Patience is a virtue that most vampires learn to eventually acquire as a result of their perpetual being. While humans nervously paced back and forth, waiting for a certain event to occur in a finite amount of time that felt interminable, vampires sat back without a care. On the timeline of a never-ending existence, minutes passed in the blink of an eye, days passed in seconds, and years passed like days.

And yet, like a human, Chan Yeol impatiently paced back and forth in the apartment, wondering how much longer until Kai finally returned. Given his fidgetiness, you would assume he had been waiting for months, or possibly years. In actuality, it had only been one day.

Chan Yeol stopped pacing and ran a hand through his hair as he frustratingly exhaled. How was he going to calmly get through the next few days, possibly weeks, until Kai returned? He had to keep himself occupied, except there was nothing to distract him from the one thought that had been on his mind since its inception, becoming human again.

He elected to do his own research on the subject, specifically, on the person who could help him achieve the goal he had never thought possible. After a quick search on the internet, he located a private investigator and called him up to request background information on Jeon Jung Ah. With the information he remembered from her ID, Chan Yeol gave the investigator all the details he needed to perform his inquiry on the person in question.

"I will need a minimum of a week, possibly two to get all the information you want," the PI said on the line.

Chan Yeol pleaded for him to expedite the process but the PI replied that a preliminary search on Jung Ah showed very little. Her information was scattered among various databases and would require some time to compile together. Chan Yeol had no choice but to concede and wait, which brought him back to square one, impatiently pacing back and forth.

He instead tried to occupy himself with the TV, although every channel he flipped to didn't really hold his interest. He settled on a documentary that put him to sleep on the couch.

When Chan Yeol awoke hours later, he felt enervated; he needed to feed. There was a park located a few miles away where he decided to try his luck hunting. At this early hour, no one was around, which was optimal since his vampiric form would surely cause a horrific scene to any witnesses.

Just as Kai had warned, the wildlife in Korea was limited and even more so since it was the city, so that all Chan Yeol had managed to prey on were rabbits and squirrels. They tasted foul compared to the larger and more satisfying dingo and kangaroo when he was in Australia, but they would do the job of suppressing his hunger for the meantime.

As the sun started to creep out, Chan Yeol had just finished burying the animals he had killed and started on his walk back home. Due to the streets filling with people who had early jobs, he couldn't use his superhuman speed to return to the apartment as he had done to arrive at the park, but he didn't mind. It was the first time he was walking through the streets of Seoul during the day and it was a very different ambience from the nightlife.

The night scene was filled with energy of the destructive kind, but in the early morning, the hardworking population started the day with some of the most difficult jobs of opening shop, delivering fresh products, and cleaning the roads of trash so that the citizens could litter them once again. These people, his former human self could relate to. The struggles of getting by each day under the Japanese occupation had evolved into the present day struggles of getting by in a society governed by income class.

Lost in his thoughts reminiscing of his previous life, Chan Yeol didn't realize that he had completely passed the apartment and was now just outside Jung Ah's neighborhood. Only when her scent carried to him did he wake up from his daze and abruptly halt. Having just fed, he was able to control himself much better than the first time when her scent had hit him out of the blue, but it didn't mean it was any less alluring.

In the back of Chan Yeol's mind, Kai's advice to stay away from her echoed continuously. He knew he should listen to Kai, but that was so much easier when he was at the apartment and her scent didn't taunt him as it was doing now.

"I can control myself," Chan Yeol said aloud, "I can do it." He repeated these reassuring words to himself and continued forward.

He stopped a block away from Jung Ah's residence, the same place from which he had watched her pick up her wallet the first night he was in Seoul. He didn't dare go any further for fear that he had overestimated his willpower.

"What am I doing here?" Chan Yeol asked himself as he stared at her closed door.

Suddenly, the door opened and a tired-looking Jung Ah stepped out. Chan Yeol clenched his jaw and took a step backwards into the shadows. He watched her walk almost robotically, as if this was routine for her to be up and out at 6:30 AM, past the alley which he hid in.

Without thinking he followed her from a distance, wondering what a young woman like her was doing up so early. It turned out she worked as a barista at a coffee shop. From the large window at the shop's front, he watched her go to the back and come out changed into her uniform of a white button down shirt, black pants, and a black apron with the shop's name and logo on its front. She greeted her coworker, a very pretty long-haired brunette, and her manager, a stern looking man in his thirties with thinning hair.

