Grocery shopping was not one of the worst things in life. It had taken Lu Han quite some time to figure that out. He’d actually become quite good at it. Nowadays, his shopping basket didn’t entirely consist of ready to cook meals and instant noodles. He didn’t wander the aisles aimlessly anymore. Lu Han was responsible. And he was happy. Happier than he’d ever thought he would be.

Throwing a smile at the young cashier, the man walked out of the mini mart. He haphazardly threw the groceries into the passenger seat, suddenly in a hurry to get to his next destination. He had meant to pick of Sunjung from her office and take her somewhere nice. Grocery shopping didn’t necessarily qualify as something nice so he’d done that by himself.
Things had been busy the past few weeks, giving him hardly any time to spend with Sunjung. She didn’t seem to mind and always waved off his excuses with a smile but lately he felt like she refused to meet his eyes and that worried him.
She’d always been the kind of person who didn’t like to complain. Even if she had every right to.
A lot of times she’d keep things to herself.
Still.
After everything they’d been through.

Once inside his car, he whipped out his phone checking to see if he had any missed calls or texts.
At the sight of no notifications, his eyes narrowed.
He was almost two hours later than promised but there was absolutely nothing from Sunjung. No calls. Not even a reply to a text he’d sent an hour ago, telling her he’d be late.
Usually there’d be at least ten passive aggressive texts from her if he was ever late.

Maybe she had been held up at work too.
That was the only explanation.
That was what Lu Han tried to tell himself as he finally started up the car.

However, out of nowhere, his mind wandered to the time she’d cut him off completely all that time ago.
He hadn’t forgotten how it felt to not know where she was, how she was and why she had even left. Thinking about it again made his heart sink.

Shaking his head at himself, he forced himself to dismiss those thoughts. That had been a while ago and Sunjung was doing much better since then.
She was a pretty private person but she had learnt to let people in.

Pursing his lips, Lu Han once again tried to call Sunjung. The dial tone seemed to last for way too long before the line finally went silent. No response.
After three more attempts, he found himself wondering if he had done something wrong.
Thinking back, she had been somewhat distant the past few days. He’d assumed she was stressed from work. She had brought up going freelance a few times. Moreover, she had been contemplating going to work late this morning.

The man lets out a sigh, his fingers drumming a steady beat on the steering wheel. He was probably worrying too much, as he often did when Sunjung was concerned. Maybe she had just been flooded with work, she hadn’t had the time to check her phone. That was a possibility.

Before he knew it, he was parked in front of Sunjung’s office building. He’d find out the reason behind her silence soon enough.
Once again, he pressed the call button.
Once again, Sunjung didn’t answer.

Just as he was about to leave the car, a knock on the passenger side window makes him pause. With a frown he turned to see who it was. He was met with the sight of Im Gaeun waving happily from outside.
In a second, he rolled the window down and greeted the woman with a smile.

“Is Sunjung done for the day?” Lu Han asked, feeling just the tiniest bit guilty for not bothering to ask the woman about her own wellbeing.

Gaeun raised her eyebrows only slightly at the question, but smiled at Lu Han nonetheless.
“She called in sick this morning.”

Lu Han’s frown deepened, “She didn’t come to work?”
Then where was she?

Before he could ask any more questions, however, Gaeun spoke, “You should go home.”