Hayi.

Maybe we just lived between hurting and healing - Benjamin Saenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. 

A sigh escapes her lips out of its own accord, and before she knows it, she's already dead tired from picking up the multiple shards of glass lying around the front area of their shop. And she's been told multiple times to stop picking up these broken pieces of glass, but she just wants to help in the clean-up. Surely she can't let her grandmother do all the work. 

While her grandmother has her back turned and on the phone with someone who promises to bring supplies for a new window and maybe even vases for the rest of the flowers that had no more containers to be put in and were now forced to be placed in with other flowers in the same small buckets, she cleans up the remaining debris from yesterday. 

Hayi sighs again, much to her dismay because it only shows how tired and irritated and frustrated she is of... well, everything. 

If only that stupid drunkard hadn't been so drunk and if only her stupid self hadn't been so stupid and scared in the first place, then this would've never happened. If only she moved out of the way, then the shop would still be a-okay and she wouldn't of have gotten an earful from her mother last night over the phone while she was at the other side of the country. 

But what's done is done, and there's nothing anybody can do about that. 

She sweeps up the remaining bits of glass on the floor, making sure she gets every single one she can find before throwing them in the garbage bin outside their store. There, she sweeps the front even though some of the neighborhood grannies had swept it earlier before heading to their homes to make lunch.

Hayi makes sure to get everything outside too, and when she turns around to sweep these shards towards the streets, it's when she sees them.

Black and shiny hair, upturned noses the other way, mouths moving in hushed whispers, hand over their lips while there eyes were on her, well-manicured nails, and cups of fruit shakes on their free hand - the girls Hayi loathes and despises the most. 

They obviously catches her looking at them, but no, that does not stop them from whispering to one another from across the street, their eyes still trained on her, as if trying to intimidate her with looks.

Oh, please, who are they trying to impress here?

"They're worst than the gossiping ahjummas," she muttered to herself before rolling her eyes at them, not bothering to make sure they did or didn't see it. She doesn't care either way, although deep down inside, she hopes they had seen it. They didn't even deserve to be thrown in the face with a book, it would wreck the book more than it would wreck their faces. 

She continues to sweep and sweep and sweep and sweep until even the dust of the sidewalk is no longer there. Her grandmother calls her for lunch, but Hayi tells her she'd be up in a moment. She just has to dispatch some of the broken plastic vases and buckets that once held some of the flowers on display outside.

She had to dispose quite a few broken plastic and it was kind of heavy, which was surprising. 

Hayi was just about to throw a big pile of the junk into the garbage bin when she feels her hold lighten on them, and it's as if the broken plastics are being lifted from her hands.

"What -"

"Let me help you with that,"

She looks past the plastic, and sure enough, it's Kim Hanbin whose carrying the plastics for her. Pieces of plastic vases and pails on his arms are there in one second, but it's gone the next because he throws it all in the garbage bin. He looks at her and shrugs, a small smile on his cheeky face. "Did I help you or did I help you?"

Hayi only rolls her eyes.

Not you.

She's groaning in her head but apparently she groaned outside, through too because Hanbin complains. "Hey, I'm just trying to be a good neighbor-"

"You live two neighborhoods away from me,"

"Point taken, but I'm just trying to be nice. Can I help you or can I help you?"

She picks up a box of broken debris from yesterday's disaster, but Hanbin takes the box easily from her and she gives him a look. "Can I help you?" he asks again, pressing on in a way she finds stubborn.

"I don't know, can you?" she challenges, crossing her arms across her chest and giving him a look she hopes he finds intimidating. He came back from playing basketball, because there's a court just two houses away from her's and all the boys in the city usually play there because apparently, the hoops are much nicer and taller than the rest of the courts around.

He's obviously worn out from playing, because the motion of his chest is clear and exaggerated. Up, down, up, down. Sweat is running down the side of his face and he wipes it with his shoulder.

He's tired, but he still wants to help her?

Hanbin rolls his eyes and adjusts his hands from the sides of the box to underneath it. "May I help you?"

"No, you may not." she says and reaches out to take the debris from him, but again, he rolls his eyes at her.

He turns his back and throws it in the garbage bin himself. Non-biodegradable. He hands the now empty box to her, grinning this time. Hayi hasn't seen his cheeky grin up close ever since middle school. It hasn't change, even though he has. 

