The hurting heart

The next morning, Donghae fetched me early at the house and gave me a ride to the office. That morning, I started noticing the extra care and attention he was giving me. It felt nice. But at some point or another it bothers me for a reason only I didn’t know.

I started my routine with a smile on my face. I cleaned my table and headed to my boss’ office. When I got inside, Myungsoo quickly flashed a smile that made me wonder. I wondered because he wasn’t like that before whenever I entered his office. He always looked serious and too focused on his work. But that morning—everything was different. It was a breath of fresh air on my part.

“Good morning, buddy!”

I was stuttering when I replied. When we were at work, he didn’t call me with the nickname we used to call at each other outside the vicinity of the office. We should treat each other properly—in a manager-secretary way. But it confused me why he suddenly acting so weird.

“G—good m—morning, Sir Kim.”

He chuckled at my politeness. “Make me a cup of hot coffee. No sugar, just milk.”

Another thing that confuses me was that whenever he asked me to make him a cup of coffee, it should always be no sugar or milk.

“Why you suddenly want to have an unsweetened milk coffee, Sir?”

“I felt weird when I woke up early today. That’s why I wanted to have a weird drink too, to accompany my mood.” He chuckled again.

I didn’t pay attention to his reasoning. When I was done making his coffee, I quickly placed it on his table and started checking on his schedule for that day. He was quietly attentive to what I was saying, but I started to feel so conscious about myself when I saw him staring at me in my peripheral vision.

I cleared out my throat, “at exactly 12 noon, Sir, you have your last meeting with our clienteles from Japan and after that no more schedules to be followed.”

“I might feel so empty stomach today. Are you working on a lot papers today?” He asked after taking a sip of his coffee.

“Not really, Sir. Why?”

“Can you join me to my late lunch later after my 12noon meeting?”

“That’s fine with me. Just drop me a call. Anything more, Sir?”

“That’s good! You can leave now.”

He said and then I closed the door.

At my office, my phone was crazily vibrating on top of my table. it was Donghae who was calling. I quickly picked it up. “Hello?”

“Why are you not answering your damn phone immediately huh?!” He bawled that almost makes me deaf.

“I—I’m at my boss’ office discussing his schedule for today. Why?” I explained.

“I’m at the first floor. Meet me here. I need to tell you something.” He hastily said and then hung up.

I was half-running, half-walking to reach the nearest elevator. I was grasping for breath when I entered and pushed the button to the first floor. I quickly stepped out and wandered around to see him. But he was nowhere to be sight.

I was still panting when a man in an all black dress with a black cap pulled me and dragged me out of the building. I was about to shout when the man revealed himself. Looking at his eyes, I knew it was Donghae. “I’m so sorry to disturb you,” he said as he breathed fast and hard.

“You scared me!” I shouted as I placed one hand over my heaving chest.

“I’m really sor—“

“It’s fine. Why are you here? And why you dressed like that?” I said as I creased my forehead.

“I have to tell you that I’ll be gone for a week. I have a business to attend to. I’ll drop you a call once I got to the venue.” he said with an assuring tone.

“I don’t understand…what business? You’re just arriving yesterday and now you’re telling me you’ll be gone for a week?” I said loss at his thought.

“Yes, this is urgent. I will call you…I promise.” He said as he planted a kiss on my forehead. He was about to run away when I called his name in a worry tone.

“Are you in trouble?”

“Not really a trouble. But I have to fix some problems. Don’t worry, I’ll be back.”

I nodded and then he ran so quickly that his retreating back disappeared abruptly before my eyes filled with tears. I couldn’t explain what I was feeling. It seemed like he was into a serious problem.

I languidly walked my way back to the building. I was wearing a frowning face when I sat on my swivel chair. I unconsciously turning the pages of the book I was reading during my break time.  I was staring at nothing in particular for a couple of hours and then the tears started to escape again out of my eyes, making it reddish and puffy.

