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Chanyeol watched Minhyuk for what seemed like an eternity. The latter wasn’t doing much; after finishing his meal, he took out his phone and stared at the screen—probably watching something to kill time with. Judging from the friendliness in his interaction with the owner of the shop, Chanyeol assumed that he had been here quiet a number of times. Which lead to him concluding that: This is the place Minhyuk had moved to.

Even as he ate, Chanyeol still kept his focus on Minhyuk who might have realized that a pair of eyes was watching him so he went to check. The former looked away, avoiding the awkward exchange of glances.

Minhyuk seemed just fine, sitting on the same spot for almost an hour and a half already, whilst Chanyeol was starting to fidget out of boredom. He sent a text message to Eunji which read: Are you enjoying your time in Incheon?

The reply was very quick but short. She said, Yep. Chanyeol found the reply amusing and weird at the same time; she never used it to reply to any of his messages before. ‘She must be bored inside,’ he thought before launching a game application on his phone. 15 minutes into the game, he looked up and noticed that Minhyuk had disappeared from his spot.

Chanyeol swiftly stood up and proceeded to pay for his food. “Do you know where the young man that sat over there,” he motioned to the said table, “Went?”

“Minhyuk?” ‘See! It is needed him!’ “He probably went back to his house,” the ahjumma answered while counting Chanyeol’s change.

“Do you know where it is?” he asked as he received the change.

“It’s the small white house just around the corner. The one with lots of flowers in the garden,” she told him. “Why did you ask?”

“Ah, uhm, so . . . ,” he made up a lie that was so good it assured the ahjumma that Kang Minhyuk was his old friend. “Well, thank you, then. I’ll be leaving.” Chanyeol bowed before he marched out of the store. He paced along the street and looked for the white house around the corner. ‘Wait,’ he thought as he stopped in front of the supposed house, ‘that’s the house Eunji went into with her friend earlier.’ His car was parked behind the big Oak tree not too far from there, though distant, still visible.

When are you coming back? He asked Eunji through a text after settling back in the driver’s seat. The watch on his wrist told him it was already 4 in the evening.

I’ll tell you when I’m in Seoul, she replied.

Chanyeol looked around and tried to find Minhyuk which he had lost track off; he was thinking of going back to Seoul but his curiosity won’t cease. ‘I know where he lives, anyway,’ he thought, ‘I could come back here sometime later.’ Just when he was about to start the engine, the front door of the house opened; Eunji and her friend walked out whilst the other woman, carrying an infant—no older than a year old—lingered at the threshold.

The cousin of Seulgi, Eunji’s friend, looked really young, probably in her mid 20s, which made it hard for Chanyeol to believe that she has a child of her own already. “I thought people nowadays don’t even get married until they passed thirty,” he muttered while watching the three exchanging words of farewell.

Out of a sudden, the image of a girl that used to be his senior in high school popped up in his mind. ‘Why does she look so much like . . . .’ Swiftly, he pulled his phone out from his jeans and scrolled through the collection of images to find Bae Joohyun’s picture.

“No way . . . .” His eyes trailed back to the woman at the door, waving Seulgi and Eunji who was starting to make their way to the gate. “Could it be that she is Bae Joohyun?” ‘That woman with the kid?’

Chanyeol quickly ducked so his face would be hidden from the girls who were now out of the house. He was now stuck between two decisions: To follow Eunji back to Seoul or to inspect supposed-Joohyun more.

‘Wouldn’t it be awkward if I knock on her door without having any connection whatsoever besides used to being her junior?’ he thought. ‘That’s stupid.’ Yet he was dying to do so.

Eunji and Seulgi was getting further away whilst he was still stuck on his seat, watching Joohyun’s house, and contemplating whether he should go with his first or second option. ‘I could come back at a later time,’ he went again in his head one more time as he started the engine of the car. Though, that was when he saw Kang Minhyuk casually entering the house as if he belonged there all his life.

He stopped. And he watched him went inside.

“So Bae Joohyun is the friend his cousin meant.” Thinking of a conclusion to this entire thing drove him crazy that he decided to just drive back home safely and talk to Eunji about how her day had been. “Home it is.”

-

When he tried to reach out to Eunji after getting no respond to his texts, he was provided with the same result: No answer. ‘Do I seem too desperate and clingy?’ She told him that she’d text him after arriving back in Seoul but it ha