“Taemin? That’s you, isn’t it?” He repeated, coming closer.

I couldn’t help but stare back at the man, still dazed that there was someone who actually recognized me. I think I even tilted my head a bit. Could there actually be someone who knows me? Or am I just day dreaming again like all those other times my memory decided to play a live action movie inside of my head. But I noticed Minho’s reaction instantly. His lips pouted, pulling themselves to the side of his cheek as he switched his gaze between me and Jonghyun. Then, he switched his body around to face the man, foot pivoting outward as they danced to the other side of the room.

“You know him?” He asked the man.

Jonghyun still looked shocked and moved his way closer to the two of us.

“Of course, I know him. I mean….not deeply or anything. Just, from before.” His voice was hesitant, cautious around me or was the slight quiver he gave off for his speech towards Minho?

“Before?” I asked.

“Yeah. You don’t remember? You were here before.”

Minho nodded and turned towards me, but I shrugged my shoulders in indifference. A small chuckle made its way out of his mouth.

“I’ll leave you two be then. It seems there are going to be a lot of questions.” Minho announced, clapping his hands together as to leave the area.

“No, no.” Jonghyun immediately answered. “I came here to talk to you.”

Minho sighed and rolled his eyes, then went over to his canvas and set his paint set down.

“If it’s about before, I don’t want to hear it.”

“Minho-“

“There is a man here right now who doesn’t remember a thing about his past. Why don’t you help him instead? Stop trying to ‘help’ me.” He put up two fingers into the air and made little quotation marks. The way his tone was set now, this wasn’t the Minho I was just recently talking to who spoke of always looking on the bright side of things. Turning a smile instead of a frown. He sounded duller and sarcastic. A hint of anger seeming to sneak its way into his words as well. Jonghyun pursed his lips and crossed his arms.

“What do you mean he doesn’t remember? And why are you trying to change the subject?”

“Bye Jonghyun.” Was all Minho would answer, calmly walking past him without a second glance back.

Jonghyun’s lips parted, perhaps about to protest and stop the man’s footsteps from walking out, but all he managed to do was put his hand up in the air as if about to say something, then put it back down to his side. He turned back to me, having said nothing to Minho. But by his demeanor, he didn’t seem like the talking type. At least not at this moment. An awkward smile crawled across my lips and I placed my hand in the air to say goodbye.

“Wait.” He answered in the dullest of voices.

His face never changed. Didn’t show a hint of a smile like Minho’s did. This man was completely opposite when I actually thought about it. His face was beautiful and his lean body complimented it, but his attitude was off. The force he placed into crossing his arms, created a strain in his clothing. They pulled inward, slightly creating wrinkles. His dark blue jeans seemed to sag just at the bottom and his hair was combed over to the side with blonde highlights at the ends. He told me to wait, but at the same time, he looked as though I was the last person he wanted to talk to.

“What did he mean you don’t remember anything?” He asked.

I wasn’t expecting him to speak to me or even want to pay me any mind even though he told me to wait, so his next set of words threw me off guard, if only for a minute.

“I-I don’t.” I stuttered.

“How convenient. You and your little boyfriend make this place into a circus town and you don’t even remember. What are the odds in that?”

Me and my boyfriend?

“My boyfriend?” I asked.

I could feel the strain on his lips, how much he pursed them, thinning them out to their full capacity.

“Don’t go playing games with me.” He retorted. “Look, I don’t know why you came back here, but don’t go causing trouble again. This is a classy hotel and the last thing we need is another animal act after last time.”

“W-What happened last time? Who’s my boyfriend?” I asked, the words almost stumbling across one another.

His face did not change, but he looked into my eyes for a long time. I’m not completely sure if he believed me but eventually he sighed and decided to answer.

“You and that other boy. You two created all these dramatics in the hotel. First, you booked yourself here, crying the whole way up, as some of my staff told me on that day. Then not long after that boy comes looking for you and you two have a flat out argument on the first floor. In front of all my customers. Then you started bawling your eyes out and yelling at him, saying that he doesn’t understand or something like that.” He waved his hands in the air like it was nothing now but none of this was helping bring back any memory of what day he was talking about.

