Time passed by quickly and before one realized, it was already Kyungil’s enlistment day. Since he had to leave early in the morning, the twins and Jun bid him farewell the previous evening itself. However, Hae Rin couldn’t sleep well that night and hence, she woke up early and decided to accompany Mr. & Mrs. Song if they let her.

When Mr. Kang drove his daughter over to the Songs’ residence, they almost immediately agreed to take her along with them. Mr. Kang patted the boy’s back and wished him luck while they all got into the car. Hae Rin beamed, noticing the watch on Kyungil’s wrist after he got in the car.

When they reached the place, they all stood in front of the camp, waiting for the gate to open. Mr. and Mrs. Song kept giving him some advice, especially Mrs. Song while Hae Rin just stood there in silence.

“Hey Kiddo, why are you standing there in silence?” Kyungil asked her after a while, when it looked like Mrs. Song was finally done with her advice. Hae Rin simply shook her head. “Is everything okay?” he inquired looking at her expression change.

“I’m alright, oppa. It just feels weird that I won’t be seeing you for two years,” she said, blinking back her tears.

“Come here,” he motioned her to get closer and hugged her, “Don’t cry. I’m sure we’ll be able to meet frequently after the training period. I’m going to serve as a conscripted policeman, remember?”

“I will miss you oppa,” she whispered against his torso, still hugging him tight. Although he looked a bit weird with his new buzz cut but strangely, she has started feeling all jittery and giddy whenever she was with him.

“I’ll miss you too, kiddo,” she immediately let go of him and glared at him with a pout, upon hearing him call her a kiddo. However, he simply laughed at her reaction. “Oh, I need you to promise me something,” he held out his pinky towards her while she gave him a weird look.

He chuckled, “It’s nothing weird. I just want you to not mind what others say,” she looked at him confused. “Just continue to enjoy eating whatever you like. Just eat and exercise like we usually do, alright?” she nodded, “Promise me then,” he firmly held his little finger in front of her.

Her smile widened, before linking her pinky with his and pressed her thumb against his, sealing the deal. “Remember the promise. Else, you’d have to face the consequence the next time we see each other.” He said in an intimidating tone, however, she simply laughed out loud.

The gate opened, and someone announced the recruits to report in. “I gotta go, but kiddo, work hard and play hard in high school, okay? I’ll see you again soon.” He ruffled her hair, before turning to his parents and hugging them both tightly. Then he waved at them before heading in.

“Yah! Were you crying?” was the first thing Hae Jin asked Hae Rin, as the latter entered the room. “Rin, do you like Kyungil oppa?” Hae Jin continued when she saw her ignore her.

Hae Rin changed into her home clothes before heading straight to bed, “I’m tired. So don’t disturb me while I sleep,” she pulled the cover over her head and ignored Hae Jin.

As the High School has already started, the twins were once again in different classes this academic year as well. Luckily, Hae Rin still had Da Yeong in her class. However, Benji was in a different class. Still they all met during the lunch break, or after school got over.

Since school began, she couldn’t meet up with Aiden that frequently as she was subjected to heavy loads of school work most of the time. Even when they met, she couldn’t help but work on her assignments. Nonetheless, she still made time to make a farewell gift to him.

On the day Aiden was returning to his home country, Hae Rin handed him her gifts, a photo album of their time together and some Korean books that could help him with learning the language along with some personal notes explaining some difficult points. She hugged him tightly as she bid him farewell.

For the first few days, the two couldn’t chat with each other, the reason mostly being Aiden too busy getting used to his new school and the school works. Nearly two weeks later, he arranged for a video chat schedule with Hae Rin. From then on, the two frequently made plans to chat, even if it meant ungodly hours for either of them. On one such chat, Aiden hesitatingly brought up something, “Do you still like me, Hae Rin?”

“Of course, I like you”

“Then do you like, Kyungil?”

“What?”

“Answer me, please”

“I like Kyungil oppa, too” she replied after a momentary pause, “but –” she started but Aiden cut in.

“Who do you like more?”

“Oppa is oppa, you are you and I like you both in different ways.”

“Alright, I’ll change the question then. Let’s imagine the three of us are in a sinking boat and there’s only two lifejackets. So, you wear one, and then who will you give the other lifejacket to?”

“Are we like in the middle of the ocean, with no lands as far as one could see?” he shrugged, “Well, doesn’t matter. I’ll give the lifejackets to you both.”

His eyes widened hearing that, “Oh God, Hae Rin! You gotta think of saving yourself too.” It was now Hae Rin’s turn to shrug, “You’ll probably give me a similar answer even if I gave you a different life saving scenario, right?” Hae Rin simply scratched the back of her neck. “I’m not trying to find any faults here, Hae Rin. I just want you to give this a bit more thoughts. I want you to look into your feelings honestly without worrying about hurting me or anyone else.”

Aiden said they should take some time off until they were sure of what they wanted and until then, he wanted to keep away from all forms of contact. Initially, it was hard on Hae Rin to stay out of contact but the more she kept away from Aiden, the more she realized what her true feelings were. And the more the realization was, the more she drowned in guilt.

