“Doctor Kris, your appo-”

“Let her in,” Kris cut his secretary off as he stared at his watch.

A knowing smile came onto Secretary Hong’s lips as she nodded and walked back out. Kris pulled out her file and waited patiently for her to come in.

“Peek a boo!” A tinkling voice squealed as the door opened.

A small smile plastered on Kris’ face as he looked up, “Hello, Hye Mi.”

Hye Mi crinkled up her nose as she came forward, “Oh the formalness.”

Kris chuckled and signed for her to sit down, “How are you feeling today?”

“Hmmm…” Hye Mi tapped her chin, “I feel wonderful.”

“Do you have your results from yesterday’s scan?”

“Ahuh!” Hye Mi nodded and started looking through her handbag, “Here you go!”

Kris took the folder from her and examined it. Hye Mi studied his expression as he read through it carefully. She stared at his slightly parted lips and furrowed eyebrows and giggled. I’ve never realised how handsome my doctor was.

“Hmm… That’s interesting,” Kris said quietly after some time.

Hye Mi’s heart started beating faster as she sat up, “What is…?”

“Your brain tumour…”

She gulped and started tapping her finger against each other, not wanting the nervousness to be shown on her face, “Am I really dying?”

Kris’ lips formed into a big smile and not long after he started laughing, “Nope.”

Hye Mi frowned, “Then what?” There was a tint of hope in her but she knew that it was just a useless hope.

“Your brain tumour hasn’t been growing these past few weeks…” Kris noted as he opened some more files belonging to her, “In fact, it hasn’t been doing anything at all.”

Hye Mi’s eyes widened and she smiled enthusiastically, “What does that mean?!”

Kris noticed her happy expression and couldn’t help but feel relaxed, “It means that your condition isn’t getting any worse, which is a great thing since it means that you are responding well to all the treatments.”

Hye Mi sat there quietly, she didn’t know how to respond. After all these horrifying and painful years of treatments, she had finally got a response, a response that she never expected to receive. After all the needle injections and medicine with disastrous side effects, she was final able to tell herself that it was all worth it. She was finally able to tell herself that all the nights she spent biting onto her pillow and ing about had now paid off. Though she knew that her cancer will never disappear, just hearing that it hadn’t been eating her alive was good enough to make her want to cry.

On the other hand, Kris was sitting there watching her blank expression with a concerned look. Looking at her face, Kris couldn’t decide on whether she was taking the good news well or not. He didn’t know whether she was happy or was she upset set that the tumour wasn’t declining or improving at all.

“This won’t do…” Hye Mi muttered and suddenly got up.

Kris moved back, startled. “What won’t do?”

Hye Mi blinked at him, “This won’t do!”

“What’s ‘this’?” Kris asked, suddenly amused with this patient of his.

“We need to celebrate!” Hye Mi suddenly broke into a sunflower smile and started waving her hands around in the air.

Kris’ eyes widened and he stood up and grabbed her arms, “Hey hey! You’re at a hospital!”

Hye Mi stopped cheering and stayed quiet. Kris thought he had scared her and immediately felt bad, “Hey I wasn’t trying to say that you were too loud or anything I-”

“No you’re right,” Hye Mi cut him off. “We shouldn’t be celebrating here…” Kris softened; he didn’t want to ruin her good mood.

“We should be out eating a Korean barbeque!” Hye Mi clapped and grabbed her bag. “Come on Kris!”

“What? But I’m working!”

Hye Mi pouted, “Then when do you finish work?”

Kris opened his mouth to say 11pm but the door opened and Secretary Hong stuck her head in, “It’s his break time now, and his 4 o clock appointment just called to cancel, so he’s free until 5:30.”

Hye Mi beamed at Secretary Hong and then turned to Kris, “You’re free! So let’s go!”

Kris thought for a minute before shaking his head with a small smile, “You really are excited aren’t you?”

