Pulling my cap low over my face, I squinted through my sunglasses at the sign which was hung up above a restaurant.

"Seoul Diner."

I pushed the door open and the bell above it tinkled at my presence. Scanning the room, I quickly spotted Ailee sitting at a corner and proceeded in her direction with my head hung down, so as to avoid capturing attention from anyone else.

Ailee looked up as I reached the table and said cooly, "You're late."

I sat down opposite her, already feeling uncomfortable in my warm sweater and the heat of the restaurant so  I took it off and hung it on the back of my chair.

I kept my head down and could feel Ailee's stare at the top of my head. A waitress appeared and we placed our orders, Ailee ordered a salad and I ordered bibimbap.

As soon as the waitress was gone, Ailee leaned forward and I cautiously looked into her cold eyes.

  "I'm sure you have no idea why I called you here do you?" she said in a deadly soft voice. "Jung Daehyun," she added and I shivered at the way she pronounced my name, like it was full of venomous poison.

"And I'm sure you wouldn't come if you didn't have anything you wanted to say to me," she said. "So why don't you start first? You can voice out your reason for coming here."

I gulped and looked away from her. The diner was very warmly lit and the tables were fortunately arranged quite a distance apart. There weren't many people there and those who were present were thankfully minding their own business at strategic corners of the restaurant.

I turned back to Ailee whose stare had never faltered. Taking a deep breath, I began the conversation.

"I came here because I want to explain the truth to you," I said.

Upon hearing this, Ailee took a deep sigh and pursed her lips together. "Don't even think about it, Daehyun. I know what is right and I will stand by it," she said in a tired voice.

"Why are you so persistent?" I said.

"Because it's the truth. I know my boyfriend and I know him well enough to know that he wouldn't do such mindless stunts such as standing at the edge of the ride," her voice had started cracking and I turned my head away as she looked down and dabbed at the corners of her eyes.

"I guess you didn't know him well enough," I said quietly.

"Excuse me?" she exclaimed loudly, apparently appalled and I whipped my head back to her. "I do not know my boyfriend well enough?" she let out a frustrated huff of breath.

"It's true," I replied calmly. "You don't even know the truth and the real cause of his death. If you hadn't been shedding all those miserable tears everyday, I'd had thought you didn't even care for him."

That was it. I'd said it. I watched as her face slowly turned red and her breathing quickened. It was too late to take back my words now, far too late.

"You arrogant piece of..." she spit between clenched teeth. "You think you know everything do you? You think you can wrap the whole world around your little finger and trust all those stupid lies you spun? Well sorry to burst your bubble, Daehyun, but everyone can see through you and your little lies. No one is going to believe you."

"Eventually they will," I muttered under my breath. "Eventually they will believe me because I know I'm speaking the truth."

Ailee stared at me and shook her head disbelievingly. "Look, there were witnesses that day who saw the whole thing. And you still assume that they were all wrong?"

"I told you it wasn't as it looked like. Why on earth would I do such a thing?" I gritted my teeth.

"Well, not everyone on this planet is normal. There are always some weirdos in every species," said Ailee.

"There is nothing wrong with me!" I exclaimed loudly and lowered my voice when a few curious glances were casted our way. "I'm perfectly fine. And besides, I thought you knew me well."

"I thought I knew you too," said Ailee in a hard voice. "But I guess people change. People change for greed and longing. They're too self-centered to share what they already have."

A lump instinctly formed at my throat as the memory of my parents slamming the front door in my face replayed in my mind. I tried to gulp it down but it was stuck there.

"Ailee, please... Just listen to me. I know why you're being like this. I know why you're being so stubborn. It's because you can't let go of the past. But I beg you to please let go of it, and start afresh with your life."

"And what if I don't want to?" there were tears swimming in Ailee's eyes right now. "He was my first love, Daehyun. You have no idea how it feels like to lose it."

