“Who was that? I don’t like him,” were the first words she heard leave Hoseok’s mouth

                She rolled her eyes at him. “You don’t even know the guy and you’re already judging him.”

                He rolled his eyes back at her. There was a snarky remark on the tip of his tongue but something about the way she was staring at him caught him off guard. In the months she started working here, he found himself finding her more and more attractive. It was a strange phenomenon as she was unlike any of the women he had been with in the past. She had neither curves nor physical beauty. Not to mention, she had a nasty personality that was not cute in any sense. Yet, despite it all, she was alluring to him.

                Daeun noticed Hoseok staring at her. It was different from his usual glances which she could read as him checking her out; this one had a slight musing on his part. “Hey, are we going to stand here all day?” she hit his arm.

                He blinked to focus out of the train of thought that had led him to the conversation between Seokjin and himself last night. “Well, I did have something planned but I spent the whole day waiting for you outside so I guess that’s thrown out the window,” he drawled.

                This time it was her that blinked in surprise. That had not been an answer she would anticipate. Since when did Jung Hoseok plan anything?

                Handing her the extra helmet, he patted the motorcycle and got into the driver seat at the front. “You know, you still haven’t answered my question.”

                She sighed and slightly shook her head. While putting on the helmet, she answered, “His name is Robert Viktor. He’s the client Hong Jung Yee spoke of; he’s also a lawyer.”

                That got Hoseok off the seat. “A lawyer?” he asked, slightly concerned. He turned to face her and saw that she was struggling with the helmet as it was slightly too large for her head. With a sigh, he took the helmet off her head, earning a yelp when it pulled out some of her hair that had been caught.

                With a glare, she rubbed the back of her head and said, “Yeah a lawyer. He was here today to represent his father who’s really the head of the business. But I’m guessing we will mainly be exchanging business with him.”

                The two of them had been walking for about twenty minutes up a hiking trail. The motorcycle was parked at the bottom and they had followed a sign that “promised you’ll be rewarded with a splendid view”. Daeun had changed out of her Qi Pao into jeans and a t-shirt, but had forgotten to bring her usual running shoes. Instead, she was fighting for footing on slippery rocks and dancing through small brooks in flats. Her feet ached and she tapped Hoseok’s back.

                “I need a break,” she panted and sat down on a fallen log.

                The sun had nearly set, casting its yellow-orange glow through the leaves and bringing warmth to the woods they were in. In the flourishing canopy above them, the birds and other small creatures initiated the evening’s music while they rested. Everything was so peaceful compared to the noise of the roads they had been driving through before. Daeun inhaled the earthiness of the environment and exhaled blissfully.

                “So, my turn to ask a question,” she said when Hoseok took a seat beside her, “What’s so special about today that you’re being so nice to me?”

                He took a swig of water before handing the bottle to her in which she accepted gratefully. Leaning back, his eyes took in the picturesque scene before him. The city lay far below the mountain they were climbing and everything – their worries, pain and stress – seemed trivial at their height. “Not today. Yesterday. It was your birthday. I wanted to do something with you then, but you weren’t home until late,” he said to her.

                She coughed, covering up the sudden increase speeding of her heart. Anytime someone mentioned last night, her mind would flash back to the memory between her and Namjoon. In a way, she felt slightly guilty that she was spending time with another man instead of him. Who was she kidding though? This was Hoseok she was with.

An extremely nice, well-behaved and unusual Hoseok.

                There had been no response from her when he finished speaking so he stood up. While they had been sitting, the sun had continued setting and now darkness was starting to wash over. He hoped they would make it to the top in time for everything he had planned. “C’mon, we’re nearly there,” he said, encouragingly.

                Groaning, she tried to stand up but her feet complained in pain. Instantly, she collapsed back on the log. With a hand, she took off a shoe and found a growing blister on her heel.

                He saw the swelling red of her feet and glanced out again at the disappearing light. With a sigh, he told her, “Take off your shoes and stand on the log.”

                “Why?” she asked, looking up at him quizzically.

                “Just do it,” he rolled his eyes at her.

