'

"You're not allowed to use the stairs, you may clean the room only when the costumers are not inside" ' she aped her fat boss, having fun on her own.

' "The only allowed way to move through the hotel" ' she said again using a man's voice pushing the red 'personnel elevator' s key.

She spun the cap of a yellow bottle and carefully placed it inside the neat pile of bottles. She wiped her hands on her waistcloth and dived inside its big pocket to reach a small yogurt can. She energetically stirred it and took a big sip. She barely managed to get it down because of the elevator’s ding. She quickly wiped and jumped up to politely bow before the two young ladies who exited the elevator, but who really didn’t even notice her.  Suddenly the yogurt didn’t look so appealing anymore. She threw it in the small garbage can she was carrying in her carrier and started counting:

“3337, 3335… 37! Aha! I found ya`!” she easily whispered and looked for the key-cards in her pocket. She pulled it through the bower and she pushed the door open with her back. She was getting ready to close it back after she stepped inside the room when a glass braking noise froze her. She rolled her eyes around as she was looking for someone to ask what must she do in such situations. Even though her mind told her to get out of the room, her legs brought her closer to the white door from where the noise came.

‘ “No, no…” ‘ her mind kept on saying, but her hand already reached the door’s handle.  She spun it around and opened it in one slow move, but  stopped when she heard a roar:

“What the it’s your problem?!” a man’s voice roared so she stepped inside to discover the guy kneeled in front of the toilet seat.

couldn’t spell any word and not only because she didn’t understood what the man said because he spoke in Korean, but also because her eyes were to focused on the shiny shards on the ground that led to the man’s bleeding hand.

“Oh my God, are you ok?”  she rushed to help him.

“Don’t touch me!” the man yelled again. “Just give me that!!” he pointed with the bleeding hand to the paper towels on the bathtub’s edge.

Even though she couldn’t understand the words he said, it wasn’t really difficult to get what he asked for, so she dart at them.  She quickly flocked some paper in her hand and pushed it on the man’s hand. She rolled the remaining paper on top of it and helped him up. Even if there were all sort of sour smells in there, when he reached her height, a sweet, flowered smell invaded her nostrils making her to take a closer look at him. He seemed fairly familiar, with his black bangs trying to reach his eyebrows, the dark brown eyes that withdrew somewhere deep inside their sockets, and the small beautiful lips that curled up in a pout now. He was pretty tall and that made the way up to his bed to be much longer and more difficult than it should, but she managed to get him safe to his brown sheets.  He fell on them and they all crumpled underneath him. She stared at him for a few minutes, giving him time to fall really asleep.

“How much did you had last night, boy?” she whispered thinking he wouldn’t hear her while she leaned to gather the empty bottles on the ground.

“Not that much” his English answer came from inside the beddings.  “What’s the clock?” he asked in his crooked English.

“Oh…. Umm..” she froze for a while then quickly spoke “It’s 12.35”. Just when she was about to congratulate herself for her silence, spoke without permission: “You should be having lunch now…”

“I should be out having lunch now” he spoke in the same time.

She froze again and stared at him. She would’ve wanted to say something but her eyes got drawn by the paper towels that colored themselves into some fiery red shade.  She gathered up the courage to speak again:

“Sir, may I take a look at your hand?”

She got her answer through a soft snore.  She smiled pleased and tiptoed to the bathroom from where she came back with the first aid kit. She gently peeled the wet paper off of his hand and slowly cleaned it until there was no trace of blood left. She warped the gauze ribbon on the hand with slow, quiet moves so she wouldn’t wake him up. She smiled satisfied when she covered the knot with a small pink patch. She escaped a short swearing word when she threw her eyes on the ground where the 5 empty bottles laid and a terrible amount of cigarettes’ left from long ago the overflowing ashtray.  With no other words she started gathering everything up hiding them in her black plastic bag with the quietest movements she was capable of. She even swiped away the shards in the bathroom, but the other half of the glass shelf stuck in the wall and she decided it would’ve been too noisy to take it down so she just left it there. She put everything in her carrier and before she left, she stopped to take one last glance at him. The snoring ceased, leaving the room in a deep silence.  She turned around to leave.

“Gajima…” his deep voice got heard again from somewhere inside the beddings.

“Well, I… “ she tried to say but this line sounded so familiar that it already started playing over and over in her mind, adding musical notes too.

“Gajima jeabal…” he said again without even moving.

“Umm…” she said stepping forward twice, without really knowing what to do. She got next to his bed but just when she changed her mind and was ready to quickly leave, he caught her wrist. She would’ve screamed only if she would’ve remembered how to connect the brains to . The only remaining thing to do now was to take a seat next to him because he was still holding tight on her hand. At first she rolled her eyes all around, slowly wiping the shy sweat drops on her forehead but his perfect side-face caught her attention.  Her eyes doubled their size and her heart almost stopped its beatings so much that it started stinging her left hand.

“No… fu… king… way…” she barely managed to spell in between the beep breaths she had to take to make sure her lungs won’t stop pumping the air.