35.

“Then, how was–” the lady pauses, fingers massaging her forehead, earning her husband’s attention to the phone call she is having at the moment. “Alright, Auntie. I’ll check on her later.” She sighs right away as the call ended, placing her cell on the table before turning to the man whose eyes are imploring for an explanation.

Jisoo curls a faint smile, arms reaching for her man’s before she lands her bum right next to the latter.

“It’s Eul, she’s–” her lips pursed, fingers threading through her locks in slight frustration, “–well, something happened in the past and now everything…” She turns to Jinyoung, pouting, “I don’t really have an idea about what’s going on right now, it has become a whole mess.”

Yet Jinyoung stays calm, caressing his lady’s back and hair in hopes that he provides comfort, “Do you want me to tag along?”

“No, it’s okay.” She leans to his broad shoulder, nuzzling her face on that chest, “Eul. I’m really worried about her. She took a very long time recovering from that incident and now it…Jongdae too…”

“You’re really having a hard time explaining this, aren’t you?”

A brittle chuckles escapes from Jisoo’s lips before it eventually turns to a puppy whine and the waterworks unleashed, “I feel really bad for her.” The lady tightens her arms around her husband’s waist, a part of shirt that Jinyoung wears at the moment is now wet with her tears as her words muffled against her man’s torso, “Why it’s always her to have it worse?”

“Don’t say it like that.” More than anyone else, Jinyoung knows how much the lady cares about that one friend of hers as she’d seen Ga Eul gone through ups and downs right in front of her eyes. Imagining the heartbreak that their friend is facing right now must have been pretty devastating for Jisoo too, thus his fingers continue to run through his wife’s locks, planting soft pecks on top of her head in between as he whispers in reassurance, “She’ll be alright. They’ll fix this, and we’ll help her.”

The lady nods a few times as she sniffles before continuing to shed tears in silence for a few more long minutes in Jinyoung’s arms – right until the buzzer of their apartment rings, indicating someone’s presence at the front door. She pulls away almost immediately, sparing a glance towards the door before pivoting to her husband again, who wears quite the same confusion in his face. It takes a few seconds before the buzzer rings once more, this time with a voice greets through the intercom.

“Sorry for coming over unannounced. It’s me.”

Cusses escapes from his mouth as he had almost get tripped over empty beer cans as soon as he enters that wide space, making a few of them scattered away from its plastic bag. His gaze then lifts sharp, darting towards the person who is currently sleeping on the hammock with a winter jacket covering the upper body right up to the face.

“For real?” He narrows his eyes to that static figure of his friend’s, yanking the jacket off the latter’s head and tossing it away. “Do you really have to do it this way? Are you kidding me?”

Baekhyun rolls his eyes, huffing in slight frustration meanwhile the other grunts, ruffling his hair as he sits up straight, looking around half-asleep.

“Don’t even bother…”

“How could I not bother, you little…” The older crosses his arms, still darting a sharp gaze towards Jongdae. “Darn it, Kim Jongdae. Come back to your sense, will you?” He looks around the art studio, sighing, “If you’re going to continue acting this way, at least show it in front of her. Be it protest or something. Not like this…” Baekhyun ambles towards the small refrigerator at the corner of the room, dipping his head to look for a cold drink for himself before finding a mineral water, “….alone. Pathetically.”

Jongdae could only return the sigh before getting off from the hammock and strides towards the door where the cans that his friend kicked just now has rolled to.

“At least I clean up. Except that you made it into a mess–” he pauses just to turn his head and squint at the other, “–by not watching your steps.” Upon that statement, Baekhyun grins sheepishly, making him shakes his head lazily before continuing to face his back at his friend, inserting the cans into that plastic bag all over again. “So you came here just to tell me I look pathetic?”

“Pretty much. More like baring the news that you’re not the only one looking like this.”

Jongdae’s hand halts its movement, tearing his gaze away from the floor yet doesn’t spare a glance towards the older. The former remains investing silence before continuing to pick up the scattered cans, completely ignoring the words from his friend.

“Egoistic bastard,” Baekhyun cusses inaudibly before slamming the bottle to the working desk, pulling the swivel chair from its place for him to sit on.

“The whole time you’re here avoiding everyone, Miss Ga Eul teaches four classes per day, substituting Ms Goh and Mr. Lee for their days off, rolling up that parents-teacher post-exam consultation session the whole day yesterday, submitted the consultation report this morning which she probably worked on the whole night and hell, apparently she’s helping our new accountant too with the financial report before the new session starts this winter break. I heard it from Mrs Ahn herself. Ga Eul comes to the office really early in the morning and get off work at 9 or 10, like an energetic superwoman. More like a madman. At first they were worried too, but she’s acting just fine so everyone ended up thinking everything is okay.”

His hand flies to the forehead, gently massaging the side of it. “And Kim Jongdae, you know better what it means when she acts that way. Not to mention that only five days have passed, no one would know how worse it’d turn out if this goes on for the rest of this month.”

Baekhyun then reaches for the bottle again, chugging the water down his throat whilst his other hand rests on his chest as he murmurs, “God, I’m losing my breath here, trying to catch up with her.”

“So you saw that,” Jongdae finally speaks up as he gets up and ambles to the trash bin, heaves a sigh whilst throwing the rubbish away, “And you do nothing?”

“Excuse me?”

The man turns to face his friend, arms crossed with a sharp, displeased gaze, “You’re the boss, Baekhyun. You could’ve stopped that.”

“Right. Why didn’t I think of that?” Baekhyun squints to the space, humming for a few seconds as if he is really working on that idea. “Oh. Probably because she avoids me at all costs! Don’t dare to say I didn’t try enough, you know how persistent she is.” He scoffs, unamused as the memory of it flashes in his mind. “Wow, I hate that I’m not even kidding now,” he gets up and wags a finger towards the other as he walks past the latter. “So don’t nag me for texting you often because I’m super bored since I have nobody else to tease on daily basis. Or maybe you could consider coming back to the academy.”

“You know I’m tied up with the company for this time being.”

“Start taking calls from your secretary then. Seriously, it gets annoying when Secretary Song wouldn’t stop