“Min!” She yelled. “Min-Kyung, wait!”

He didn’t. Min didn’t even glance back at her or make any sign that he’d heard. Keiba broke into a run. She was able to stop him a few blocks away from the bench where Ben and Ruth were sitting; he’d led them to an even emptier region of the park.

She stopped in front of him, panting from the run. She pushed strands of hair out of her face and tried to get her heart to calm from its galloping pace. He watched her catch her breath, a cold, angry expression on his face.

“Go away, Keiba.” He said.

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

He scoffed at that. “Yes, you can. You have two legs, don’t you? Use them to go back to Ruth and Ben.”

“No.”

“You must not understand.” He said. “I don’t want to deal with you, so leave me alone. Arasso?”

She shook her head again. His words hurt, but she knew he didn’t mean them. “It’s okay, Min.” She said, and her voice was very soft. “You don’t have to hide every time you get upset. You don’t have to deal with everything by yourself.”

He was angry all of a sudden, defensive. “I dealt with it by myself when it happened!” He growled. “I dealt with it for nine years after! I can deal with it alone now.”

“I won’t let you.”

The control he had over his anger weakened. His hand tightened into a fist. Keiba glanced at it and then looked back into his face.

“Move, Keiba.” He demanded.

“No.”

“I’m serious. Move or I’ll make you move.”

She smiled, but the expression was sad. This Min-Kyung reminded her of the man she’d met at the start of the school year. The look in his eyes had been the same: less cold, but just as angry.

She told him, “This isn’t like you at all, Min-Kyung.”

He huffed angrily and tried to go around her. She got in his way. He feigned to go right, and went left. Before he could get far, her arms wound around him tightly from behind.

“Keiba, let go.” He growled.

She held on.

“Keiba.” He tugged at her arms.

She shook her head against his back. “Not this time, Min.”

His hands were like vices around her wrists, but she refused to let him go. His fingers were pressed so firmly against her skin, she thought she might bruise. But when he realized she wasn’t going to let up, his hands fell away. After a moment, she let go of him too, and when she did, he turned so that he was facing her. She pulled him into her embrace.

He held her back. His face pressed into her neck as he trembled. Tears didn’t push at the backs of his eyes, but the memories flooded in. They were much more vivid and realistic and terrible than when he’d simply recounted the story to Keiba before. Now he was reliving them. It was as though he were breaking apart all over again.

But Keiba was with him through it all. She didn’t say anything, but then, there was nothing she could say. He needed her to be there for him, and that was what she did. She held him tightly as he went through everything for the second time. When he’d gained some of his bearings, his arms gentled around her and he released a shuddering breath. Keiba looked up at him. Her hand pushed his hair out of his face so she could search his gaze more thoroughly.

“I’m sorry. Naneun nayaghan cheoleom haengdong.” He muttered under his breath.

“What?”

“I acted like a weakling.” He translated.

Keiba shook her head. “Min-Kyung, don’t even think like that. You are not weak. After what you’ve experienced…” She shuddered and pulled him close again. “I can’t even imagine what it must’ve been like. The horror of it all.”

He pulled back again so that he could look down at her. “You ran after me. Most people would have left me alone.”

“Yeah…

“But you’re not like most people.”

She shook her head. “I remembered how you were when you first told me the story and I knew I couldn’t let you go through that alone. It’s always hard to find out new information about past trauma—especially when the information is horrible.”

“You know, then, don’t you?” He asked.

She nodded. “Sharing your pain is part of having a relationship with someone. You helped me see that, Mini.”

He kissed her forehead. “Naui taeyang gongju.” He murmured.

She smiled and blushed, remembering that that meant “my sun princess”.

“Ma lune prince.” She whispered and got up on her tiptoes to kiss him gently. She ran her hand over his cheek. “I know the emotions are still raw, but are you okay with talking about what happened to Ruth and Ben? At least a little bit? Ben, I know, is curious, but it’s okay if you’re not ready.”

He sighed.” I could probably talk about it a little bit.”

“You sure?”

He nodded. He wasn’t really, but he knew he wouldn’t have to go into too much detail.

“Okay, let’s go.”

He slipped his hand in hers. “Yeah.”

They saw that Ben and Ruth were sitting close together, going through the diary when they reached the bench. Ruth hopped up when she saw that they’d returned.

“Min-Kyung, are you feeling better?” She asked.

“Yeah.” He nodded. “Sorry about that.”

“No, no. Don’t worry about it at all.”

Ben added, “I’d imagine that whatever happened with this fire was pretty bad.”

“Worse than bad.” Min corrected. He squeezed Keiba’s hand before adding, “Over half of the students died. The police had said a gas leak had caused it, but now, I guess, we know the leak was actually caused by someone.”

“Does it say how they’d done it?” Keiba asked.

Ben shook his head. “There was another entry about an estimation of how many had died, but other than that she never mentioned it again. At least, not where we are now.” He glanced at Keiba. “I’m sorry she put you through all that when you were younger.”

