26 | she her | mdni @juneskitten - Tumblr Blog

Apr 15

calculate me | one

✧✎ synopsis: seungcheol's gotten used to living alone. he's turning a new leaf. closing doors but opening windows. taking life one day at a time. however, he's also learned a window left open lets in many things. a voiceless girl, for instance, unconscious and tattered on his step.

pairing: fem!reader x seungcheol chapter word count: 15.6k series word count: 80k genres/tropes: widower!seungcheol + he's a retired private investigator + jeonghan/joshua are a couple bc i can't write anything without making people gay + original characters + an attempt at mystery (ooOOuuUU) + time travel!au + gets a bit sci-fi down the line but it's not overbearing + slowburn obviously + romance + very angsty so pls read the warnings! + some intense action scenes + comfort/fluff + smut

(!) warnings: PLEASE READDD PLEASUHHH > multiple mentions of character death + grief of losing a loved one + a side character's suicide is brought up various times + a particular character is a PHYSICAL ABUSER (scenes are not at all frequent but the moment is indeed graphic) + use of knives and a gun + gets quite bloody/gorey at a certain point + one instance of homophobia + mature language

✧✎ a/n: YAYYAYA i'm so excited to share part one <3 again - a big massive thank you for the patience! when i finished posting ghost ride i was just starting my final year at uni and now i'm gonna be graduating this summer ‼️ although i'm proud of this fic i can't help but feel a tiny seed of doubt 🌱 and maybe that's bc i'm entering another period of change in my life. ANYWAY. no more yapping... for now...

important bullets:

chapter releases are every saturday at ~10pm EST

msg/dm/inbox me to be added to the taglist

the series is split into 5 chapters (14-18k)

majority is told from scoups pov!

✎ 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05

PLEASE NOTE: i block contentless blogs who interact with my posts! if you like something, pls let the poster know 🫶

GRIEF COUNSELLING.

Seungcheol was no novice to the gymnasium: its lacquered floors, the wood yellow and shiny; the metallic rafters hidden by ceiling shadows; how the foldable chairs were arranged in that wide, perfect circle, pushing everyone into uncomfortable familiarity. He found it ironic that each session took place in an elementary school. An elementary school. Kids who were just learning to tie their shoelaces and add simple numbers using their fingers had no idea what their gymnasium was being converted into by the first hour of nighttime.

He only paid attention to the faces he knew. The faces that were so consistent he could notice the smallest, faintest adjustment—when they plucked their eyebrows or trimmed their facial hair or wore a new tint of lip balm—until a day came when that face was no longer there, and he must move onto a new face to fill their subtle absence. He wondered if there was someone in the room who monitored him.

Probably not.

There wasn’t much Seungcheol contributed to the meetings apart from his attentive silence and the clearness of his fixed gaze. Others prattled, at times for too long, to the point their tears thinned completely and their throats relaxed open, but the counsellor rarely intervened. It was the one space where words were not controlled or edited to appease another, and once people realized, they tended to flow like stochastic, running liquid. Two to four sessions were typically enough for most. The drainage was instant. Their catharsis was a glow of mental release.

Seungcheol never knew which session might be his last. He supposed he would keep going, keep listening, keep adding his appropriately timed “hmm’s” and thoughtful nods and answers to the counsellor’s prompts with honed emotional intelligence until he experienced the glorious glow of one-thousand suns. The release. And maybe that would take forever. Maybe he would never leave.

“How about you, Seungcheol?”

He looked up from the floor’s middle point, where a ceiling light had reflected a smooth, white halo into the clean wood. Seungcheol raised his eyebrows, made it evident he did not hear the question.

The counsellor repeated himself. “Now that we’ve learned to identify the mental and physical cues that grief may be reapproaching, what is something you do to bring yourself back? Keep grounded?” The older man finished explaining with a smile, soft and wrinkled, a testament to his age that had turned his hair a faded, thinning grey, near the colour of snow, but otherwise led to his sharpened wisdom.

Seungcheol adjusted himself in the squeaky, feeble chair, pushed up his heavy-rimmed glasses. “I like to make myself still,” he said. No matter how dimly he spoke, the openness of the gymnasium caused his words to echo and drift akin to a careening beach tide. “I listen to where the grief is coming from… where the hurt is. Sometimes I’m remembering a touch, or laughter, a good meal, a stupid boardgame we forced ourselves to learn. And then, in that stillness, I try to separate the hurt from the memory. Leave only the light. Until I feel everything recede. And I can breathe again. I can move fluidly with the present.”

Eyes were shameless and desperate, wonderstruck, hung on Seungcheol, letting his answer disperse into deft silence. The counsellor smiled again, but with that unfettered fullness as opposed to gentle guidance, his voice a soothing timbre in Seungcheol’s ears.

“That’s a thoughtful answer. Glad to hear it. Some others may find use in such an approach,” he pointed out by widely gesturing his hand around the circle. “Thank you for sharing with the group.”

Once the session had ended, most removed the coats from behind their chairs, tucked on knitted hats, pulled on thin gloves, grabbed purses or side-slung bags. Some picked between the remaining refreshments sitting at the white table off toward the wall. Seungcheol took his coat over his arm—a salt-and-pepper-coloured fleece trench coat—as well as his gym bag. He grabbed an apple. The short, thin woman beside him moved away in a soundless but hurried stride, leaving the straw to her juice box. While he squeezed the piebald apple under his fingers, testing its hardness, he somehow managed to hear a whisper.

“… don’t know why he still comes here. He’s fucking more collected than the counsellor. Does he just want to show off?”

Seungcheol took a bite. The apple was crisp and the juices tangy, a mix of sour and sweet. He followed the two women outside into the coolness, who immediately hushed. He furtively slid past them.

Still no release. But at least he was steady.

“Are you coming?”

“Uh… coming… to—uh… what?”

It was five in the morning. Seungcheol was awake, had been for the past hour, now standing in the narrow, poorly lit front foyer of his apartment. His phone was left sitting on the hallway dresser as he knelt down to finish tying his shoe. Then he was popping back up, twirling off the cap to his water bottle in one practiced, familiar motion.

“Running, Jeonghan. Are you running?”

Silence. A faint rustling, tugging, of sheets. “God? What?”

“Did you go out drinking last night? You asked me to call you before I went running, so we could meet at Massey Park,” Seungcheol reaffirmed before taking a sip. He placed the cap back on his bottle.

More rustling. And then, a vibrating, loud groan. “Oh, fuck. I said that? I fucking said that? No. Fuck that. Don’t take anything I say seriously past five-thirty, okay? Have fun. Good-fucking-night.”

Seungcheol watched the call close. “Thank god,” he huffed.

Running was something Seungcheol did alone. It was never an activity that included another person. It was merely him and his breath, his pumping heart, his physicality and focus as the coldness of night gradually ebbed into a lavender morning. He favoured Massey Park for its winding pathways underneath the fawning trees, and its general bareness of people, especially at the hour before dawn.

But even when he ran alone, there was always something there.

One part had left but the other was destined to stay.

Upon parking his car in the barren lot, Seungcheol started with some stretches. He made sure his expensive tech watch was working in order to track his heartrate. He slotted in tiny earbuds. He took his last sip of cold, sweet water, feeling the liquid slide down his throat.

Relying on purely memory, Seungcheol suspected he could run the entire park with his eyes closed, and still describe each twist and turn in detail. He knew where every bench was placed, and where the cat-tailed, marshy duck pond was located. The elm tree with the rotted burrow was about fifteen minutes into the run, while the children’s play structure was closer to the twenty-minute mark. He knew every crack and crevice in the pavement that should be avoided—even remembered the exact, scissored branch of a grand maple that unfortunately housed a nasty hornet’s nest last summer.

The park felt like his.

He finished two complete circuits. His skin was glistening and the collar of his t-shirt dampened in sweat. Seungcheol let his breathing come down, kept his eye on the watch secured to his wrist, placed right overtop a pulse-point. His head tilted back and he saw the first raining mist of pastel daylight. In the calmness, the tender wind cool through his thick hair, Seungcheol’s heartrate had finally returned to baseline.

At home, he showered while his morning coffee brewed.

Seungcheol enjoyed eggs-on-toast. Read a few pages from his book as he licked off his thumb of greasy butter and crumbs.

His life was much quieter now.

Settled and solid, like a stone tossed and hidden.

Very little could ruin that, he thought.

“I should really go. It’s late.”

“It’s nine o’clock you weenie!”

“Yes, and he wakes up at four in the morning to run. Stop being a drunk idiot and let the man go home,” Joshua sighed, stepping out into the corridor with a glass of red wine poised elegantly in his hand and a patterned blanket wrapped around his shoulders.

Seungcheol raised his eyebrows at Jeonghan, hopeful that he might step away from the front door as opposed to obstructing it with his extended limbs, sluggish and clumsy, pinkened, with warm, weighted alcohol. But it was never that easy. Not when Jeonghan was this drunk. Instead, his friend grinned wickedly, lurched for the car keys in Seungcheol’s hand, ran down the corridor snickering, giggling, shaking the keys to characteristically gloat, before scampering up the staircase.

Joshua watched, unimpressed, tired, from babysitting his deviant boyfriend, while swirling the red wine around in his glass. “Yeah, he’s fucking gone.” Then he turned back to Seungcheol, tilted his head apologetically, his eyes clear and sensible. He spent more time holding his wine than drinking it. “Might be best to set a blanket and pillow out on the couch. Sorry about that. I can get the keys before your run. It’s no problem.”

Seungcheol rubbed the back of his neck. “Eh, all good.”

“We’re always glad to have you over,” Joshua said. “Despite how it might end…” A thump was heard from upstairs, and Joshua merely lifted the glass to his mouth, taking a soft sip. “So, couch for tonight?”

“Couch.”

“Let me get you some things.”

Once Joshua had laid out a pillow and a blanket, allowed Seungcheol to borrow some clothes so he didn’t have to sleep in jeans, he was laid down comfortably, a hand tucked behind his head, as he stared at the high, sloped ceiling, muted and fuzzy in the darkness. The only glow provided came from a nightlight in the adjacent hallway. Every now and again, Seungcheol heard one of Jeonghan’s slurred, giggling shouts echo from the upstairs, followed by Joshua’s coarse shushing. It didn’t bother him. He appreciated knowing his friends were so close by.

When Seungcheol was disturbed again, it was by a hand lightly shaking his shoulder until his eyes unwilfully pulled themselves apart, the air around him suddenly feeling colder than when he first went to bed, the dimness an indiscernible blur. But he heard Joshua’s low, sweet voice, heard the tinkling of keys, and Seungcheol began to shuffle up.

