Chapter LX:

Goddamnit, Park Bom

22:01 KST

“Dara?” a voice called.

Ah. He also called me by my name earlier when he chased after me.

“Are you listening?”

Ah. The ocean waves were loud, but funny how I didn’t even remember hearing anything at all.  Nothing but his voice. And his words.

“Yah, Dara. Seriously, don’t ignore me!”

Ah. He also said I was ignoring him. But he believed I ignored him for the wrong reason. That man thought I actually—

Whack!

At the sudden slap on her exposed thigh, Dara flinched. She realized that she was no longer standing on a sand and stone covered earth with the ocean in front of her, but was now draped over the railing of her bedroom’s balcony—a part of the room she only realize existed after Bom casually slid the glass panels exposing the suspended scaffold. Bom’s loud and amused laughter still rang on the air as she took in Dara’s surprised expression when she saw the balcony like it was a hidden passage she just discovered inside her room.

Can’t blame you, Darong. With the things occupying your mind, I won’t be surprised anymore if you also didn’t know your room had jacuzzi in it.

Dara then threw another I-never-knew-that look at her cousin, and she laughed anew.

That was an hour ago. Bom was not laughing now as she watched Dara with a pout on her lovely face, glowering like an attention-deprived child.

“What the heck was that for?” Dara grumbled, rubbing the sting off her bare thigh. She was simply wearing a sleeping robe now with her night gown hidden beneath the pink silken cloth, while her cousin wore a yellow sundress that effectively hugged her proud curves, and effectively smitten almost half of the men’s population—even some women—within the small island of Dongbaek.

That curve rouse and fell as she heaved an irritated breath. “What’s up with you? I’ve been talking here but you’re not listening.”

Rolling her eyes, Dara disagreed. “Oh, please. I was listening while you kept talking about Choi Siwon,”—she made sure she mirrored Bom’s pensive drawl when she mentioned the man’s name— “The dreamy Choi Siwon, the sweet Choi Siwon.”

From how the idol kept her company when she was worried sick about Dara, how the man wiped her tears away and prepared her a calming tea while they waited for the news about Dara, how the man so lovingly whispered assurances on her deaf ears as the search party finally found both Donghae and Dara, and how, in the middle of all that paranoia, Siwon shone like a knight in shining armor as he held onto her quivering hands and kissed her worried goodbye--Dara forced herself to listen. 

Then Bom began talking about how they started getting intimately close and Dara stopped paying attention. The details about her cousin’s passionate rendezvous while she was probably revealing her secret to Donghae and bawling her eyes out was the last thing Dara needed to hear.

“I was also talking about his pets, you know.” Bom retorted as though it was an entirely different subject.  

“Yes, of course. His pets.” Dara bobbed her head in faux interest.

The lawyer thought having her cousin here was a good idea and she could momentarily forget about Donghae, but she knew that was a useless attempt. Because even Bom’s non-stop comments about Siwon’s dimples and his ‘hard rock abs’—Bom’s words not hers—and the incessant gushing of this starry-eyed, lovestruck woman, Dara’s attention would still drift away and settle on the memory of Lee Donghae then her mind would have its own version of incessant gushing over his perfect smile and his perfect body.

And on the revelation that the man loved her.

Had been in love with her the first time he kissed her.

She recounted the time when he stole a kiss the first time, and it was at the parking lot where someone had caught them in camera. No wonder he was burning with jealousy. He was in love.

She remembered when she collapsed in front of her law firm and saw Donghae’s face before losing consciousness. He had looked so awfully shocked and worried then. No wonder: he was in love.

Then, with a small crease on her eyebrows, Dara recalled the times he had and flirted so openly with her; on how he possessively claimed in front of other people, on how he seemed to enjoy watching her flustered expressions after every shameless act and how he would smile so brightly like an idiot when she indulged him with her attention.

He was in love.

“Now look at you smile like a fool. Seems like I’m not the only one thinking about someone here.”

Bom’s teasing voice dragged her back to the balcony. Dara ignored her cousin who was now holding a small porcelain pot as she poured tea on a cup that sat on the table. It was her usual herbal tea, a drink she took every evening for reasons Dara didn’t know. Maybe it was some sort of tranquilizer to warrant a good night sleep, or simply part of her healthy lifestyle. Tonight, it smelled like chamomile, so Dara guessed it was the former.

On the other end of the table was Dara’s half-filled bordeaux glass and a bottle of well-aged red wine. If her cousin favored brewed herbs as a midnight drink, Dara preferred hers fermented with 15% alcohol content because why the hell not?

Reaching for her wine glass, Dara drew herself away from the railings and accompanied Bom as she sat on the chair across her.  After twirling the scarlet liquid in its glass, she took sip from it, rolled the liquid on her tongue, and savored the bittersweet taste before swallowing it. In front of her, Bom took a sip on her teacup as well and both cousins sighed into the quiet night.

