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“So does this mean you guys are together?”
Hyeon-ju tilted her head, her lip quirking in an amused smile as her eyes flashed with a knowing glint. They had just dropped off Ms Yoon, pausing to have a chat with her and checking in on Nam-gi before returning. Now, Hyeon-ju found the time perfect to interrogate her friend on the prevalent bruise on his neck and the way he couldn’t seem to knock the smile from his face.
“Who? Me?” he blinked, his eyes tearing from the blurring scenery to the woman beside him.
“Pft, no, Woo-jin and his ego” she scoffed, eyes lifting from the road to shoot him an exasperated glare. ”Yes you, you daft idiot. You and Nari. Judging from your little friend over there, I’d say yes” she said, gesturing got the hickey on his neck.
Geon-woo flushed, his fingers lifting to lightly brush it before dropping his hands to his lap “I think so, we haven’t discussed labels or anything” he muttered, his tone slightly weary. Did whatever happen between them last night mean they were boyfriend and girlfriend. Surely right?
“Oh please, as if it wasn’t obvious already. You like her, she likes you. You kissed, you had sex. I think that means you’re boyfriend and girlfriend” Hyeon-ju chided. ” You do…want to be right?” she said suddenly, her tone sceptical.
Geon-woo wasn’t an idiot, she knew that, but while he was certain in terms of his ambition of vengeance, navigating this new feelings of love and longing was a different ball game. And while Geon-woo may be shy, gentlemanly and too kind, he knew what he wanted and if that just so happened to be a five-foot six raven haired dropped boxer, then so be it. Hyeon-ju didn’t doubt his affection for the woman, she had seen it as bright as day and develop over time. She had witnessed her friend’s love slowly blossom, her protectiveness, consideration and valency grow from the rather dull and duty driven woman she had first met. The two of them made a pair unlike anything she had seen. They shared such a deep level of intimacy, a connection forced from shared struggles and adversity and together they pulled each other out of that darkness and moved in a direction of happiness. A happiness they found in each other. Hyeon-ju did not doubt Geon-woo for his love for her friend, but at the same time she only hoped that because they cared so much for one another, their heartbreak if anything, would not be as devastating. She did not wish for that for either of her friends.
“Of course I do” he said. ” I just thought it was too soon” he told her, his chest constricting at the sudden doubt.
“Geon-woo” Hyeon-ju said, her hands circling her steering wheel with a sudden sadness. ” In this line of work, sooner is better than later. You make her happy. Seize the moment while you can”
Hyeon-ju knew the life ahead of them would be nothing but trials and tribulations. She had seen how this life had affected her grandfather, heard stories and how it could rob you of everything you loved. Hyeon-ju wanted it all to end before she’d lose anyone else dear to her. Before Geon-woo could or Nari or Woo-jin. She wanted their small family to last because for the first time in her life- Hyeon-ju felt as if she belonged. So when Geon-woo smiled, and told her he’d tell Nari when they arrived, she had never felt happier. Because it seemed everything was slowly falling into a place, a life she so desperately had wished for.
It was a shame that some people were born with tragedy in their veins. A notion, the four friends were to realise sooner rather than later.
His grief started the second he saw smoke twirl and whirl in the sky. A black cloud of death over the Choi household.
It only intensified as he threw himself into the burning home, flames licking his skin and bathing him in an orange glow. His screams were as raw as the fire around him, turning memory to ash and home to rubble. He staggered with woe and despair, their names tight and suffocating against his throat as the smoke stole his breath as much as his grief tore through his heart.
His bereavement was solidified when he stumbled over Woo-jin’s limp and bloodied body. His friend. His brother, was laid so incredibly still it didn’t even look like him. That was not Woo-jin. His Woo-jin was always on the move, always fidgeting and always laughing. This Woo-jin was motionless, eyes closed with a frown as if he too knew this was unbecoming of him. His hand was over his stomach where three large and wicked holes spewed blood like waterfalls that pooled around his body like a wreath.
Geon-woo could barely utter his name without blacking out. He was a boxer; he was a champion and yet he had never felt so weak in his life as he hauled his dying friend out of the flaming house and onto the grass outside. He barely shredded his jacket as he screamed and begged and pleaded.
Life could not be so cruel, but he’d learn to find out that life could be way more crueller. That the devil was very much real and out to get them and that he resembled a man of wicked stature, a gleam of evil and a smirk of contest. Kim Myeong-gil would meet a fate far worse than death. That was a promise.
Geon-woo had been faced with many choices before. But nothing compared to the choice of having to tear himself from Woo-jin’s side, a man who would have chosen his friend over anything, to rush back into the building. He needed to find the others and he needed to find Nari.
His grief became consuming as he staggered down the stairs, his jacket left with Woo-jin and his shirt burning black. He couldn’t look at the dead body of Mr Choi. He could not allow himself to hear the guttural screams that shredded Hyeon-ju alive as she held onto her grandfather’s lifeless body. Geon-woo would not allow her to become a corpse too. With whatever strength he had left, Geon-woo hauled Hyeon-ju’s kicking and screaming body up the stairs and out of the building.
With deep breaths he turned to rush back in but a trembling hand halted him in place. Hyeon-ju was collapsed to her knees, the tips of her hair smoking with soot smearing her hands and face as tears kept rigorously pouring down her face while her other hand, bloodstained till her forearms pressed down on Woo-jin’s wound as sirens blared in their ears.
“She’s not here” Hyeon-ju breathed so lowly with so much defeated energy it hurt to get the words out. “Nari is not here”
Geon-woo could’ve sank to the floor in relief. Nari was not in the building, but it did not mean she was safe either.
Something he would only come to find when he was at the hospital, admitting Woo-jin into theatre.
His grief would not relent until it shattered him completely.ย
Poor babies ๐
I literally warned yall it wasn’t gonna be pretty ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ why would you not listen to me.
I don’t know peace only violence๐ฉ
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