Poker-faced, he stared at her for a silent moment before bursting out laughing. In the swing of those few seconds Namjoo’s heart leapt up only to plunge back down.

“What is with you?” Tao laughed. “Hey, you didn’t sleep last night, did you?”

“I’m serious,” Namjoo voiced.

“Ok, I know,” he sing-songed. “You’re not Choonhee. Ok. I get it. So what’d you come here for so early in the morning?”

“Why won’t you believe me?!” Namjoo raised her voice impatiently. “I…earlier this month, Choonhee found me. Then she disappeared and a week later her friend, Hayoung, approached me. I’m telling you, I might have the same face but I’m not Choonhee!”

Blankly, Tao stared at her again. Namjoo foolishly believed he was actually listening to her until he laughed again, slapping her back hard this time.

“What’s the matter with you?” Tao wondered. Unamused, Namjoo stared up at him without anything more to say. All she could think about was how much she was going to lose of her life if the engagement went through.

“Should I prove it to you?” she challenged. “That I’m not Choonhee?”

His goofy expression faded by the second, his dark eyes landing on her seriously. “Hey…”

“I really need your help,” Namjoo pleaded. “Will you listen to me if I can prove to you I’m not Choonhee?”

She took his silence as her answer and her heels, heading toward the street.  

\\\\\

Waking up from her slumber that morning after a phone call from Lee Eungi, Hayoung showered and dressed in a daze before heading out; more awake after a cup of coffee on the way to the Lee manor.

Today was supposed to be her day off. It was a Sunday after all and Choonhee’s parents had no plan to head in to work. Plus, she supposed Sehun wouldn’t have any plans for her either. For once in a lifetime she wanted to sleep in just because. Then the phone call woke her up. It was 7:30 AM when Eungi’s voice told her to get up and to come over. They wanted her to stand as a friend and witness on Choonhee’s side as engagement talk went through.

The moment she drove up the winding driveway she parked behind a black BMW that obviously belonged to President Kim. All, but meaning that Kai and his parents were here. As Hayoung stepped out she ran her eyes over the vehicle, absorbing the fact that the engagement was actually coming to light at last. She was surprised at the pace of it, yet not surprised that it had taken this long after she’d scared Kai.

Hayoung started toward the stairs but stopped in her tracks and turned when the roar of an engine pulled up behind her. Spinning around she recognized Sehun’s white car come to a park before their eyes met. She barely scoffed, wondering if he knew what he was in for when he stepped out. Without moving she waited for him to walk over.

“Here so early.” Hayoung greeted. “You here for Kai?”

“Supposedly,” he answered as he started up the steps toward the front doors.

“I was surprised with the call this morning from the President’s wife. What do you think Kai’s going to say?”

“It’s not Kai that matters, it’s Choonhee’s answer that will call it.” Sehun shot her a glance before going a step ahead of her.

Hayoung narrowed her eyes as she stared at his back.

“If only you knew,” she thought silently to herself, “if only you knew.”  

\\\\\

A homey bricked building with a wide yard overflowing with grass in need of a cut appeared when the cab pulled up. Angel House still looked the same – white paned windows, a black tinted roof, that old chimney extending into the sky, and voices of children breezing across the emptiness from where they were at play.

The nostalgia of young years and early allied friendships against the bigger stuck-up kids flashed through Tao’s mind. The motherly but strict women who helped rear and look after him appeared in memory. He recalled being unable to sleep one night and while heading outside for fresh air had come across a young assistant, who instead of scolding him for not being asleep stayed up with him, telling him stories till he fell asleep. Until he had been adopted at the age of eight, this had been his first home where every kid good to him had been a brother or sister.

He was struck that Choonhee knew about this orphanage. As she stepped up to his side and peered up at the golden arc with the orphanage name attached to it, he felt it slowly dawn on him, the truth in this girl’s voice, why she brought him here.

“When I was five, I was brought here in a car from Namsanwon. On the way here I was so happy, thinking someone finally wanted me. I would have a home,” the girl said, reminiscing. “Later I found out, Namsanwon had reached its capacity of kids, so they chucked me out. I spent majority of my life here.”

Tao turned to look at her, the girl with the same face as Choonhee; his mind refusing to believe what he was hearing. No, he thought, you belong to a rich family. There’s no way you’re from an orphanage.    

She went on, “Sixty-percent of the children here are successfully adopted. Some two-percent run back here. I belonged to the rest of that blank area. No one came for me. Shall we go find it? The proof?”

“Ch…” Tao quickly stopped himself.

The girl let him soak in the fact that he was started to believe her, then she said, “There was a woman here who said if I was good and no one still came for me, she’d be my family.” She shrugged, “I knew she was lying, but her words were comfort to me. Yoo Hasun is her name. I think she may still be here. She found me once when I stayed at a shelter for the homeless.”

Looking up at him she urged, “Then, shall we?”

Tao quickly grabbed her arm the second she stepped forth. “Why are you doing this?”