“Got ‘em,” Joshua whispered, placing the keys in Seungcheol’s hand. “He was like a goddamn baby. Couldn’t get him down for hours.”

He nodded, rubbed his crusted eye. “Sounds like Jeonghan…”

“Obviously, feel free to wake up first. Use whatever you need. I’m heading back to bed. Jeonghan’s fucking comatose. See you Cheol.”

And then Joshua was leaving, his bare feet swift against the wooden floor as the same blanket from the night before remained wrapped around his shoulders. Seungcheol took about half-an-hour to properly awaken, mostly attributed to the frigid water he splashed across his puffy face in the downstairs washroom after nearly falling back asleep on the couch, wrapped toastily in the thick, linen-scented comforter. His hair was a rumpled, smooshed mess, sticking up stubbornly. Seungcheol squirmed into the dark blue hoodie he left on the living room armchair to cover his untamed tresses. He left, began the early drive home, played some music to keep himself alert while tapping his finger to the wheel.

God—he didn’t want to run—for once in his life.

He wished he drank to give himself an excuse.

After parking the car behind the building, Seungcheol made his way to the front stoop, rubbing fingers against the edges of his brows, hoping to ease out his foreign reluctance. It was still dark despite the distant ember of approaching dawn, the air frosty, strikingly crisp.

But then Seungcheol heard a groan.

He paused at the base of the stoop.

“Jesus… what the—what the fuck?”

Immediately, Seungcheol dropped to his knee. He started shaking the woman’s shoulder, at first with gentleness, and then panic, jarring her body harder and harder. He stuck a finger underneath her nose, felt her breath, barely there, dull as a kitten’s yawn, but there, nonetheless. She didn’t respond to a thing he said—things he couldn’t even remember saying despite being conscious of his mouth pursing, his tongue moving—until Seungcheol attempted to roll her attentively onto her back. The movement prompted another groan, and her eyelids seemed to twitch. He fished out his phone, about to call the police.

However, he paused.

Looked at her body again. Her clothes. They were burnt, desecrated into holes and gashes fluttering with loose threads. Small smears of ash were like freckles to her exposed skin. When he had shaken her shoulder, her flesh against his was not just warm, but hot, fever-like, enough to make one uncomfortably slippery with their own sweat. Her initial position was unusual, as though she had tumbled out of bed, almost. Seungcheol swallowed the pit knifing at his throat.

He put his phone away.

Instead, he gingerly gathered the fevered, ashen woman into his arms, smelling the acrid, burnt tinges in her hair, her clothes. He took her upstairs to his apartment, laid her down with the cautiousness of a newborn infant on his sofa, ensuring her head was supported by a silk-cased pillow. She squirmed slightly, and Seungcheol noticed her fingertips press into the sofa’s fabric while her cheek nuzzled the pillow, and he wondered if she was realizing, somewhere distant and buried in her mind, that she was no longer crumpled against a concrete stoop.

God—what the fuck was he supposed to do?

He pulled out his phone again, traversed the living room in repetitive circles, attempting to discern why he was struggling that greatly, that agonizingly, with calling the police.

Outside, the cloudy dimness was steadfast. Light was attempting to push through the dense grey with its aglow, sunlit breath and Seungcheol could see finite cracks in the sky, lined in pearl, shimmery white. For the umpteenth time, he put the phone back in his pocket.

The woman was perfectly still now.

Carefully, he settled his finger underneath her nose again to ensure he could still feel each thin exhale. How long was he supposed to wait? What was he supposed to do while an unconscious woman wearing peculiarly burnt clothing lay so still and ash-speckled on his sofa? He questioned preparing a warm, damp rag to at least clean up her soiled skin, but then he thought against it—thought about how startling it would be to awaken in a stranger’s home as he leaned over her imposingly with a damn rag—and decided to make coffee instead. The spoon clinked around the mug to stir in the fatty milk and sugar. He chose the seat at the dinner table that would still allow him to see the sofa, the crests of her unmoving body in the tenebrosity.

And then... he made breakfast.

Heard the dulcet clicks of the gas stove as he settled a frying pan overtop, broke two brown eggs, their perfectly rounded yolks bubbling at the buttered heat from underneath.

Seungcheol fried hashbrowns.

He grilled toast.

Poured himself the remainder of the coffee, a Colombian dark roast with delicious, nutty undertones rich in the morning air. He washed his dishes. Went to the washroom to shave his face. The blue gel frothed into a foam cream in his hands. His motions with the razor were smooth and seasoned, a seamless glide from the cheekbone to his jaw before shaking the razor off into a cup of warm water. He patted his face dry, rubbed in a few drops of fresh, clean-scented oil to help heal and moisturize his skin. Took a bristled brush to his frenzied hair that managed to calm its stubbornness. It was structure. His structure. At times the only mechanism he had when thinking felt like dying.

Finally, he retrieved his glasses from the mirror cabinet.

But when he came back into the living room, feeling somewhat rejuvenized and clear-headed, he noticed a glaring, terrifying change.

The woman was sitting up.

You.

THE WOMAN.

Seungcheol didn’t move, didn’t breathe. Instead, he watched from the hallway behind the sofa, almost waiting you for to spring into action, clamber around in panic, scream for help because who’s fucking place was this and why were you laid inside it? But you were evidently lethargic, bogged by the drowsy vestiges of unconsciousness. He studied the palm that pressed deep against your forehead, the arm you settled across the back of the sofa with such brittleness, as though your bones were in pieces. And Seungcheol knew he should make himself known rather than wait for you to discover him sleuthing in the corridor shadows. He shifted forward, and the floorboards squeaked.

In an instant, your head lurched around.

“Uh—” he raised his hands slowly, “—hey, there.”

Your eyes were wide in terror, although he noted that you were staring unfocused in confusion, unable to spot him despite his shortening distance from the sofa. Seungcheol took another step, and your eyes raced to a different corner, a different picture on the wall.

He cleared his throat upon noticing a small hitch. “I found you outside, on the stairway, totally unconscious. I promise, you don’t need to be scared.” Sure, that was helpful. What was a promise from one complete stranger to another if not completely useless. Regardless, he took another step. At last, your gaze settled on him, bloated and wild. “But I won’t feel offended if not. Is there anything I can do for you?”

The room was icy and silent.

Seungcheol’s heart was swollen in his chest. Your fear became his fear, and how his ears were two ringing seashells of pumping blood.

But then your arm shifted. You began to reach over the back of the sofa, fingertips quaking like dry twigs. Somehow, he grew stiller than he was before, watching intensely as your timid hand proceeded to brush ever so gingerly against his wrist. And you gasped. Seungcheol jolted.

Your fingers on his bare skin had been hot metal.

“I’m sorry,” he felt urged to apologize, “I know this is weird. I just want to know if you’re okay, if I need to call emergency services. Can you… can you... see okay? Are you able to use your voice at all?”

He was right behind the sofa now. The closeness allowed him to realize a faint, stirred cloudiness in your eyes that he couldn’t help studying with a curious squinch. You touched your chest, however, your hand sunk through a tattered hole, the fabric outlined in dark, burnt singes, and Seungcheol noticed how your entire body tensed like a closing fist. Your fingers began rubbing together, the tiny ashes smearing into powdered black, each inspection of your skin turning more frantic, more hurried, shakier as your breathing thickened audibly.

Unsure what to do, Seungcheol could only watch. But then your milky gaze fluttered the space to his outline, your forehead rippled tight with worry, and he could vaguely see that your throat was twitching, a dry but gurgled noise buzzing up. Seungcheol cracked from his stupor.

“Okay, okay, don’t worry, alright?” He hurried around the sofa to sit down on the edge, pulled out his phone. “I’m going to call—”

You placed a trembling hand over his phone and began to push it away, hide the screen and its number pad. He felt his face blanch in a surge of white heat. There was a watery, sharp pleading in your eyes.

He swallowed. “You don’t want help?”

No, you shook your head. No, no, no.

Again, the room was silent but squeezed with pressure, his thoughts impossibly scattered. At least you could understand him.

Seungcheol sighed deeply, tempted to use his phone again, now slipped beside his thigh. “What should I do?” A question more for himself. “I mean, you can’t speak, and it seems your eyesight is poor. I’ll be honest, I have no fucking clue what’s happening. No idea how you got there or why your clothes are... destroyed like this.” He leaned forward, practicing a long, heavy breath while massaging his sore temples, closing his eyes, focusing on the circular motions to his skull.

“What can I do?”

A moment passed. He looked to you and stiffened. Your head was slumped back lazily and your eyes were shut. Seungcheol saw your chest rising with the languorous steadiness of sleep and felt himself ache at the confusion. The longer he observed you, he found that something bizarre was standing out—a dull, soft glow on the side of your dirtied neck, greenish-blue, emanating a near imperceptible palpation. Without thinking, his mind a chaffing blank, Seungcheol slowly crept out his hand, the pads of his index and middle finger settling lightly overtop the foreign glow.

The area was whirring hot. It reminded him of his laptop when he let a large document sit open for too long. Unconsciously biting onto his bottom lip, Seungcheol decided to push down on the warm area, feeling himself tense, and then, all at once, a biting, rolling shock shot up his fingers like a freshly fired arrow, the pain sizzling at the same point along his neck until he recoiled, standing up from the sofa and gutturally cursing. Seungcheol approached the mirror by the front door, noticed a reddish bruise that his fingers swept over, performing their own inspection while the skin continued to experience a residual sting.

Where the absolute fuck had you come from?

Seungcheol was terrified to leave the living room—let alone his apartment—now that you had staked your claim of the sofa, continuing to sleep past lunch time, past dinner time. He had grief counselling tomorrow night, and then breakfast with Jeonghan, Joshua, and their lifelong friend, Phoebe, the following day. He paced around the kitchen island while scraping out leftover jasmine rice from a microwave dish, the steeped, sesame oil flavour tasting unusually bland.

How was he supposed to sleep? Go on his morning run?

Why didn’t he just phone the police?

He sunk down in the armchair oblique to the sofa, pulling on its side-lever to extend the unfolding compartment from underneath. After draping a spare closet blanket over his body, Seungcheol puffed out his chest, sighed again, as dreary, grey daytime was coloured in by the dark charcoal of night. How tired he felt, suckled dry, from worry’s unkempt greediness. Before Seungcheol could manage to stitch together one final thought—something about the moonlight, its silver seas splashing through the window—his mind was turning on its side, lost in sleep.

Scribblescribblescribble.

Scratchscratchscratch.

Scribblescribblescribble.

Scratchscratchscratch.