Hayi shakes his head at him. "It's okay, I got it." the words would sound nice in someone else's mouth, but it comes out from Hayi's mouth and it sounds indifferent and totally unwelcoming that she even notices Hanbin flinch. "You should go home, and eat."

"You should go inside and eat,"

"Later,"

"It could be now if you let me help you."

She only gives him another look, but somehow she knows her glares and stares don't do any harm to Hanbin. It's not that he's used to it, or maybe that's the case? She hasn't been indifferent for a long time, it's just a phase they told her, but it took time for her family to adjust to this coldness phase, but it only took Hanbin one minute.

Really, this boy never ceases to surprise Hayi. Even before, and until now.

He continues to help, and Hayi lets him because she now remembers how stubborn he is. When he wants something, he gets it. When she wants something, she has to earn it. It's the difference between them that lets her remember where she stands. Hanbin is now at the top of the social group, effortlessly there because of his easy-going yet stubborn attitude. Hayi is below, way under the belt and miles away from Hanbin.

It is in their differences that Hayi remembers who Kim Hanbin is and who Kim Hanbin was. 

She doesn't realize she's staring at him until he speaks up and breaks her train of thoughts. "Hey, Hayi, did I do this -"

"If you're going to talk then you better just go." 

"Okay," he says meekly, and after that, he just completely shuts his mouth.

She feels proud she has this control over people, and feels even more proud when she finds out it also affects Hanbin. They continue to work and not once did her grandmother call for her again. She must be on the phone, she guessed.

When it came to sweeping again, Hanbin grabbed the broom from her, and she glared at him without a word. He shrugged, keeping his promise of closing his mouth, and crouches to sweep the remaining tiny pieces of plastic away and towards the road. 

She sees the look some of the kids are giving them.

Friends of Hanbin, those girls from earlier.

They're all looking, they're all staring. 

Wondering, just like Hayi. 

Why is Kim Hanbin over that side of the road? 

Hayi doesn't know, but she knows this: he has no more business being here, yet he acts as if he does. 

Hayi wants to ask him what his big deal is, when she tells herself that Kim Hanbin had always been there.

Well, not always but for her it feels like always. When the ahjummas need someone else's opinion on their clothes, when the ahjussis need a younger man's advice, when the other kids need someone to play with, when the girls need a guy to make them feel special, when Hayi needs someone to be her friend - Hanbin is always there; always had, and perhaps, always will. 

He's not friendly, just really helpful. 

Hayi remembers this just now. 

She sighs and leaves him there, crouched down and sweeping the what reamins of the dust and plastics away.

Hanbin calls for her, again and again and he only stops when she's done picking out a flower to give to him. Two flowers in fact, and it's not just to symbolize for two words she's too shy and proud to say to him face to face not just for today, but for yesterday too.

He saved her, even though she didn't really need it. But maybe with her frightened expression yesterday, she looked like she needed it so Kim Hanbin just had to swoop in and grab her by the arm. It hurt, the way they fell onto each other.

Either way, she never really said thank you.

He blinks down at the two flowers she's holding out for him. Though, it's technically for his mother and little sister. 

"What's this for?"

Two flowers, for your thank you.

"Give them to Hanbyul and your mom," she says, still remembering his little sister's cute name. "It's Alyssum." she says, handing it over to him.

Hanbin receives it with gentleness and care she didnt' know a guy could posses. He looked at it the way girls would look at a rose. "Um, thanks?"

"Yeah," she says, nodding. Thank you too. "It symbolizes beauty beyond worth. Give it to them for me, okay?" she tells him, although her eyes are on the purple flowers that are clustered together at the top but are held by just one stem. It's bigger than most flowers of its kind, and it's only because her grandmother grew them well. 

Hanbin looks up, nods and says "okay" before waving goodbye to her. 

> ; <

here's a short little something for you guys, because I was too excited to post this for next week. I promise to make the next one longer and from now on with every Hayi chapter, I'll be quoting quotes from books that I love since here, Hayi is a total bookworm although I haven't really gone into that in this chapter much. Hope you guys wait for the next chapter a little bit longer. 
Anyways, comment, comment, comment!