Chapter 17

They had not gone anywhere. After they had eaten their breakfast, the silence had engulfed them and they had been sitting by the table, starring at the crumbs from the bread and the half-empty glasses.

Both of them thought about where to go, but no one could come up with an answer. They both knew that home wasn’t an option no matter how much they wanted to go. Several times, Hyuna had thought about suggestion that the went home, but she knew that Hyunseung wouldn’t accept her offer.

Hyunseung had mentioned a lot of different towns where they couldn’t go, but it didn’t make it any better at all, it just made it harder since they would have to travel through the different town at some point.

Hyuna looked up and stared at Hyunseung who had his eyes turned down. She gulped before she slowly stood up and walked over in front of him. Carefully she got down onto her knees and looked up at him with a gentle smile on her lips. She had to ask, just this once.

“We could go back, you know,” she said and took his hands into hers.

“They’ll find us,” Hyunseung sighed as he let his head fall back. “And they’ll kill us”.

“They are your friends, “Hyuna tried again as she looked down. “They wouldn’t stab you I the back like that-“

“Says the girl, whose friends left her, because they didn’t like the choices she made”.

Hyuna sighed and stood up as she walked towards the fireplace, where there only were a couple of burning embers back. She crossed her arms and enjoyed the last bit of warmth from the dying fire.

She felt tears well up in her eyes as she thought about Joon. Who should have thought that things would turn out like this… She had no one… If she went home her family would probably disown her, and her friends wouldn’t talk to her. She only had Hyunseung… But then again, it wasn’t because she regretted anything, she was so happy to be with Hyunseung, he was her absolute everything. She wished that she could be selfish and just have all of her friends and family and Hyunseung as well.

After a couple of minutes, silence fell over them. Hyunseung was still sitting by the table, looking at his hand that rested on the table, while Hyuna kept staring into the glows from the fire.

 “What are we supposed to do?” Hyuna finally asked and turned to Hyunseung.

“Leave,” Hyunseung said and almost jumped up from the chair as he walked towards the table and began to pack their things away. “We are leaving… We are going back to Seoul-“

“We can’t go back?” Hyuna asked a bit confused as she walked over to him and grabbed the nearest thing she could find, which turned out to be a mug filled with now cold coffee.

“We pick up some of our stuff and then travel… I don’t know, to England or something… Maybe Japan”.

Hyuna just nodded as she ran over the couch where she grabbed the blanket she had been sleeping with the other night and ran towards Hyunseung once again, who quickly grabbed it and folded it over his arm.

Hyuna quickly cleaned the table and watched Hyunseung leave the house to put the things away in the car. As he walked inside again, he suddenly stopped and said: “But Hyuna, I’m only doing this because I know that you want to go home… If you do something, which can bring us in danger, we leave immediately”.

Hyuna just nodded as fast as she could before she continued with what she was doing.

It took them half an hour to pack all of their stuff and get dressed into some warm clothes, before they left their small wonky place. Only a couple of droplets hit their car as they drove, but the skies above their heads threatened to release a storm.

“What exactly do we need?” Hyuna asked and looked over at Hyunseung, whose eyes were the road.

“Some more clothes, money and something we can use to protect ourselves with,” he said and drove down the main road towards Seoul.

“Protect ourselves with?” Hyuna asked rather confused and straightened up in her seat.

Hyunseung didn’t answer, but kept driving. She sighed and looked out of the windows once again, they were literally in the middle of nowhere. Empty fields were lying beside them on each side, not a single house or town could be spotted in the distance, they only sign of population was the empty fields and cars beside them.

Once again she found her thoughts drifting back to her home. Her parents must have been worried, maybe even Joon and the others, or maybe they hadn’t even noticed her disappearance? What if it actually was wrong of them to return back? What if it caused more trouble?

“Hyunseung,” she whispered, a bit surprised that he had heard her, when he hummed in an answer. “We are making it quick”.

Hyunseung only nodded.

They drove the next hour in silence, both of them consumed in thoughts until the drove past the first tall building of Seoul. The longer they got, the more buildings as well as people appeared. Lights in the windows of the stores were and the streets were filled with cars like always.

Even though they only had been gone for one day or so, everything seemed different. It was like they were being followed by the stares from the people they drove past, like they were waiting for them to show up and then call the police.

The paranoia was slowly starting to get to her head until they left the city and drove down the familiar road towards Hyunseung’s home.

She could almost feel the relief taking over as they drove down the bumpy and dusty road.

“Finally,” she heard Hyunseung mumble as the view of his house came into their sight. He pushed the speeder a bit down and drove faster towards the house and stopped right in front of the front door.

They both got out of the car and ran towards the door, which Hyunseung quickly got unlocked. The house was a mess, clothes and papers were lying everywhere on the floor, the blankets from the bed was half lying on the floor and bed as well.

“Find the stuff that you need here,” Hyunseung said and walked towards the cabinet where he found the black box. “I’ll find the rest”.

Hyuna nodded and looked a bit back and forth until she remembered the stuff Hyunseung had bought for her. She gave him one last glance before she once again found herself outside by the car, where she found the small bag.

She quickly grabbed it and ran inside towards the bathroom. With one hand she pushed all of the things that were filling the sink aside and placed the bag there instead as her hands roamed through it.

She quickly placed the small white packet she had spotted in the bottom, on the table and pulled her shirt over her head. The cold air around her immediately made small goose bumps appear on her arms and stomach as she opened the sink. With a beating heart and deep breath she pushed her head in under the cold water and let it run over her head as she washed it as fast as she could.

It only took a couple of minutes before she removed her head from the water and grabbed the white packet and emptied it.

“What am I doing?” She mumbled to herself as she started to pour the contents into her head. It took her about 20 minutes to be done before she left the bathroom.

The kitchen was still a mess as well as the bedroom, where she spotted Hyunseung crawling around on the bed searching for something. His silver-ish hair was a complete mess as if he in frustration had run his hands through it. His white shirt had slipped up over his entire back as he looked down under the bed with his hands roaming around under it.

“What are you looking for?” Hyuna asked and took a few steps closer towards him.

“I had this bag…” he said and looked up, immediately stopping in the middle of his speech. “Hyuna… Your hair?”

“Like it?” She asked with a smirk on her lips as she let her hand run through her now blond and short hair. She knew that her hair wasn’t the most perfect hair, but it was the best she could come up with, to get unnoticed through the town.

“I love it,” he said without taking his eyes away from her bad haircut. “It was a good idea”.

She slowly swung from side to side as she let herself fall down onto the bed beside him. His arm immediately found its way around her waist as he once again began to search underneath the bed.

“It was some money I could use for a situation like this,” he said and straightened up again, giving up. “They must have taken it”.

“Probably,” Hyuna sighed and looked up towards the ceiling when voices suddenly reached her ear.

She wasn’t the only one who had noticed that they weren’t alone any longer. Hyunseung soundlessly jumped down from the bed and tiptoed towards the door, with Hyuna right behind him. His hands reached over to the back of his jeans where he slowly found the gun he had been hiding in the box. Hyuna felt the blood leave her cheeks as she saw him putting the silencer on.

The voices continued to talk outside; their steps could now be heard as they neared the house.

Suddenly out of nowhere, Hyunseung kicked the door opened and pointed the gun at the intruders, who came with a short scream as they backed away.

“Hyuna,” Hyunseung called and pointed the gun towards the air, as she appeared by his side.

“Joon,” she mumbled and looked at the pale boy, who now was lying on the ground with a shocked expression. “Gayoon, Jihyun, Sohyun, JiYoon… What are you doing here?”

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