Seven.

BOM

“Come on, Mai, let me in!” I shouted as I pounded at her door the next day. This had been the third time I tried to convince her that I want to help in preparing for her husband’s birthday party later.

For the third time, the door to Mai’s apartment swung open. “I don’t want you to tire yourself out. You have to look superbly radiant and beautiful tonight. You know, for the…”

I rolled my eyes. “Really? You are going to deprive me of my desire to help you?”

It was her turn to roll her eyes. “You don’t have anything to worry, Bom. I have the boys providing all the help I need.”

I peeked inside her apartment. Mai’s three sons, Ethan, Malik, and Gabriel were sitting comfortably on their sofa, their eyes glued to the TV. Which is sort of understandable. 2 teenagers and a child—the last thing they’d be doing is helping their mother decorate or chop ingredients.

“I can help you, Mai, and you know that.” I couldn’t believe I was begging to help, not for it.

“What’s going on here?” The sudden emergence of a male’s voice interrupted our little argument.

“Hi, Seunghyun!” greeted Mai with a huge smile plastered on her face.

I cocked an eyebrow. Since when did their relationship as neighbors reached that level?

“Hello, Mai. Hi, Bom.”

 “We’ll be seeing you tonight at the party, right?” Mai asked him.

“Absolutely. I’m just dropping by at the wine store to buy the wine you asked me to. And you texted me a while ago you ran out of sugar? So I’ll also get that. Oh, and the candles, as well.

“Scented candles,” Mai corrected.

I could feel hot steam running out at the top of my head from rage. This was unbelievable!

“What the hell?!” I roared, and I could have sworn I saw Mai and Seunghyun jumped back in surprise and fright. “So Seunghyun is okay with helping you and I’m not?”

Mai smiled nervously at me. Eventually, she raised her hands up in defeat. “Fine. You wanna help? Go with him and choose the candles for me. No offense, Seunghyun, but I don’t peg you to be a candle man.”

“It’s okay. I really don’t know anything about that stuff.”

I was still angry. Mai didn’t really want me to help. She just wanted me to be alone with him. I squinted my eyes at her before Seunghyun and I finally went on our way. Mai watched us leave and before we entered the elevator, she called to Seunghyun in a sing-song voice, “Take care of Bom, okay? She’s a darling.” Which only earned her more squinted eyes from me. Then before the elevator doors closed, she added, “And take your time, kids.”

Times like this, I wish I had powers to disappear.

***

Because Rosemary is located in the metropolitan area, where almost everything we’re looking for is within our reach, we elected not to take Seunghyun’s car anymore. We just went about the small district (in his feet and in my wheelchair) and grabbed the things that we needed. Seunghyun got the wine and I got the scented candles. Last was sugar. We stopped by at a mini grocery store a few blocks away from Rosemary. Whilst Seunghyun momentarily proceeded to the Pet Care section to grab some food for his cat, I went ahead and searched for sugar. I was spinning the wheels of my wheelchair, looking sideways, not entirely aware that I would be running over someone’s foot.

And lo and behold it was Siwon’s.

“!” he cried.

“I’m sorry!” I apologized right away, and believe it or not, it was sincere.

“Seriously?!” His sinister look and thunderous voice undoubtedly suggested that he was outraged. And I must admit that I was utterly surprised. His foot wasn’t the first one I accidentally squashed with my wheelchair, but I didn’t get the same response. Could it be that his reaction was solely because of me? It’s quite sad to know that the one you had loved and loved you would look at you now as if he’dwant to throw a hard smack on your face. “Are you that bitter over our break-up, you had to go as immature as running your damn wheelchair over my foot?”

“It wasn’t intentional,” I explained. “I didn’t see you. I was busy looking for—”

“Yeah, right. For all I know, you’re even stalking me!”

Tears welled up in the corner of my eyes. How dare him? He broke up with me, got me a replacement as quick as he changed his clothes, and now he’s accusing me of something as despicable as stalking him?

Karma, what did I do for you to punish me this way? Hasn’t the accident and then getting incapacitated been enough?

I kept my calm and bottled up the tears. I wasn’t going to explode in front of a lot of people. “I told you it wasn’t intentional. I swear I didn’t see you—”

“Just freaking move on, Bom. I don’t love you anymore, when are you ever going to accept that?”

I was about to speak, retort to his absurdity, but someone already beat me to it.

“Hey, , don’t you ever talk to my girlfriend that way.” It was Seunghyun, a bag of cat food in his arms. He positioned himself in front of me, chest out, as though shielding me from any harm. “Leave before I ing knock you off.”

And that’s what Siwon did. Typical. He wasn’t cut out for a fight. He loves his pretty face too much to let a fist ruin it.

Seunghyun swiveled around to face me and dropped to one knee. “Are you okay?”

“I—I didn’t mean to run over his foot.” Somehow, I was stuck with that thought. Probably because it was in the first place why Siwon blew up, and then went as far as call me immature and accuse me of stalking. Things that were completely baseless and untrue, yet shook me inside.

“I know,” Seunghyun said, smiling softly as he squeezed my hand. “Come on, let’s get that sugar and get out of here.”

~*~