He scrunched his nose, felt his glasses straighten. The noises were quiet, but their consistency was a wriggling worm breaking through the soil of his unconscious. Seungcheol threw the blanket from his lap, half-hanging off the chair. He sat up against smooth leather, rubbed underneath his glasses to relieve the graininess from his eyes, finding the room revealed in a tinted, sombre blue, as though it had been dipped. The sofa was—fuck—empty. And now Seungcheol was forced to his feet by the fluttering of anxiety, nearly tripping over himself, feeling a lost name wander his tongue but melt away when he needed it.

In the hallway, he noticed an open door with yellow light pouring out like a spilled glass of juice—his old study turned into storage when he no longer used it—and Seungcheol marched inside. There, hunched over an open notebook on the wooden floor, was you, a pencil in your hand.

“Uh…” he swallowed dryly, squinted at you in disbelief.

Then you made a rough noise, strangled, upset. Seungcheol watched you tear a paper out from the runged notebook, and he realized that you were surrounded by ripped papers—each with their own marooned scribbling, similar to that of a child’s—discarded and harshly blacked out by the frustrated streaks of rubbing graphite.

Stay calm, Seungcheol, stay fucking calm.

“I—uh—see you’re awake,” he chose to dumbly comment.

You growled again, the pencil performing a circus act of impatient swirling around the page until you ripped it free. Without pause, you began to draw again, leaned so achingly close to the notebook.

Seungcheol moved slow, lowered himself to the floor, sat across from you with his arms caged around his knees. “What’s all this?” No response. Did you even understand he was in the room? He debated reaching out and delivering a grazing touch across your pointed shoulder, although he didn’t want a pencil stabbed through his palm. “Gosh—it’s—two in the morning,” he said upon checking his watch. “But I guess you slept all day.” Seungcheol grabbed one of the papers. He pushed up his glasses and attempted to study what he saw in between the angry scribbling, perhaps the crude outline of a face and its features, however, misplaced, warped. “Who is this you’re trying to draw?”

Abruptly, you swung up from leaning over the notebook, the pencil left behind on the floor. Seungcheol froze, yet his gaze was fixed and observing, noting the defeated tremble in your bottom lip and the glassiness soaking over your eyes, having lost some of their mist.

You choked, shook your head in blatant misery.

He stopped thinking. Another part of him clicked into play.

Seungcheol sat on his knee and leaned in close, meanwhile your expression twisted with emotion. “Don’t stress, okay?” he hummed, letting his fingers sweep down your forearm. Gently, he grabbed your warm wrist, a pulse barking from underneath, and squeezed. “Whatever you’ve been through, it’s clearly a lot. I can only imagine how much this overwhelms you,” he continued, slow and soft, as the wobbling water in your eyes appeared to dry. “How about doing this in a more... step-wise way? Would you like to shower? Eat?”

Your gaze drifted across the floor, weighted with weakness, while your shoulders drooped like branches sagging in frosted snow. Seungcheol couldn’t stand to see you in those ruined, sooty clothes—practically wearing your own burnt ashes—and so he stood up amongst the clutter of cryptic papers, extended his hand.

“C’mon,” he murmured, “I’ll show you to the shower.”

When you huffed, carefully grasping onto his fingers with an exploratory gentleness, Seungcheol smiled, helped tug you to your feet.

“Here we are,” he said, pushing open another door in the corridor. After flicking the light switch, the casual modernity of the washroom was revealed. The shower walls were glass and the tiles were large and cool, granite grey. He had spent many, many nights underneath the flat, circular showerhead, feeling the hot water surge down his back while he thought in restive echoes. “You can use the white towel. I keep mine in my bedroom. And… uh—shit—clothes. You’re gonna need clothes.” He delved a hand through his hair. “I’ll look, okay? If you want, you can start the water so it’ll be hot by the time I’m back.”

In his bedroom, Seungcheol began opening drawers and picking out articles at random. He heard the water the gushing as he looked over a simple black t-shirt, then folding it on top a pair of plaid-blue boxer shorts. Before he left, he quickly grabbed some white tube socks.

He felt the familiar warmth of shower steam upon returning to the washroom, settling the fresh clothes down on the sink’s edge. But when he glanced at you, his eyes bulged—“Jesus—fuck—sorry,”—and he immediately turned around, fumbling to pull the door shut. “I’ll leave you alone. Sorry.” You had been completely undressed, watching the water spray from above with a sort of hypnotized, enraptured wonder.

Seungcheol hurried into the moonlit living room—not without loudly stubbing his toe on the sofa’s corner—and climbed back onto the armchair, hauling the blanket over him like an embarrassed boy. You hadn’t seemed to care at all. Not even a bit. It proved to fascinate him.

He couldn’t sit still. Seungcheol thought he noticed an oddity on your lower back (not that he was intentionally looking), little textured patches, perhaps from your unsolved injury, or possible birthmarks.

Seungcheol found himself back in his abandoned office, walking between scraps of torn paper, glancing down at every scribble and shape. He saw the drawer pulled open on the desk—now piled high with clutter and boxes—the metal cup split over, spreading out pens and pencils. It seemed that the world was coming back to you piece by piece, like a string emerging from a dark fog, and you had leapt at the opportunity to keep pulling the string further toward yourself. His socked foot brushed against another sheet. Seungcheol knelt down, gathered the mangled image into his hands, rubbed along his chin as he observed the harshly penciled face, a rough darkness pressed so intensely into the eyes he was surprised the paper wasn't torn.

Upon hearing the shower silence, Seungcheol set the drawing down on his desk. He hurried back into the living room, flicking on the ceiling light, and gone was the heavy blue-blackness. There was no point in going back to sleep, anyway. Not now. After all this.

He wondered when you last ate or drank anything.

Seungcheol picked his way through the fridge, turning over rectangles of block cheese and pushing behind the greek yogurt he used for his post-gym protein shakes. He thought about setting up the coffee machine, or making eggs. But you were a complete enigma to his guesses and the sight of syrupy-like goo and a gelatinous yellow yolk might be the straw that broke the camel's back.

In confused defeat, he shut the fridge and turned around, fingers sinking underneath his glasses, pushing them up so he could rub deeply at his eyes and face until his vision was spirals of white stars.

He fixed his glasses back on and jolted.

You were there, standing across from him in silence, separated by the warm marble of the kitchen island. Wetness still clung shiny to your hair. He studied your skin unmarred by smeared ash, almost glowing, breathing, without sooty, sweaty film to smother it.

Seungcheol nodded. “I hope that made you feel better.”

There was a Tupperware of round, purple grapes left on the kitchen island. You grabbed a chair, high like a barstool, and began to pull it, the legs squeaking against the tiled floor. Then you squished into the seat, carefully, slowly, as though it were something foreign, before grabbing the container and pulling it toward you.

He rubbed his nose. “Yeah. Take it. Eat as many as you like.”

You started with one, popping the grape straight into your mouth. He heard its thin skin bursting between your teeth. And then you plucked another, feeding yourself grape after grape, chewing, swallowing, chewing, swallowing, and Seungcheol just stood there aimlessly observing, lost in thoughts that could not be untangled even with the most dexterous fingers, until there were more thin stems than grapes.

“I’ll get you some water,” he murmured, his voice hoarse.

There was a cold carafe he kept in the fridge. Seungcheol poured you a glass, about half full, and slid it across the countertop.

You nudged the Tupperware away and proceeded to touch the glass, rubbing its moist, chilled condensation between your fingers. He watched you pick the glass up, bring the rim to your lips and experiment with a small sip. Suddenly, the glass was flush to your mouth, and the water seemed to be disappearing at an astounding rate. Every swallow was more like an echoing, painful gulp. You had emptied the cup, then leaned forward, eyeing the full jug next to his hand, droplets framing your chin.

“Oh, uh, sure,” he answered, spilling more into the glass.

You drank the water just as quickly.

“I can only imagine how that feels,” he said, smiling. “Is there anything else you need? Do you want more than just... grapes?”

Wiping off your lips, your head shook.

“Best to start small. You’re right. Let me put the jug in the fridge. You can take whatever you want, honestly. It doesn’t matter.”

He turned back to the counter. Your hand was making a scribbling motion, like you were holding something, going up and down.

“Oh.” Seungcheol shook his head. “The notebook?”

You nodded vigorously and gripped the table’s edge.

“Alright. Sure. One sec.”

He thought some good could come out of the notebook, actually. So he opened another compartment on his desk, squeezed with tan-coloured tabbed files from a different period in his life, a different time, and found one with a red cover. The first page had nothing written but a penned date, the start of a resignation letter he spinelessly gave up on.

“Okay,” Seungcheol hummed as he returned to the kitchen island, “I’ve got an idea.” Your notebook was placed underneath his, and your eyes were dilated plates, keening for its endless pages. “You can draw a little. So I’m wondering if you can write, too.” He flipped open his red notebook, uncapped a pen, and jotted down a simple word.

Then he turned the book to you, tapped at it.

HELLO.

“Can you read this?” Seungcheol asked.

You nodded obediently.

“That’s great! But’s let be certain.” He bent over the notebook, his pen working fluidly with every stroke of his hand. “What about this?”

I’M SEUNGCHEOL. WHO ARE YOU?

He followed your gaze, how it moved lithely across the paper, until it connected confidently with his. When he first looked into your eyes, they were thick with pulpy cloudiness, but after some sleep and a hot shower, it seemed that their stucco had vanished.

“I’ll give you your notebook. You can respond.”

Seungcheol set a different pen atop your book and pushed it across the marble toward you. The pages fluttered in your fingers as you flipped them open. He heard the pen click. Its inky point touched the paper. Your hand wouldn’t move, and he could see the tenseness of your thin finger bones, the wrinkled strain in your expression. Then you removed the pen and shook your head, huffing, frustrated.

He edged onto his stool. “There’s no rush.”

You leaned over the notebook, one hand gripping its corner while the other clasped the metallic pen, and he thought he could see something being written, although quite slowly, uncertainly, with effort.

The dark blue notebook was then flipped toward him.

I DO N’T NOW.

Seungcheol squinted, mouthed the words. “You don’t know?”

You nodded.

“That’s okay. Do you, uh, remember how you got here?”

No, you shook your head.

“Who was that person you were trying to draw?”

Your eyes rounded. Again, you returned to the notebook, now clutching it from underneath as the pen glided stubbornly. His thigh began to bounce rapidly while he waited, and he smoothed his hand along the taunt, jittery muscle to make it stop. You sat back in the chair and held the notebook up, making sure to peel the drooping page away.

BAD. THINK THEY WANT TO HURT ME.

His stomach writhed. But he ignored it. “Do you remember anything about them? What was their relationship to you?”

At that, you winced, shaking your head.

