Still With You [2/?] - A Date

Author's Notes: This was inspired very very loosely by this article: http:// bumsso. wordpress. com /2009/12/03/ kim-so-eun-supports-bisang/

Very very loosely, because when I read the article, I've finished ¾ of this chapter. Also, this chapter is somewhat detached from the previous one. Treat it as a scene that happened before any of this whole storyline takes place. 

…

“I don't like this. I don't like this at all.”

Kim Bum looked at his girlfriend across the table. If she just wasn't very upset with their current situation, he knew he would've laughed at her getup — her head was covered in a shawl in a way that it was only and eyes which were peeking at him.

“You look fine,” he said, grinning.

“No, I look ridiculous,” Kim So Eun hissed, her eyes glaring at him. “I can't believe you. Why did you have to bring me here of all places?”

“What's wrong with this place?” he said. His eyes took a quick survey of the spacious restaurant, full of people talking to themselves, minding their own business. Nobody seemed to be paying them any attention.

“It's nice,” So Eun commented. “But it's public. Much too public for us.”

“No one's watching us. And besides, I thought you wanted to come here. You were talking about it in Korea.” He cleared his throat and started talking in almost perfect mimicry of her tone. “Bum-ah, have you heard about The Lobster Shack in Shanghai? They say the food there is delicious. We should eat there some—”

“Okay, okay, stop,” she said, smiling slightly. She positioned an elbow atop the table and put a hand under her chin as she gazed outside the restaurant's glass walls. “Are you not afraid of being recognized around here? You're an actor. Girls hang posters of you on their bedroom walls.” She proceeded to stare down two girls whom she thought were looking at Kim Bum. The action didn't go unnoticed by her boyfriend, who smirked a little at her reaction.

“Awfully protective of me, aren't you?” he teased. He took a sip from his water glass. “Do you hang a poster of me on your bedroom wall too?”

“Why would I?” she snorted. “I get to kiss the real thing anyway.”

Kim Bum, who was totally caught offguard by her declaration, snorted his water right out of his nose.

He found it annoying to see Kim So Eun red in the face, her shawl loosening up a little, trying to stifle her laughter as she wiped away moisture around his mouth and nose with a napkin. It's a good thing the water didn't drip on his suit; it was new and he valued it too much since it's something So Eun bought for him while they were shopping around Shanghai the day before. He looked to his left and right. Thankfully, no one noticed the incident.

“It's not funny,” he lamented while she laughed some more. “Go on. If you won't stop laughing, I'll kiss you.”

Her expression instantly turned sour as she covered with her hands and made her laughter die down. He smirked. He was sure her cheeks were flaming red behind her shawl.

“Since when did you become so afraid of being in the news?” he asked.

“A long time ago. When we started...” she trailed off.

“What's so embarrassing about being with me?”

She only rolled her eyes, looked in either direction of her and huffed. “What's taking the waitress so long anyway?”

“It's been only seven minutes, So Eun-ah. This isn't fastfood.”

She let out an audible sigh as she caught yet another pair of girls stealing glances at her boyfriend from outside. “I think you need this shawl more than I do.”

Kim Bum smiled at her distress. “Just ignore them.”

“That's proving a little difficult to do right now.”

He leaned back in his seat and held out a hand. “You're right. You really have to remove that shawl. It's getting in the way.”

She scowled. “You said I look fine.”

“You look fine.” He gave her a smirk. “The problem is, it would be difficult to steal kisses with all that stuff—” he made a vague gesture at her cover-up “covering all the parts that should be kissed.”

Right then and there, a flash of light went off. A camera, he thought. Concerned about So Eun, Kim Bum instinctively reached across the table and took her hand. He also did it partly because he was afraid she would run off somewhere and hide.

“What was that?” Kim So Eun whispered. She looked around her hurriedly, alarmed.

Soothingly, he murmured, “It was nothing. It's okay.”

“It's gonna be in the news again, Bum-ah.”

“No, it isn't,” he insisted, running a hand up and down her lower arm, trying to calm her down.

“I want my lobster!” she whined. “Bum-ah!”

He looked behind So Eun and saw their waitress coming their way, a large, covered plate in her hands. “Your lobster's here.” He smiled.

...

Kim So Eun turned out to be right. That night, the local TV news station aired footage of Kim Bum, the Korean actor, out on a date with an unknown girl in a blue shawl. “Kim Bum looked really smitten. Whoever she is, she's one lucky girl,” the reporter said. “Sorry, girls. Looks like our Bummie is out of the market, maybe for the meantime."

Hopefully forever, Kim Bum thought as he turned of the TV. He looked at a sleeping So Eun in his arms, and pushed a stray lock of her hair behind an ear.

“Good night, Jagiya,” he whispered, planting a soft kiss on her forehead.

He might've imagined it if he wasn't watching her closely, but So Eun's breathing had changed; she shifted ever so slightly and mumbled unintelligible words in her peaceful slumber. And then he felt as if all else had faded into the background, when he heard clearly the single sweetest declaration in the world...

“Bum-ah... saranghae.”

He definitely slept with sweet dreams that night.

…