“What happen to you?” Grandma asked, obviously not taking in the favour of watching Jooyoung ended up on someone else’s house. Jaehwan’s mother was behind her, gently Grandma’s shoulder to calm her down.

“The important thing she’s safe with us now. Don’t get too hard on her,” Jaehwan’s mother soothingly said.

Jooyoung was facing the other side, not prepared. Jaehwan had left the room after telling her that Grandma had been informed about the incident. He said he promised to take all the risks and would take the blame from her.

He made up story to save her.

Grandma then pulled Jooyoung so that she could see her granddaughter’s face. Jooyoung intentionally avoided eye contact as she stared hardly on the ceiling. Her mind was blank. She didn’t know how to face Grandma, she was ashamed.

“Explain to Grandma, I know you’re hiding something. I’m not leaving you alone till you break everything to me,” she then pulled Jooyoung’s arm to get her up. She made her mind, she would bring Jooyoung home. What was a young lady doing at night outside of the house? Is this how a proper lady should act?

Jaehwan’s mother tried to stop them from leaving and Jooyoung limply got up, not protesting. She managed to stand up and Grandma had pulled her to the door only stopped by Jaehwan. Jaehwan’s eyes darted to Jooyoung’s face and to Grandma quickly; there was a hint of guilt in his eyes.

“Jooyoung is still sick, she needs more rest,” he blurted.

Grandma exhaled audibly as she gave a weary look at Jaehwan. “She’s my granddaughter. I know what to do with my granddaughter.” She then gestured him to give way and Jaehwan who had ran out of word complied as he slowly unblocking the exit way. Moving his gaze to his mother, her mother could only give him an apologetic look.

Jaehwan sighed at the sight of them leaving.

“It was my idea. I asked her to sneak out with me.”

He prayed silently that she would be fine.

---

Grandma demanded the explanation from Jooyoung. Both of them had arrived at home and Jooyoung saw Hongbin stood beside the window, watching her being questioned endlessly by Grandma.

She guessed it was time for her to leave the village? Who knew? She might pack up her things and left the next morning.

“Answer her,” Hongbin spoke. Her eyes fixed at his, absentmindedly gritted her teeth. What was there to explain? Her brain seemed like she had damaged it from the fainted episode, making her couldn’t produce any lies to defend herself.

Even if she wanted to tell the truth, would they believe her without a judgemental look?

She could already see villagers hissing towards her like a cat.

Hongbin had been standing there since she entered the room with Grandma. She was not shocked to see him or seeing that Grandma hadn’t noticed him. She was exhausted to care if Grandma noticed that there was someone else in the room besides the two of them.

“I can’t go into Jaehwan’s house. Their house has protection,” he winced. Grandma was still shooting her questions but she deafened her ears towards her but him. She could clearly hear every word he spoke. To Grandma, she looked as if she was staring vacantly at the empty space but she was actually listening to Hongbin.

“I’m sorry,” he suddenly dropped his gaze on the floor. “I left you. For some reason, he was out of my radar. I used to be good at this but last night was a shock… Only after you react to him I got him but it was too late…”

Jooyoung watched him wordlessly. If she responded to his talking, it would freak Grandma out.

He connected his gaze with hers as he painfully made a small smile. “I’m sorry…” he apologized once again and vanished from the place he stood.

Jooyoung stared at the place hard before she suddenly turned to face Grandma. Grandma turned speechless all of sudden with the unexpected movement.

“Grandma…”

Grandma watched her expectedly.

“I know you won’t let me go if I ask your permission,” she paused.

Grandma admitted it right away but preferred to not tell Jooyoung what she was thinking; she wanted to let her granddaughter to explain herself.

“So I sneaked out,” she took a deep breath as she spoke that. “No one see me so I think I’ll be okay… And that’s when I felt dizzy and Jaehwan happened to be there.”

Grandma’s eyebrows furrowed, unsatisfied. Questions clouded her eyes and Jooyoung could see that. Jaehwan probably told a different version from hers but she thought it was best to leave Jaehwan out of the equation.

She is a big girl, she could handle this.

“Jaehwan is trying to save me and that’s why he made up a story so that I don’t get into trouble… But I’m already into one. What’s there to save?”

Grandma’s face softened. She believed Jooyoung wouldn’t dare to lie to her to make her feel better. She trusted her granddaughter than anyone else so she decided to stick to Jooyoung’s version.

A small nod seen from Grandma’s and gently she patted on Jooyoung’s shoulder. “I believe in you…” Grandma then pulled Jooyoung in her embrace. Jooyoung had never been a trouble to her but Jooyoung must have her own reason to do what she did. Besides, she is not a little girl anymore, she had grown.