In an instant, his thoughts were electric, one firing after the other in succession like a bugged computer. There was a part of him that crackled, a lightbulb long burnt out in a cobwebby basement finally coursing with the spark to make it twinkle, but Seungcheol swallowed the inkling away before the glow could enshroud him. When he looked to you, the notebook had been pushed aside, and he saw your shoulders, pinched-in and shrunken, trembling. You bit at your thumb. Your body seemed to remember what anxiety and dread was because he could feel its scattered pulses booming throughout the air like thunder.

He settled his arms onto the marble. One hand reached out tentatively, stopping midway. Your eyes flickered toward it.

“Look,” Seungcheol spoke in a careful, low brass, “you have every right to feel frustrated and scared. But—if this is any assurance—nothing is going to happen to you. Not while I’m here.” He tilted his head, practiced a comforting but confident, strict smile, one that he hadn’t used in years. He wondered how it looked from your perspective. “You just have to trust me,” he murmured, sliding his hand back.

You sighed exhaustedly, brushing a tear off your clean cheek.

But then you nodded, your lips pushed together in acceptance.

THE NOTEBOOK.

Seungcheol skipped his morning run at Massey Park.

Instead, he used the treadmill in his bedroom, the conveyor belt churning at a medium pace underneath his shoes. After he showed you how to operate the television, he left you alone on the couch with the notebook. He reassured you it was completely okay to get anything you pleased from the fridge. His shoes continued to beat against the rubber track. The treadmill was poised in front of a window. He could see down onto the street, the world still gloomy with early-morning shadows.

His eyes flickered to the treadmill’s timer.

Most of his run-time was spent thinking about what he should do, how he should handle your situation, and his conclusion changed with every hard puff from his beating chest. Seungcheol’s days of being a sleuthing private investigator—tossing out business cards with fake embossed names and pretending to like presumptuous journalists and spending his nights in seedy, cheap motels—were long over. He sympathized with you, wanted to help, but his help should be nothing more than getting you back on your feet with a visit to the police station.

He felt a pearl of sweat slide down his temple. Seungcheol wiped it away, squeezed his fists, continued to run the pushing pace. Like clockwork, his mind turned, and he considered how deeply, unnervingly strange your predicament was. His gut was sharp and clanging, demanding to be acknowledged. The one rule Seungcheol stuck true to since leaving behind his investigative career was always listening to his gut, his instinct. It never led him astray. A sort of sixth, ironclad sense.

But you weren’t his case.

Seungcheol gritted his teeth and clicked a button on the treadmill to increase the track’s speed. He was running so quickly that his mind fell into a forced and quiet focus, his eyes still, trained, at nothing but the pinkish dimness outside the window. Yet, something managed to penetrate his steely concentration, like a jarring flash of white light on the highway that slaps you awake.

He had grief counselling tonight.

Fuck.

When Seungcheol returned to the living room after showering, he noticed the TV was left glowing on the plethora of streaming apps.

He walked into the kitchen and opened a cupboard, pulling out a frying pan that he rested atop his favourite burner on the steel stove. The gas clicked. Seungcheol cut a tablespoon of butter and let it melt.

“Couldn’t find anything you liked?” he called to you.

Upon shuffling against the sofa and the large, tousled blanket you had removed from the armchair, you flashed Seungcheol your notebook. He had a bowl on the island counter, and now an egg yolk was being smoothly cracked into it by a single expert hand.

NO.

Seungcheol laughed. “I often have the same experience.”

He finished cracking the remainder of brown-shelled eggs into the bowl, then poured in some heavy cream, added a few spices and herbs, and finished with a splash of hot sauce. After whisking everything together, he poured the mixture slowly into the warmed pan.

As he turned to open another drawer for his silicon spatula, he saw you standing behind the island, watching him. Seungcheol blinked, relaxed his shoulders, then returned to pushing around miscellaneous utensils and measuring cups until he found the spatula.

“I’m making eggs and toast,” he said. “Want any?”

You swallowed.

“It's good. Not bland. I put a lot of spices... um, which I guess you could describe as flavour enhancers? Not too many. A little paprika. Cayenne hot sauce. It's how I like it, though.” He paused, scratched his cheek. “Should I just shut the fuck up and put a pan on for you?”

You smirked a little, nodded.

When everything was done cooking and toasting, Seungcheol set two plates onto the marble, then spread out forks and knives. He poured himself a cup of orange juice and you some more water from his cold carafe in the fridge. At your elbow was the notebook and pen. He wanted to converse with you, tease things out, but Seungcheol wasn’t entirely sure what to ask someone who couldn’t even remember their own name.

So he let you eat, watching loosely as you pushed some scrambled eggs onto the buttered toast and took a messy bite, never wiping your mouth or licking off your greasy fingers until the plate was a sparkling white—completely cleaned. Before him.

“Good?” Seungcheol asked, quirking his eyebrow knowingly.

You grabbed the pen and scribbled onto the notebook.

He enjoyed how much you seemed to like it.

YES!

Seungcheol smiled. “I eat this most mornings.” He fiddled with his fork while staring down at the plate. Just another bite of toast and some smaller, browner pieces of scrambled egg left, although he moved everything around idly with the fork as he contemplated. “By the way,” he rumbled, clearing his throat, “I have a commitment tonight. And I'll need to go out today for groceries so I can make dinner—or, fuck—so we can have dinner,” he questioned more than stated. “My point is, aside from the grocery stuff, this commitment is... well...”

You were motionless.

He set the fork down and began to rub along his wrist, choking it between his fingers. “It’s pretty important to me. I’ve been going for about a year now.” Seungcheol sat back in a huff, moved a hand to his thigh and squeezed. “Of course, I want you to feel safe. And I want you to have a space to rebuild everything. I’m just not sure if… if that space should be my apartment, you know? Have you thought about it? Going down to the station. Now that you’re a little more grounded. It wouldn’t be something you’d have to do alone. I could come with you.”

Your mouth opened, and he heard the faintest tickle of a rasp, a rumble from somewhere deep down. But you shut your mouth a moment later, opting to grab the dark blue notebook instead. It was stabbing into your chest as you wrote, the pen hurried, your franticness evident.

THEY CAN’T HELP.

Seungcheol frowned. “You don’t even want to try?”

You briskly flipped the page, shaking your head.

PLEASE. I NEED TO STAY.

He watched you readjust the notebook to add something.

PLEASE.

God, how could he fucking argue with you? When you were using a notebook to communicate with him? When you had nothing but the most gradual outlines of a stranger's face drifting through your shattered memories? The twinge he experienced earlier while running on the treadmill stabbed him again, twisted harder than before until he pushed a hand against his gut and took in a stabilizing breath to singularize everything. Your eyes were wide, full of lacquered pleading and anxiety. Seungcheol crossed his arms, bit onto his bottom lip.

Then he started to nod. “Okay. Okay. That’s fine. You can stay here for a bit. But we’ve got to figure this out at some point.” He nudged up his glasses and readjusted them against the outside light. “Then I’ll be gone tonight, for an hour and a half. You’ll be alone, alright?”

Your head dipped in acknowledgement.

The pen was back in your hand, and then the notebook.

THANK YOU.

Seungcheol decided he was going to make menudo for dinner, but he needed pork belly and potatoes. Carrots, too. Eventually, he ended up with a long list written on his phone. Months and months had passed before Seungcheol returned to the local grocery store, just last Spring. He was petrified of running into a familiar face, being subject to their expectant doting, their over-endearing softness, the manner in which they froze—instantly offered apologies—whenever making a tiny blunder about the past. But Seungcheol learned it was something to simply swallow, something that would fade slowly until normality resumed.

His cart was getting fuller. A proper grocery run. It made him feel part of his own life, the conductor, not a passenger. He carefully inspected his apples for bruises and shuffled between dewy clumps of fresh parsley until he found the most suitable. He wrinkled his nose at the ridiculous price of the yogurt he needed to buy, and let his eyes skim the assorted shelves in concentration until he found the tomato sauce. Little things that allowed him to blend in. He was no longer the grieving widower, requiring condolence and sympathy, pitied as he walked each aisle alone without someone at his side. Now he was merely another man buying groceries. Unquestioned.

However, right before Seungcheol got in line for check-out, he stopped by the store’s flower display. They still sold those luscious pink orchids, artfully tied to thin, brown stalks. Why wouldn’t they? Were they supposed to sixty-nine orchids just because they had been his wife’s favourite flower? The ones he bought her at the end of each month?

“They're gorgeous, aren't they?”

A woman was beside him, holding onto a handbasket that had little to nothing inside, apart from a single box of Bandaids and a soy-noodle ramen cup that needed water and a microwave. She was shorter than him, with straight, sandy-blonde hair cut bluntly at the shoulders, and brown-framed glasses set right to the tip of her tiny nose.

“Sorry, didn't mean to be annoying,” she continued. “I'm... new to the area, I guess. Just trying out some small talk. Rebuilding your life sucks.”

Seungcheol swallowed, taken off guard. “Uh, yeah. Right.”

“Sorry,” she apologized again, her thin lips flickering at the edges with a shameful but presumably sincere smile. “I’m Millie.”

“Seungcheol,” he answered, trying to walk back his cold demeanour.

She tilted her head. “I'm making this weird, aren't I? I'll go.”

“No, you're not. I'm sorry. I was deep in thought, that's all.” At least he was being asked about flowers, not if he'd finally gotten used to sleeping alone, having one toothbrush in the washroom, a single pair of slippers by the front door. Orchids were better. Far better.

“Deep in thought...” she hummed. “Good thoughts?”

Seungcheol shrugged. “I'm trying to make it a good thought.”

Millie snorted, and it was an unexpected sound to come out from her willowy frame. “Sounds like grief.”

And Seungcheol's eyes narrowed. “Are you psychic?”

Her eyelashes batted calmly behind her glasses. “Nope. Just know the look. The feeling. The trying to make sad things seem less sad.”

“Well, my grief counsellor would like you.”

Her expression opened into brightness. “Mr. Marshall?”

Seungcheol gawped. “Are you going to Rosseau?”

“My first session is tonight.”

“I guess I'll see you there,” he chuckled. “And... I'm sorry. For whatever loss you're going through. Seems like you're already making strides.”

Millie bobbed her head. “My sister,” she said briefly.

Seungcheol breathed a little deeper. “My wife,” he answered.

Unfortunately, that was how most people identified each other in grief counselling, right after learning their name. Whoever you lost came with an invisible label, and at times, the grief was measured in ways it should not be. Seungcheol had learned to let go of the measuring.

Her eyes pointed down toward Seungcheol’s cart. “What’s for dinner exactly?”

He shifted some items aside. “Menudo. But I’m running low on pretty much everything. Means I won’t have to worry for a while.”

“Cool. I'm having this instant ramen tonight. Soy noodles. Supposed to be healthier or some shit. But I think I'll make sandwiches some time this weekend.”