"Excuse me, are you going in?" a middle-aged woman asked him from where he stood in front of the coffee shop's door.

"Oh no, sorry," Chan Yeol said and stepped aside so she could enter.

But the lady stopped short of opening the door and looked at Chan Yeol curiously. "Your eyes, they're purple," she remarked with awe.

Chan Yeol looked away and then returned his attention back to the woman with a polite smile, "What are you talking about, ma'am?"

She stared at his eyes again, now a brown, and furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "Was I seeing things?" she said to herself. "I was sure they were purple." She shook her head and laughed at herself, "Maybe it was the trick of the light."

Chan Yeol laughed good-naturedly and pulled the shop's door open for her. She thanked him and entered. He let out a sigh of relief and mentally chastised himself for nearly exposing his true self. It was probably best for him to return to the apartment as he had planned, but that would mean returning to the indefinite game of waiting for either Kai or the PI to contact him with their status or any information.

But here, where Jung Ah was, he could gather some of his own intel. Besides, whatever the specifics of the test comprised of, it probably didn't hurt to familiarize himself with the subject and build up immunity to her scent, right?

With those reasons Chan Yeol convinced himself he could and should approach Jung Ah. He obtained a pair of sunglasses from a shop across the street to mask his eyes if he lost control over them at any point and entered the coffee shop.

Chan Yeol was immediately greeted by the pretty coworker who smiled extra brightly at him, noticing his attractiveness even behind the sunglasses that covered his eyes, and asked to take his order.

Jung Ah was behind her with her back to him, working on an order. Despite the strong smell of coffee, he could still clearly discern her scent and knew his eyes had probably turned. After clearing his throat, he asked for just a cup of the special for the day.

As he paid, Jung Ah turned around to hand a caddy of coffee orders to a customer waiting at the end of the counter. As her eyes followed the customer that made his way out, they landed on Chan Yeol and lingered on him with a strange look. Behind the dark shades, Chan Yeol stared back without her knowledge, wondering what she was thinking. Why was she looking at him in that way?

Jung Ah approached the register to take the place of her coworker who now worked on Chan Yeol's coffee and after one more quick glance at Chan Yeol, turned to the man behind him to take his order.

"Here's your coffee," said the pretty coworker as she held out a cup.

Chan Yeol took hold of it and went towards a seat in the corner, next to the front counter. He grabbed a nearby newspaper that someone had left behind and pretended to read while keeping his covered eyes on Jung Ah. She continued to work, taking orders, making coffee, wiping tables when customers left a mess, and sometimes going to the back to retrieve more supplies.

Around noon, she went to the back again and returned in her clothes from earlier that morning, a sign that her shift was done. She bade her coworker goodbye and bowed to her manager before making her way to the door. But she stopped midway through opening it and turned around, making her way to where Chan Yeol sat.

He immediately tensed up in his seat, both because this was the closest he had been to her yet and it was making his throat dry up with a craving, and because he was anxious to know what she would say to him.

"Sorry if I'm being presumptuous, but this has been bothering me the whole time you've been here. Don't you think it's a little rude to be wearing sunglasses inside? Are you a celebrity or something?"

Chan Yeol was flabbergasted by her question. Is this why she had given him a strange look earlier? "No, I have sensitive eyes," he replied.

"Ah, is that so?" Jung Ah said with an embarrassed smile. She was about to leave, but again stopped and turned back to him to say, "You didn't hear this from me, but she's interested too."

"Excuse me?"

Jung Ah nodded towards her coworker at the counter, "Woo Ri, the girl who took your order."

Chan Yeol didn't respond and just tilted his head slightly in a gesture for her to elucidate.

She did. "You've been sitting here for the past five hours, your coffee is untouched, you've yet to flip the page of that newspaper in front of you, and you chose to sit at this particular table with a view of the counter. I think it's safe to say you came here with a motive, and that's Woo Ri."

Chan Yeol was impressed by her deductive skills, despite her incorrect conclusion. He smiled softly and asked, "Why do you assume it's your friend I'm interested in, and not you?"

Jung Ah glanced at Woo Ri quickly and then replied with deadpan obviousness, "Because she's prettier."

Chan Yeol chuckled to himself. "You know, we have four other senses besides sight that can attract us to someone. The sound of their voice, the feeling of their soft hair, the taste of their lips…"

Chan Yeol daringly leaned forward across the table, knowing that his irises would change color with desire from the close proximity. It was a risky action, but the aroma emanating from her was drawing him in and making him lose his rationale, though he had enough willpower intact to keep his fangs retracted, "...their natural scent."