                She did as she was told and left her shoes on the pine-covered floor. She grimaced as she stood on the log, but the pain was not unbearable and so she waited to see what Hoseok was up to. With light hands, he scooped her onto his back and then picked up her shoes from the floor. She heard a slight grunt from him as he started climbing up the trail while piggybacking her as well.

                At first, she wasn’t sure how to react. She contemplated on asking him to put her down, but it was comfortable being on his back. Plus, her feet were graciously thanking her for relieving it of tension. Her arms slowly wrapped around his shoulders and locked in front of his chest.

                He had already anticipated that she would not be too heavy. What he did not anticipate was how steep the incline of the second half of the climb was. Within minutes, he was panting and sweating. Although it was deep into the evening, the wind that blew was still warm.

                “Maybe I should walk the rest of the way up with you,” she said, her voice close to his ears.

                “No,” he mumbled and then readjusted her with his arms. He willed his legs to continue forward.

                “Fine,” she said, not wanting to start any unnecessary argument, and allowed him to carry her up to the top. At last, they broke through the clearing and a single stone stair case curved up a slope that would lead them to the cliffs. Hoseok looked up and contained his excitement. They were nearly there.

                On the other hand, Daeun bit the inside of her lip when she saw that they still had a way to go. “Are you sure you’ll be okay?” she asked him again.

                “Don’t worry about it,” he brushed her question aside, “You may have never seen it, but I can guarantee you I’ve got a rock solid body.”

                She held in a smile seeing his determination for her. “Okay but before you go up, I’ve gotta get something.”

                He stood in place and felt her carefully shift her body. Gripping her thighs such that she wouldn’t fall, he waited until she got whatever she needed. Suddenly, he felt his cap being taken away and a soft towel patting his forehead.

                “I can feel you sweating through your back and it’s gross,” she , wearing the hat that had been on his head on her own. After she finished wiping away his sweat, she swept his bangs back over the top of his head and used the bill of his cap as a fan. It sent a lukewarm wind down his shirt and back of the neck, cooling his working body.

                As she continued to fan him, he made his way up the stone staircases while drawing strength from her actions. At the top, they were met with a clear overview of the city. He gently set her down and she ran barefoot across the grass until she stood at the ledge. The city was currently in shadows as the last of the sunlight disappeared but within seconds, all the lights of the city burst into life. A gasp escaped her lips as dots slowly blossomed in front of her eyes like mini fireworks from below.

                He stood behind her, exhausted from the climb but smiling at her happiness. Her hair whipped in the wind at the top of the cliff and he gazed at her silhouette standing tall in the cloudless night. Making sure that she was still enchanted by the skyline, he slowly ducked behind the trees.

                A small act of kindness was what Seokjin had called it. Hoseok had never been one to do anything “small”. He preferred to work on a much grander scale.

                Her eyes would not stop darting around. Below them, the forest spread until it hit the foot of the city in which that kept stretching on and on until it faded in the horizon. Hungrily grasping for more, she took one step closer towards the breathtaking view.

                “Daeun,” she heard her name being called from behind her. She turned and was mildly confused when she saw Hoseok nowhere in sight. The only thing she could see was the woods they had walked out of and the small stone staircase that would lead her back down. Her ears could not pick up anything either besides the gentle rustling of the leaves.

                “Hoseok?” she called into the emptiness. Her heart started racing with the thought that perhaps he had abandoned her here. He had played a trick like this on her before and she had not appreciated it last time.

                Her steps froze when she heard jazz music filtering through nature’s ambience. “Stay there,” his voice came from somewhere in the vicinity. She waited in anticipation.

                Slowly, like waking fireflies, small lights were between the leaves and branches of the trees. There were multitudes of them that he had strung. They kept appearing until the surroundings arc of trees in front of her twinkled with stars among a dark green sky. The music she heard earlier became louder as Hoseok walked out from the trees with a small speaker in one hand.

                “That was sort of anticlimactic, wasn’t it?” he sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck. He had planned it out such that when the city lights beneath them lit up, he would turn on the lights he had strung earlier than afternoon as well. However, he had been caught up watching her from behind that he had missed it by mere seconds.

