THE past month has been, in Mei’s words, “Alright”. Jun is back to his normal self again—though slightly less annoying but subjectively more protective—Ming Hao is still himself—she’s starting to doubt that he’s ever going to change—the coffee shop is still her sanctuary, and Jing Jing’s still bugging her about wedding jitters, as if Mei’s supposed to understand what that’s all about. On the other hand, Lucca did end up getting Bella back home (somehow) yet, he’s still that little nagger that keeps bugging her about giving the baby up, or getting rid of the baby all together but Bella won’t have any of it.

To say the least, despite her misconceptions of thinking this place is going to be horrible to stay at—Mei has actually liked living with Jun and Ming Hao, even with Ming Hao being a jerk. Although, she’s still trying to figure out different ways to make Ming Hao more comfortable with her; she thought he would like her when she made him his favorite (at least what Jun said was his favorite) homemade chicken casserole. In the end it made him sulk off to his bedroom and Mei swears she could hear him crying—and she’s pretty sure it’s because he hasn’t been near his family in almost four years and the casserole made him remember all the good memories he’s had with his family, which made him miss them more.

There was the other time she asked Ming Hao what he likes to do in his free time, and in the end got so wrapped up in playing Mario Kart—she beat his all time score which made him pissed for the rest of the week, like a two year old wh lost their favorite toy. Then, only a few days ago, she went to his work—apparently he works for a small comic design store as a manager—and dropped off a packed lunch only to have him come home and yell at her about his co-workers making fun of him; something along the lines of having to have his girlfriend drop him off a lunch.

Needless to say, there’s no possible way of getting through to Ming Hao; because, unfortunately, he seriously does dislike her. Maybe he dislikes her less from when he met her, but he still dislikes her. Sometimes it makes her feel like there’s a burden on her shoulders. As if she’s causing a rift between the household. If she looks at it from Ming Hao’s point of view, Jun is on her side meaning Ming Hao doesn’t have anyone supporting him. And that’s got to for him. So, in a way, she understands him.

“Thought I’d find you here.” Mei’s a little surprised to see Jun climbing out of her window to sit on the fire escape with her. After having used the fire escape to technically leave via cowardly inability to communicate correctly with others—Mei’s found it as her little bubble in the house. The mornings before work—after having made her coffee—she’ll keep her comforter wrapped around her with her coffee in one hand, a journal in the other, make her way out onto it and stay there until she feels good enough to get ready for work.

She tilts her head as he takes part of the comforter and wraps it around himself—seeing as it’s chilly outside—before carefully, and casually maneuvering himself to huddle up against her. Though once she catches whiff of the action she nudges him away from her. Something’s haven’t changed; and that would be Mei’s still not okay with Jun’s touchy feely behavior. Although sometimes—very rare—she’ll let him hug her. For instance, when he passed his first giant test of the year, she let him hug her for a good minute before pushing him off, congratulating him, and bolting to her room. The only other form of touch would be a hand shake though that’s rare as well.

“How’d you know?” It’s not like she’s ever invited Jun into her room before. The last time he was there was when he first introduced her to it—otherwise the only person to step in has been Jing Jing when she visits for the weekend.

He lifts his arm up to point his index finger along the brick wall to a window a good amount of ways down. “That’s my window. I saw you out here once in the morning, and then again the day after.” He pauses to look back at her, only to see her still starring at his window. “Do you come out here a lot?”

She nods her head as she pulls her gaze away from the window, and back to him. “It’s nice out here. Not much of a view, but nice.” The "view" consists of the back of a dumpling restaurant that gave Jun food poisoning when he went there for lunch and ordered streamed shrimp dumplings. Four large green trash cans sit right in front of it—one of them Mei thinks a homeless man lives in—and about three parked cars that always seem to be there.

“Yeah, I’d come out here too if I had someplace to sit.” Ironically Jun’s window is the only window on the whole entire complex, that doesn’t have a fire escape. Which, to him, he deems unfit and unsafe; there should, at the very least, be a long ladder going all the way down; but, no, it’s just a window with a set of unmoving bars.

She nods her head once more before taking a sip of her coffee which she notices is getting quite cold from the morning air—to the point that the steam has almost dissipated. “I’ve been meaning to ask,” She begins while setting her cup down to wrap her arms around her knees to draw them closer to her chest. “What type of chef do you want to be?”