“Sandwiches? Are you having people over?”

“No. I can see how it sounds that way. But truth be told, I can eat about three sandwiches in a night. It was a thing my sister and I did. Stay up late in the kitchen, talk about life, butter bread and arrange our toppings and mix together spicy sauces. I can’t let it go.”

“Doesn’t seem like you need to,” Seungcheol said.

“You know what else is cool, I was talking to this woman earlier, trying to find my way around the downtown transit station. Said her name was Evie, and she mentioned grief counselling, too. It makes me think we exude some sort of energy, you know? A certain vibe. Like, we can tell who's going through it. Who's coming out of it. Who hasn't really figured it out. It's like you and the orchids. That little bit of sadness, that little bit of frustration, that little bit of wistfulness on your face. Maybe that's why I picked you to small talk with... Anyway, you know Evie?”

Seungcheol furrowed his dark brow. “Yeah. I mean, we don't speak much at counselling. Or ever cross paths, really. But she used to be a server at a diner I had frequented a lot, out West. Big Whally's.”

His fingers squeezed around the cart handle as the memories unveiled like lifted tiles. At one point in his life, Seungcheol had spent many late nights there, amongst the buzzing bulbs, the stained window shutters, the distant sizzling and popping of bacon and cooking oil. His plate would always struggle to fit on the table. Instead, papers would be spread out around him. A laptop. His dog-eared notebook. A big map he could fold up and pen notes onto. Seungcheol looked at Millie again, into her eyes, light like milk mixed into coffee. It was as though a spark had jolted alive in his chest. His head momentarily ached, and the pain rippled. There was much he chose to bury since those days, and now a small piece had dug its way out, thrashing rapidly, like an earwig.

Seungcheol nodded. “Her hair was dyed then. Purple, I think? And she only wore dark lipstick. Had a piercing in her right daith.”

“Your memory is quite sharp,” Millie commended.

He shrugged, finally deciding to push his cart forward. “Not sure how I remember. I just do.”

“Well, I think that would flatter her. She seems frustrated by a lot, like she can’t get it and never will. Did you feel like that?”

“Of course I did,” Seungcheol huffed. “How about you?”

Millie offered a small, scrunched smile that he was unsure what to make of. “I’ll just have to keep trying,” she said. “See you tonight.”

“Yeah, see you,” Seungcheol answered.

She smelled like sandalwood and vanilla. Seungcheol breathed it in, closed his eyes for a moment and allowed the scent to sidle through his senses. When he tried to think back to Big Whally’s, tried to remember more about Evie with her flat-ironed, vibrant purpose hair and dark, overly-lined lipsticks, he found that there was an abrupt, crashing end. His memories steered him elsewhere. He let them.

Some roadblocks, he had put up for a reason.

The drive to the elementary school was somewhat torturous. His finger consistently tapped the steering wheel, beat after beat after beat, his mind trapped outside, needing to run alongside the car at times to keep up with his physical body. He had felt so assured nothing would happen to you. But then doubt leaked in, starting as a small droplet, yet gradually gaining size and weight until it felt like a snowball was sitting cold and hard in his chest.

There was so much unknown in the situation.

He toed the break, easing the car into a stop at the light.

Seungcheol breathed out, flexed his fingers around the wheel.

Would it really hurt to miss one session? He had been going dutifully for months. What could he hear in this particular hour that he hadn’t already heard? What answer could he propose to the counsellor’s prompt that hadn’t already been said? The light flicked into bright green, glowing and fuzzy against the blustery blackness of night.

He glanced at the silver wedding band snug around his ring finger, how it turned emerald for a brief moment, and decided to focus on his commitment. In this one hour, you could not exist.

When Seungcheol walked into the dimly lit gymnasium, he dressed his coat over the back of his usual chair and sat down. Some people were hovering near the refreshment table in small groups of twos and threes, eating crackers and cheese, sticking apple wedges in peanut butter. Others were already sat, staring down quietly at the clasped hands in their lap, waiting for the counsellor to make his way over. Seungcheol could hear the wind blowing against the side of the building and folded his arms, willing himself to smother the worry he felt for you, alone.

“Hey, you mind if I sit next to you?”

He looked over his shoulder and noticed Millie unwrapping a cream scarf from around her neck, her cheeks brushed with soft pink.

“Go for it,” Seungcheol answered, shrugging.

She hung her purse off the chair and smiled. “Fucking windy out there, isn’t it? Like a pack of dogs howling. Huskeys or something.” Millie unzipped her coat and sat down, proceeding to fold the thick material into a square that she left on her lap. “I saw this poor lady chasing a coffee cup all over the place. At least she didn’t want to litter, though.”

“Good judge of character, that,” he said.

“How have you been since I saw you... uh...” she glanced at the caged clock against the wall, squinted. “Approximately five hours ago?”

He stopped himself from laughing and choked the insufferable tickle down. “Oh, everything's been fine.” Fuck—he almost grinned at how ridiculous a lie his response was—and so he ran a hand down his face, wiping the twitch away. “What about you?”

“Well, I managed to hang up some pictures in my dingy little apartment. Put way too many mismeasured holes in the wall that I’m hoping my landlord will blissfully ignore when the time comes.”

Seungcheol nodded. “If it's already dingy, I wouldn't worry.”

“Got any interesting plans this week?”

“Not really. A breakfast coming up. Seeing some friends.”

“Oh, fun. Where at?” Millie asked, her smile faint and reminiscent.

Seungcheol chuckled. “Ada and Jo's.”

“Is it cheap?”

“I suppose so. If you order a single egg on toast.”

Millie’s chestnut eyes were then diverted by the counsellor’s loud clap echoing around the spacious gym as he settled down into his seat. The circle was mostly full. Seungcheol spotted three empty chairs that the counsellor liked to keep for late newcomers making reserved, tentative entrances, but he noticed nobody new (apart from Millie) or nobody disappeared. The session was ignited with an open-ended question—would anybody like to share how their week has been?—and the air fell silent between the torrents of wind rocking the building like a baby crib.

“How quiet you’ve all gotten since last week,” the counsellor chuckled, rubbing his palms along his brown corduroy slacks. “Should I start, then? I had a nice weekend with the grandkids. Took them out to the movies. Do people still eat liquorice during movies? I guess my age was showing. Liquorice seems like an ‘old person’ thing nowadays.”

“I really like liquorice,” Millie said, slightly raising her hand.

The counsellor’s gaze ticked the room to her, his expression relaxed and inviting, his smile perfectly warm. “Red or black?”

“All-sorts.”

He snorted, and his smile extended to further round out his spotty, sinking cheeks. “All-sorts? Now that’s old!”

A soft undulating of chuckles broke the room’s stillness. More people began interjecting with their opinions, funny anecdotes, bouncing off the conversation in ever-confident swells. Millie partly turned to Seungcheol, and he saw a lopsided, prideful grin pushing at her lip. He nudged her elbow in acknowledgment, returning a faint smize of his own.

When Seungcheol came to his door, his fist precisely tapped the wood in a pattern recognizable to you. He decided to add the measure before he left, figuring it would make you more at ease to know it was him unlocking the door and not some potential, figurative maniac. Then he was coming inside to bold darkness exempt for the television, its white lambency touching you in fleeting, watery strokes on the sofa, wrapped in a blanket and eating what he assumed to be cereal.

“Finally found something you like?” Seungcheol noted while hanging his trench coat on the rack. He stepped closer to the TV and folded his arms, delightfully scoffing at your choice. “Spongebob, huh?”

You nodded.

He proceeded to glance at the blue bowl filled with white-frosted Mini Wheats in your lap. You scooped one out with a spoon and he heard it crunch very dryly in your mouth. “Maybe that’s just how you eat cereal, but you can put milk in that, you know,” Seungcheol commented gently, deciding to fit himself next to you on the couch, leaned forward on his knees. “I guess I underestimate how much you’ve forgotten.”

In response, you merely shrugged.

“I’ll be up early to run. At four.”

You reached forward, resting the bowl on the coffee table. The runged notebook was pulled from the shadows beside you, and he watched you rest it against your knee, bent over while you scribbled.

YOU RUN AT FOUR IN THE MORNING?!

Seungcheol flattened his lips together, nodding.

Then you wrote again.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?

Seungcheol chuckled sleepily, and his fingers rubbed circles to the bridge of his nose, his eyes fluttering shut for a brief moment. “A lot of shit, honestly. I’ll try not to wake you.” He stood up. “Goodnight.”

You nodded back, setting the notebook aside and pulling the blanket up comfortably to your chin, the TV glowing against your face.

He wondered how long it would take for you to speak.

How long it would take for you to get bored.

And for how long should he keep you a secret?

“I love when they give you these hard little squares of unspreadable butter like we have some sort of use for them. Are they even real? Or just table ornaments?” Jeonghan took a wrapped square and knocked it against the table’s hard edge. “Okay, it squished a bit.”

Joshua gathered his hands around his steaming cup of espresso, blowing quaintly before taking an experimental sip. “It’s probably for hot food. Pancakes and that.” He suddenly placed his cup down, wrangling out an unwrapped butter square from Jeonghan’s hand before he could shove the whole thing in his mouth. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“I want to make sure they’re real!” Jeonghan exclaimed.

Joshua hid the square back in its messy, unfolded wrapper. “They are real you idiot. Why would they benefit from giving customers fake food to choke on?” He sipped from his hot espresso again. “I swear, the way you act makes me think you’re alien. Little weirdo.”

“You love it,” Jeonghan snickered, pecking Joshua’s cheek.

Seungcheol fingered a crease in the white tablecloth, his eyes adrift. “When’s Pheobe getting here? She’s typically pretty punctual.”

“Oh—oh crap—I forgot to tell you, Seungcheol,” Joshua sputtered, pushing away the black fringe over his forehead only for it flop right into its usual curtain. “She’s on her way, alright? But she’s bringing someone. This guy she’s been seeing. He’s having breakfast with us.”

“Wow—uh—okay,” Seungcheol answered in shock, slumping into the chair. “Yeah, I had no idea she was even seeing someone.”

Joshua nodded. “It’s in its infancy. We only figured out last night. But you know how she is. One good conversation with a stranger across the bar and she swears they're star-crossed the next day.”

“So you don't know him then?”

“Nope, not at all. She never goes for my recommendations.”

Suddenly, a silver fork was flying down, hitting the table with a loud, bone-solid thud that made Joshua jump and gasp. “Judgement day!” Jeonghan cackled aloud, proceeding to devilishly rub his hands together while the fork stuck straight out of the table, still quivering to its end. “He will not survive this unscathed. He will suffer!”