                She waited until he got closer until she turned to look at him, the look of astonishment on her face replaced with genuine excitement and delight. “No, it’s… it’s perfect,” she whispered.

                He laughed at her childish happiness. “Well then, happy birthday, Daeun,” he stood beside and looked with her at the scene he had created.

                Never would she have guessed that Hoseok was capable of doing anything like this. Not only did he set up the lights and a small banner that said “Happy Birthday”, but he had also brought a picnic basket for a late dinner they could share. Although it was only bento from the Japanese restaurant outside their house, she was content in seeing all the effort her put in just for her.

                Their glasses of red wine clinked together as they sat with their feet, dangling over the edge of the cliff. Behind them, a blanket had been spread out and their finished dinner, as well as the remaining half a bottle of wine, was placed on top. The night had deepened but Daeun’s spirits were soaring over the city.

                “Would you rather… have with a goat or have everyone think you had with a goat even though you didn’t?” he asked her with a mischievous glint. Their game had been going on for a while, starting off with innocent questions but she found it no surprise that he would ask her something like this.

                She sipped at the wine, sighing at its tart but silky flavour. “Have everyone think I did it. ‘Cuz actually doing it is too gross,” she shivered at the thought. He chuckled beside her when she said, “Let me guess, you’ll just have with a goat.”

                “Yeah sure. I mean, it’s better than people thinking you did something you never did. Plus it can’t be too bad. A quick in and then a quick out, you know what I mean?” he smirked.

                “You are disgusting.”

                He laughed again. The nerves that had been running through him when the night first started had long since disappeared. She had that effect on him – the ability to help his relax despite all his stress and worries. It was not a specific action that she did but her pure presence being beside him.

                “Alright. My turn. Um… Would you rather make mistakes your whole life or make a single mistake, but regret it for the rest of your life?” she asked, fully preparing for his answer to be the latter, based on everything he had said that night.

                He proved her wrong when he answered, “Make mistakes my whole life.”

                She raised an eyebrow. “Really? I actually didn’t think you’d say that, with the YOLO type of answers you’ve been giving me all night,” she grinned.

                “I’d rather deal with the mistakes as they come than have to live through the pain of constant regret,” he said, not quite meeting her eye.

                The grin on her lips faltered. She turned and tried to read his face after the unexpected response. There was nothing there as it was being covered by the tipped wine glass as he finished the last of his drink. Feeling her gaze on him, he turned and shot her a smile, “I’m going to grab a cigarette if you don’t mind. Want a refill?” He gestured to her emptying glass.

                “I’m good for the night,” she answered, shaking her head.

                He hoisted himself up from their spot overlooking the city and left her momentarily.

                She continued to absentmindedly swirl the remaining wine in her glass. It was not so much the answer he gave that caused her to look up in concern but rather the change of tone that accompanied when he spoke. His words had a ring of truth to it. Her thoughts were interrupted when the smell of smoke hit her nose.

                He took a seat a little behind her this time, further from the edge of the cliff. Sitting in such a way that one leg was tucked behind the other which acted as an arm rest, he took a long inhale of the cigarette and watched as the smoke exited his mouth in a long line.

                “I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to be drinking and smoking,” she said, turning her body so that she could sit cross-legged beside him.

                “Well, YOLO,” he smiled cheekily at her then placed his arm on his knee. Some of the lights behind them flickered off as the battery died.

                They sat in silence together; her finishing the last of the wine and him as he lazily drew up his arm and set it back down after each drag of smoke.

                “Before all this, what did you do?” he suddenly asked her, “And don’t say waitressing.”

                It had been a while since she last thought of the life she once could have. “I was Assistant Director of Internal Affairs at a well-known company,” she answered.

                He nodded. “Why did you give it up?”

                The question made her squirm in her position, digging up emotions and thoughts she had left behind for a long time. “I didn’t like it,” she said, coming up with half the truth.

                “Really?” he said.