He flipped his hair back a bit then huffed.

“Look, the rest that I know is I tried to get the two of you out of our hotel before you made us look worse and it took forever to get to that. Eventually, you just stormed out and your little boyfriend just stood there. I yelled at him of course, seeing as you fled the crime. So no, there’s no possible way that I could forget your name of all customers.”

“What was the other man’s name?” I asked.

He looked at me as if to say, ‘seriously.’ As if part of him still didn’t believe that I couldn’t remember. That I was still putting up an act.

“I don’t know.” He said sternly. “He apologized for the two of you and then left after a minute of thinking I guess.”

It had to be Kai, I thought. Who else would it be? And why was I yelling at him?

“You did, have a little bandage around your head.” He continued, swirling his finger around his forehead. “Like your hurt yourself or something. Looked like it got wrapped in the hospital or something.” He shrugged his shoulders.

“Is there anything else?” I asked anxiously.

“Is there anything else?” His voice raised in annoyance. “Look, it’s not my fault you went all out with losing your memory or what not. But don’t come at me asking me a thousand questions after that little act you played in our hotel the last time. Remember or not, you better not do it again.”

I could hear the anger and sternness behind his words.

“Our?” I asked.

“Yes, me and Minho’s? We're friends after all. I’m the co-owner of this place.” He rolled his eyes. “Look, I need to find Minho, whether he likes it or not.”

I grabbed him before he could completely escape. After all, I was desperate.

“Wait!” I accidently yelled.

I was waiting for it, waiting for him to strike me in any sort of way, but instead, he turned around with a questionable expression mixed in with annoyance.

“That picture,” I said pointing to the one of the girl with the black hair. “Do you know where the idea came from or anything about the girl in it?”

He snatched his arm away from me and gave me a cold stare.

“It’s just some painting that Minho did a while ago.” And without another word, he walked away from me, his footsteps creating loud and heavy thunder against the wooden floor.

****

Hours had passed by and I found myself yet again sitting at the desk of my hotel room pondering on what just occurred, clouded with question after question just like all the other days. The only difference about today seemed to be the fact that I got some answers if they could count as such. I don’t know where Jonghyun had gone and after he’d left, I too tried to look for Minho. Maybe he’d met me before and doesn’t remember. Either way, there was some connection between me and the painting of the girl. I just knew it. Before I left the art room, I had turned around to stare at it one last time. Just to make sure the tight feeling that crept into my chest and squeezed my lungs wasn’t just an illusion.

It didn’t matter, though. I couldn’t find Minho and when I came back to my room, no new memories came back to me. I’ve just been sitting in this chair, beating my brain for some miracle to happen, but nothing. What was wrong with me? At the beach memories popped up like a pain from a sore but now, ever since I came to this city, it seems harder and harder to grasps things. I still felt like being here was the right decision but I was starting to question my own instincts. They were leading me nowhere after all.

Then I thought back on the white tree. Could there be something about it? About that place that helped my memories? Maybe it was a mistake that I came here. Maybe I should had just taken Key’s advice and stayed longer. I probably would have more memories back than I do now. But just like the feeling I received from the painting of the girl, I had that same feeling when I thought about coming to the city. The day I met Minho seemed to be a plus with a boost from the past, but now….With all that Jonghyun said, it just seems like there’s more missing than I hoped to find. A part of me thought it would be a little easy to try and remember what I was forgetting but I knew deep down inside that this journey I was going on was like a map with no labels.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. It took me off guard, here in my quiet room so I jumped a little, my hand grasping the table edge. Snapping out of my dream world, I immediately got up and rushed towards the doorway. Anything to stop me from thinking so much. My head was starting to hurt. I felt a smile creeping up upon my face but when I opened up the door, it wasn’t who I expected.

