"Ah," Seunghee sighed inwardly, "Why is she being so quiet?"

They had done the all things they had originally set out to do like find clothes and eat delicious food. Now? They were just aimlessly walking about without knowing where hey wanted to go. Despite Seunghee's outburst of confidence from a few hours before and immediately declaring Arin as her partner, she now felt awkward and frustrated and extremely distant from her. Seunghee began to overthink many things. She thought about what Arin would like. Did she want to be out in the fresh air or did she prefer in airconditioned indoors? She wondered about Arin wanted to do. Did she want to go watch a movie or go to the pet store? She thought and thought about whether Arin wanted to be with her or not. That was the thing Seunghee worried about the most. She just kept asking more questions and couldn't answer any of these. She simply wound up scratching her head in frustration.

"Your hair is a mess already, Seunghee," Arin said quietly.

"E-Eh? It is?" Seunghee stammered.

She glanced at one of the glass walls and immediately saw her terrible hair. She glanced at Arin who looked at her quietly. Seunghee coughed and began laughing extremely loud.

"Ah, well, it's a good look on me, don'cha think?" Seunghee grinned.

Despite saying that, she was deperately trying to fix her hair because deep inside, Seunghee was dying of embarrassment.

"You've been doing it for a while now," Arin said carefully.

"Ah, well, my hand can't help doing it," Seunghee said defensively, a little too harshly. 

Arin flinched. Seunghee sopped trying to fix her hair. She immediately felt sorry for snapping. It wasn't like she meant to sound so sharp but it just came out like that. Seunghee's heart sank. She was never good at interacting with people. Maybe it was her defense mechanism or something but it definitely didn't help her make friends. People always saw her as cocky or overly aggressive and Seunghee never really bothered to correct them. In the end, she just kept growing into a big ball of frustration. Even now, with someone as gentle as Arin, she had lashed out. Seunghee sighed, trying to cool down her hot head.

"Sorry," Seunghee breathed out.

She had said it so softly, as if she never even said anything in the first place. Seunghee was surprised when she felt Arin's cool hand in hers.

"Then maybe I could hold your hand to preoccupy it?" Arin suggested.

It was as if the simple coolness of Arin's hand negated all of the red, hot feelings that was inside of Seunghee. All she could do was nod. She saw Arin smile. Her smile looked different, as if she was content with something. Seunghee wanted to stare at it longer but Arin turned away, looking at something that had caught her eye. Seunghee's eyes followed Arin's gaze over to where a large, colorful, extremely bouncy-looking castle stood. It had children laughing and bouncing all over it. The children's laughter seemed to echo in Seunghee's ears.

"Seunghee unnie! Seunghee unnie, let's go play!"

"Seunghee, are you listening?"

"I- uh! Ta-"

"Seunghee, I want to play on that!"

Seunghee finally realized that it was Arin. Arin was asking her to play on the castle thing. Seunghee realized her heart was beating really fast. Focusing on Arin, she saw that her eyes were twinkling in excitement. Arin's hand kept tugging on Seunghee's. 

"Aaaah, she's so cute~!!!" Seunghee smiled to herself.

"Alright, let's go see how much it is," Seunghee said gently.

Seunghee wasn't sure of who led the way but it didn't matter. They were both heading in the same direction, together.

"Hey, how much is the entrance for this thing?" Seunghee asked, trying to look tall.

All her doubt from a while ago was shoved back and she channeled all the confidence she could have just to ask how much it was to get on this thing. It was weird, trying to summon everythign she had jsut for one simple thing, but Seunghee didn't mind at all.

"Ah, it's 20 bucks for an hour," he guy drawled. Looking closely at them he said, "Aren't you two a little... old for this?"

"You would think that maybe he'd ask about how messy your hair was instead," Arin laughed to herself.

"Hey, not funny kid," Seunghee pouted playfully, giving her hair one final brush. Seunghee turned back to the guy.

"Here's your 40 bucks, dude. Just take it."

Seunghee slammed the bills into his palm and stalked off, dragging Arin with her. The guy just watched them enter, scratching his head.

"Don't forget to take off your shoes!" he called out.

After a shrug, he soon forgot all about them.

Arin and Seunghee excitedly shook off their shoes and body slammed themselves into the bounce house/castle/thing. There were some adults monitoring kids who gave them curious and somewhat dissaproving stares but they ignored it all. They rolled about, bounced way too high and laughed extremely loud. Seunghee loved hearing Arin's high frequency squeals even she felt like she would never be able to hear anything again. The next thing they knew, they were both breathing really hard.

"Hey, Seunghee?" Arin smiled, her eyes sort of disappearing.