Yes, for the last month and half Mei has failed to ask Jun anything about his want or need to become a chef. Mainly because Mei’s been a little busy getting into her routine at work—and trying to convince Seok Min that she’s good enough to learn about coffee making. Also because every chance she does get to ask, something or someone, interrupts them. (Ming Hao to say the least.)

Jun smiles, as if it’s the best question she could’ve asked. Honestly, it’s because Jun loves to talk about what he wants to achieve. His parents never wondered, nor did his friends—beside Ming Hao—which only left him to grovel in his own pity for no one having interest. So when anyone asks, he becomes fully alert and tells them everything—especially if that someone happens to be the girl he has a giant crush on.

Mei.

“Chef de cuisine. That’s what I want to be.” Mei turns to look at him in confusion. Chef de cuisine? Yes, she’s traveled the world, learned many things but she has never heard that word and she for sure worked at a restaurant. “It’s the literal title for an ‘executive chef’.” He pauses to look away from her and out at the crappy view below. “I don’t know if you know but my families originally from Shenzhen not Taiyuan. Every time my grandmother would come over, she’d cook the traditional food from Shenzhen instead of Taiyuan—so the food I learned to cook had a more modern-esque taste to it. But it’s not just that, in Shenzhen there’s so many different cultures and religions that every part of China can be found in the food they make there.”

He finally turns to look back at her, that bright smile still on his face. “I want to own and run a restaurant here in Seoul. When people leave it’ll be like they take a little part of Shenzhen with them. And when people who either know or lived in Shenzhen they’ll think of it like home.” Mei gets it. Jun loves his home and his family. He seemed to be that type of guy as a kid as well. It only makes since for him to continue that love into whatever profession he may want to go into. “There’s so much culture in Chinese food, it’s an embarrassment how many poor restaurants are here. Those restaurants serve food like they could care less about the culture of China. It’s shameful.”

“It sounds like you know what you want to do.” She mumbles.

He nods as he stretches out his arms and leans his back against the window behind him. “What about you? What do you want to do? Are you just going to continue to travel, or do you have a plan?” Mei twists away from him the minute the questions leave his mouth.

A plan? Mei’s never had a plan for her life. Unless you consider running away from China, and traveling the globe until somehow finding her way to stay—for a long period of time—in Seoul, South Korea with Jun Hui aka her old neighbor. Although, when Mei was still in school and actually thought about life afterwards: her goal was to go to medical school, and ultimately become a veterinarian. But, she didn’t even finish middle school; how could she possibly go to university and end up becoming a veterinarian?

“I guess I’ll just continue to travel.”

“Or you could just stay here.” He says it very quietly. In that voice that sounds like he’s not sure whether or not she’ll just ignore him if he says it. Mei’s not the only one enjoying her time living in the apartment. Jun’s liked having her live here as well. He likes that she keeps the apartment clean (although he does a good job of that on his own), he likes when he opens the fridge to see two packed lunches—one for himself and for Ming Hao—he likes when the three of them can all sit together and watch a movie in the family room (though Ming Hao thinks it’s because Mei always seems to fall asleep and end up either putting her legs on him or leaning her head against his). He likes when he can have conversations about anything, and everything. He likes that she brings a different view to his life. He just, likes having her here.

She sighs and shakes her head—her blonde bangs sliding over her eyes in the worst way possible. “I have to get to work.” She sets the coffee cup down before climbing back into her room—Jun following closely behind her.

“You’re seriously just going to leave again?” He goes to grab her shoulder, that way they’d be facing each other, but stops himself short to watch as she gathers her work clothes together in her arms. “Why would you? Don’t you like it here?” He asks again, following her even to the bathroom—where she ultimately slams the door in his face.

She honestly just doesn’t want to deal with it right now. It’s too much for the early morning. Her brain isn’t near the functionality that it should be for that type of conversation. She’s not even sure how he can function like that. Taking a deep breath, she changes into her outfit for work—throwing her hair up into a ponytail—before retreating back into the hallways to be greeted by a barely awake Ming Hao and a very curious looking Jun.

