Her hand traced the scar on her abdomen with her left forefinger.  Her eyes scanned at it from the reflection of the mirror in front of her.  She let the blouse she was wearing dropped, covering the scarred wound after putting on some Vitamin E ointment on both of her scars, the one on the abdomen and the one just beneath her , hoping the scars would fade away with time. 

She knew she was shot.  She remembered that much.  But she was shot twice?  That must have slipped through her mind or she probably was already unconscious from the first hit.  For nearly a month she was in a coma.  From what was told to her by the doctor when she opened her eyes and found herself in unfamiliar room.

Starring at her own self image on the mirror, she felt she had changed so much.  Not just on her physical self, as she has lost nearly 10 kilogram of her weight by just having a needle stuck on her arm, supplying her body’s needs for energy during that few weeks; but it was the change within her that she noticed first after awaking from her deep slumber or coma.

Knocks on her door startled her and snatched her away from her deep thought.

“Soo Min?  Are you ready?”  A man’s voice heard from the other side of the door, calling out to her.

She turned her sight away from her reflection, towards the door, “Ne.  I’ll be out in a minute.”

“I’ll wait downstairs,” said the man as she heard footsteps leaving from outside of her room.

Having a man in her life still felt awkward for her since she had lived alone for so long.  She looked back to the mirror and made a few final adjustments to her clothing and hair before taking her laptop bag and her handbag with her as she made her way out of her room.

“I’m ready.  Let’s go.  Do you have all the documents with you?” she asked, as the man approached her, together making their way out of the apartment. 

The man beside her smiled, “Do you think I am that forgetful?”

She smiled at him, “I kind off still remembered you being forgetful in your teenage years, oppa.  And you have been a lot older now.”

“Ya…”

“I’m kidding.  So, who is this client of us?  Why must the client request me to be the one in charge of his account?  I already have one in hand,” she grumbled as she put on her seatbelt.

“The owner specifically ordered you to handle it, even paying more than the usual price.  So, I’ll drop you off at the company and head straight to the bank to pick up the new check book.  I’ll swing by to pick you up later after the interview for the new staff.  4 hours sufficient time for you?  Or maybe you should just call me when you are done?”

She looked over at the man beside her, smile on her face. ‘I did make a good decision to accept him in my life.  I miss this.  It has been so long,’ she thought.

Waking up from coma, she was confused seeing the man beside her now, standing by her bedside looking hopeful and concern, gander at her with his tired eyes.  Her body was weak but shockingly painless.  The first thought that came to her mind was why there is a man in her room, looking intently at her?  But as he called out for the doctor, it was then everything registered back.  She was shot and was now in a hospital.  But again, who was this man?  He was there when the doctor and nurses came to her to check her up and he was genuinely worried about her.  Even the doctor reported to him as if he was someone important in her life.

It was after the group of doctors and nurses left, he went up to sit next to her.  His hand held hers.  “The doctor said you are going to be just fine.  If in the next two days you continued to progress positively, you would be released.  For now, they are going to change you to the normal rooms for observations.”

Hearing his voice made something at the back of her mind stirred.  She has heard his voice before.  She had known him before.  But she’s too weak to talk and felt dry.  Without looking away, she gestured for a drink.  It was when he came closer to help her with her drink, she finally realized it.  He was her brother.  She should be mad at him.  Hate him at that moment but looking at him, she didn’t feel any of those.  It was weird, but she was feeling at peace seeing him.

“Oppa?” she called out to him, her mind back in the present time.

“Mmmm?”

“What really happened?  How did you end up here at South Korea?”

Her brother looked at her with concern, “Why are you asking this again?  We have gone through this set of questions for the past 10 months.  Since you came back from that long sleep.”

“Nothing.  I felt something was amiss.   Was there anything else you haven’t told me?” she asked.  Ever since she’s back, she always felt something was at loss.  Something she had forgotten.  But she had no idea what.

“Okay, I’ll answer your questions for the last time.  No more of these questions after this.  Here it goes, again,” he stressed the word ‘again’, making her chuckled a little, “You were shot and after the surgery, you’ve slipped into a coma.  The police department contacted me and told me about your condition.  I quit my job and came back to take care of you.  That’s it.”

“Are you sure?  Because, I’m pretty sure I hate you all along and when I wake up, those feelings were gone.  And when you’ve told me everything about what had happened back then, I felt like I have already known them.  How do you answer that?” she asked, daring him for an answer.

Her brother pulled over in front of a shop lot, “I don’t know.  Probably during your coma?  I did ask for your forgiveness and told you the truth when you lied there, on the bed.  I’m not a psychic, Soo Min ah.  Anyway, we are here.  Call me when you are done.”

She got out of the car and went straight into the shop, carrying with her, her laptop and a few tools she’ll need to do her work.  10 months has past and during those 10 months, she received her insurance money and the government also paid her some amount of money as compensation due to being shot and hospitalized during work.  With the money, she quit her job and opened a small security consultation company with her brother. 

Their company does some system penetration testing job for other companies in order to identify vulnerabilities and threats in their system as well as doing some IT auditing work.  They don’t have a lot of workers; including her, there are another 3 technical staff and her brother does the management work.  It’s a small company but they are gaining more clients as the months crept on.  The reason why she had to accept this job even though she already has one on hold. 

The door chime rang as she entered the shop.  She was welcomed by a smile from the staffs there.  Her eyes scanned the room.  It was a shop selling clothes with a little café at the side.  ‘They must be selling items online because the clothes here don’t look that many and everything is pretty normal for the need of a penetration tester.’ 

“Anyeonghaseyo, I’m Yu Soo Min from M&K Security Inc.  You were expecting me?” she politely asked one of the staff as she held out her name card.

“Please wait, I’ll get my CEO for you,” ushered the sales assistant, towards the café.  He prepared her drink, an iced mocha, before retreating away.

She waited there as she looked around, ‘Mmm...There’s WiFi here.  I could just do my work from here.  Is the web server here or do they just rented an online server?’

Taking a sip of her favorite drink, she smiled.  The taste was good.  It fit her taste bud perfectly.  She sat the drink back on the counter and walked around the shop.  Looking at the garments on the rack and suddenly her eyes caught something moved under one of the rack where the shoes are displayed.  She bent down and was surprised to see a rabbit.  A little gray-brownish rabbit.  Dropping down on her knees, she managed to grab the little cutie after a few tries.

“I see the rabbit Lapin got out of her cage again…”