She looked at him.

“We read the part about her getting those middle school kids to corner you.” Ruth said.

Keiba’s left hand twitched reflexively, but she closed her mind to the memories. She’d act the same way Min had if she looked into them now. “The past isn’t as important as the present.” She replied. “And right now we have to make sure Darcie doesn’t hurt anyone anymore.”

Ruth hugged her encouragingly. Keiba returned the hug with her free arm.

“What about Aina?” Min asked. “Was she mentioned?”

“Darcie kind of hints that she and Aina grew apart after it happened.” Ben replied. “Her name hasn’t come up in the entries we read while you two were gone.”

“We need to get to Sun-Hee and ask her about her.” Min said. “She might know where she is.”

“If this Aina person is twisted enough to start a fire that killed over five-hundred kids,” Ruth said. “She’s probably twisted enough to coerce people into committing murder. Like Yun.”

Oh.

The others started to connect the same dots that Ruth had. What if Aina was the “She” from Yun’s letter? Could it be that she and Darcie had hooked up again? Or was it too big of a stretch? Either way they had to find out. They had to.

“I’ll do it tomorrow.” Keiba said. “We have French on Mondays.”

Ben nodded. “We should also figure out what to do about Darcie’s threat to tell everyone about me and Ruth.”

“She hasn’t said anything yet.” Ruth said. “Maybe she won’t.”

Keiba doubted that. “She’s probably waiting for the right time.”

“What do you mean?”

“When she’s screwing with you, she waits until she has the biggest audience around her to hear your secrets.”

Ben cursed. “When would that be?”

“Well, the only place where your relationship would matter is at school, so it’d have to be at a big event on campus.”

“The orchestra competition.” Ruth whispered.

Keiba nodded.

“How do we keep her from saying anything?”

“We could threaten her with the diary.” Min suggested. “We could tell her that if she says anything about the two of you, we’ll take the diary to the police.”

“We can do that until we find another solution.” Keiba said. “With the information that’s in here, we could probably get her arrested.”

“Maybe.” He said. “But just to be sure, we’d have to get her to admit it and record it somehow. That would be even more damning than mild suspicion on the police’s part.”

She nodded.

“So, what we have to do is corner her, tell her what we know, get her to admit to it, record it, and then blackmail her with that.” Ben summarized.

“Yeah. Does it sound good to you?”

“It sounds better than good.” He grinned. “It sounds like a plan.”

Min looked at Keiba. “What time is the competition?”

“The event starts at 6, but the actual competition doesn’t actually start until 6:30 or 7. Right, Ruth?”

She nodded. “Yes.”

Ben looked at Keiba closely. “You’re kind of an expert on Darcie, aren’t you, Keiba?” He commented.

The question took her off guard. “What?”

“I bet you had to keep track of her when you were younger so that you could be ready for her later, didn’t you?”

“Oh.” She nodded. “Yeah, I did.”

After Darcie and her mother moved in, Keiba had to know where she was at all times to avoid her. For the most part, things worked out pretty well with that strategy, but when they didn’t, it went badly—like with what happened to her arm. But that wasn’t the only incident. The others were probably written in that diary somewhere.

Min’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and checked the screen. He frowned. Keiba looked at him curiously. “It’s Ricky.” He whispered.

“You should answer it.” She advised just as quietly.

“Right now? In the middle of all this?”

She nodded. “He probably has something important to tell you. Besides, he’s part of this too.”

He looked at her.

“He was with you in the fire, wasn’t he?”

Min paused. Then he sighed. “Fine. I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.”

He let go of her hand and away so that he could talk to Ricky. Keiba tried to eavesdrop, but Min immediately started speaking in Korean. She gave up, knowing she wouldn’t be able to understand anything.

“Do you have any thoughts on what time she’d want to do it?” Ruth asked. “Like in the beginning or the middle of the competition?”

Keiba thought about it for a few moments. “Well,” she answered slowly. “It’d probably be the most crowded around the middle of the competition, but I can’t be sure. She might even do it around the time that I perform.”

“We’ll have to do something before then.”

Min-Kyung returned to the group as he was getting off with Ricky. It wasn’t a long conversation. “Annyeong. Gamsa, Ricky.” He hung up and then stared blankly at the phone.

“What?” Keiba asked.

“It’s about my roommate.”

“Steven?” Min nodded. “What about him?”

“Ricky said he just saw him getting hauled out of his friend’s apartment.”

“What? Why?”

“He’s being arrested under the suspicion of aiding and abetting.”

---

Annyeong- goodbye. Gamsa-Thanks 

So, Keiba, Min, Ruth, and Ben (that kind of rhymed) have a plan now for what to do with Darcie, and Aina's identity will soon be revealed. Steven's too. Probably in the next chapter, so I guess y'all can look forward to that. ^-^  I also edited chapter 22, those of you that wanted to know.