“Ahuh! Come on let’s gooo!”

Kris chuckled as he took off his lab coat, when he finished putting away all his folders, Hye Mi clapped and pulled him out of the room. They went pass Secretary Hong and Hye Mi skidded to a stop, “Oh Secretary Hong, do you want to join us? If Kris is on break then you should be too, right?”

Kris watched his patient and his secretary, completely befuddled. Since when were they so close?

Secretary Hong shook her head, “No thanks, I’ve got some papers to finish.”

“Awww,” Hye Mi’s shoulders drooped, “But we’re supposed to be celebrating.”

Secretary Hong giggled and glanced at Kris, “I think Doctor Wu is enough.”

Kris coughed and scratched the back of his neck, not knowing how to respond to such a blunt comment. Hye Mi laughed and nodded, completely oblivious to the secretary’s hint. “Mhm I guess… Well then we’ll get going now, bye bye!”

Secretary Hong waved with mischievous eyes, “Bye bye! Have fun!”

Kris and Hye Mi walked down to the car park and got into Kris’ car. Hye Mi clipped on her seatbelt and pulled out her phone, “So what do you want to eat, doctor?”

“Well, it’s your celebration,” Kris replied as he started the engine.

“Hmmm… barbeque or pizza…” Hye Mi tapped on her phone with pursed lips.

“In my opinion, I think pizza is a little bit dodgy,” Kris commented carefully.

Hye Mi blinked at him, “What do you mean?”

Kris shrugged and stared at his rear view mirror. “Just talking in a doctor’s perspective,” he stated as he started driving.

“Oooh, so you’re worried about this patient’s health?” Hye Mi teased. Kris stayed quiet and Hye Mi laughed, “I’m just joking. I want to eat Korean barbeque, any restaurant will do.”

Kris nodded and made sure the windows were up, just in case the roads were going to be dusty. He turned into a smaller road and tapped the address onto his GPS. As he was driving, Hye Mi continued to blabber on and on about nothing in particular and Kris couldn’t help but feel happy for her. Though they haven’t been friends for that long, he could still tell how much all of this meant for her. If only there was something he could do to keep her this happy every day.

About 20 minutes later, Kris arrived at a busy street where the restaurant he wanted was on. He frowned and he drove around, looking for a place to park his car.

“Woah…” Hye Mi’s eyes widened at all the cars in front of her. “There’s a free slot there!”

“That’s a little far…” Kris sighed. He didn’t want to make her walk all that way because of his stupid decision.

Hye Mi laughed and shook her head, “Then we can walk! Hehe it’d be good if we’re able to digest all the food after we eat by walking back!”

Kris thought for a moment before nodding and parked into the empty slot Hye Mi pointed to before.  He gave her a small apologetic smile before they got of the car and started walking down the vintage looking street.

“Woah…” Hye Mi awed at the big buildings, “I feel like im in the 80’s!”

Kris chuckled. Of course she’ll be amazed at something like this. He was growing used to her easily amused personality, and every time she awed at something, it was as if all his stress from work had disappeared.

“Omg there’s a night market here!?” Hye Mi squealed as they walked pass a stall being set up. She ran up to a stall full of merchandise and admired the different accessories laid out on the table.

The ahjumma managing the stall smiled gently as Kris came towards her. “Did you guys want to buy anything?”

“Oh no thanks, we’re just looking!” Hye Mi politely beamed.

Kris’ eyes roamed around the table and it landed on a unique looking box. Curious, he picked it up to take a closer look. The box was silver and it looked like it had something inside. Kris tried to open it but there was something keeping it looked, he opened up the flap and found a keyhole.

“Oooh, that’s so pretty!” Hye Mi awed at the box as Kris furrowed his eyebrows.

The ahjumma chuckled, “I see you two are interested in the box of fate.”

“The what?” Kris and Hye Mi asked at the same time. They met eyes and awkwardly looked away.

