He almost turns around three, four, five or more times before he pulls up in front of the small house set back from the road. Dark has fully fallen as he parks his car near the two dim electric lanterns framing the gate.

Turning off the car, he hesitates one more time.

What am I doing? This is stupid. This is so stupid.

He turns the car back on, then off again.

I’m just going to go see. Just going to go see now that I’m sober. I’m just going to see if my memories match up with reality. I’m going to go in, take a look around, and then leave. It’s not crazy just to go see.

Reassuring himself that there’s nothing wrong with refreshing his memory about what went on last year, he exits the car and pushes through the wrought iron gate. He’s down the path and at the front door in a few strides, lifting his hand to knock before he can second guess (third, fourth) guess himself again.

After a few moments, the door swings open to reveal Ji Ji Min. She’s nothing like he remembers, but then, he didn’t really remember her at all. There’s something strange about how utterly unremarkable she is. He realizes he could pass her on the street three times a week and never register her presence, even having met her before.

She smiles in greeting. “Mr. Kim Jong Kook. Right on time.” She stands back, pulling the door wide and allowing him to enter the front room.

He swivels his head around, noting that everything looks exactly the same as when he marched out the door over a year ago, biting back bitter anger. The same feelings tug at him, threatening to pull him down and weaken him to the fortune teller’s potential offerings. He forces a cough and shoves the feelings down, turning to look at Ji Min.

“Right on time? I didn’t make an appointment.”

“I knew you’d come.”

“Oh? I thought you didn’t do stuff like that, predictions of the future and the specifics of someone’s life. So how did you know I’d be here tonight?”

He finds himself very invested in her answer, mind already spinning to work out exactly what the plain woman is capable of and how it might benefit him.

"It wasn’t so much a prediction as it was… well. I knew you’d be back. Look, I'm going for a certain aura here, so stop wrecking it.” Ji Min smiles the creepy close-lipped smile at him, an expression Jong Kook had forgotten until right this second. He shivers lightly.

“I actually expected you much sooner,” she admits. “Did you bring anyone with you?” She peers around his broad shoulders expectantly.

“No. I’m alone.”

He immediately regrets his choice of words, feeling as though he might have shown his cards before he’s ready.

She deflates ever so slightly before sliding her smile back into place. “Oh. Well. That’s good, we have some things to talk about and no distractions are needed.”

“What could we possibly have to talk about?” He doesn’t know why, but his hackles are raised and he feels defensive.

“Mr. Kim, let’s not play around here,” she says, rolling her eyes as she heads down the short hallway to the left. “You came to me. You know why you came back to me. Let’s be upfront with each other and discuss what you’re looking for and what I have to offer.”

He doesn’t respond, trailing behind her. She’s right. He came back to her, he wasn’t forced here. While he’s not sure exactly what he’s looking for or hoping for with this visit, there’s nothing to be gained by denying - to her or to himself - that he’s interested in hearing more than he heard last year.

He passes through the door at the end of the hall that Ji Min is holding open for him, surprised all over again at the utter blackness surrounding them once she closes it behind herself. He feels her brush past him as the haze begins to fill the room, billions of strands illuminating the expansive space dimly. Ji Min is standing several large paces away, slightly elevated. Jong Kook feels a huge wave of deja vu crash over him, bringing with it a rapid progression of disbelief, hope, and disappointment in the same order he felt them last year.

He looks around the space slowly and silently, trying to sort out his feelings and why he’s here. After all, he’s spent more than a year convincing himself that nothing significant happened here, nothing the fortune teller said was true, that she was just talented with some sort of trickery designed to prey on the weak and foolish. He strives very hard to be neither, so the pangs that occasionally wake him up in the night, the longing for something that he was allowed to imagine he’d get to have, have been unpleasant and unwanted.

So why come back? Why refresh everything and put himself through the same process of self-flagellation, self-consolation, and the almost self-hypnotism required to set it all aside all over again?

The night’s been hard. Finding out Haha was dating someone for so long without confiding in him stung. Then to find out he’s getting married as well… Jong Kook thinks back to that moment, how his ears roared and his vision tunneled and all he could think about was getting up and away from the table, away from what he imagined to be everyone’s sympathetic glances, and away from Haha. He cringes even now, almost sick with his own selfishness, his inability to just be happy for his friend and nothing more.