And Joshua practically roared at his boyfriend. “Okay, seriously! What the hell is wrong with you? You have way too much energy and it’s totally overwhelming me.” He got up from the table, and then made an impatient swooping gesture with his hand. “C’mon. We’re taking a quick walk outside.” Joshua pointed his dreary stare at Seungcheol. “We won’t be long. He’s like a fucking dog. Needs his morning play.”

Seungcheol shrugged, grinning. “Well, go play.”

They abandoned the table together, with Joshua wrapping his arm through Jeonghan’s elbow and steadfastly tugging him, not allowing his partner a moment to straighten out his feet. Sighing, Seungcheol glanced at the polished fork stabbed into the table through the sleek, white cloth. He pulled it out, staring at himself in the distorted, silvery reflection until he heard a bell’s pealing and a distant, familiar squeal.

“Seungcheol!”

Phoebe rushed toward his side of the table. He stood up, let the small but feisty girl barrel into his arms, her disarrayed coils of black, fruity-scented hair tickling his face until he nearly sneezed.

She stepped back. “Gosh! It’s great to see you!”

“You too, Pheobs,” Seungcheol said, pulling a brown, crinkled leaf out from her hair. “Josh and Jeonghan will be right back.”

“Oh—where’d they go?”

“A little walk.”

She glanced around the table. “Josh’s espresso, I see.”

“I heard you brought someone.”

“Oh, yes!” A new thrill of energy sparked through her body. She stuck her hand high in the air and waved across the restaurant at a tall, well-groomed man conversing politely with a waitress. He noticed Phoebe’s elated beckoning and stalked his way over, his smile somewhat stern, fixed, but present enough to indicate his friendliness.

“This is Rory!” she introduced, seeming proud, confident.

Seungcheol shook the man’s hand from across the table, catching his brown eyes, browner than soil, appreciating the clean grooves of his dense, black stubble that sloped down below his sturdy cheekbones.

“Nice to meet you,” Seungcheol said.

“Remind me of your name?” Rory answered.

“Seungcheol.”

“And the other two are?...”

“Joshua,” Seungcheol sighed, “and Jeonghan. To join shortly.”

Phoebe and Rory sat at the end of the table, leaving their coats over the chairs and browsing a single-page menu together while Seungcheol gazed out the window into the autumn drizzle. He had always known Phoebe to maintain a relatively scattered dating history—no two men she introduced were ever the same—and Seungcheol was curious to disinter more about the hoarse-voiced man brushing back Phoebe’s humidified curls to better inspect the menu. Joshua and Jeonghan always characteristically handled the questioning process.

Thankfully, they returned to the restaurant about a minute later, their faces somewhat dewy from the mist and their dark hair holding sparkling droplets. The table erupted into more introductory clauses and laughter, with Joshua refusing to disclose that his boyfriend had just tried to eat a square of plain butter and promptly stabbed a fork into the table. He tended to scare people off that way. And Joshua knew.

“So, Rory, what do you do?” Joshua asked.

Rory sipped from his black coffee. “Right now, I tutor. Usually high school students. A few university kids here and there. If luck goes my way, I’ll be starting as an associate professor next year. In Halifax.”

Phoebe nudged her date’s elbow. “He’s got a PhD.”

Joshua nodded acceptably. “That’s quite respectable.”

“What subject?” Jeonghan asked. “You give me… finance vibes.”

“Well, close, I suppose?” Rory smiled. “Math. I do dabble in other subjects closely related. Math is kinda everywhere, right?”

Jeonghan rolled his head unenthusiastically. “Unfortunately.”

“Sorry, did I miss it? What do you do, Seungcheol?” Rory asked, his posture and expression much more relaxed, forthcoming.

Seungcheol’s throat felt uncomfortably dry. “I used to be a PI.”

“PI?” Rory scrunched his perfectly triangular nose. “That is…”

“Private Invest-i-gateur,” Jeonghan pronounced smarmily, with a poorly mimicked French accent that made Joshua’s jaw tighten.

Rory seemed impressed, his eyebrows poised upward and his lips pursed in interest. “What a job. Full of mystery, it sounds.” He placed his hot coffee cup before his lips, the steam warming his pale skin, about to take another tentative sip before moving it away. “And what does your wife think of that?” Rory chuckled, his gaze cordial, good-spirited. However, the atmosphere stiffened like frozen snow.

Phoebe suddenly bit onto a hangnail and Jeonghan slumped a palm into his cheek and Joshua stared intensely at Seungcheol.

He exhaled softly and unclenched his hand hidden underneath the table, afraid that Rory might feel insecure at the interaction turned soaking-bitter. “I lost my wife, five years ago. The job, it was hard, for sure. It took time away from home. It got pretty twisted. But we always had good communication about it. Made it way easier.”

And then everyone seemed to take a gradual, deep breath.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I saw the ring on your hand and I assumed.”

Seungcheol shook his head earnestly. “Don’t apologize. You aren’t the first person to assume and you won’t be the last. Totally fine.”

Rory eased back into his seat. He didn’t say anything, opting to nurse another sip from his black coffee, but his eyes were understanding.

He found you taking a nap on the sofa when he returned home, your bare legs tangled up in the blanket, one arm dangling limply off the edge, your lips smooshed open, and a small burring of noise sounding from your throat. Seungcheol traipsed around the apartment with delicacy, carefully removing the plastic bag from the sandwich he bought you at the deli on his way back. In the meantime, he left the sandwich in the fridge and decided to grab his laptop, settling down at the kitchen island.

Your subtle snores reminded him of a purring cat.

Seungcheol knew that he couldn’t just confine you to his house until your memory patched itself back together. He wondered if the lack of stimulation was working against you. By tucking you away from the busy world, your memories were bound to stagnate, drift about listlessly, waiting to be activated like some sort of powder keg. Nonetheless, he had his concerns about taking you outside—how you might react to the sudden influx of cues—and what he should do if confronted by someone he knew. You couldn’t fucking talk. Couldn’t explain yourself. Seungcheol could hardly explain you.

All you had was a lined notebook and a pen.

He dug into the internet, picking apart missing persons reports in the area, following link after link leading to forum after forum, and expanding ever so gradually when he found nothing. The task seemed fruitless. Seungcheol felt his eyes begin to sting and burn from the uninterrupted screen time. Black lines of blended text and white pages were fuzzy tattoos against his closed eyelids.

He couldn’t take it anymore.

Seungcheol closed his laptop and sighed, rubbing the divots between his nose until the ache in his skull dully mellowed. But then he was jolting, a curse zapped off his tongue as a notebook was tossed onto the island counter. He glanced up to see you standing there, smiling.

HOW WAS BREAKFAST?

A defeated laugh vibrated his chest. “Jesus—you’re so soundless, you know? Feel like I need to put a bell on you or something.” He read the notebook’s message again, letting his finger tap the corner of the paper. “Uh, it was fine. Good food. Good conversation. A sandwich is in the fridge for you, by the way. It’s wrapped in the white parchment.”

Your eyes enlarged with interest and your socked feet moved so quietly, so swiftly, around the island to the fridge. A moment later you were popping onto the stool across from him, proceeding to unwrap the parchment and reveal the loaded sandwich. In haste, you began to devour it, your bites large and almost aggressive, tearing hunk after hunk until there was just crumbs and mayonnaise spotting your fingers.

God—this place wasn’t helping your memory at all, was it?

He wanted to ask you about his idea, but you had already slipped off the stool and wandered back to the fridge. It seemed you were getting familiar with the placement of dishes—you opened a cupboard and grabbed a glass, then sloshed it full of cold water from the carafe. You wriggled back onto the stool and started drinking, each gulp loud, thirsty, wet beads sliding down your chin until the glass was polished empty.

Seungcheol laughed. “I wonder if you’ve always ate like that?”

Expectedly, you shrugged in response.

He cleared his throat, ran a hand through his hair. “So… I’ve got this idea. I’m not sure if it’s doing you any good to be cooped up in this place. It doesn’t seem to be helping your memory. Do you agree?”

You looked down at the counter, then back at him.

A nod.

“Okay. I’m thinking I take you outside. Somewhere fairly calm, not too fast-paced. Maybe Massey Park. We could sit on the stoop even, if you’re not comfortable going that far.” He raised his brow at you.

With a single finger, you dragged the notebook toward you, pushing out the pen from its metal rungs. You leaned over the paper and the pen began to move; your pace now unencumbered with slurry.

PARK? THE PARK WHERE YOU RUN?

Seungcheol nodded. “Yes. It’s quite pleasant, honestly.”

You wrote something else.

ARE WE GOING TO BE RUNNING?

He snorted and scratched his chin. “Not unless you want to?”

And then you made a gesture, pointing a finger into your open mouth and gagging. Seungcheol chuckled, waved his hand dismissively, as you swung the pen in your fingers, looking cheeky, smart.

“Am I insane to you?” Seungcheol asked.

You flipped to a fresh page.

AM I INSANE TO YOU?

Promptly, he sunk back and tilted his head, studying the faint pricks of a smile alighting your lips. “No,” he came to answer after a self-musing silence. “Not insane… just strange. Is that what you think of me?”

Another scribble.

NO. YOU ARE INSANE!

He rolled his eyes, leaned over to jokingly pluck the notebook out from your hands while you made a crinkled, ebullient expression, as though you were laughing, and Seungcheol swore he could hear a distant rasp working from somewhere far down your throat.

“Alright. Think you need a little break from this,” he said, waving the notebook around. “We’ll go to the park tomorrow. Sound good?”

You nodded, your eyes two glints of twinkling sunlight.

Before the park visit, Seungcheol realized you needed… things.

You had been wearing his t-shirt and boxers. It only made sense that you should have your own clothes. So he went shopping early in the morning, trying his best to infer what you might like as he swept through racks of shirts and pants. Eventually, he realized he was overthinking it—he doubted you cared about style—and started grabbing mostly plain items for you to wear, shucking in underwear and socks. Before he went through cash, he added shoes and a toothbrush, since you had been testing his mouthwash and absolutely hated it.

Once he returned to the apartment, Seungcheol dumped everything into a pile on the coffee table, showing you each article one by one before folding it up neatly. You were smiling the entire time, appearing charmed, presumably enjoying his fumbled presentation about cotton versus polyester, denim versus cargo, and ended up pulling out some baggy black jeans and a navy-blue t-shirt, the same colour as your notebook which never seemed to leave your side.

“I’ll wait for you to change,” he said, standing up.

You nodded, and began to pull his t-shirt over your head.

Seungcheol quickly grabbed your wrist. “Uh, in the washroom.”

In response, your forehead creased, and you looked confused.

“You should change in the washroom,” he explained, pointing down the corridor. His cheeks were somewhat prickling with pinkness.

