BLURRED

“Let’s go in there!” mom exclaimed excitedly before gripping my wrist and pulling me into a random store while I just rolled my eyes a little.

I actually didn’t quite know who was keener on visiting Seoul for the first time; me or my mom. She had been unstoppable since the early morning, jumping out of her bed at five o’clock, literally dragging me across the floor to the bathroom. And even if I did spent some time getting ready, I, or to be more accurate, we, still looked like peasants. Not only the way we looked, but also the way we talked revealed – no, it screamed – that we were from the ‘brilliant city’ of Busan.

It was my idea to travel to Seoul since I always wanted to experience this modern, high-tech feel – which I must have missed until my sixteenth birthday – and because my parents never really took time off their work, being two extremely hard-working fishermen.

However, while we left dad in an expensive sports resort, mom and I decided to explore the streets of Seoul. We have already went into several cosmetic stores – since mom is in love with anything she can put on her face and makes her pretty – and also bought loads of clothes in different clothing shops until we were both so packed with shopping bags that we couldn’t carry anything else anymore.

So that’s why I couldn’t help but just let out an enormous sigh escape my lips as I followed her into that store which seemed to sell accessories.

While mom disappeared in the crowd which filled like 99 percent of the store, I just stood there, petrified, with thousands of shopping bags dangling off my two arms. My sight was getting blurred and there was this loud noise in the back of my head as if someone was banging on the inside of my head with a hammer. Everything went darker and darker around me and I felt like fainting any second.

“I have to get out of here,” I silently whispered to myself.

I turned round on my heels and just as I was about to leave the overfilled store, a young guy appeared right in front of me, giving me his biggest smile. I, still feeling dizzy, only have him a confused look and tried to squeeze my way out. But the guy persistently stepped in front of me, bowed to me and flashed his smile at me again.

“Welcome to whystyle,” he said loudly, trying to drown the voices coming from everywhere around me. “May I help you?”

I opened my mouth to say something, but my throat was dry. Unable to speak, I pursed my lips into a thin line. His eyes locked with mine and didn’t let go of them. Same with me, I couldn’t keep my eyes off his either as if they were glued on his. It was like losing myself in his dark eyes, falling and falling.

“Miss?” His oh-so-gentle voice brought me back to reality, but the smile which was plastered on his face almost distracted me again.

“Uh…” I hesitated for a second. “Yes.” What? I was completely taken away by his looks.

“May I help you with anything?” he repeated politely, clearly amused by my reaction.

“Uh… yes,” I just said again, looking around the store. What am I looking for? My panicked eyes were shifting from one object to another. Bracelets, watches, glasses. “Glasses, maybe?”

I bit the inner of my cheek furiously, hoping that he wouldn’t realize my nervousness. I waited for him to response and after a felt hour, he eventually said, “Follow me.” 

I trailed him with quick, small steps as he guided me to a shelf on the far right.

“These are our new glasses. This collection just came in this morning.” While he reached out to take one model at the very top shelf, my eyes fell on his nametag which was neatly pinned on his white dress shirt.

“Kim Jongwoon,” I muttered slowly.

Suddenly I felt his gaze resting on my forehead. As I looked up, his eyes met mine again and I felt how my cheeks blushed in a bright red color as the corners of his lips lifted into a grin. Just as I finally could take my eyes off of his, I realized how he held a hazel pair of glasses right in front of my face.

I opened my mouth, but immediately closed it again. In the same moment as I lifted my hands to touch the spectacle frame, Jongwoon slightly bent forward and my hand brushed his for a millisecond, sending sparkles down my spine. His swift fingers carefully placed the frame on the bridge of my nose and, again, I felt something weird in my stomach as he accidentally touched my ear.

“What prescription do you have?” he asked while I felt his hands on my skin one more time as he tugged some strands of hair behind my ear to get a better overview of the glasses.

“Uhm…” I stammered again, feeling how my brain worked hard for a credible answer. “-5.5?” It actually sounded more like a question than a statement and my voice sounded like a guy who was nearly dying of thirst, dehydrated from wandering in the desert for a week.

“So you wear contact lenses, I suppose?” Jongwoon continued to ask, smirking at my answer.

“Yes,” I replied quickly, “I like this pair.”

I pointed to the pair of glasses which I was wearing while Jongwoon, again, gave me one of his perfect smiles. He looked down on the ground for a second, before his eyes met mine again.

Jongwoon just stared at me, not saying anything. Even though I knew that the store was completely packed with costumers, suddenly everything went quiet around us and there was only him and me.

“Actually, I like you better without glasses.”

His voice echoed over and over again in my head, his low and soft voice. Jongwoon gently took off the pair of glasses for me, but his eyes never left mine for a moment.

His hand brushed my cheek lightly.

“Why?”

“Because it would be a shame to hide such gorgeous eyes from the rest of the world.”