As long as nothing bad happened to her, Grandma would be on her side.

---

She couldn’t sneak out anytime soon. Sitting on her bed, she staring vacantly at the window curtain, tempting to open the window and be free. She felt suffocated to be locked in her room. Grandma was nice enough for not placing her on grounded and she was free to go anywhere she wanted but she thought that it was better for her to stay.

It was hard for Grandma to put trust on her, and so, she should at least respect Grandma’s tough decision.

Just when she was about to go to the window, she almost let out a sudden scream when Hongbin appeared before her eyes in a second. Hongbin quickly caught her from falling as his hand covered at the same time.

Their eyes stared at each other. They were so close and he could hear her heart palpitated and her breath quicken. Jooyoung stared into his eyes. He used to cover one of his eyes but now she could easily see both of his eyes but his tattoo was still covered under his jet black bang.

Staring blankly, she suddenly had the sudden urge to move aside the bang and feel the tattoo under her fingers.

He could still hear her heart but it gradually paced regularly and they stood frozen to each other. He then noticed that her eyes shifted to something other than his eyes. There was a careful look in her eyes and he felt something pushing gently the bang he used to cover his ‘mark’.

He stayed still as he tried to read the look in her eyes. Her eyes uttered fascination as she ran her fingers across the mark. A glint of bliss flashed in her eyes as she continued touching the mark. A foreign feeling grew inside him as he watched her swayed in her own world.

He used to be insecure with the mark, but Jooyoung treated it as the most precious thing he had in the world. No one else could make him feel like this.

He loved whatever she had done to him, the way she had changed his life one hundred eighty degrees and everything about her.

”I love her.”

He confessed in his head.

“Wait,” he thought and suddenly shoved her away from him and quickly hide the mark once again. Jooyoung looked at him in shock; she had just crossed the border, hadn’t she? She shouldn’t let her feeling took control of her body.

“He’s a soul. Remember?” she made a mental note and ensure that this wouldn’t happen again in the future.

“I’m sorry,” Jooyoung apologised while searching for his eyes but he had been avoiding her eyes since then. “Lee Hongbin,” she called trying to get his attention but he still looked away from her.

“What were you thinking?” he questioned, not looking at her.

Her eyes wandered around, reflecting her actions. “I’m sorry. It’s a mistake. I just wanted to see your tattoo…” she paused and averted her gaze at him once again. He still looked away making her sighed. “It’s just a sudden urge. I couldn’t control myself...”

She ran out of words to say and so was he, inviting the dead silence between them.

Collecting his courage, he then slowly moved his gaze towards her as she looked at the floor, thinking. Even in her confused state, he still could feel the foreign feeling gradually developing. It came every time he laid his eyes on her.

“What does this mean?” he thought.

“Shin Jooyoung,” he called and connected with her eyes. “Do you feel anything when you see me?”

The feeling exploded in him as she continued staring at him curiously. She then shook her head making him broke the eye contact dejectedly. “What feeling…?” she asked, clearly confused.

Taking her answer as a ‘No’, he then shook his head and decided that it was enough for the night.

---

As Jooyoung expected, Jaehwan was the first thing she would see that morning. Grandma acknowledged his visit but she acted a slight cold towards him. Jooyoung understood. It must felt strange and awkward after acting brisk against him.

He forced a smile and Jooyoung could see the effort. Unlike him, she didn’t want to act as if nothing happened. She was already in trouble, what was there to act?

He must have come to torture her.

“How are you?” he softly asked, a genuine concern could be seen in his eyes but Jooyoung suddenly felt sick with him. She knew it wasn’t his fault for not being able to get her back in her room but to be caught was the last thing in her list.

Seeing that Jooyoung didn’t response to him and the lack of friendliness from her body language, he guessed it was better for him to get into the main point.

She must hate him so much. He could practically feel it on his skin.

“You look okay to me so I’m going to get straight to my intention.”

Jooyoung couldn’t help but to roll her eyes in disgust. She thought he could hold it any longer. Why everything had come to this? He used to be the best guy in the village. He was there when she needed her and even Grandma was fond of him but now?

So people did change?

“You’ve changed,” he said, disappointed. She looked at him, impressed that he was thinking the same thing.

“What did you see that night, Jaehwan?” she asked, turning the wheel.

He realised the sudden changed of topic and he gazed at her, trying to see what was going on in her head but to no avail. He couldn’t read mind.

