sixteen

“Did you send her home?”

“Jongin…you scared me.” Mrs. Kim exclaimed, sighing heavily as she walked further into the apartment, coming to her son who was standing in the door frame of his room – probably getting out just the moment he heard the front door opening and her footsteps coming.

“Yes, I send Yeoreum back home. It’s going to be a stormy night, her family would be worried sick if she wasn’t home, right?”

Jongin’s lashes fluttered as he stared at nothing.

“You go inside and I will bring your dinner afterwards, okay?”

Jongin didn’t even bother to reply to his mother as his hands silently searched for his ways back into the room. He let out a shaky sigh, hearing another set of thunder and clenched his jaw.

Knowing that Yeoreum was already gone and wasn’t with him somehow makes his heart dropped because he wasn’t ready to have her go home yet – not when the weather was not on his good side.

Oh, just by hearing those thunders and droplets of rains outside makes him wanted her even more – wanted nothing but her hold against him and her sweet warmth and her silence comforting sounds – he wanted everything – he wanted her.

It’s funny how he finds her so comforting and needed her so much for just that simple act – just wanting her near him, during the bad nights even though they had just gotten to know each other for a couple of months. Even her mother didn’t give that kind of impact on him – sure, he found comfort in his own mother, who wouldn’t? But with Yeoreum, it’s different and he didn’t even know how to describe it.

It’s just complicated.

He took a deep sigh, taking a seat on his bed.

It’s going to be a long night and he hoped that it will be over soon so that he could have Yeoreum with him again in the next morning.

“I can’t do it.” Yeoreum swallowed hard as she felt her heart swelled heavily, not liking the sudden news.

“Oh, come on…I thought you hated that blind boy.”

She pressed the phone closer to her ears, listening to her friend’s steady voice. “I don’t hate him. Jongin is…”

“…is…?” Eunhui pressed on her words and Yeoreum didn’t know whether it was the right thing to rant to her friend about how she hated the fact that she was being fired for taking care of Jongin.

But she needed to rant to someone and the moment she reached the house after Mrs. Kim had sent her home, she had called her friend, wanting to rant and maybe get a bit of advices – though she was regretted it a bit because Eunhui was someone who at giving advices and making choices.

“…is someone that I don’t want to part with, at least not now…when we…” she sighed.

And the thing with Eunhui, even though she at helping people making life choices and giving a good advices, she was a good friend who listened well and that’s why Yeoreum spent hours on the phone talking with her about Jongin, just describing him with all her might and by the time she finished ranting, Eunhui just snorted out loud.

“It seems to me that you really cherish him.”

“I know, and I’m so scared because of that. I mean, don’t you think it’s too early for this kind of ?”

“Okay, what is your definition of early actually? How early is too early? If it wants to happen, it happens. You don’t control it.”

“But…” Yeoreum bit her lips.

“Yeo, if you really don’t want to part away from him just yet…then don’t.”

Yeoreum frowned at the words. She looked at the sky, noticing that the cold storms slowly starting to fade out yet – her worries for Jongin were still there.

She should have stayed with him.

Yeoreum felt like the next day – feeling like a big chunk of her had being ripped apart without her consent and it was leaving a big hole in it and she didn’t know what to put there to make it feel less empty.

She felt dreaded.

It was her number one wishes to finally finish the job on taking care of the blind boy – yet, she didn’t want that anymore.

Not after they had something going on between them that still didn’t quite have a label yet.

And the thought of having to walk out from Jongin’s life sounded foreign to her and she didn’t want it. But she couldn’t change it – it wasn’t her decision to be considered, thus – there she was, sighing all the way as she tried to numb the breaking feeling that she was having inside and tried very hard to sound happy.

The weather was great, unlike her dreaded feelings – as if mocking her with its beaming rays of sunshine and slow soft wind that it was so great and perfect that Yeoreum was sighing the whole time.

And to make it worse, Jongin seemed so pleased the moment she was in the house, already smiling even though he also looked like a – a handsome , and immediately – she was trapped with guilt because the boy didn’t even know anything and was so happy by the thought of meeting her while she was forcing herself to stay like the usual because she doesn’t want him to know.

Jongin doesn’t know.

He doesn’t know that – that day was her last day. She forced Mrs. Kim to not say anything to the boy and promised herself to not say anything too. Because she doesn’t want him to know. She doesn’t want to bear the thought of him saddening – though she doubted that he will feel that way.

But still…

“Hey…”

“For once, you’re early.”

She would have rolled her eyes usually at those kind of remarks, but she was too overwhelmed with her feelings that she just ignored that and forced a smile, eyes wavering when she walked inside.

“And you have a problem with that, pretty boy?” Yeoreum let her bag dropped on the coffee table that was in the living room.