“Can we talk when you get back?” He nudges her arm as she walks by to grab her key out of the small dish on the banister. She doesn’t respond, but relies a message with a nod of her head. Yeah, they can talk; but that’s not a guarantee that she’ll actually be nice enough or open enough to discuss such a topic so soon. She leaves—soon after answering his question—leaving Ming Hao and Jun in the apartment.

Ming Hao, to say the least, is still practically sleeping—but is awake enough to know something just happened between his roommates. “What’s up with her?” He asks as he juts his chin out toward the door she just left. Jun doesn’t even spare him a glance, as he walks around him to get to his bedroom. Thus leaving Ming Hao mildly confused. “What’s up with you?” He shouts.

The minute Mei get’s to the front door of the café, she’s greeted by a waving Ming Yu who’s flipping over the sign that says “closed” to say “open”. She waves back at him, and thanks him quietly as he opens the door for her. Inside already smiling brightly is Seok Min, and an already hard-at-work Won Woo. As she takes closer steps to the counter she sees Ming Yu scurry behind the counter to get to his section of the counter. His usual section being where the espresso machine is since he’s the expert at everything espresso.

“Good morning Mei!” Seok Min beams as she takes a seat on one of the bar stools. “You seem tired,” He mumbles to himself before turning toward Ming Yu. The two make quick eye contact before Ming Yu is nodding and getting to work. Seok Min turns back toward Mei who stares at him with curiosity. Mainly because she doesn’t understand how he and Ming Yu or he and Won Woo can communicate with just looks and gestures. “He’s making you something to drink. Are you hungry?” He gestures over his shoulder—with his index finger—toward the pastry wrack filled with goodies from a bakery a couple blocks down. (For every goodie sold, the bakery gets fifty percent of the profit—only on the goodies. Not only does it benefit them but it benefits the café as well since people like a little substance with their coffee drinks.)

She shakes her head, “I’m fine thank you.” After a few minutes of tinkering with the espresso machine, Ming Yu brings a small rounded coffee mug filled to the brim with semi-dark liquid and light brownish foam, along with one slice of lemon sat on a small round pearl colored plate. She knows, for a fact, she’s never seen this served anywhere in the shop before. Or maybe she hasn’t been paying attention. “What is it?” She asks tenderly.

“Espresso Romano!” Ming Yu cheers, trying to get the correct pronunciation under control but the ‘r’s’ are always getting him. It comes out more along the lines of, 'Esppesso Pomano'. “It’s one shot of an espresso—which mind you is hard to do when the machine is prepared to make a doppio,” He glances at Mei to see her furrowing her eyes in confusion. Doppio? Does he mean Dopey? As in the purple hat wearing cute one of the seven dwarfs? “Doppio is a double shot of espresso. Most machines now a days—like ours—are set to perfectly make a doppio. This means making single shots of espresso harder because you have to separate it out and then measure it to make sure you’re getting the right ounce.”

She knows that working at a café isn’t just “oh, clean here! Make coffee there!” She’s smarter than to think that. What she didn’t expect was the massive terminology she’d need to learn just to hold down her training. “Anyways, take the lemon and squeeze it onto the rim of the drink, and then try it. The lemon supposed to bring the sweetness of the espresso out. The drink itself should give you enough of a boast for the day.”

The day goes pretty smoothly. Mei only makes one mistake—and it wasn’t even her fault. In technicality it’s Seok Min’s fault for accidentally lifting up the sponge mat in the kitchen for her to inadvertently trip over and have the cup of boiling hot coffee go straight to the ground and ultimately break the nice cup it sat in. Seok Min sheepishly smiled at her, and she glared before ultimately cleaning the mess up herself.

Her break consisted of a call from Jing Jing—who didn’t say anything she wanted to here. “You’re at work?” She asks first which makes Mei glance around the coffee shop before muttering a yes to the girl on the other side. Mei sat in one of the three corner booths, her legs are stretched out on the rest of the cushion, and an empty red cup—that used to be filled with her latte—sits nearing her arm which is leaning on the table. The boys are scattered around the shop—Ming Yu sitting on the counter texting away on his phone, Won Woo finishing up the coffee orders, and Seok Min having a one sided conversation with Won Woo. “I think I should tell you something.”