Her question suddenly brought him to the night where she was in front of her room’s only window…

He wanted to make things right and apologised to her for how things had turned. He wanted to be friend with her and what he meant by being friends was to be good friends till their last breath.

He realised that she was not opening the window after several attempts of calling her. Disappointed, he decided to take fresh air and rode his bike around the village until he reached the lake. It was odd that he somehow felt that something had pulling him there.

He never liked the lake. He remembered the last time he went there and got scolded by his mother for being stubborn. He secretly went to the lake when he was a little kid and got drowned. Fortunately, there were villagers passing by and he got rescued in time.

The memory of the drowning was not clear and he sometime got confused it with his nightmare –the nightmare where something forcefully dragging him down the lake water.

As he rested his bicycle to one of the tree, he was mesmerised by the glistening surface of the water surface. With his gaze fixed on the crystal look he absentmindedly made his way towards the lake and caught human-like noise.

That was when he saw Jooyoung and his heart skipped a beat.

Jooyoung knew he was going to answer that he only saw her doing stupid action by herself, she almost laughed maniacally but controlled herself.

“I saw you at the lake. I was looking for you. I went to your house but you didn’t open the window for me,” he explained.

He then reached for her forehead and before Jooyoung could shove it away his hand already reach her forehead. “You’re okay now.”

Shoving his hand away, she shot him a threatening look. “Tell me what you actually saw,” she insisted. She wanted to know if he actually saw everything from the start.

He sighed in disbelief. “You acted like a strange person. You acted as if someone was accompanying you.” He hated the way she looked him, he felt disgusting all of sudden. “What were you doing? Are you in your sane self? I can’t leave you in this state. We need to go meet that Grandma.”

Her wrist suddenly in his grip and she shot him a questionable look, “Where are you bring me?”

“We need to go meet Grandma that healed your ankle. Maybe she can help you.”

She harshly pulled her wrist away and Jaehwan lost her wrist. She watched at him in disbelief. “So you think… I’m actually sick? Crazy?” she felt a bitter aftertaste after the last word rolled off her tongue. She is not crazy!

Jaehwan looked away as his shoulders fell. He didn’t think she was crazy, he just thought that she needed help.

“I’m not crazy!” she got up and stepped away from him slowly with eyes still fixed on him. “You just don’t understand it. You don’t see what I see… You will never understand. You’re not me…”

With that, she disappeared to her room, leaving Jaehwan alone in the living room. He then shut his eyes tight, hating himself for doing this to her. But he just wanted the best for her, nothing else.

---

It was late night and Jooyoung thought that Hongbin was not coming so she slowly drifted into sleep. A figure then appeared close to the window and he tentatively made steps towards Jooyoung on the bed.

After ensured that Jooyoung wasn’t responding to her surrounding, Hongbin then took a seat on the floor beside her bed, running his gaze through the complete features of her face. He took every detail of her face, from the smooth, milky white skin to her beautiful curve eyebrows.

Without him realising, he had his hand reaching for her hair but his hand froze mid-air. He might woke her up and pulled her hand back. He had not prepared to see her responding to her again after the foreign feeling that kept invading inside him. He thought the feeling would cease when he watched her asleep but the feeling unexpectedly grew stronger.

She looked fragile like a dried leaf, all he wanted to do was to embrace her and protect her from the sufferings and pains of the world, especially the world he’s living now.

If only they lived in the same world…

She suddenly shifted in her sleep and he froze beside her, eyes fixed on her. He would leave if she opened her eyes but to his relief, she was still in deep slumber. He noticed her hands fumbled to get the blanket on her and he silently helped her with the blanket. She must felt cold with his presence.

He hoped she wouldn’t have nightmare around his presence because he remembered when he terrorise the villagers. He purposely stayed around them so that they woke with cold sweat in the middle of the night; it managed to give him a small satisfaction.

He remembered the conversation going on between Jaehwan and Jooyoung. Hongbin hated to admit it but he was the main reason that the conflict happened between the two friends and the distant feelings.

Hongbin knew all Jaehwan did was to protect her, just like him.

…To protect someone that he loved.

After a final glance, he faded away.

---

Taking a seat on a tree’s branch, he leaned his back comfortably before his eyes blinded by something. Quickly, he covered his eyes from the blinding light.

“Lee Hongbin.”

He heard his name and wanted to uncover her eyes to see what was happening around him. Slowly, he uncovered his eyes to see that the blinding light had ceased to a luminous light.

He suddenly felt he was moved in a narrow path.

Trying to adjust his sight after the painful light, his eyes then could make a dark silhouette at the end of the path, calling his name…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N; Two chapters and we’ll get to end of the story ^_^