saw a small smile on his lips. Small but genuine. “Except that I don’t know how long it will go… So, when I’m not back by 11 o’clock, you go to bed, understood?”

“But—“

He raised an eyebrow. “Understood?”

“Yes…”

“Okay, now go!” He commanded. “We wouldn’t want to have those busy people wait for you, would we?”

I stood up and brushed off my pants. “Will you be alright?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” He said as if the last three hours hadn’t happened.

I shrugged and mumbled to myself: “Just don’t jump off the roof… So, see you!” I added louder, for him to hear, and walked away.

“WHY WOULD I JUMP OFF THE ROOF, YOU STUPID GHOSTY?! YOU REALLY NEED TO STOP WATCHING THOSE DRAMAS!!!” He yelled after me.

I looked over my shoulder and waved goodbye. Well, at least he was shouting at me again…! ^^

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I thought it was so obvious who that woman was... But reading all your comments (Thank you guys so much!!! <3) I found out it actually wasn't... ^^

BTW: Anyone seen the teaser for SHINee's new single Fire??? Gosh, I CAN'T wait for it to be released!!! XDDD Already the treaser looks and sounds soooo great!!! Kyaaaaa~! XD