“That is the box of fate,” the ahjumma repeated and pulled out an enormous chain of keys. “Out of these 500 keys, only 1 is the right one to open that box.”

“Woah…” Hye Mi whispered.

“But you are only allowed to try one key a day, and if you don’t get the right one within 365 days then the box is not yours.”

“Have you tried opening it?” Kris asked, interested in the box in his hand.

“Yup, it was my last try yesterday,” the ahjumma replied. “Guess the box doesn’t belong to me. Did you guys want it?”

“Err no thanks,” Hye Mi replied politely. I honestly don’t know if I even have 365 days.

The ahjumma smiled and turned to Kris, “What about you, young man?”

Kris stayed quiet. He wasn’t the type to believe in this fate thing, but something about this box was making him want it. “How much is it? I’ll take it.”

“It’s all yours,” the ahjumma smiled, “It never belonged to me so I have no rights to sell it. Keep it.”

Kris’ eyes widened, “Really? But-”

“Please accept it,” the lady spoke softly. I have a feeling you’re going to succeed in opening it.

Hye Mi tiptoed up and whispered into Kris’ ears, “Accept it, you’re going to hurt her feelings.”

Kris thought for a moment before agreeing, he bowed to the lady as he took the key and box. “Thank you ahjumma.”

The ahjumma sent them a warm smile, “You’re welcome.” She turned and stared directly into Hye Mi’s eyes, “Please take good care of it.”

Hye Mi blinked and pointed to herself, “Are you looking at me?”

The lady gave her a small nod before walking off to continue to set up the stall. Hye Mi stood there confused. Kris carefully slipped the box and keychain into his bag before looking at Hye Mi, “Come on, we should continue walking now.”

The two of them continued walking past all the stalls and down the road. Kris thought the walk was quite long but Hye Mi didn’t seem to mind at all, she was too busy admiring the scene to realise how much she has walked. “Kris…” Hye Mi spoke quietly and suddenly grabbed onto Kris’ arm. “Are we nearly there?”

“We’ve walked more than halfway,” Kris replied. “Are you tired?”

“No… But…” She looked up at the sky. “I think it’s going to rain…”

“What?” Kris yelped and looked up at the sky. Hye Mi was right, it was going to rain. The clouds were grey, and it was moving towards their direction. “Oh my god…”

“Eeks I didn’t bring an umbrella!” Hye Mi squealed. But Kris could see the excitement in her eyes.

“Then I guess we better…” Kris halted when he felt something wet against his cheek.

Hye Mi looked around, “Better what?”

“RUN!” Kris shouted and started running. Hye Mi squealed as the cold raindrops started pouring and ran after him.

While running, Kris realised that his daddy long legs were a little too hard for Hye Mi to catch up and slowed down. Hye Mi ran up to him and started panting, “Why- are you- stopping?”

Kris chuckled at the sight of her messy hair and shook his head, “Nothing, just a little tired, come on, there’s a bus stop we can stand under up there.” He grabbed her wrist and started running.

By the time they reached the bus stop, the rain was pouring as hard as ever and both of them were soaking wet. Hye Mi giggled as she fixed her soaking hair, “That was so fun!”

Kris stared at her weirdly, they just ran under heavy rain for like 10 minutes and she actually enjoyed it?! But then again, he had to admit, he enjoyed it too. Kris watched as Hye Mi let out her hands so the raindrops could fall onto her palm. The way she smiled gently every time she felt a raindrop made his heart skip beats and he wouldn’t be surprised if one day he woke up and found out that she was an angel dropped from heaven. Hye Mi was so pure and gentle it was as if she’d disappear if someone came and hugged her.

Suddenly, he wanted to know her more. He wanted to be able to know what she’s thinking and how she’s feeling. He wanted to have the chance to be Hye Mi’s shoulder to lean on, and he wanted her to trust him. Kris had no idea why, but suddenly…

He wanted to be with her.