Jonghyun.

“J-Jonghyun?” I stuttered.

His demeanor was different. He seemed tired, his energy draining from his body. When I looked down, I saw that he held a folded up piece of paper. And when I looked back up into his eyes, a bit of sorrow was stored in them.

“Um…I-I haven’t caused any more trouble if that’s what you’re wondering.” My voice was almost that of a whisper, remembering his angered expression when he saw me earlier. “Do you want to come in?”

“No.” He quickly responded.

He stood there for a moment, then, without warning, pushed the paper into my arms. I was so caught oblivious that I grabbed it before I could even register why I was accepting it.

“It’s a letter.” He finally said.

I unfolded it and scanned it over, not really paying attention to the words, but at the end, it was signed….

“Kai,” I spoke.

I looked up at him.

“What is-“

“It’s a letter that boy left you the day you went away.” He responded.

His voice was still harsh and blunt from before. That hadn’t changed no matter how tired he appeared.

“I lied on some parts.” He spoke in a low tone. “Mostly didn’t say some stuff.”

“What?”

“I was just so mad when I saw you again. You and your little boyfriend caused so much trouble. That and I’m having too much trouble already with Minho.”

He looked down and started tapping his right foot lightly on the floor.

“I am. Sorry.” He breathed. “I was upset but when I left for a while after trying to find Minho with no success,” he sighed, “I realized how much of a jackass I was.”

“I didn’t even try to consider the fact that you couldn’t remember, although I’m still not sure why. It wasn’t that long ago.”

“I-It wasn’t?” I creased my eyebrows.

“No, don’t you re-Right you don’t.”

“I don’t know why I don’t remember either.” I quietly responded. “I just woke up in the country, on the ground, with no memory of anything. I wasn’t even entirely sure who I was.” I left out the part about the tree. I thought it too weird to tell a stranger.

He’d probably think I was more trouble than I looked.

“Ah.” He simply answered. “Well, he gave me that letter the same day you two had that argument. He came back later on that day. He looked sad. He said that he couldn’t find you and said that was a bad thing.”

I couldn’t respond, only listen.

“I told him to call the cops, but he told me that they wouldn’t go looking for you since it hadn’t been that long since you were gone. He was right, though, I already knew that. He said he needed to find you fast before it was too late for you or something like that. Then he gave me this letter. At first, he was going to give it to my front desk people to give to me, but I was still in the lobby so he saw me and told me all of this. I almost didn’t do it because he was soaking wet from all the rain. There had been a storm that day.”

Wet? Rain? A storm? Like the one in my dream when I was at the tree?

“He was scaring my customers, but I took the letter anyway. At the time, I simply did it to get him out because of all the trouble you two caused. I don’t know why I kept it, but I guess you can say I’m glad I did.”

He turned to walk away, but I touched his shoulder. He half turned his head around.

“Thanks, Jonghyun. I don’t remember what we did that day, but thanks.”

He nodded and started to walk again, but stopped.

“Taemin,” he said looking straight down the hallway. “If Minho comes to visit you, tell him I’m looking for him.”

“Why do you think-“

“He looked comfortable with you. I was watching longer than you might’ve thought.” His voice sounded depressed. “I didn’t see you through the doorway really. I just saw that he was talking to someone. And…he looked comfortable. He always comes back to people he’s comfortable with.”

“Jonghyun-“

“Just like your guy was worried about you on that night, I’m worried about him.”

And with that he walked away, his head held down as if thinking, but dreading his thoughts.

As I watched his back grow further and further away from me, I realized I forgot to ask if he’d lied about not knowing something about the painting either but he had other problems on his mind. No need bothering him now. I closed my door and walked over to sit at the edge of my bed. I looked down at the paper and caressed my hand over it. Whoever Kai was to me, he sure did have beautiful handwriting. I could see that he was rushed but careful all at once. That whatever he’d wrote me, he wanted me to understand in the best way possible.

I straightened the paper out more and began to read….