Suzy yawned as she stretched her arms and bent her back. She had been browsing through her psychology books and some other journals, articles and references for hours as she tried to find some guidance on her patient’s case. It was the third time they saw each other this morning but there was no progress on their communication. Tuan would refuse to even look at her. At rare times, he would spare her a glance but Suzy would see nothing in his eyes but emptiness. She knew that if she did nothing more than let him take his medicines, his case and her grades would both fail.

I need him to open up to me first, she thought as she bit the end of her pencil.

But how would that be possible if he can’t talk?

She huffed out some air in frustration but then her gaze landed on the pencil she was holding. She flinched upon hearing the door suddenly creak, but her heart quickly calmed down as she heard Jaebum’s voice.

“I’m home!” he called.

But Suzy replied with silence. Jaebum sighed in frustration as for the third time, he had heard no ‘welcome back’ in return. It had been three days since she started avoiding him. Jaebum found it absurd as both of them lives in the same flat, but then when Suzy’s mad, she’d always be giving the coldest shoulder she could.

These past few days, Jaebum wondered if her patient had already passed her his mutism.

“Did you eat?” Jaebum asked, trying to initiate a conversation.

“Hmmm,” Suzy only hummed before packing all her things, going to her room and shutting the door behind her.

Scoffing in disbelief, Jaebum dropped all the files he was carrying to the desk that Suzy had just emptied. Annoyed, he grabbed a glass of water to calm him down as one of his hands ed his uniform. He was thankful that Jackson had offered him to eat dinner together or else he would be eating alone again in the dining table tonight.

He rolled his eyes as he groaned, “So childish.”

But he clearly knew that there was only one word Suzy longed to hear from him. If he would just spat out that one word she yearned for, then the cold war would be over. He sighed as he whispered to himself,

“I’ll find a proper time to say ‘sorry’.”

Taking another gulp, his gaze then landed on the folder. Walking towards it, he flipped the pages and he figured out that like Suzy, he also needed to study a case he had been recently appointed to. He sighed as his gaze remained focus on the picture of the red haired man on the file. Below it was the name,

Mark Tuan.

“I know that you might still feel uncomfortable to talk to me but would you at least nod or shake your head when I ask something?” Suzy asked as she tilted her head.

And the response she got was a lazy stare.

“Do you understand me?” Suzy asked again but instead of answering, he avoided her gaze. She sighed as she got a set of coloring materials in her bag and mumbled, “I stayed all night drafting a letter to the officials and I woke up early in the morning to buy this set, so would you please cooperate?”

She coughed as she noticed herself that the tone of her voice was already off. She was getting frustrated with the limited reactions she was getting, but it was not the time for her to give up. Honestly, it was not on her position to give up.

Suzy tried her best to smile as she offered a crayon to him and said, “Let’s draw.”

He looked at her again, and Suzy took it as a positive sign as she continued, “I know you miss the world outside and I still don’t know how long would it take for you to have a glimpse of it, so I thought of having it drawn on your walls for the mean time. I wanted to give you a motivation too. Something to look forward to once you’re really okay.”

When his gaze travelled to the crayon she was holding, she took it as an improvement. However, he merely stared at it, as if he was a child oblivious to the object in front of him.

Maybe he really doesn’t understand Korean, she thought.

Suzy sighed but she put out her best smile as she walked towards his wide wall. She figured out that maybe, she must demonstrate it first. However once faced with the blank wall, she realized that she had no idea what to draw.

I said that it’s the world outside, but what if my world is different from his world? He’s a foreigner, she furrowed her eyebrows.