I thought when Donghae came back; everything between us will be fine like before. But as time passes us by, I didn’t know if I was still doing the right thing, if I still deserved to wait for him. Sometimes, I asked myself if Donghae still loves me or he loved someone else without my knowing.

Out of my deep thinking, I heard my phone ringing. “Hello?” I uttered in a strange voice as I pretended to be happy.

“I’m dying of hungriness. What time are you going here?”

I jumped out of my seat as I heard Myungsoo’s pale voice on the other line. I took a glimpse at the wall clock and I was surprised knowing that it was already past two in the afternoon. “Hold on for a minute. I’m coming. I’m really sorry, I forgot.” I apologetically said as I doubled my pace.

“I can wait. I’m at the restaurant on the left side of the office building by the way.”

I was totally in a hurry while wiping my tears away. I even combed my hair with the use of my finger as I forgot to carry my bag with me. Crazy me!

When I reached the cafeteria, I didn’t have the hard time to search for Myungsoo as he was the only people there. He sat lazily on the red couch as his face was a little pale already. He seemed really and totally hungry.

I sat across his, facing him while controlling my heaving chest. I was really tired from running, yet I was happy to know that he was still breathing. He immediately called the attention of the waiter to order. I let him do the choosing of our food to eat. The taking of our orders were done when I noticed he was eyeing on me.

“Am I look horrible?” I said as I tuck some strands of my hair behind my ears.

“No. but did you cry?”

“N—no...I mean yes. Oh, I—I actually mean no.”

“Why did you cry?”

I started fiddling my fingers under the table. It was my habit whenever I didn’t know how to explain the feelings welling up inside me. “I—I stumbled on my way to my cubicle earlier.”

Myungsoo’s eyes grew wide as he bent down to see if I have wounded knees. But he clicked his tongue when he found out that there were no wounds. “Tell me, did he make you cry, buddy?”

I couldn’t handle the big droplets of tears anymore as it flows freely down my cheeks. I covered my face with both palms and started crying silently. “I don’t know if I could go on like this for another day. I’ve been trying to cope up with the misunderstanding between us. And I thought we could’ve at least had a talk—even a short talk just to settle the things that are mulling inside my head for a long time now. But he goes somewhere I don’t know and told me he will be gone for a week. What a good boyfriend Donghae is!”

He let out a heavy sigh before removing my palms that covers my face and uttered, “I don’t know what’s going on between the two of you. I don’t even know what’s the real score is, but you have to gather some courage to confront him and speak up before that bad feeling affects you more.”

“But I just can’t…”

“Why you think you can’t do it?”

“Because I’m afraid,” I said as I felt a sharp object stabbed my heart at the thought I was thinking.

“Afraid of what?”

“Afraid of hearing from him that he didn’t love me anymore, that he loves someone else.”

After spilling out what was inside me, Myungsoo mum the word. The waiter served the orders and I was crying while eating while he just stole glances at me with comforting eyes.

Writer’s note: First and foremost, thank you for subscribing, reading, commenting, and waiting. I know some parts of this story were kind of boring, yet and still all of you keep on reading this story. Secondly, to tell you all frankly—I had the plan of deleting this story, too, because of the reason that I didn’t have the inspiration anymore to continue writing this. But miracles are just around the corner and knocked on me and I’m very much happy to tell you all that I have the inspiration again. Third, the remaining chapters of this story contain many revelations until the end. As of today, this story has 15 chapters remaining plus an epilogue. BUT there might be some changes depending on my mood/inspiration. Lastly, I’m currently working on the chapters continuously while I still have the inspiration. This story has been on-going for months already and I think it’s time to work harder for its ending. I don’t want to disappoint y’all about the ending, so I am thinking hard of a better way to end it. Do you want the end to be a cliff-hanger?

P.S: For my 1^st year anniversary here on AFF, I’ll be writing another Haesica-centered story, but this time, the story line will be different from my other stories. So, I hope you’ll all look forward to it. ^^