As she stepped out of the taxi and paid the man his last fees, she wondered why she was even doing all this. After all, friends come and go, even childhood ones. Despite how close they all were, it was natural for people to move on. That’s where the problem was though. It was natural for people to grow apart, but when you grow up knowing that your own family never wanted you… well, then the three boys who slowly became your best friends take on more importance. They become family that you absolutely must not let go of. Min Ah sighed and in that moment she could understand why he hadn’t wanted to see her. Rational thought told her that since she understood she should leave him alone, but she was never one to listen to rationality when they were involved. Even as she thought about their life she couldn’t help, but wonder how different things would have been if she had simply stayed all those years ago.

It was a special kind of selfish guilt.

The type that made her feel responsible for the way the choices they had made… but mostly because it gave her an excuse to stay. She wasn’t ready to let go and so even she clung onto every single reason to stick around.

“What are you doing here…?” Tao said in surprise as he opened the door to see Min Ah standing there. Her head hung low and her finger still on the doorbell.

“You said I should come and I— I couldn’t just leave like that” She said quietly.

The dark haired man glanced behind him and for the first time when it came to her, he hesitated. He had been so sure that her presence would change everything for the better, but for the first time he had finally come to realize how unpredictable the results from her presence could really be. His hand tightened on the doorknob as he pulled it back wider and stepped back allowing her enough room to come in.

“I’ll go tell him you’re here. It’s not like I can keep that a secret I guess” He said with a small smile though he desperately wished he could.

The guys in the living room spared her nothing past a curious glance as they each returned to their own business. Min Ah followed Tao inside the large house and wondered how long they had been staying here. It wasn’t in bad shape, it actually looked expensive. She could have tried to figure out how much it was, but she didn’t want to know where they had gotten the money to pay for it in the first place. So she followed Tao silently down a small hallway and up some wooden stairs that groaned under their weight.

Their steps froze in place when there was a loud crash from behind one of the closed doors. Tao hesitated as he turned quickly to Min Ah.

“Stay here. I’ll let you know when you can come in” He said hurriedly as he took a few long strides and walked into the second door on the right, slamming it shut behind him.

She stood in place awkwardly as she wondered what was going on. She frowned as muffled voices made their way through the hall until another crash and two more yells burst their way out. Min Ah jumped in surprise suddenly recognizing the other one a Jong In’s. Impulse forced her legs to move forward. It pushed her to make that barely courteous knock on the door before pushing it open with disregard to how intrusive she was being. With a nervous look on her face she took in the scene before her. Tao stood between the two men. Wu Fan stood furiously to the side, his face flushed red with rage and his fists clenched tight. Meanwhile, Jong In was on the ground. His back was against the wall, old books scattered on the ground from the impact he had made with the bookshelf behind. He looked at Min Ah with fear in his eyes as he held his hand on his chest. She couldn’t tell if the fear was for her or himself.

“He’s not fully recovered” She said hollowly to no one in particular, “He was hurt really badly in when he was arrested. His ribs were broken. Physical… altercations like that will hurt him even more”

“Get out” He said icily.

“He was in hospital for a while. He needs to be extra careful” She said as her steps echoed on the floor while she went over to Jong In and placed a trembling hand on his arms and helped him up. Why was she so nervous? Why was she saying such nonsense? She didn’t know how to talk to him.

“Get. OUT.” He hissed, taking a menacing step forward.

“It wasn’t his fault I showed up here. I promised him I wouldn’t, but I still came here. He tried to get me to leave. You can’t blame him for my choices Wu Fan” She said firmly, taking a protective step in front of Jong In yet still failing to lift her gaze past his nose.

“That name, you have no right to say it. That boy is long gone and it’s about time you realized that. You want to talk? Fine. Then you can answer the questions Jong In didn’t” He snapped his annoyance plain on his voice, “You two get out”

“Maybe it’s better if we stay…” Tao said uncertainly.

“It’s fine” Min Ah cut in, interrupting the order about to come from Kris’ lips.

They both hesitated before walking out the door. She glanced and caught Jong In’s worried glance as they closed the door and suddenly it was just her and him.

“I want to know what happened in Korea. How did you and Jong In meet? How did he get out of that? Did you help him?” He asked quickly.

