August 12th, 2013

Sunggyu was wearing his white cardigan over his cream T-shirt, walking up to the woman who was standing in a distant. She was looking up the sky a few times, hugging her arms around her torso tightly. As if sensing he was near, she turned and smiled at Sunggyu. Sunggyu walked a bit more until he was standing near her and returned the smile, kindly so.

"I'm sorry for making you come out like this." She said, looking at him with a guilty expression.

"It's fine." Sunggyu said, watching her face that she hung low. "What's the matter?"

Youngeun lifted her head a bit, and smiled nervously. "I just want to see you..."

Sunggyu was quiet, looking at the woman before him. He could still recall their memories together and each day of their lives had been something that became so precious to him for a while. But Sunggyu was Sunggyu; he's a man that wouldn't go back on his words, he reminded himself. He offered no answer to her, only watching her for a moment.

"And to apologize for suddenly disappearing two years ago." She said, her expression turning somber. Sunggyu took a deep breath but he didn't know of what to actually say.

"You really left me devastated that day." He admitted, quietly. "I was looking for you around, like a mad person, calling every person that knows you, going to every possible place that you could possibly be at."

Youngeun fell quiet for a moment. "I'm sorry." Sunggyu offered no answer so she went on, "I'm sorry, but I have a good reason for it."

"A good reason for disappearing for a whole two years?" Sunggyu asked, sounding a bit sinister.

Youngeun only smiled to herself. "You've never changed, Gyu-ah."

"I think I've changed a lot."

"Maybe I'm not seeing those changes. Yet." She said, smiling meaningfully to him. He watched her pale lips that were tinted with natural lip gloss and saw as the smile faded away from them. "You seem like... You're not forgiving me yet."

"Well, you're not telling me the reason yet."

Youngeun laughed, "That is just like you." She smiled a bit and walked up to an empty bench. Sunggyu followed her and sat down, leaving a space in between them. She was looking up at the young night sky, with a calm expression. "Two years ago... When we promised to meet at the amusement park the next day, I can still remember you were so excited for it." Sunggyu was looking ahead of him, offering no reply again. "But as soon as I ended the call from you, I received another and it was from my father." She paused to take deep breath. "I knew it was coming, that sooner or later a day like that would surely come. You know that my father had been having difficulty with his business around that time?"

"Yes. I knew about it." Sunggyu said, nodding promptly. "I went to your house a few days after you disappeared and saw that court letter."

Youngeun heaved in a heavy breath again. "You saw it? Well, that night, my father told me that we were moving out of the country, on that very night. I told him I wasn't coming but he told me he was being chased by loan sharks. So, I had no choice but to listen to him." She looked down on her hands, feeling her nails against her thumbs. "We ran to China, just the two of us. I only brought a luggage of clothes and left everything else behind. I even left everything that Sunggyu had given me, our pictures, everything..."

"You couldn't help it." Sunggyu replied with a quiet voice.

"I guess so." She sighed, "I hated my father so much at that time. I asked him why did he have to borrow money from loan sharks and he told me that if it wasn't because of those loans he made, he wouldn't even have the money to send me to school. How could I even say anything at that time? I told him he should have left me here because I was already an adult but he told me that those lenders won't ever let me slip away. He said that if they couldn't find my father, they would come for me. I didn't know what else to do then, so I had to listen to him."

They were both quiet, feeling the night air slowly becoming colder.

"We moved a lot in China. We moved every time my father felt that something was off somewhere. We moved when he got into trouble again. But in the end, he managed to set up business there and he's paying off his debt. I enrolled into a local college there, doing the same major I did here and graduated a few months ago and I just told my father that I was coming back here. He was against it at first but I told him I am too much of an adult for him to keep at home." She laughed a bit, probably remembering her father's reaction.

"So you came back months ago?" She nodded. Sunggyu felt himself hesitating to ask it but in the end, he let it out of his mouth. "Why didn't you look for me then?"

Youngeun turned to him, and smiled flatly. "I was afraid, you see. I was gone for two years, without any news. I broke every promise that we made. How could I just appear before you again?"

"I didn't know that." Sunggyu said, feeling his heart burdened. "All this while, I've been asking myself what had happened to you and gradually I came to hate you for leaving so suddenly without any word." He took a deep breath again. "I never knew you were having a hard time."

She fell quiet again, looking down on her feet. "It's okay."

"You could have sent me a letter or something." Sunggyu asked, furrowing.