“Ah, my dear cousin,” Park Bom breathed out, beaming dreamily as she brought the cup down and stared at the star-studded sky above them. “Love is truly in the air.”

Dara snorted. “That’s just the smell of saltwater, my dear cousin.”

And like saltwater, the smile dripped off Bom’s face. She frowned at the other woman. “When you’re not in a daze, you’re as prickly as a cactus. Did something happen?”

“Nothing.” She answered, shaking her head. “And FYI, I was never in a daze.”

Clicking her tongue, Bom lifted a well-coifed brow. “Oh, really now? Let me remind you then, miss FYI-I-was-never-in-a-daze,” she drawled, and lifted her hand, splaying one finger after the other. “First, you bumped your head on a door five times, tripped over your own feet three times, and bumped with four different persons—that’s when I was counting. Second, you mistook salt for sugar when we were eating our lunch and poured all of it in your soup, you didn’t even notice it until I took a taste on from your bowl. Third, when the waiter asked you to choose between lemon juice and orange juice, you merely said yes and the poor guy just stood there looking confused. Then, when we were—"

“Okay, okay.” Dara swatted Bom’s hand. “I made a lot of mistakes today. I know.”

“And I know for sure you are never the air head type. So, what’s the tea, couz?” Bom demanded, taking a sip--or more like slurping--from her teacup.

Dara scoffed at her cousin’s dramatic attempt to showcase her intrigue, but then maybe it was effective because she found herself giving in and feeding her cousin’s curiosity.  

“Donghae said he was…in love with me,” she admitted in helpless honesty, suddenly shy while Bom’s was still looking at her over the brim of her teacup, raised brows hidden behind her fringes, waiting for more, expecting for the juiciest gossip like a voracious tabloid writer. But then, it seemed her cousin was done talking.

“Well, that’s it?” Her cousin couldn’t have sounded more disappointed.

“Yes,” Dara deadpanned, and took another sip on her wine in attempt to avoid Bom’s drilling stare.

She remembered how her cousin was still clueless about the real situation with Donghae; the fake relationship and their agreement. But the lawyer didn’t plan on telling her the truth just yet, at least not now when they were lounging here out on the balcony, five floors up in this towering building and so dangerously close to the railings. Telling Bom now would not guarantee her safe flight back to Seoul.  So, Dara opted to sound vague.

“What’s so troublesome about that, anyway?” Bom replied. “It’s not like he proposed to you.”

“P-p-propose?!” she sputtered. 

At the mere idea of it, Dara blushed in a deep scarlet. She almost choked on the wine she had already swallowed. A confession was one thing, but marriage? Oh, dear heavens, the woman’s fragile heart would be a pulverized mess.

Clearing , Dara dismissed the thought away, saying: “That’s not…He didn’t do that. It’s just that, I was caught off guard when he said those words to me. I was just surprised,” Well, it was half the truth any way.  

“Stupefied would be more accurate.” Bom pointed out. “I think it’s sweet of him. Why are so surprised, anyway?”

Biting her lips, the lawyer tried to think of a sensible answer to convince her cousin that before that day, Dara never thought Donghae had feelings for her beyond their fake relationship, and how she had always interpreted his flirtatious actions as nothing but a testament to his annoying erted tendencies, but then she found none. Sighing, she gave a small defeated shrug. “I didn’t realize he felt that way. Until today.”

Looking at her like she was the densest person in the entire universe, Dara’s cousin clapped her hands. “Well, congratulations, dearie. You’re officially the last person to realize that.” Much to Dara’s chagrin, Bom went on and said. “How can you be so smart yet so clueless at the same time when it comes to Lee Donghae? It seems you can see everything except the poor man’s heart!”

“It’s not like I’m an x-ray machine,” the lawyer shot back.

“Don’t give me that silly response, couz.” Bom rolled her eyes. “Are you perhaps having troubles with your feelings about him? It seems to me like you’re afraid to allow yourself to indulge in the affection he keeps on showing you. Like you’re still testing waters and unsure of whether to take the plunge.”

Dara winced mentally. Was she that obvious?

Bom then made a delighted gasp, flicked her fingers in eureka and exclaimed, “Aha! I know what you just need to do!”

With her beloved cousin’s penchant for otherworldly ideas and ridiculous-bordering-to-comical tendencies, Dara was already sure that whatever that is, she didn’t need to do it. But asked nonetheless.

“What do you me—”

“Sleep with him!”

“I already did,” she replied flatly. “I slept with him thrice now, and he doesn’t snore.”

Bom laughed at that. “You silly girl! That’s not what I mean.” She wriggled her eyebrows suggestively, and it only took 2 seconds before Dara understood the implication behind her knowing look. Her face turned several shades of red once she comprehended the full breadth of Bom’s suggestion. “Looking at how you are bl