The few words peak Mei’s interest. Usually Jing Jing’s and hers conversations are about the wedding, and Mei trying to convince Jing Jing not to have her parents come to the wedding, but then Jing Jing shouts back saying she’s stupid for even proposing the idea.  Mei disagrees—and it usually ends up with the two having a huge fight over the phone, and forgiveness comes hours later when Mei sends a text back apologizing for letting it get out of hand; but not for her opinion on the stance of the parents.

“What is it?” She asks after a minute.

Jing Jing sighs, a long boisterous sigh, “I got a call from the police office in Taiyuan,” Mei’s eyes widen as she shifts on the booth to be sitting with her feet on the floor and her arms covering the view of her face. “It’s was from a police officer named Charlie Wang, he says that his partner gave you his card four years ago. He was one of the men investigating our case.” Mei’s eyes glaze over as a sudden nestling feeling comes up in the pit of her stomach; she has the urge to throw up everything she’s drank today.

“What did he want?”

“Mei, I swear I didn’t know this. God if I did—”

“What did he want Jing Jing?” Mei’s voice rises in tone as she tries to keep her agony in check. All she wants to do is flee from this conversation, run and hide. But, she can’t do that. She has to know what this cop wants with her.

Jing Jing gulps, an audible one—but it goes unnoticed by Mei. “Apparently he’s been investigating your disappearance, and that…” Jing Jing trails off as a sudden rise of stress results in her voice and she can’t speak. Tears spring to the brunette’s eyes as she places a hand over her heart. Mei almost asks what’s wrong but then Jing Jing’s sobbing into the phone and ultimately in Mei's ear.

“Calm down, and breathe Jing Jing.” Mei relies, as she herself tries to keep calm. Why the hell was a cop investigating her disappearance? Her parents never called the cops. Or, did they?

Jing Jing takes a deep breath, and gulps down the rest of her sobs. With the least bit of confidence she has, she relies the rest of the information. “He said that he’s coming to Korea because he thinks he found you. He said he needs to talk to you. He said he has information about what happened four years ago. He said he knows what your father did.”

Mei’s world stops momentarily. All she can hear is her breathing, and the slight drip of water from the sink within the kitchen. Now she knows why Jing Jing was sobbing, God Mei wants to sob. “When did you talk to him?”

“Three days ago.”

Mei snaps her phone shut and flings herself out of the booth. “Mei, is everything alright?” Won Woo asks as she’s grabbing her jacket off the back of a bar stool and slinging it over her shoulders. She mutters something back, along the lines of ‘have to go, take it out of my pay’. And then she’s off, sprinting back to her apartment at top speed.

The minute she makes it inside she’s greeted by the view of Ming Hao, who’s watching some anime on the TV. “What are you doing back early?” He asks in a gruff voice, but she bypasses him and makes her way to her room. All that’s going through her mind is the fact she has to leave. She has to leave. She hasn’t unpacked anything—but grabs for some of the things that are thrown around her room. “Wow, are you leaving?” Ming Hao’s voice is closer, and she glances over her shoulder to see him leaning up against her door frame.

“Someone’s coming for me.” She mumbles, and she’s not sure why since he probably doesn’t even care. She turns away just after she sees his eyebrows furrow together, and a strange wrinkle to form between them.

He rakes a hand through his hair, “What do you mean?”

“He’s coming here, and I’m not sure when. But he contacted Jing Jing three days ago. He knows where I am, and he’s coming here.” Her thoughts don’t make much since to Ming Hao. Seeing as though they’re just phrases strung together into different sentences. But, he can still sense something is wrong, and now’s not the time to be his rude self.

He shuffles toward her and kicks her suitcase away from her. “If you’re trying to leave, you should wait until Jun gets home. He said you’d try this one day, and that I should stop you and call him.” Mei tries to ignore him as she scrambles over to her suitcase, but it only makes Ming Hao kick it again. This time it hits the wall directly behind it, and snaps shut. “Mei, stop it.” Ming Hao warns in a stern voice.

“Why do you care? You hate me right? You want me to leave right?” She asks in a soft voice as she stands up and walks over to her bag. “Ever since I came here, you’ve wanted me gone. Well, now’s your chance—so why are you stopping me?” She grabs her suitcase, then reaches over and slings her backpack onto her shoulders.