"I didn't know what to write. Somehow I was embarrassed that such thing happened to me. I didn't know how to let you know about it." She admitted quietly.

"Well..." Sunggyu sighed. "How are you doing now?"

"I'm doing good." She smiled, and looked up again. "I'm an assistant lecturer in a college right now."

"Are you? Whoa." Sunggyu looked at her, feeling impressed. "You, a lecturer? Won't you be shivering?"

"Yah, believe it or not I tutor a lot when I was in China, so I sort of overcame that." She said, looking at him with the end of her eyes.

"Good for you then."

"I guess." She said, smiling to herself. "My life sort of changed after what happened. I became more independent, and since we were running around a lot, I guess it made me tougher."

"You were never a weak person."

"Really?" She laughed a bit and sighed. She was quiet then, looking down on her shoes. "Sunggyu?"

"What is it?"

"Did you miss me?"

"I did."

"How about now?" She asked, slowly lifting her head and turned to him. Sunggyu also turned his head, and looked at her thoughtfully. He said nothing as he went on looking at her, not knowing of how to answer her question. He found himself wordless as he looked at into those pair of eyes that he used to cherish; those pair of eyes that were once so close to his. He opened his mouth, not actually knowing what to say when he felt his phone vibrated in his pocket. He fished his phone from his pocket and shot an apologetic smile to Youngeun. The number on the screen was an unfamiliar number and he sensed something uneasy when he looked at it.

"Something wrong?" Youngeun asked, looking at his phone.

Sunggyu shook his head and finally answered the phone. The first thing he heard was the shouting of some men in the background and he straightened his back, his gaze turning to Youngeun. "Hello?"

"Sunggyu-sshi?"

"Lee Seul-ki?" Sunggyu widened his eyes when he stood up and looked at his phone again to confirm the number was unfamiliar. "Where are you calling from?" Seul-ki was silent and when she finally told her whereabouts, Sunggyu shouted 'what' so loudly that even the people passing by jumped terribly.

Seul-ki was sitting on a bench alongside with some other people who were brought to the police station from the night club. They all had a sour look on their face, their true age hidden behind a thick layer of makeup. Seul-ki looked a bit out of place among them all, only wearing her red hooded jacket (with Always Keep the Faith on the back) and skinny jeans with her old sneakers and her hair tied in a ponytail. She had just gotten off the phone, and hearing Sunggyu's anguish and worried tone made her felt like crying but she held it in, and waited patiently for him.

The person next to her was called up when her father came by. Her father was only bowing to the police officers and smacked the back of her daughter's head to make her walk out of the police station. She shouted to her father, and her father smacked her again, before apologizing to the police officers again.

"I'm glad I didn't take it tonight. Or else I'll be dead." The girl next to her said, lazily. Seul-ki turned to her, thinking that she was talking to her. The girl with excessive eyeliner glared at her, along with the other girls who were staring at her lazily. "What?"

"Nothing." Seul-ki said, looking away. She watched a man who was around Sunggyu's age being interrogated by the bald police officer, and she jumped a few times when the officer slammed his hand on the table.

"So you're saying that someone put that powder into your drink? Huh?" The officer said, shouting. "You think I will buy that? Huh, you rascal!"

Seul-ki widened her eyes, and looked away, watching the other people who were also being interrogated in the same manner. Some were crying and begging to not put them in jail and to not call for their parents and some were fighting back. Seul-ki felt that everything felt surreal, and her mind was going hazy. She even had to do urine and alcohol test and even after she had shown her ID, the police officer was a bit sceptical about her age since they said she looked like a middle school kid, much to her annoyance so they told her to call for her guardian. So, she had no choice but to call up Sunggyu and waited nervously before he appeared before her, looking crossed.

"This is your sister?" An officer came up and asked Sunggyu. Sunggyu bowed a bit and answered yes and Seul-ki bit her lips, trying really hard not to break down. "Well, you can take her home now."

"Ah, thank you." Sunggyu said, watching the officer walked away and he turned to Seul-ki who was looking down. "Group discussion?" He began with a sinister tone.

"It's not like that..." Seul-ki replied, quietly but Sunggyu seemed to be too angry to even hear her.

"Get up." Sunggyu said with a deep voice, and held her up roughly to make her stand. Seul-ki choked back the tears she had in and let Sunggyu pulled her to walk towards the entrance, half-dragging her. She heard the girls giggling behind her and felt that everyone in the police station was looking at her. And for the first time in her life, she was glad that no one knew he was her husband because she felt it was just too embarrassi