Seunghee found that so adorable.

"Mm, what is it?"

"Do you want to rest up there?"

Arin was pointed to the upper part of teh castle, the unnel leading to the slide. 

"Last one there's a rotten egg!" Seunghee cried out.

The two laughed and stumbled as they tried to reach the top first. It was pretty empty since the children weren't using the slide that much or probably their parents wouldnt let them. Either way, Seunghee and Arin were left in the semi darkness by themselves, the outside world a bit muffled so they could just focus on listening to each others' heavy breathing. Seunghee was surprised as she felt Arin's head on her shoulder. Looking down, she saw Arin's eyes flutter closed and she saw the little smile resting on her lips.

"Seunghee?" Arin asked, eyes still closed.

"Mm?" Seunghee hummed.

"Is there anybody you miss?"

"Well, yes, there is," Seunghee answered truthfully.

Seunghee was a little startled by the sudden question though. Where did it come from?

"Is it Taro?"

Seunghee would have jumped a bit if Arin wasn't leaning on her.

"H-How did you know?"

"You've been saying that name in your sleep for a while. Who is he?"

Seunghee thought about it for a bit. How could she explain who Taro was? Not wanting to leave Arin waiting she replied with whatever was on her mind.

"Taro is... a lot like you. A gentle kid. He'd kinda follow me around. There was a time when he got into a bit of trouble and I tried to help him out."

"Wow, that sounds pretty heroic," Arin said in admiration.

Seunghee gave a short laugh.

"Far from it. I didn't do much, really. He ended up getting caught in the mess I made trying to help and he ended up... getting hurt. He still thought I was the best thing ever though. He was really... the only one who ever.. thought.. I was worth something..." she trailed off, voice getting weaker.

Seunghee sighed, turning away from Arin. Whatever kind of face she was making right now, she didn't want Arin to see it.

"Is he alright now?" Arin asked, sitting up.

"I wouldn't know," Seunghee mumbled. "I got sent away to the company. Those guys told the people in charge of the orphanage home that I'd be sent to a reform center or something."

"Well, I think you are a bit better than from when we first met," Arin mused.

"In what way!?" Seunghee asked, surprised.

"Well, you used to be a lot more arrogant and self centered," Arin laughed.

"I-I wasn't r-really-!" Seunghee stammered, turning red.

"Really..? Or maybe you've just got some sort of facade on but you're actually not all tough as you seem. You've got a soft side for Taro." 

"Well..."

"Well?" Arin retorted, a little challenging note in her question.

"I've got a soft spot for you too," Seunghee smirked.

"Is it because I remind you of Taro?" Arin said, completely unmoved.

"Mm, it could be a part of it," Seunghee said, unbothered with how it didn't affect Arin too much. "But no two people are alike, you know. I'd miss you, Arin, even if I got reunited with Taro."

Arin was quiet and, in the dim light, Seunghee couldn't see the faint pink spreading across Arin's face.

"If we happen to get separated, don't miss me," Arin said seriously.

"Hm?" Seunghee hummed curiously.

"Find me."

Seunghee's eyes widened as she tried to find Arin's eyes in the dim light. When their eyes met, Arin and Seunghee broke out into a wide smile at the same time.

"Yeah, I'll do that," Seunghee said, nodding.

Somewhere in the mall, a song starts playing loud enough for them to hear.

From the moon to the stars

"Do you know this song?" Arin asked.

While lingering in the universe

"Not really," Seunghee replied.

We got to know each other

They stopped talking and somehow inched closer together, moving smoothly like the song.

We slide on the paint

Somehow, their fingers are right next to each other, almost touching.

That spread while

Their space between their fingers have enough room for each other.

drawing, drawing

Their hands find themselves naturally intertwined.

The song continues to play as Seunghee whispers, loud enough for Arin to hear:

"No matter where you are in this universe, I'll draw a line on that white canvas to pull you closer to me."

"Those men are here too. Will they be alright?" Archer asked.

"Well, they'll have to. Looks like they're gonna pop the Moon Bounce, what a shame," the boss said, her chin resting in her hand, arm propped against the table.

"We could take care of this ourselves, you know. It would save everybody some trouble," Archer suggested unconvincingly.

"We could... but this is not our problem. Let's go find the others. This story's wrapping up."

"You're right," he agreed. "But... It was quite a lovely scene though," he said in a low voice.

Standing up from table, the boss gave one final look at the bounce house.

"It was."

With that, the two walked away and set off to spy on the next lucky pair.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Sorry for the long wait! I just haven't been inspired enough to write well :<

The featured song in this chapter is called Daybreak by Nuest (Minhyun and JR).

Author, out ;)