Daehyun, simply put, was entirely oblivious to what was going on around him. Actually, to go even further, saying that he was oblivious seemed to be a massive understatement — Lee Daehyun had no idea that his own baby sister had sat down at his bar, and had even less of an idea that she was seemingly watching his every move. The minute that the other patron had sat down at the counter, he just walked away and left Maeum to drink (or not drink, in this case) the expensive cocktail in peace. He was only doing what he would on any regular night, regardless of the giant shoe hanging from the ceiling, waiting to drop at any moment. Despite his usual awareness when it came to who entered Pitch Black, his own family, apparently, was not on his radar. But could you really blame him?
Years he had spent trying to contact Maeum, on the off chance that she would want to speak to him again, with no luck whatsoever. Every call to his old address never went through and after the millionth time, he had no other choice but to give up. He wouldn’t have put it past his father to change the number as soon as he left to solidify the choice he made, to help Daehyun realize what he was doing by moving to a different country. Of course he wouldn’t know what his sister looked like — the last time he spoke to her was when she was thirteen. And considering that he could hardly recognize himself at eighteen, being unable to recognize his sister now that she was well into adulthood wasn’t all that uncommon either.
It didn’t really help that whenever Daehyun so much as glanced in Maeum’s direction, her head was pointed towards her glass, features covered. He observed that she hadn’t seemed to be drinking almost immediately, but unsurprisingly, he didn’t think much of it. It wasn’t the first time that someone had sat at the counter just to take up space, and it clearly wasn’t the last. Heedless, Daehyun just kept on with his night as normal. And a little over an hour passed before the bar began to empty out, customers leaving as the night closed in and the clock ticked on. Maeum — or, to Daehyun, the woman at the end of the counter — obviously didn’t make a move to leave with the rest of the patrons. So as everyone else continued cleaning around them, Daehyun finally walked over and addressed her instead of leaving her alone to her own devices. “Hey, uh —,” he gave another smile, hoping to soften the blow of basically kicking her out. If he hadn’t wanted to go home to his sleeping children, he wouldn’t have confronted her; but since she didn’t even drink what he gave her in the first place, he didn’t mind risking a horrible tip this late. “I don’t want to rush you or anything, but, I figured I’d let you know that we close in a couple of minutes,” he said. “Take your time, though. It’s just a heads up. But — if you need a cab, I can call one for you?”
Her fingers traced random patterns on the countertop. Her mind was scattered all over the place, divided between just getting up and leaving or just staying where she was and seeing this through to the end. It felt like she still didn’t have any answers for the burning questions she had for the past eleven years. Of course she didn’t expect that just by seeing him for a few minutes or even a few hours, Maeum was going to figure out the inner workings of her brother’s mind. If she couldn’t completely understand him years ago when they were practically best friends, how was she supposed to know what the stranger before her thought? That alone was enough to bring the sadness back into her otherwise hardened and anger filled heart. She couldn’t even say he was her brother anymore. He was no closer to her, no more familiar, than the patrons that surrounded her. They were all strangers who were just going about their own lives. And looking at him, she barely recognized him. The resemblance to his childhood was there of course but it had been over a decade since she last saw him. Of course he didn’t look the same and she wondered if they just passed each other on the street, would she have known that he was her brother? And the unfortunate answer was probably not.
Maeum did not like to live in the past; that too being something she likely inherited from her father. Yet it felt like they were all stagnated, not able to move forward from the moment that Daehyun left Busan for good. And she had often tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. He was only eighteen then and maybe was acting out against their father who had kicked him out for what seemed like for good. Maybe he was angry, justifiably so. So he needed to get away. But what kept him from coming back after his anger cooled? Did he have no thoughts of those who he left behind, only looking at his future and not even giving his past a passing glance? Of course her family, on the surface acted as though they were all far past that moment, despite suffering the repercussions to date.
One by one everyone was leaving yet Maeum had no intention of leaving with them. Surely, after the bar almost completely cleared out her brother, approached her to let her know that they were going to be closing up soon and he could get her a taxi. Her head was still down, an uncharacteristic smirk spreading on otherwise gentle features. “You know I always wondered something,” she began as she reached into her purse to pull out the money to pay for the untouched drink. “Can you ever just take a bottle or two back home working as a bartender? I mean how would they know right?” She placed the money down and looked up at her brother straight, figuring that he probably wouldn’t recognize her anyways. After all, what were the chances of her being there and even if he didn’t think of that, clearly his family wasn’t on his mind anymore. He forgot their existence no doubt so of course, why would he recognize her? “Not that you would. Just curious.”