“No.” Jongin buried his face under his arms that were on the kitchen counter and she smiled softly when she heard another mumble coming from him under the arms.

“It would be better if you come early like this every day.”

There was an awful feeling in her guts after processing what he had just said – knowing that it wouldn’t matter anymore if she comes late or early the next time – because, well – it was her last day anyway and she swallowed that thoughts down, walking into the kitchen where the boy was waiting for her.

“Why are you here, Jongin?” she sighed.

It’s not like she doesn’t like seeing him first thing first the moment she stepped into the apartment, but she knew why he would always came and sit in the kitchen counter waiting for her –

“Don’t say you couldn’t sleep and you’re waiting for me?”

Jongin raised his face, having a small line of smile on his lips as he leaned down his right cheek on his arms. “You already have the answer, why bother asking?”

Her shoulders slumped, suddenly feeling another set of dreadfulness at what he was feeling and she couldn’t help but to feel that it was her fault – for leaving him last night while the storm was still outside. She knew she should have stayed.

“Well…” she pressed her lips tight – throwing away the thoughts about wanting to apologize for leaving him last night because she knew that he would be telling her stop feeling sorry for him and acting so positive and s.

Typical Jongin.

“Let’s get your breakfast ready then…so you can go back to sleep.”

Jongin snorted, eyes still closing as he leaned on his arms. His ears perked at the sound of her movements, guessing what she was doing.

He knew that she was brewing the coffee because he suddenly could smell the aroma of the coffee that he always adores and he unknowingly smiled. The sounds of his kitchen cabinet and his fridge being opened hinted him that Han Yeoreum was starting to make the breakfast and he just smiled, closing his eyes as he listened to every movement that she was making.

And it was the coffee aroma and the delicious smell of the girl’s signature toast that makes Jongin slowly woken up from his light nap and he was smiling immediately when he heard the chair being pulled in front of him and he knew that she was sitting in front of him like the usual.

“I made you, my usual toast and…your usual espresso.” Yeoreum said, angling his hands to where the food and drink was – though Jongin didn’t really mind that and just went for the coffee instead, making her rolled her eyes at that.

“And of course, you only drink your stupid espresso.”

Jongin frowned in disagreement, slowly letting the espresso away from his mouth before he spoke, “It’s not stupid.”

He took a sip.

Yeoreum sighed fondly at him, having a stupid smile on her face. It’s weird how it’s always the small things that makes her adore him so much – like, his addiction to that drink and how he wanted everything but his mother’s healthy meal diet and somehow those things seemed so small and didn’t matter – but it brought smiles to his face and she would give him the same thing every day just to see that pure bliss on his face and would be feeling content at knowing he was happy because of that.

Though, if he became so addictive to it – she would stop giving him that, because he could die and she didn’t want that to happen.

“Still…I don’t understand why you have to drink it. I mean, you have trouble sleeping…then why bother drinking it?”

“Caffeine actually does nothing to me.” Jongin admitted as his hand searched for the counter to place back the drink.

“I could still be drinking tons of that and I could be sleeping like a log in the next seconds.”

Yeoreum hummed, staring at how he slowly searching for the food. “But still…”

He clacked his tongue. “Why are you so nosy about my coffee intake?”

She frowned. “I don’t know… it’s something about your obsession towards coffee that makes me interested and think that it’s ing dangerous and you could kill yourself.”

Jongin snorted, “I’m not obsessed…”

He popped the toast that he had ripped in small pieces into his mouth. “…it’s like, a habit you know. I always had coffee before anything. It makes me start my day.”

“And…kinda helps me through the ty day.”

“Well, I only had coffee before any of classes because…well, people and stress.”

“Same!” Jongin exclaimed, eyes wide in excitement although he was staring at the blank spot of nothing.

“I always drink coffee before classes because…my classes are s. I have to go through a lot. Do you know that Architecture is ing hard? I kept wondering why I turned down to take the Business course, because that’s much easier.”

Yeoreum laughed, somehow find it funny how Jongin suddenly ranting out for the first time about other thing rather than food and his coffee. And she took the chance to ask why he turned down the offer to take the Business course which he just replied with,

“I like to build things, like…I love to create something and I want to see people be using it, and be happy because of it and I guess I find it cool that people can create cool buildings and stuff.” He popped another piece of toast in his mouth.

“My dad wants me to be in the business stuff because he wanted me to be like him. That’s cool too, but I love Architecture more.” He shrugged.

“I guess I can see that since Chanyeol told me that you’re one of the top students.”

He snorted, almost chocking on his own spit. “Nah, he’s just bad at Architecture…that’s why he thinks everyone is top students.” He munched on the toast.

“The only think he cares about is his music.”

Chanyeol loves his music – Jongin said, bragging about his friend and she smiled, noticing the proud lo