“If I answer your questions will you answer mine?” She asked, finally raising her gaze and meeting his.

“No, but if you don’t answer my questions Jong In will… eventually”

“Stop it. Stop picking on him alright?!” She snapped the image of Jong In in the hospital flashing past her and making her angry, “I work for the police. The only reason I ever found Jong In was because my team was assigned to catch the elusive exo” She snapped.

“Ha, he brought a cop home… What do you want?” He said, his tone serious as he registered the words she was saying. She was far more dangerous than he had originally thought.

“I have another week. I want you to give me a chance” She said quietly. His eyes tightened as he tensed up. Was she asking for too much? But this was her only chance her only bargaining chip, “If you can do that and still don’t want me around I’ll forget everything I know about you guys”

“How can I trust you’ll keep your word?” He asked, gears turning in his head as he tried to come up with another way to get out of this. Chances were she would never snitch on them anyways otherwise she already would have, but he couldn’t risk it. Other options were out of the question.

“You just have to take my word for it” She said.

“Stay for a single week then, but you can’t interfere in anything… business related. And please, don’t get in my way. I’ll let you stay, but nothing between us will change”

“Why do you hate me so much?” She whispered suddenly, the words stumbling from her lips uselessly.

Kris closed the gap between them in a few seconds as he grabbed her wrist lightly and pulled her hand up. His eyes examined her hand as he softly rubbed his thumb across her palm. He cocked his head to the side as he moved his eyes to her face and her eyes fluttered nervously. He laughed, it was cruel and unfeeling as the grip tightened on her wrist.

“You know, you’re overcomplicating our lives. Don’t be so egotistical to think that my life revolves around you. The decisions that brought us here had nothing to do you with you. Don’t you understand? I don’t care enough about you to hate you” An arrogant smirk on his face as he settled his cold glare on her.

She wasn’t sure if it existed, but if there was any time to actually feel a heart breaking it would be now. Was he just generally good at hurting people’s feelings? Or was it because he remembered her weaknesses that he was so good at hurting her?

“I didn’t leave because I didn’t care about you guys. I was young and I wanted a family. They were good people who wanted to adopt me. When they took me overseas… that was something I never wanted to happen!” She insisted.

“You wrote a letter the day you left” He said carefully looking down at her, “Tell me, do you remember what you said?”

“…. I said I would come back. When I was an adult I said I would come back on your birthday” Min Ah said in a shaky tone and that was she had meant to do, but then there was that damn accident…

“You left us. We waited for you, don’t you dare act like a victim in this” He snapped as he let go of his hand like it was trash. He turned away and went for the door before pausing, “and don’t call me that name. It’s something no one aside from Tao and Jong In know and I want it to stay that way. It’s Kris now” He said as he slammed the door shut.

“You’re going to be staying here?” Jong In asked as she walked out a few minutes later.

“I guess so” She said with a smile that hid the uncertainty in her face.

“What if nothing works out the way you intended?” He asked.

“Then I haven’t really lost anything. Could things between him and me really get any worse?” She asked with a sigh afterwards.

“Good point… Should I help you push things in your favor?” He said thoughtfully.

Min Ah glanced at him curiously and wondered what on earth he had on his mind.

“I thought you were completely against this?”

“The hardest part is over in my opinion. Nothing went as terribly as I thought. It could still go worse, but at this point I’m not sure what to expect” He answered a bit uneasily, “It looks like Tao was right”

“Right about what?”

“Right about you bringing unpredictable changes. If you were anyone else you would be dead by now to be honest”

~~~~~~

Kris shut and locked the room to his bedroom as he walked comfortably through the darkness and collapsed on his bed. The soft sheets welcomed his body as he lazily kicked off his shoes and slipped off his shirt, throwing it to the side. He laid there motionless as he listened to footsteps and sounds above him and he wondered if any of them were her. If what had happened before wasn’t enough of a sign that it was never meant to be she had gone in the completely opposite direction and become a police officer. He shook his head at her stubbornness of pushing her job to the side for him.

She was risking her entire job for him.

He shut his eyes as fear struck him. Would one week be too long? Could he go that whole week without giving in to her? He had to come up with something. Something that would end those pesky lingering emotions he decided as he closed his eyes and tried to forget how soft her hand was.

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Updated (on time)! Thanks for reading guys! :)