Ming Hao doesn’t reply and instead rips her suitcase out of her hands before flinging it onto the bed. “You’re not leaving because Jun deserves a goodbye.” And then he’s walking over to the suitcase, and rips it open. Mei swears she’s never wanted to scream as much as she does then, when he’s pulling out everything from her suitcase. Afterwards he walks over towards her and tears her backpack off of her before throwing everything out of it as well. But the thing that gets her the most, is when he takes her passport and shoves it down his boxers. “I’m calling Jun.”

He walks out of the room, making sure to pass a glare off at her. She doesn’t respond, and simply—with the little energy she has—sits on the edge of her bed; starring off at all of her stuff thrown across the room from Ming Hao’s rampage. She can’t leave now, he has her passport shoved down his boxers. Disgusting. And it’s pointless to pack all her belongings. She has to wait for Jun to come to the apartment; in order for her to plead her case. That she needs to leave before that police officer gets here.

What does that officer know? About her, about her father, about back then? What is it? She never gave information about her father when it came to the crime at the school. She never said anything about her father. She’s never even talked about where she’s living—so how does he know?

“Jun’s on his way.” Ming Hao mutters as he walks back into her room a few minutes later. He stares at the girl—her body hanging over the edge of her bed, her short blonde hair covering parts of her face, and her hands dragging along the black skirt she wears for work. “Do you want to explain what’s going on?”

She shrugs her shoulders and moves her head to look up at him. “It’s a long story.” And she’s right, it is. To fully understand what’s going on, he’d have to know everything about her past. Her parents, what happened to Jing Jing in high school, and even things that relate to Jun. It’s too much to talk about in one sitting.

“Just tell me the short story.” He says as he slides down the wall and comes to a sitting position. One leg is stretched out, and the other is pulled up towards his chest as he stares at her. She realizes it then, that now’s the second time someone other than herself and Jing Jing have stepped foot into her bedroom.

“Something gruesome happened back in my junior year of middle school, and it resulted in my best friend landing in the hospital. Because of that, two police officers got involved—obviously,” Mei stops for a second to look over at Ming Hao who’s staring at her expectantly. “After my disappearance, one of the officers decided to look into it. Despite never being requested to do so.”

Ming Hao’s eyebrows drop down as he scrounges his face, “And so?”

“Apparently he’s found me, and knows some information about what happened in the past. And I need to go before he does actually find me.” He doesn’t say anything for a minute. Instead he keeps quiet, as if processing the information through his brain. And yet all Mei can think about, is the fact that her passport is still shoved down his boxers.

“Why?”

“He might tell my parents where I am.”

“So?”

She sighs. That’s right, not even Ming Hao has learned of her parents. There’s only a few that do: herself, Jing Jing, her parents, and Jun. And the last one she never meant to tell—she didn’t either—but he discovered it anyways. “My parents are bad people.”

“What did they do?” He asks automatically afterwards.

His head shifts to one side as he stares at her curiously. She shakes her head, her hands beginning to shake at the nervousness bubbling up in her chest. “I can’t say.” She mutters while raking one of her shaky hands through her hair.

“Can’t or won’t?” He replies right after.

She gulps, “Does it matter?” Ming Hao shrugs his shoulders and leans his head back to hit the wall behind him. Mei relaxes as well, stopping herself from dragging her hands against her skirt. Its a few minutes before she finally musters the courage; because, what the hell? Why shouldn’t Ming Hao know? “My parents,” She mumbles causing Ming Hao to snap his gaze back to her. “They did things. They…” She truly tries to say it, but it’s like the word gets stuck in and she backs out.

“What did they do?” He asks a bit louder this time—frustrated.

She truly wants to let it out—say everything that happened—but it’s like her body is forcefully saying she can’t. So, she opts for another way of interpretation. She stands up, and lifts part of her shirt up. There in different spots around her torso—front to back—are scars. Knife scars, cigarette scars, scars from being pushed down the stairs, scars from being punched so hard that it dug into her skin, scars from whenever her father hurt her. And they aren’t the normal type of scars you get from scratching your knee on the pavement—these are Hypertrophic scars. The scars are so bad that they are red and raised a few centimeters above her actual skin—and they’ll most likely never go away.