"But he's gone," I said matter-of-factly. I was surprised my voice actually sounded calm when inside, I was already flinching when I said that out loud. "And there's no help in dwelling on the past. You need to move on... Please Ailee, I'm sure Daeyoung would like that-"

"What do you know?!?" she suddenly screamed and stood up. The whole diner went quiet. "How would you know what he would want? He's already dead for God's sake and you murdered him!"

Ailee pointed an accusing finger at me. From the corner of my eye, I could spot all the diners leaning forward among themselves to whisper about our current situation. Maybe, I thought with a dreadful feeling. They recognize us.

"Ailee please..." I tried to hush her but to no avail.

"You are my boyfriend's murderer! You have no right to say what he would want! You have no right to even live in this world! And here you are, begging for forgiveness! Well let me tell you something, I will only forgive you if you bring him back!"

Something rose inside me and I was suddenly seeing red. I curled my hands into balls and stood up, towering over Ailee.

"I didn't beg for forgiveness, get your facts right. I don't need to beg for forgiveness because I did nothing wrong. I know the truth, I'm standing by it, and it's gonna be revealed one day. You can't just live in ignorance your whole life like a blind person. Admit it, you do have some doubts of yourself sometimes. Well, that's because I know that YOU know the truth but you're just too stubborn to accept it. And the thing about what I know about my brother, well, for one thing, he's my brother and I have every right to speak up for him. I have every right to defend him and I have every right to make sure the cause of his death is known later if not sooner."

Ailee looked taken aback and slightly scared by my outburst, if you could even call it that. My voice was so low, it couldn't even be heard from three tables onwards. However, it still held all that trembling anger that I wanted to release. Boiling with seething rage, I strode out of the restaurant, bumping into the waitress who was carrying our dishes on the way out. I heard the soup bowl clatter onto the floor with its contents spilling out but I didn't care. I rushed through the slightly chilly night to the direction of my dorms, taking some of the deserted shortcuts which were rarely used by anyone because of it's intimidating darkness and shadowed alleys. The anger which boiled inside me was unaffected by the cold weather and I didn't even realize that I had left my sweater in the restaurant and that I was only wearing a black T-shirt.

As I crossed the traffic junction which was right near my dorms, I whipped out my phone, typing a short message to Youngjae whom I hoped would still be awake.

'Prepare some ramyun for me.'

I entered the passcode to my dorms and stepped into the slightly warm atmosphere of the dormitories. Turning right, I headed for our room, bumping into misfortune just as I reached the front door.

"Yah! Jung Daehyun!" our manager exclaimed as he saw me. He was just exiting the dorm. "Were you out again?" his face contorted into fury. "You know you are banned from leaving the company! Yah! JUNG DAEHYUN!!!" he shouted as I brushed past him into the dorm.

I shut the door in his face, knowing that I would get chewed out by him tomorrow and that I would probably regret it but I didn't care. His anger was much less compared to mine. I turned to meet the smell of ramyun wafting from the kitchen and strolled over to it. Sitting down quietly on the dining table, I immersed myself in my thoughts, regret already starting to build up inside me.

Youngjae turned off the stove at that moment and he poured the ramyun into a bowl before placing it on the table and sitting beside me.

"Something is bothering you," he said softly.

I said nothing but just reached for my chopsticks. I took the bowl and dived in, I was famished as it was my first meal since twelve that afternoon.

"Daehyun ah," he reached out to brush my fringe out of my eyes.

I ducked his movement, not because I didn't want him to touch me but because I thought this kind of gesture now, when I was full of emotions, would just make me explode. Youngjae sighed and dropped his hand. He apparently thought I wasn't comfortable around him so he just stood up and left the kitchen. My eyes followed his figure until it disappeared. I was having too many mixed feelings at once that it was hard to tell them apart.

Putting my empty bowl down on the table, I decided that I would just ignore the happenings of that day and just sleep and hope that the next day, my fury, regret and a certain kind of incomprehensible ache in my heart would all disappear.