She didn’t flinch. Her eyes met his, stayed there. Liars, he knew, couldn’t hold eye contact. There was a depth there he couldn’t put in words. This girl’s expression remained confident and determined. In his head he could hear her pleading with him again.

“I said I need your help,” she repeated herself.

\\\\\

Namjoo couldn’t express how relieved she was when they were back at Tao’s place. That he had believed her, let her go back with him so he could listen to what it was she needed. So long before this, she had prepared so many things she wanted to say, the order she wanted them, and exactly what words to use.

None of that seemed to matter anymore, because a ray of hope was right in front of her.

Tao’s trailer home was small, spacious enough for one person. There was no private room, except for everything else it was an open space kind of home. Namjoo sat down at the tiny kitchen table no longer shiny white. It barely reflected the sunshine from the window.

“Are you hungry?” Tao asked, pouring a cup of water for her.

“No.” she didn’t have an appetite due to feeling so overwhelmed from everything. Finally setting the cup down in front of her he sat down opposite her.

“So,” he began, “what exactly do you think I can help you with?”

“You knew Choonhee. That means you must also know the people around her.” Namjoo said. “Right?”

Tao shrugged, “I don’t know everyone. I only who who’s who.”

Namjoo bit her lower lip, “Then tell me, who are these people to her? Why do they matter? What was happening before she disappeared?”

A silence infiltrated the gap between them. “Excuse me?”

“Choonhee,” Namjoo breathed, realizing she hadn’t yet made it clear, “is dead.”

“What?!” he literally screamed, jumping up from his seat.

Flustered from saying it right through , Namjoo quickly blinked repeatedly. “That’s why I’m trying to find out what happened. What her relationship with Kai and Sehun were, I don’t understand any of it.”

“Who killed her?” it came out a whisper. Tao’s eyes quickly filled with rage and devastation beyond the recognition of words. To have not even known that his friend had passed. Namjoo couldn’t imagine it.

Namjoo almost hesitated. She had to seek out some courage before looking up at him, “She was pregnant. Hayoung said he didn’t want the baby…and it happened…”

A deep breath of disbelief flew threw his lips. Dropping back into his seat Tao gazed around the room, unable to believe what he was hearing right before him. Namjoo sympathized with the sudden loss, she really did, but she only understood it to a par for she never knew her sister or had she lost anyone dear to her.

“I’m supposedly standing in Choonhee’s place right now,” Namjoo told quietly. “I don’t know what’s going on and Hayoung isn’t helping me. Kai wants to get engaged, but I…how can I?!  I’m not Choonhee. I don’t even know him. This wasn’t supposed to happen. What am I supposed to do? I need to stop the engagement somehow, but how do I do it without getting myself pinned into some kind of situation even worse than now…”

“Stop, stop!” Tao raised his voice, shook his head and raised a hand up to silence her. “Just stop.”

Namjoo stared at him, breathless and desperate.   

“This…this is a crime, you know,” he looked her right in the eye. “Someone is dead! And you’re pretending to be her?!”

Namjoo blinked, flabbergasted; knowing she was wrong.

“This is an insult to her! Choonhee!” he stated, slapping his palm against the table. “Your sister, you said? Long lost twin? If you’re so helpless, you run as fast as you can. You get out of there. I’m telling you, I don’t know anything about Choonhee’s personal life any better than you do, but I can surely tell you that those guys aren’t as innocent as they might seem. They have a reason for being magnets to Choonhee. No one in this world is as pure as an angel.”

He let a moment of silence pass before ordering, “Get out.”

All her hopes came crashing down, like an airplane shot from the sky. Namjoo lowered her gaze. “Alright. I know I’m not innocent. Don’t you think I would have left if I could? If Hayoung didn’t threaten me every second of the day to send me to jail, I would have run. I didn’t choose to do this. So please, I’m begging you, I just want help.”

She watched even more hopelessly as Tao turned to glance at her. He was her last straw, her only option.

“I can’t go back to the engagement. It can’t happen, but I can’t run away if I need to find out who hurt Choonhee and pushed her to the limit of death. You want to know too, don’t you? Who he is; why he sent her to her death sentence?” Namjoo pleaded.

Another long moment of silence wafted through the home, both of them vexed with complicated thoughts.

“What exactly do you want me to do?” Tao questioned.

Namjoo had no answer to that. Suddenly, she didn’t even know what she wanted to know anymore. All she could sum up to this point was that Choonhee’s relationship with Kai and Sehun had been very perplexed with every circumstance possible standing as reasoning. If it had been something personal between only the three of them, maybe she wouldn’t have chosen to share it with anyone at all.

And she was wrong. Tao didn’t know everything.

Disappointment fluctuated to her heart at such speed she couldn’t stop the emotions from showing up on her face. Tao showed no sympathy. She didn’t expect him to.