Jung Ah gaped at him for a few seconds, dumbfounded, and then, seeming to fall for his words, sniffed the collar of her shirt. When she realized nothing special about the way she smelled, she scoffed, muttered, "I can't believe I almost fell for it," to herself, and then returned to Chan Yeol with eyes narrowed accusingly. "Are you a ert or something? Because I may not look it, but I know self-defense, and if you think just because you're so good-looking you can take advantage of me, you've got another thing coming," she resolutely declared.

Chan Yeol knew well of her ability to take out a full grown man if he posed a threat, though she had no idea that she was no match for him. He returned to his upright position and cordially smiled. "I believe you and no, I'm not a ert. I'm just stating a fact of nature."

Jung Ah still seemed dubious of him from her expression. "Okay, well, I better get going. Good luck with whatever it is you're trying to accomplish," she half-heartedly said.

As Jung Ah walked towards the exit of the coffee shop, a small beeping sound came from the messenger bag hanging by her side. Chan Yeol watched as she frantically searched for it, as if her life depended on it, and pulled out a pager, a surprising device for someone of her generation to be using.

Jung Ah ran back inside the shop, behind the counter, and disappeared in the back, most likely to use a phone to call back the pager. With his heightened sense of hearing, Chan Yeol intently listened for her voice amidst the chatter around him by the other customers. Once he recognized hers, he shut out all others.

"This is Jeon Jung Ah calling for Jeon Jung Kook," she urgently said into the phone. Chan Yeol focused harder to hear the receiver's response.

"Yes?" a woman's voice on the other end answered.

"Is he alright?" Jung Ah demanded. "I received a page, did something happen to him? Did he get worse? Please, you have to do everything you can to save him. I promise, I can pay for it," she said through tears.

"Miss, there has been no change in Jeon Jung Kook’s stability. Would you like me to direct the call to his room?"

Jung Ah sniffled a "yes" and after a short pause, a young boy answered, "Hello?"

"Jeon Jung Kook! Do you know how worried you had me when I got a page from the hospital?! I thought there was an emergency!" she angrily cried.

"But this is an emergency, Noona. I'm out of books to read," he whined. "Can you go to the library and check out volumes 61-65 of One Piece, 50-57 of Naruto, 43-48 of-"

[Noona: how a male addresses an older female that he's comfortable with; usually used for an older sister or close friend]

Chan Yeol could barely hear Jung Ah exhale softly before she interjected Jung Kook in a dangerously low voice, "Yah, you brat, what am I, your slave? How could you beep me for some stupid comic books?!"

[Yah: literally "hey", but not like a greeting. It is an informal/impolite way to get someone's attention commonly used only between friends or on someone younger than you. Addressing an older person in this way is considered disrespectful]

Jung Kook was quiet on the other end for a while. "I'm sorry, Noona. I just miss you. You haven't visited in a while," he replied softly in repentance.

Jung Ah sighed. "No, I'm sorry. I've just been a little busy. But I have some time now, so I'll drop by, okay?"

"Okay!" he happily replied.

Chan Yeol couldn't hear any more of their conversation as he received a call of his own from Kai and stepped out of the shop to answer it.

"Hey, just thought I'd check in with you," Kai said, "Good news is I was able to locate some of the gypsy's descendants here in Romania; bad news is none of them know anything about the supernatural world, let alone vampires."

Chan Yeol sighed heavily and stared at the ground, "So that's it then. The secret will remain a secret."

"No, there's one more person I'm going to try. But they live in the U.S. so I’m flying there in the morning. There's still hope," Kai optimistically replied and then changed his tone to a more sympathetic one, "What about you? How are you holding up? It must be torture waiting."

Chan Yeol watched Jung Ah finally leave the coffee shop and head in the opposite direction of him, towards the intersection. "It was, but I found something to keep me preoccupied until you return," he absentmindedly replied as he followed at a distance.

"That's a relief to hear. I was worried you might go looking for that girl again. But I'll call again if I have any more information."

After he hung up, Chan Yeol stared at his phone's screen and said, "I'm sorry Kai, I know I should be keeping my distance until I find out exactly what this test of nature I'm up against is, but I can't." He glanced up and watched as Jung Ah crossed the intersection. "It's strange, but more than just wanting her blood, I want to be near her. I want to know more about her."

January 13, 2014, 5:24 PM