You shrugged, not seeming to fully understand his reason, but took your clothes with you to change in private. He remembered the moment he walked in on you before showering, how unabashedly you had removed all your singed clothes, unafraid to be naked before him.

Seungcheol sighed, rubbing his scalp, and retrieved his car keys.

Strange, indeed.

He thought you might be weary of the outside, to feel the whistling breeze of autumn and experience the tang of warm sunshine hugging your skin. But if anything, you were embracing it. Seungcheol let you walk ahead of him to the parking lot behind the building. He examined every bouncy step you took, the confident line to your poised shoulders, the way your head actively swiveled toward distant sounds.

Maybe this would be alright.

He would do anything to get your memory flowing.

“I guess you wouldn’t remember being in a car?” Seungcheol asked as you came to the vehicle and stared at it blankly, as though it were some useless conjunction of metal taking up space. He opened the passenger door you for, gesturing to the seat. “All yours.”

Seungcheol still worried about overstimulating your senses. He played music, but quietly, just enough to hear the whispered words. You seemed to enjoy the coolness of the alive breeze, so he opened your window, let your fingers play curiously with the wind as it blew between them. When people began to pass by the car, you wouldn’t let them part from your sight—turning around uncomfortably in the seat to watch them vanish—before finding a new stranger to blatantly ogle.

You were staring particularly hard at a man parked beside you at a stop light, and Seungcheol had to tug on your shirt sleeve. “Uh, best not to do that kinda thing,” he murmured uncertaintly. “People are touchy.”

And so you shrugged, uncaring, your interest always shifting.

Seungcheol soon introduced you to the park. It was especially beautiful at this time of year. The leaves lost their lush pigment and revealed the gemstone goldens and reds of dazzling carotenoids underneath. You smelled the air, its moisture and earthy wind, and let your gaze be swept up toward the seraphic sky, where blankets of white light cracked between the sewn clouds. Seungcheol set his hand along your shoulder blades, guided you onto the pathway he always ran.

“What do you think?”

Immediately, you reached into the satchel placed over your shoulder. It was just big enough to keep your notebook. A well-loved trinket of his wife, the auburn leather looking weathered, faded. He tried not to stare and let the stinging memories push forward like tumbling dominos. You began writing with the book against your forearm.

BEAUTIFUL. AIR SMELLS SO GOOD.

He nodded in agreement. “It wakes you up.”

You put the notebook away. Glanced at Seungcheol funnily for a moment. Then, you started to jog, making your way down the path, your hair jostling with every step. Actually, your form was pretty good.

Seungcheol began rubbing along his neck when you turned around, ending your little comedic dig at his morning habit with a daring but frivolous grin, and he noted that your expression had never looked this bright—like life was fully pumping through you—to the point he wouldn’t be able to identify you as the same woman collapsed on his complex stoop, slumped over and speckled with black ashes.

He caught up to you, shaking his head. “Thought that was funny, huh?” Seungcheol spurred. “Your form’s decent, you know.”

Your lips twisted, and you shook your head in rejection.

“Hey, not trying to convert you to join my sad little one-man running club,” Seungcheol answered. “Just pointing something out.”

The walk continued. He didn’t speak much, opting to let you absorb everything without distraction. When you travelled underneath the draping canopy of a sunlit ruby tree, a leaf swept down in gentle, airy sways, coming to brush against the side of your head. Seungcheol pulled it off your shoulder to show you, and you took the red leaf gingerly into your hand, tracing an infinitesimal vein with such unbeknownst tenderness. Then you passed the duck pond, the water not as clear, the surrounding weeds beginning to go limp and brown. Seungcheol grabbed onto a protruding cattail, showed you how it turned to baby-soft fluff in his hands with some squeezing pressure. You were delighted to try, making him hold the red leaf while you pressed both hands around another cattail, your countenance beaming with wonder as its furry, dark exterior melted into an aurora of white, travelling wisps.

Seungcheol thought he could spend the entire day showing you every nook and cranny of the park he kept to himself, to feel your excitement become his own. He didn’t want to admit he was lonely.

Not yet.

You took a break at one of the benches placed around the perimeter of the children’s play structure. It wasn’t very busy, exempt for two young boys chasing each other through the structure’s yellow tunnel while a mother watched from a distance, her arms folded and dark sunglasses sitting square on her face. You watched them, too, smiling faintly, twirling the leaf around in your fingers by its stem.

He nudged your elbow. “Enjoying it?”

Your gaze locked with his and you nodded.

“I like the calmness,” Seungcheol explained. “It’s never too busy here. I mean, I’m pretty much the only guy in sight when I go running in the morning. But I like it. Having the park to myself.” He rested an arm along the bench and scratched his eyebrow. “I don’t mind sharing, though,” Seungcheol made sure to add, adorning a warm smile.

You pointed across the park.

He followed your finger. “The swings?”

You were already getting up and walking toward the structure, leaving the bench behind. Seungcheol followed you, watched you grab a swing by its chain links and shake it slightly before sitting down. You handed him the leaf again. The tips of your new shoes dusted the powdery sand underneath, stirring a shallow pot. You seemed to understand that the more you leaned and the more momentum you put into each swing, the higher you would go. He swore he heard something of a strangled chuckle rumble in your chest when the swing reached its highest point yet, your shoes kicking into the sunlight.

Then you let yourself slow down.

Seungcheol grabbed the chain to help steady you.

“You’re having more fun than those kids,” he said, smiling.

Quickly, you started digging in the satchel. The notebook came out again and you penned something down. He examined from over your shoulder, letting the leaf twiddle between his fingers.

PUSH ME! AHHH!

And Seungcheol stumbled backward, wiping a hand down his face as his chest swelled instantly with laughter. “Are you serious?”

You nodded, energetic and engaging.

He shook his head in disbelief.

You tapped the notebook, jabbing the words pointedly with your finger, your lips fully curled into an eager grin, your eyes possessing him.

“What about the leaf? Huh? Your precious fucking leaf?”

You leaned backward, gesturing for it. Seungcheol saw you place the leaf as flatly as possible inside the notebook pages, and then close it shut to keep it in place. The notebook was buried back into the satchel.

Seungcheol’s shoulders sagged in defeat. He stood behind you, tonguing his cheek begrudgingly, while you wriggled in anticipation.

“Nothing stops you, huh?” Seungcheol hummed.

And so he began to push you, both his hands shoving the centre of your back as you leaned and swayed, leaned and swayed. Sometimes he let the swing come hurtling down on its own, afraid to get whacked and crumpled by your force, and other times he quickly stepped in the way to give you another sailing shove that made you happily writhe.

“Jump!” Seungcheol called.

He saw you glance doubtfully from over your shoulder.

Seungcheol caught your back again and pushed. “Jump!”

Though he was only teasing, regret was suddenly thick in his throat when you soared out from the swing. Fuck—he probably shouldn’t tease you anymore—he thought poignantly, clenching his teeth as you landed awkwardly onto the sand with a heavy thud and collapsed. In an instant, Seungcheol was kneeling next to you, concern throbbing at the worried forefront of his brow, attempting to roll you over. But you did the rolling yourself, and he noticed the pleased crescent shape of your eyes, the trembling of your chest, and suddenly—like a diver taking their final surface breath—you gasped aloud, reached out to brush his face.

“Fuck,” Seungcheol cursed, feeling the shakiness of your fingertips stroke his jaw before your hand fell back to the sand. “You are fucking insane. I didn’t mean you should actually jump.” He shook his head, laughed nervously, let his bottom lip slip through his teeth. “It’s my fucking fault, though. Are you okay? That was some gasp.”

You nodded, and he helped you sit up. He plucked the back of your shirt to remove the sand while you pulled the satchel onto your lap.

“I think we should head home, now,” Seungcheol said.

No, you shook your head.

He frowned, and decided to sit too, his legs criss-crossed. “Okay, okay. Let’s just sit here for a few minutes. Then we’ll go.”

Your expression was sour in disagreement. You proceeded to finger the pearl clasp of the satchel, running around its lustered surface.

Seungcheol prayed you remembered anything.

Anything at all.

“Ready to go?” he queried after giving you both some time to sit and relax, dig fingers into the cool sand, listen to the billowing wind.

While you didn’t seem entirely happy, you nodded.

Seungcheol got to his feet. He then stuck out a hand for you to take, and your grasped it awfully firm, hoisting yourself up, squeezing every one of his thick fingers. “Alright,” he sighed. “Lot’s this way.”

You tugged on the sleeve of his black corduroy jacket, and he waited for you to unveil the notebook again. He was hardly paying attention, instead squinting against the sky’s shiny, sharp rays.

Then you flashed the notebook in his face.

RACE TO THE CAR?

He couldn’t help his scoff. “Uh, what?”

You shook the notebook and squeaked.

“Are you sure? That’s a fairly long race,” he said, pushing his fingertip against the notebook to lower it, revealing your willful expression, its playfulness and untempered twitches of challenge. “You’ll tire out easy,” Seungcheol continued, trying to somehow coax you out of the tormenting idea emboldened on the paper. He ruffled his hair. “And you just fell off a goddamn swing. Let’s not push too much, okay?”

There was a deft smirk on your mouth as you scribbled.

SCARED?

“Uh—no? I’m trying to keep track of you.”

Another scribble.

BECAUSE I’LL LEAVE YOU IN THE DUST.

When Seungcheol was younger, he bore an unforgiving competitiveness. No matter how innocuous the situation, he refused to lose, and on the rare occasion he did, it only stoked the strength of the flames burning hot in his stomach. His wife used to tease him about it, especially when it came to their boardgame and card nights—how passionately Seungcheol would throw himself into any instruction, making her giggle, prod, splatter out her red wine in unbridled laughter.

Something about the memory soaked him in dull, aching greyness, although he didn’t want you to catch wind of his melancholy.

“How about this?” Seungcheol said, clearing his burdened, pinched throat. “Let’s do a shorter race. You remember the duck pond?”

You nodded.

“If you get there before me… I’ll…” he tapped his chin pensively, trying to pinpoint some sort of reward. “I’ll take you… uh…”

He felt another soft pluck at his shoulder.

WE CAN GO TO THE SQUARE TOMORROW?

Seungcheol tightened his jaw. Fuck. He had wanted to promise something more reserved, less public, something he would be okay with losing to. But you were so persistent, tapping the flapping paper enthusiastically, your gaze unwavering in its influential persuasion.

“How do you know about the Square?”

You readjusted the pen in your hand.

SAW IT ON A POSTER THING.

He capitulated.

“Fine. If you beat me to the pond, we’ll go to the Square.”

The market made Seungcheol especially nervous.