And the next time she contacted him, she brawled her eyes out for hours together. “Don’t cry, Hae. It’s okay. Feelings change, especially at our age. It’s no one’s fault. You neither took my feelings lightly when we dated nor did you cheat. That speaks for everything. Although it’s been a short time, I’m glad to have known you.”

“Is this the last time we will be talking? I wish we could still be friends,” she mumbled in between her sobs.

Aiden chuckled hearing that, “If we stop talking, then who will teach me Korean for free?” A chuckle escaped from Hae Rin’s mouth, before her crying turned into sniffles.

After speaking for a few more minutes, they disconnected the call after he reassured her to stay in contact. Hae Rin felt like a huge weight has been lifted off her shoulders. But, even though Aiden said they would stay in touch, she still couldn’t get in touch with him for the next month or two, although he did message her once or twice to let her know he was preoccupied with school, she was still worried.

Meanwhile, it was already summer holidays in Korea and during them, Benji and Da Yeong started going out. However, the two tried to always include Hae Rin in their plans. They knew she would be really alone since they were her only friends and so, neither minded that they couldn’t have a date night. They did their best to go on dates on the day Hae Rin had her part-time job.

Around two weeks into the summer holiday, Aiden contacted Hae Rin again and apologized for not contacting her for so long. Then they chatted for a while, then helped each other with their respective language learning and this continued on for a while during the break.

Although, Hae Rin was aware that there was no chance for her to date Kyungil, she still diligently followed all the promises she made to him. She ate well, continued with her martial arts practice, and tried her best to tune out the haters’ remarks. She also wrote Kyungil some letters that she posted every now and then.

Meanwhile, Hae Jin was going around participating in dance competitions and winning a few trophies. She not only excelled in that, but also in some boxing tournaments that she participated. At the same time, she did fairly in the academics too. And Jun followed nearly every footsteps of hers.

A few months after the school began again following the end of the summer vacation, an upperclassman approached Hae Rin and introduced himself. He said he liked her and would like to get acquainted to her.

Initially, Hae Rin said she was not interested in him. But he suggested that she at least try getting to know him and that he wouldn’t bother her if she didn’t happen to be interested in him even after that. He also asked her to give this some thinking before answering. She has seen him around the school campus a few times and he seemed like a nice guy. So she agreed to give his suggestion some thought before she decided on what to do. While she did so, he patiently waited for her answer.

No matter how nice of a guy he seemed, she still couldn’t bring herself to like him. Her heart has already gone to someone else. So she didn’t want to lead him on unnecessarily, as that would only end up hurting him more.

However, even after getting rejected by her, the guy continued to acknowledge her presence in the school ground and treated her gently while interacting with her. At times, he gave some chocolates, snacks etc. albeit her hesitating and refusing to accept them. He said it’s just his token of friendship.

A few months later, Kyungil came home on his first holiday and his mom cooked a feast nearly for the entire town. Although it was a bit of an exaggeration, she really did it on a big scale. And before he left back, he invited them all to a military event that his unit would be participating in.

On the day of the event, Hae Rin, Hae Jin and Jun accompanied Kyungil’s parents to the event. At the event place, the kids decided to look around the ground a bit more during the short breaks between the performances. There were a few food stalls. Hae Rin excused herself to use the restroom while Hae Jin and Jun ate at the stalls.

When she walked out, she was confused on which direction to take, but soon spotted Kyungil a few feet away with the group of people he had just performed with. Earlier when they arrived, Kyungil introduced those people to his family and them.

Just as she neared them, she heard her name being mentioned by someone in the group, so she stopped in her track, abruptly. “Doesn’t that high schooler like you?” one of the guys in the group asked while Kyungil remained silent, “Oh come on! Don’t act like you didn’t know it.” He commented.

“She’s just having a crush. She’ll get over it. Why do you care anyway?” Kyungil questioned, not sparing him a glance.

The guys still ignored Kyungil’s action and continued joking among them a bit more while Kyungil grit his teeth and held back his anger. However, a guy suddenly asked, “Kyungil-sshi, be frank with us. You’re grooming her now, so you could eat her up in a few years, aren’t you?”

Kyungil stood up in anger and was about to pounce on the guy but was held back by the tall, handsome guy who sitting beside him. Even though Kyungil was commanding the guy to let him go, he refused to do so, “It’s not worth it,” the guy said, before turning towards the other guy, “You did take it way out of line this time.” He looked at the guy with disdain, before his eyes noticed Hae Rin standing at a distance.

Upon locking eyes with the guy, Hae Rin quickly composed herself and bowed her head slightly with a smile, acting as if she has just come there. The tall guy whispered something into the ears of the still furious Kyungil, who quickly stood up straight and looked around, before noticing her and quickly marching in her direction.

He looked really troubled, standing in front of her. He seemed like he was struggling to say the right thing. However, she acted as if she has just gotten there and feigned ignorance.

Ever since Hae Rin overheard the way the boys spoke of Kyungil and her, she had been greatly confused, disturbed and shaken. She didn’t like how those guys spoke ill of Kyungil even when he had nothing to do with her one-sided crush on him.

She wasn’t sure of whom to talk about this issue with, her sister’s reaction was obvious and she wasn’t willing to sacrifice Da Yeong and Benji’s time any more than what they had already been sacrificing for her. The only other person who was good at