                His stare on her was much longer than she would have liked and so she broke off eye contact first. “Yeah,” she muttered. In truth, she had loved it. It was a job she had worked for her whole life. If it wasn’t for her stupid “gift”, her entire life could have been changed. There was a reason she hated to speak about it so she quickly changed the focus away from her. “How about you? Before all this, what did you do?”

                He pursed his lips and looked out over the city. With a slight moan, he stretched his legs in front of him and leaned back on his forearms in a reclined position. “I was a high school student,” he said. The term seemed so foreign to him even as he remembered his past now.

                “Wow. You’ve been in this business for a really long time,” she said softly.

                “I was a dance major,” he continued talking, “I made it onto the school’s dance team and then later became its captain. We competed and won first in our region.”

                “Wow,” she breathed again.

                He was silent for a while but then he leaned his head back and closed his eyes. “Do you remember when you asked me about the organization and the Boss?”

                “Mhmm.”

                “So you remember what I said about my initiation task then?”

                She hesitated. She did remember. His words had haunted her for a couple of nights but when he never brought it up again, she slowly put his words away. “I do,” she answered.

                “That’s my one mistake that I’ve been regretting my whole life,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. In a way, he hoped she hadn’t heard what he said.

                She watched him as he silently lay there with only his chest moving up and down. He still had his eyes closed and her mind scrambled for words to say after hearing him say that.

                A single tear rolled down the side of his cheek that was faced away from her.

                The wind is the only sound they hear in the brief silence. She swallows and the sound is deafening in her ears.

                “Hoseok, you don’t have to – ”

                “I was 17 when I did it,” he finally spoke again. His voice wavered while cutting into hers, but quickly reclaimed composure when he continued, “I had been given my initiation task three weeks ago with a deadline that was approaching the night I did it.” A voice told him to stop speaking but the burden that he had been carrying his whole life needed to be put down before it could crack him.

                She reached out and put a hand over his. It was all the comfort he needed at that moment.

                “Hoseok,” she quietly said his name. She knew how much anguish his memories were causing him at the moment. She could see the pain even beneath his closed eyelids and she could feel the slight shivering of his hand beneath her own.

                He took a deep breath then said, “The only person I knew in the organization was Seokjin-hyung. He had been accepted a couple days before I was given the tasks and he was the only person I had been able to connect to. When I found out what I was requested to do, he was the first person I ran to because I was scared and I had no idea what to do. He comforted me and asked me if it was really worth it – to kill my own father for the additional amount of cash I would be getting if I were to join the organization. He told me to carefully think it through because taking another person’s life was not something I could undo once it was done.

                I listened to him. I thought about my life, my family, my mother and my father. I thought about all the hurt that I would bring to them if I followed through with what the organization asked of me.”

                Drawing himself up back to a sitting position, he opened his eyes and shakily put the cigarette he had been holding between his lips. However, seeing that it was a stub made him angry for some strange reason and he threw it over the cliff. He could hear his breathing rate rise up and his heart pounded in his chest. There were emotions of anger, confusion, pain and fear circulating around him. He didn’t know what to do with it all so he latched onto the only one that seemed to be constant in his life.

                He stood up and stomped over to the jacket he had placed beside the picnic basket earlier on. Rummaging through all the pockets, he came up empty handed when he could not find the cigarette box he swore he had put back earlier. He growled and angrily threw the jacket back onto the ground.

                “Hoseok,” she said his name again.

                He whirled and faced her. The anger was dangerous inside him, he knew that much. When he heard her say his name, that only seemed to fan the fire. He clenched his jaw and tried to say something but the words stopped when she reached towards him.

                She had stood up and was now scanning his face. She had never seen him like this. It was all unfamiliar to her and she didn’t know what to do. Her hand trembled when she touched his cheek and with gentle fingers, she wiped the tears he had unknowingly let fall.

                The emotions he had tried to hide through all the years had resurfaced from that night long ago during their initial conversation. With determination, he had thought to have crammed them back through the years but with her question in the form of a game, they pricked the delicate surface that had been enclosing them. All at once, they burst out of him as he stood looking at her. It made him dizzy and nauseous but at the same time, relieved. Each memory of that night flashed before his eyes and consumed him with pain.