It was always a demanding attraction whenever it came by the downtown square, giving locals the opportunity to present handmade crafts, vintage clothes, and homegrown produce. Joshua and Jeonghan had never missed a market sale—Joshua liked sorting amongst the knitted cardigans and sweatshirts while Jeonghan typically wondered through the smoky-smelling food stalls, often returning with falafel or golden churros or some fancily bottled jam—and that had Seungcheol chewing his bottom lip into a swollen bruise.

Phoebe liked to go, too. She preferred the jewelry.

He won the stupid race because he didn’t want the market to happen. At first, he wasn’t really trying, but when he noticed that you were keeping speed a little too close to his side, Seungcheol had to throw himself wholeheartedly into running, until he felt like a high school student again, practicing for county sprints. You acknowledged that he beat you with a breathy, loosened grin, hands stunted on your hips as you plopped down atop a large rock close to the duck pond. Somehow, he couldn’t find it in himself to reprieve you of the market. Not when you had been so close to passing him. Not when he was trying to get you comfortable with the outside world and its spread of experiences.

“Stay close to me, okay?” Seungcheol instructed as you followed the buzz of people toward the large, open town square.

You had the satchel, your notebook, and nodded in response.

His eyes were lurching everywhere, scanning, floating, at the man who blathered loudly on his cellphone, at the woman getting pulled along helplessly by a massive, shaggy golden retriever, the group of skinny tweens giggling and pushing into each other, the cyclist who split straight down the crowded cobblestone like a dividing arrow. He felt an abandoned part of himself naturally bubble to the surface—the vigilance, the threat-assessment—Seungcheol found it to be a switch he struggled to control, especially with you at his side, peeking curiously over heads.

The stalls were split into three rows.

Seungcheol glanced around again, sighed. “Where do we start?”

You shrugged. It didn’t seem to matter. Seungcheol followed you down the first row, beginning with a small tent that housed boxes and boxes of records. And then past a woman placing a body-length mirror against a pole, racks of fluttery clothes surrounding her. There was another tent, and its table was aligned with verdantly coloured fruits and vegetables, bejewelled-looking corn cobs and plump, purple tomatoes. Seungcheol kept following you, glaring between every person who stood in your way or moved a little too close to you, until he realized what he was doing, how over-protective and unnecessary he must seem.

He rubbed his forehead, pulling away the stress.

Suddenly, you stopped, and Seungcheol bumped into you from behind. “Sorry,” he mumbled, gently grabbing your arms and guiding you aside as to not block the stream of people wandering around.

You pointed at a table. A woman was seated behind it, the rounded top to her straw sunhat surfacing vaguely amongst bouquets and pots of flowers she had arranged very neatly. It seemed you wanted to take a closer look, and you glanced at Seungcheol in an earnest, entreating way. You could explore whatever you wanted—it wasn’t that he cared about—more so avoiding a run-in with any familiar faces. He looked, too, approaching the tent beside you. All the flowers were labelled using a paper tag wound to a stem by brown wool. There were thick white roses and flashy pink peonies, bulbous hydrangeas the colour of powder-blue pastels. The smells were wafting, fresh and sweet.

Then your hand was on his wrist, pulling him down the table to a small clay pot sitting near the edge. The flowers grew in organized, straight lines, surrounding one single stalk in a cylindrical growth. Their petals were white, folded over a speckled pink centre.

Seungcheol pulled at the paper tag. “Snapdragons.”

You nodded at him vigorously.

“Do you want them?” he asked.

You nodded again, bouncing on your heels.

“Uh, okay, I can do that,” Seungcheol mumbled, pulling out the wallet from his back pocket. He waved cordially at the lady to get her attention. She placed her phone onto the table and stood up, her cheeks shiny and blush-covered. “The snapdragons—are they available?”

A minute later, you were carrying the pot around pridefully, holding the flowers in the crook of your armpit. Upon reaching the end of the row, Seungcheol pointed out an empty bench for you to sit at.

You placed the snapdragons beside you, admiring them.

“I really like those,” Seungcheol said.

Me too, you seemed to nod.

For a few moments, you people-watched. Seungcheol felt himself unwind and relax. The market was so dense and bustling, full of distractions, that he doubted he would run into anyone. You seemed to enjoy watching the crowds, how they shifted, how the people reacted, studying their mannerisms with slim but soft eyes like it was some sort of ethereal painting brought to life. But then his ears picked up on something—a laugh—a very specific, loud, high-pitched laugh that was more reminiscent of a witch’s cackle than anything. Phoebe. He could recognize her damn laugh anywhere. “I was bullied about it, y’know?!”

He found Phoebe at the end of the third row. She appeared to be sniffing a candle, bringing it close to her nose and subtly inhaling. Her newest fling—Rory—was at her side, fiddling around with a glistening, flat tin. They were going to start coming his way. He knew it, felt it deep in his gut. Seungcheol glanced around quickly, spotting a long line for fresh frozen yogurt outside a small, kitschy shop. They set up every year, always with a new and limited flavour. It had been three years and somehow Joshua still reminisced over their butterscotch walnut.

Seungcheol took the wallet out from his pocket and handed it to you, who glanced over the black, pleating leather curiously.

“Okay, see that shop over there? Moomoo's?” Seungcheol said, pointing in its direction. “They sell frozen yogurt. It’s delicious. You wanna try buying some? There’s a really good pineapple-coconut flavour. Oh—strawberry swirl is great, too. I should have enough bills in here to cover it. If you give too much, you'll get change.”

Your eyes rounded, and your bottom lip pursed. There was uncertainty and tentativeness in your expression as you peeked inside the wallet and thumbed at some wrinkled bills. Seungcheol felt poorly about pushing you, but you wouldn’t be far—he wouldn’t be far—and so you stood up, adjusted the auburn satchel, and wandered into line.

He looked over to Phoebe and Rory. They had bought something, it appeared, as Phoebe was holding the silver tin Rory had been examining earlier, walking slowly, speaking to each other in smiles without paying much attention to the world around them. Predictably, the girl glanced his way, and he heard Phoebe’s surprised yelp. She scampered toward Seungcheol while Rory strolled behind rather lackadaisically, squinting at the bench, hands in his pockets.

Seungcheol stood up to hug her. “Hey there, Phoebs.”

“Wow! Wasn’t expecting to see you here! Oh—did you come along with Jeonghan and Josh? I haven’t seen them yet.”

“No. Just wanted to check things out by myself.” Seungcheol sparingly peeked at the line for frozen yogurt, saw you continuing to stand in place, arms folded boredly, while a woman with a tiny white dog slung over her shoulder bobbed in front of you. “What did you buy?”

Phoebe held up the tin. “It’s hand cream! Smells like lavender!”

Rory had finally made his way over. He shook Seungcheol’s hand, reminiscent of their first meeting at Ada and Jo's.

“Let’s see,” Seungcheol said, and Phoebe swirled open the lid to reveal a butter-like balm. “It does smell good. Whose got the dry hands?”

She immediately stabbed Rory’s arm.

“I wouldn’t say dry,” Rory mumbled, staring down at his hand in uncertain defense. Between his thumb and forefinger, there were some reddish cracks, spreading apart like webs, with a bulbous, pink callous on the side of his thumb. “But… uh… lacking moisture?”

“That means dryyy,” Phoebe lilted in a teasing cadence.

He shrugged, hiding his hands back in his pockets.

“Oh, Seungcheol—are those yours?” Phoebe chattered, moving toward the clay pot of snapdragons left behind on the bench.

Tensing, Seungcheol scrunched his nose and reluctantly agreed.

She leaned down to sniff them. “They’re gorgeous! I always thought you liked orchids. Actually—maybe that was Hunter.”

He nodded. “They were Hunter’s favourite.”

“What are they?” Phoebe wondered.

For some reason, Seungcheol found it difficult to speak. He saw you moving closer toward the shop’s service window, tilting your head back to perhaps study autumn’s plain, infinite greyness.

“Snapdragons,” Rory offered.

And Seungcheol smiled meekly. “Yes. Correct.”

“This is my first time seeing them,” Phoebe laughed. “We’re not very big green thumbs. Remember when I tried to grow pumpkins?”

“Yeah,” Seungcheol answered with a wince. “Sad stuff.” He checked his watch, stared blankly at the time, wanting nothing more than for them to disappear. “Well, I’m probably gonna head out. But enjoy the rest of the market. Did you find any good jewelry, Phoebs?”

“I’m trying not to be too… erm, irresponsible,” she answered in a quiet grumble, brushing a long tangle of black coils off her face, her blue eyes narrowing against the light. “The handmade stuff is pricey.”

“So? That’s why you’ve got this guy,” Seungcheol joked, briefly shaking Rory’s heavy shoulder. “Suppose I'll catch up with you later.”

They parted ways. Seungcheol exhaled so deeply he felt something in his chest stir, tickle. Picking up the snapdragons, he wandered over to the frozen yogurt stand. For a moment, he couldn’t spot you anywhere, and the panic cut through him like a well-wielded scythe. There was a tap on his shoulder. Seungcheol whipped around, saw you standing there, holding two cups of frozen yogurt.

You handed him one.

He could smell the pineapple and coconut.

“Oh—thanks,” he breathed out, trying not to reveal how thunderously his heartbeat had kicked up. “What did you decide on?”

One hand slid into the satchel, pulled out the notebook.

There was already something written on the page.

SMORES.

LADY SAID IT'S CHOCOLATE, MARSHMALLOW, AND HONEY CRACKERS. WHAT IS MARSHMALLOW?

“I don't know,” Seungcheol chuckled. “I've never had to describe it. Aerated sugar. Squishy and gummy. That must be their new flavour or something.” He leaned his head toward a park bench. It was obscured by the yogurt shop, private enough to eat. “Wanna sit?”

You slid into one side and Seungcheol settled down at the other, his fingers brushing over the prickly, faded wood. The satchel hit the table and you wriggled out Seungcheol’s wallet. He noticed a few bills from the loose fold inside were gone. It seemed some aspects of day-to-day life had flitted back to you, and Seungcheol was tempted to keep digging, keep pressing, squeeze all that he could out from your ransacked memory like a citrus fruit against a juicer. But he didn’t. He let you sit and eat, drag the spoon around the bowl, scrape the dessert onto your tongue with inquisitiveness. Seungcheol couldn’t remember the last time he tasted the pineapple-coconut flavour. It was cold and light, the tanginess of the pineapple leaving a zingy sweetness in his mouth.

He glanced up, saw you staring at him with slimmed eyes as you removed the spoon out from your mouth and licked at your smudged lip.

Seungcheol cleared his throat. “Is there something on my face?”

You shook your head, pulled your knee onto the bench, and went back to eating, not bothering to touch the notebook and elaborate.

—END OF PART ONE.