Ming Hao’s gaze drops from her eyes, and straight to her waist. He doesn’t say anything—he just flinches. Because, there are a lot of scars, just on the front he counts three in a straight line as if she got slashed three times at the same exact time. Four more cigarette like burns are spread throughout. Five scars are a bit more faded—still prominent—and are wrapping around her body in such a way it looks as if it was painful to experience it. And that’s just the front side. There’s even more on the back, with a painfully long knife wound going from, what looks like further up her spine, all the way down below her pant line. Like someone kept a knife in her skin and let it drag all the way down her spine.

“Your parents did that?” He asks after a second.

She nods, “My dad.”

“And your mom?” He continues.

She takes a deep breath, letting go of her shirt, and sitting back down. “She did more of the mental…” She still can’t say the word, but by now Ming Hao gets it. Abuse. They abused her. “You get it now—why I have to leave.”

“You don’t know that the cop will say anything to your parents. You’re just being paranoid.” Ming Hao offers, transitioning to his regular self. As if what just happened went over his head.

Mei turns to look at him once more, eyes narrowing. “Don’t I have the right to be paranoid? My parents were insane.” She replies before tilting her head and continuing her thought. “They are insane.” She whispers after a second. There was no more talking after that. It was just waiting.

Jun came approximately one and half hours later. When he reached her room, he was panting, sweat drenching his hair, and he looked nervous as hell. Mei guesses that he ran all the way here—just to stop her from running. “What the hell?” Ming Hao mutters as Jun calms himself down before walking up to Mei and crouching down to her eye level. Mei catches Ming Hao whispering something along the lines of, ‘love makes you do crazy things.’ And refuses to laugh at it, because in fact, she’s not sure if love can make you do crazy things—she’s not in love, nor has she ever been.

“Why are you trying to leave?” He asks softly placing a hand over hers. As if that’s supposed to comfort her. It does actually, only a little, but it does—before she swipes her hand away from him and folds it in her lap. “Mei…” He trails off and practically begs with his puppy dog eyes for her to talk.

She sighs, “You remember the cops from Jing Jing’s accident?” She begins, to which he nods. How can he forget? He still blames himself. “One of them contacted Jing Jing. Apparently he’s been trying to find me ever since I’ve disappeared. He told her that he did find me, and that he has information to tell me. Stuff about my father, and what happened four years ago. He said he’s on the way to Korea—to me.”

Jun sighs as he sits himself down on the bed next to her and sighs just as deeply as she did before. “You can’t run from it Mei. Don’t you think it would be beneficial to know why that man attacked Jing Jing?” He asks while tilting his head to still look her.

Mei shakes her head, “I know why he attacked Jing Jing.”

“It’s too weird for it to just be about her purse. I mean why at the school? Why not out on the streets? And why our school, there are a million different—” Mei stops him by putting her hand up. She guesses it’s time to tell him the truth about this matter as well—he knows everything else. Why not this?

She faces her body towards him, it peaks not only Jun’s interest but Ming Hao’s as well. “The man attacked Jing Jing because he thought she was me. He wanted me to tell my dad something about rejecting an offer. I don’t know what offer. But, that’s why the man attacked her. He thought she was me.” Jun has never been so surprised in his life as he listened to her story.

“You mean, it was because of you?” He asks.

Mei flinches, “Yes.”

“Then you have to find out. He probably knows what this ‘offer’ is or was. And what the hell your dad was up to. Why the hell would you blow this opportunity?” His voice was rising in tone—anger protruding through. It doesn’t faze her, she’s heard worse. Yet, it surprises her. Sweet Jun, getting angry because of this?

She shakes her head, “I don’t care anymore.”

“Why not?” Ming Hao pipes in; surprising both of them, since they ultimately forgot he was in the room in the first place. The kid is too silent sometimes. Like a statue, never moving, always in one place.

She groans in annoyance as she runs a hand down her face. Is she not allowed to not care about the past? Her past ruined her. Why should she care anymore? “I just don’t; and I don’t have to deal with it, if I don’t want to.” She turns back towards Jun and glowers at him. “You can’t make me—” Mei stops dead. Faintly, in the near distance, is a knocking sound. On their front door.

“Zhao Mei Fen, this is Officer Charlie Wang—we need to talk.”