“I can’t stop the engagement for you,” it was the most obvious and painful fact he could have ever stated. And it was of no help, which was even more painful. Namjoo felt a dart fly into her chest. She had never been so helpless before.

“If you don’t want to do it, come up with a reason not to,” he said.

Her brain was a deep empty bit of an endless blank. She didn’t know anymore, what was possible and what wasn’t. Namjoo didn’t even know what she was feeling right then. She only knew she didn’t want to end her life with an engagement to a man she barely knew.

It wasn’t right no matter how many times she wondered about it.

The ringing of her phone interrupted the moment of thought. Pulling it out from her pocket she felt her heart sink at the sight of Sehun’s name. Then folding her fingers over it, set her hand on her lap and waited for the ringing to stop.

When it did, Tao spoke, “I’ll take you back.”

\\\\\

Namjoo stood by, a part of her weeping at the failure of coming to Tao for help as she watched him pull out antoher safety helmet for her from the back of his motorcycle. Handing it to her without a word she stared at the plain blue color on it before quietly putting it on.

Getting onto the motorcycle, Tao turned the engine on, kicking the machine awake. A depressed sensation warped over Namjoo. Going back to Choonhee’s home was like another prison for her. There, her feet and legs were bound, where her voice couldn’t reign.

She was afraid of confronting Kai. She had no desire to look Hayoung in the face. Most of all, she hated being the puppet.

She could never be Choonhee.

Forcing herself onto the motorcycle behind Tao, she thought as they drove through the streets of Seoul that she could never do this. She hadn’t run before. She had thought of it, but always a second too late.

A little angry now with how events were turning at the blink of an eye, Namjoo became more determined to escape Choonhee’s awaiting fate. The engagement couldn’t go through. She wouldn’t let it. No matter what, this was her life. And whether she was alone or not, no one would do anything for her ever.

The bitterness crept through her veins. Namjoo believed even more that the world was just out to get her.

Tao slowed down when they arrived in front of those towering steel gates. Letting go of him Namjoo climbed down and silently took off the helmet, handing it to him. She expected him to immediately drive off, no longer wanting to see the sight of her. Instead, he remained there leaving her puzzled.

“If you need anything else, call me.” was all he offered her before driving off. She watched him become a speck in the road then pretended to walk toward the door to unlock the door. Her hand hovered over the key lock before she abruptly turned and dashed down the street.

\\\\\

The house was a merry atmosphere; even the lighting was a happy gold. Sehun expected to see Choonhee sitting in the lounge room with Kai, his parents, and her father.

She wasn’t.

The second he and Hayoung appeared at the doorway Lee Kwan stood to his feet, “You’re here? Come have a seat. Sit here, sit here.”

“Congratulations, Kai,” Hayoung leaned over to smile toward their friend. “I was wondering which one of us would be the first to go. You beat us.”

Sehun sat between them not amused by her show of politeness. He was rather awestruck that neither parent was putting on a show of awkwardness that Kai was getting married to Choonhee, his ex, and that he was there. He couldn’t help but wonder if they knew Choonhee had dumped him because of her change of heart, and if it had been their scheme from the very beginning to get her with Kai.

“I am so sorry,” Choonhee’s mother walked into the room with a tray of glasses of water. “It turns out we’re out of tea, so I had to resort to water.”

“No tea?” her husband asked. “We can’t do that. It doesn’t complement the purpose of today’s meeting. Where’s Aunt Shin? Get her to buy some more.” Then he proceeded to shout for her.

Unable to bear the merry atmosphere and stand as witness for Kai to propose his engagement, Sehun stood to his feet. “I can go grab some tea.”

“Oh no, don’t worry about it,” Eungi shook her head. “We’re about to have breakfast in a few minutes. You can’t miss out on that. What will Choonhee think?”

“I’m quite fine,” Sehun assured. “I ate before coming. I won’t be long.”

With a nod he started toward the door and quickened his pace once he was out the door. His heart revved up as he started the engine, backed up, and drove away. Driving toward the road he wondered if Kai had intentionally called him that morning. The sudden engagement a show that Choonhee would never return to him; that it was well over and that he’d never get the company or become a wealthy man in his lifetime. That he would never match up to Kim Jongin.

Grabbing his phone he called for Choonhee, urged to interrogate her on her feelings about Kai. He was confident from that point on that the girl wasn’t serious about that man, but rather had somehow been tricked. And he wanted to hear from that she wouldn’t agree to the engagement.

Sehun listened to the phone ring continuously before hanging up and tossing his phone aside frustrated. In the next twenty minutes he spent looking for the famous green tea that Choonhee’s family loved serving guests before driving back. As he neared the gates he thought he spotted someone dashing from the door and down the road, disappearing beyond the trees at the bend. 

***Ok...well I wasn't satisfied with this chapter but my concentration has been staticky due to the interruptions of babysitting. You can tell I rushed to post this right?? I'm trying to build it up to where I want it to be. I have a lot of things figured out, just need to get there naturally without rushing.