                “I didn’t want to do it,” he choked, pressing his head down into her hand. The feelings of anger were being washed away by everything else he had buried beneath it.

                She gently guided his head until his forehead rested against her shoulder all the while his back. This was the only way she knew how to offer him the presence of her support.

                “I was angry. I returned home, with full intentions of betraying the whole organization and throwing my own life away for the sake of our family only to find that he had already betrayed us with another woman. He took advantage of my mother’s sickness and the fact that she couldn’t see so that he could screw someone else. I betrayed him because he first betrayed us and I hated him for it,” he said, “And so I took a knife and I stabbed it through his heart. It was the only way I could think of then to hurt him in the way he had hurt me.”

                Beneath her hands, his body shook as the tears came out of him. They dropped to the ground no matter how hard he tried to contain them. He arms hung by his side, devoid of energy as he sobbed.

                “I want to tell him: I’m so sorry, Dad,” the words choking as he said them, “I’m so sorry that I let my anger get the better of me. This is not the life you and Mom wanted me to have. I broke your heart and I broke hers that night and I’m so so sorry. But it’s too late…”

                Daeun drew him close to her and wrapped him in a hug. She had never been taught to console another human being but at this moment, she felt this was the right thing to do. His arms came up to meet her body and enveloped her against his own.

                He tasted the salt on his lips as each breath raked his chest. He had been young and foolish. He let his emotions get the better of him and someone else had to suffer as a consequence. When reality hit him afterwards of what he had done, it scared him. What should he do now? Where was he supposed to go? More importantly, who was he now?

                Making a vow to himself never to let something like that ever occur again, Hoseok buried all emotions inside. Instead, he acted like how he thought people wanted him to act. He took all he wanted when he wanted. There was no such thing as real love in the world; he used the people around him when he felt suit. As long as he was never alone, that was okay for him.

                But no matter how many layers he put on top, there was the ever-present emptiness. The emptiness that could not be filled by money, women, power or any material worth. The emptiness caused when he took away the people he loved with his own hands.

                The emptiness filled only with loneliness.

                The instant she wrapped him into her hug, he could feel the fear and anguish being washed away. The beating of another person’s heart near his own calmed him. Her collective breathing was rhythmic in his ears and reduced his own quickened pace. It took time, but slowly he felt himself in a sense of peace in her arms and when he felt ready, he pulled himself away.

                Tears had left a trace on his skin like rain on a dusty windowpane, but tranquility had settled into his eyes. “I hated him for many years after that,” his voice was calm, “But that night after I first spoke to you about my father, I realized that it was not him I hated. It was the monster that I had become that night.”

                “We all do things we’re not proud of. But that doesn’t make any of us a monster,” she said, “Not you, not him, not me.” The last part whispered almost to herself.

                The wind howled in the background as they both stood, facing each other in their own thoughts. With a last sigh, he brings her in towards her and hugs her again, “Thank you.”

                She squeezes him in return and then feels herself being released. “Don’t get cheesy on me now. It’s making me want to actually like you.”

                “I can be an sometimes, can’t I?” he chuckles.

                “Sometimes?” she rolls her eyes. She was relieved to see that he was returning to his usual self.

                In the moonlight, the necklace she had been wearing sparkles. He reaches towards it and cups the pendant with his fingers.

                “Is that necklace new? I’ve never seen you wear it before,” he asks.

                Quickly, she pushes away from him and walks back to the picnic blanket. She starts putting away the utensils that had been taken out into the basket. “I got it last night,” she responds, a different feeling taking her heart, “It’s a gift from a friend.”

                She doesn’t see it, but a flash of emotion fly across his eyes. Hoseok nods in understanding. Sadness lingers in him but not for the previous reason. She felt so far away in that instance. He watches as she puts the wine glasses away, her actions flustered by the question he had asked.

                “Let me help you,” he offers, and hands her the other wine glass. Their eyes meet again and she smiles before breaking away.