But how many more people will go before him? How many more years will he wait, attending the weddings of friends and colleagues, not only miles away from his own happy ending, but with Kwang Soo as a date instead of a potential lifetime love? All this rushed through his mind as he leaned against the wall outside the restaurant, bitterness and self-recrimination tangled together. His throat burned and his stomach clenched. And there, niggling at the corner of his mind, was a black car. Light brown hair streaked with blonde. A Madonna song. He shoved it back and shoved it back and shoved it back, but… it shoved back. It shoved back when Ji Hyo came out to talk and shoved back when Haha appeared, and then when Haha revealed that it was his fiancee who sent them to Ji Min in the first place and not only that, but also that his fiancee did so because she was so confident in the fortune teller’s abilities that she was marrying Haha, it all leapt right to the forefront of his mind again.

If it’s real… if there’s even a chance that it’s real… Everything he could remember whirred through his mind over and over, whipping through at top speed. Before he knew it, he was standing in front of Kwang Soo.

If there’s a chance… if there’s even a chance… he shakes his head to clear it, seeing Ji Ji Min standing before him, waiting patiently. She smiles when his eyes refocus on her.

“So you’re back again,” she says. “I’ve thought about you a lot in the last year or so. I hope you know I’m truly sorry about the way that all played out.”

The odd smile belies her words, just a bit.

“But let’s put all that behind us for good. You’re here now. Let’s talk about that.”

Jong Kook notices two lines slowly starting to brighten among the rest of them, or maybe the billions of others are dimming slightly. It’s hard to say. But whatever the case, one line off to his right and one line back behind Ji Min make themselves more apparent than the rest. His chest tightens as he remembers what the second line represents and Ji Min manipulates the space somehow to pull the two lines in front of her, between them. Now that he’s paying attention and knows what to look for, he can see that what she said a year ago is true. The two lines are vibrating ever so slightly. While they’re drawn together by Ji Min’s hands, the more they near each other, the more they seem to be pulling themselves closer, independent of her ministrations.

He swallows as he watches them. It’s easy to imagine that they’re yearning to be together. He can feel the same ball of confused emotion in his own chest. He shakes his head firmly, trying to clear it of the strange feelings he’s feeling for a person he’s tried so hard to convince himself isn’t even real.

“So that’s… “

“Yes,” the fortune teller supplies. “The same person as before. It doesn’t change. At least, I’ve never seen it change.”

“What it one of the pair dies before they ever meet?”

She shrugs. “That’s life. But keep in mind that most people, even if they say they believe in the concept of soul mates, don’t really believe it. Hardly anyone sits at home worrying that their one perfect person was born on the other side of the world or never made it out of childhood due to some accident or illness. They just assume they’ll meet the perfect person and when they find someone they want to be with forever, they apply the label of soul mate to that person retroactively. And that’s fine. Think of the distress and upset if everyone knew that soul mates are in fact very real and that there’s no guarantee at all of you ending up with that person.”

Jong Kook rolls his eyes and smiles tightly.

“I guess you don’t have to think very hard to understand how that feels,” she concedes. “But the point is that very few people are aware of me and my services and those who aren’t continue through life just fine. They meet people, they have relationships, they get married, they have children. Never knowing that the person they’re with, the person they love, the person they can’t imagine their life without, never know that that person isn’t the person. And out of the vast number of people who have never met me and never learned of what I can offer, how many are truly miserable? Think of all the successful and happy relationships you know of. Some of them are with their soul mates naturally, of course, but many aren’t. Many are just with someone. Can you tell the difference? Probably not.”

“So it’s possible, then, that I don’t really need to meet this match to meet someone,” Jong Kook confirms what he’s been telling himself for a year.

“Oh, sure,” Ji Min allows. “Everyone meets and interacts will all different kinds of people throughout their lives, romantic interests included. But once you’re aware that the person is out there, it’s kind of hard to imagine anything less, isn’t it?” She smiles knowingly. Creepily.

Jong Kook grimaces as he thinks back on his dating efforts over the last year. Pretty woman. Smart women. Women who would make good mothers. But all the while, at the back of his mind, he knew there was someone more perfect out there, no matter how he tried to talk himself out of it or slap the feeling away. In truth, it’s been more than a little hard to put a full measure of effort into meeting new women, knowing that the one woman for him isn’t coming.

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