“They don’t have to. You already did.”

Her words cut through me and rang in my head endlessly as I watched her back disappear into the distance. I wanted to run after her, but I was afraid anything I said would only upset her more. I didn’t understand why watching her walk away hurt so much.

After a few minutes, I followed her back to the beach. When I reached the densely populated area, I took off my glasses, and immediately, girls began to flock me. It was a welcome distraction. Soon, the crowd ballooned, and everyone was demanding to take a picture with me.

Trying to ignore my heavy heart, I forced my lips upwards and signed autographs, took pictures, and hugged people. Anything to forget the pain.

I had tried not to run away. I really tried so hard to walk away steadily, but once a payphone came to view, I sprinted towards it. I needed somewhere I could break down in private. Once I closed the door behind me, the sobs that I contained for so long escaped me. I hugged myself as I cried, unable to get a grip. Why did this hurt so much?

Once I calmed down, I called a taxi company. After someone promised to come pick me up, I hung up and put the phone back in its place. Overhearing, the clamor of the crowd outside of my isolating payphone box, I turned around to see Baekhyun smiling and taking pictures with his fans. That jerk. He didn’t look the least bit upset about our separation.

I stared a little too long, and he looked up from kindly refusing to sign some girl’s arm and made eye contact with me. In the brief second we locked eyes, my heart hurt tenfold. I quickly turned my back to him, trying to sternly remind myself to forget him. He wasn’t worth the pain.

I looked up from a fan to catch Eunsung staring at me from a payphone. We made eye contact for a moment before she whipped around, embarrassed and still upset. Some dude distracted me by asking to take a picture with me, and I obliged. But my eyes strayed back to Eunsung who was exiting the payphone.

If I had known there was someone in the nearby bushes who followed my gaze to Eunsung and took a few photos of her, I wouldn’t have watched her walk away. But I didn’t know. My eyes were fixed solely on her.

With every step she took away from me, the more I wanted to chase after her, to apologize, to explain I was only trying to protect her because I didn’t want the paparazzi to taint her. But another fan asking for a photo stole my attention away, and when I looked up again, she was gone. I never saw her again for the remainder of her trip.

Everyone could tell there was something off about my behavior when I got back from the beach, but nobody asked about it. They probably thought I just needed a few days to recover before I was back to normal, but I knew better. I was never going to be quite the same again.

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