The Beacon; My Siren - Chap 3
Title: The Beacon; My Siren
Author: wild_terrain (ie.
fi_chan )
Special Banner (Made beautifully by:
love_cassiopeia )
Chapter: [03 / ?]
Rating: MA15+
Genre: AU [FLANGST, mystery, spirituality, romance]
Summary:
Philophobia… The fear of falling in love or being in love. I didn’t know such a thing existed until I met him… Kim JaeJoong was my age-a youthful 25 years-and the owner of a popular café, yet he was already known around town as the mysterious hermit who had chosen to completely withdraw from the world. How on earth could someone so young be afraid of loving others to the point of secluding themselves from all human beings? What was he afraid of? What was he hiding? I just didn’t understand it. And by that stage, the need to understand it was all I could think about... In fact, he was all I could think about…
Jung Yunho… For all of my life I had grown up away from the limelight. I couldn’t stand being noticed by anybody, and for a long time I thankfully never was. But then you came and suddenly you were everywhere - waving to me as I swept the café after closing, saying hello to me as you cycled past the bench I was sitting on, helping me carry my groceries inside whilst talking non-stop to me as if we were actually friends… Why are you always around making my heart thump erratically? Why do you even care? The more you try to explore this town, the more I need to step up and protect you from your own curiosity, because I know It is out there and I know It wants to harm you…
Trailer: CLICK TO WATCH~~
ETA = moon1084 <3
A/N: Wahhhh. I've had this really annoying mouth ulcer for the past few days. I really need to stop myself from always randomly biting the inside of my bottom lip. Curses! T___T. Anyhoos, here's the next chappy for you. It's probably the shortest chapter of the whole fic, but I really didn't want to clog it up with useless spam. ^^;;
“We’re going to the beach again today, right?”
“Yes, HyunAe, we’re going to the beach again today.” My reassurance came out rather garbled due to the mouthful of pancake I was trying to chew through.
“What about tomorrow? On the weather report it looked like there was going to be a cold change coming through this afternoon…”
“Tomorrow we’ll find something else to do then,” I yawned, reaching over for my blackcurrant breakfast juice. “I’ll grab some brochures from that tourist place after breakfast.”
“What tourist place?”
“You know, that tourist place where you can get tour guides and information about what there is to do in town? It’s next to the swimsuit shop you were looking at yesterday.”
“Ohh! Right.”
“We could go on one of those bay watch cruise things if you want. Take a few seasickness tablets, cruise through the ocean to look for dolphins, etc.”
I couldn’t help but smile knowingly in response to the sound of my sister’s delighted squeals. Girls were all the same… God bless them.
“Maybe we could also hire one of those speedboats for the day. I’ve seen quite a lot of people using them lately. You haven’t ridden in one before, have you? It’s really fun.”
“Getting into a speedboat with you as the driver?” HyunAe drawled.
“Hey! I make life exciting…”
“Mum will kill us if she ever found out…”
“She won’t find out,” I promised, trying to ignore the fleeting pangs of guilt at the thought of being such a bad influence on my younger sister. “Besides, it’s a speedboat, not a motorbike…”
The sound of water gushing against tiles suddenly filled the room as Junsu finally got into the shower. Once he was out we’d be ready to head off to the beach again. I personally found it a little ridiculous to insist on having a shower when moments later the salt water would be ruining our hair and sun cream would be making our skin feel sticky, but hey, each to their own.
“Whilst Su takes his time in the bathroom I may as well run down to the tourist information office and grab us those brochures. You don’t mind doing the washing up whilst I’m gone, do you?”
“Nope. Go get us those brochures, Oppa, and don’t forget the dolphin cruise one!”
I rolled my eyes at her and slipped into my runners, making sure to shove my sunglasses on as soon as the bright morning light rushed through the open door. I made my way down the steps and then jogged down the long driveway to get to the main street. It was still fairly early, nine o’clock to be specific, and the streets were already crowded with other tourists. I maneuvered through the crowds and stopped to catch my breath outside of the small tourist information office.
I pushed open the door gently and squeezed through into the small room. Brochures of every imaginable size covered the walls and stands. Even behind the lady at the desk, there were stacks of colorful brochures offering snorkeling classes and fishing classes.
“Good morning!” I smiled towards the middle-aged lady, glancing around me to find what I was looking for. The dolphin cruise pamphlets were neatly displayed to my right and I grabbed two of them before I could forget.
“Are you looking for anything in particular?” I heard the middle-aged lady politely inquire.
“Erm… I’m not sure. Possibly… Is there any information on hiring boats?”
“What sort would you like? Rowboats? Paddleboats? Fishing boats? Speedboats?”
“Wow, that’s quite a selection,” I grinned in anticipation. “Maybe just the speedboats and paddleboats for now…”
“Here you go, sir.”
I eagerly reached over for the pile of pamphlets the lady had complied for me, staring down at the alluring, glossy photo of a gorgeous white speedboat calling to me from on top of the first pamphlet.
“Is there anything else you were interested in, sir?”
“Erm… Yeh. You see I came here with my male best friend and my younger sister, so would you be able to perhaps recommend some activities that might suit us?”
“Let’s see…” the woman pondered, getting up from her seat to wander past me towards the corner of the room. “We have some nighttime bonfire activities, karaoke competitions, beach ball game competitions, bush walking tracks…”
“Would it be incredibly greedy of me if I said all of them sounded great?”
The lady smiled at me and shook her head before darting around the room to find each brochure she had listed. I tried to help her out but there were so many damn brochures it was like trying to find a particular tree in a forest!
Trying not to disturb the woman’s concentration, I stood nearby the window out of harm’s way. There were still a lot of people rushing around with shopping bags and there were several kids licking away at some ice-cream cones as it melted all down their chins and left little dots of melted ice-cream on the path as they walked. It was pretty cute, but at the same time I was glad that my sister was firmly past the age of seven already…
A few buildings down I saw a few people exit the busy grocery store. One was an old man carrying bags of what looked like boxes of cereal, the other was a young woman nibbling on the packet of chocolate she had just opened up, and the other was…
I almost gasped out loud as I saw the third figure slowly exit the grocery store and make his way down the opposite side of the street. It was the creepy janitor! In daylight! He had about five bags of groceries hanging off his skinny arms, making the muscles barely visible behind the short sleeves of his black t-shirt bulge from the weight of everything he was carrying.
I hurriedly turned around to face the helpful lady still rummaging around for brochures. “Excuse me, madam!”
She looked up a little startled.
“Do you know that man over there?” I asked hopefully, pointing towards the lanky figure slowly walking farther away. “The one in the black t-shirt with the grocery bags…”
“Oh, him. Yes, I do know him.”
“And?” I accidentally pushed a little too rudely in my excitement.
“He’s the quiet little kid who owns Café JaDe.”
“Wait, what?” I could feel my eyes bulging out in shock. “Did you say ‘owner’?!”
“Yes,” she politely replied. “He used to live with this nice little old lady who was the previous owner. Back then it was called Waterside Café… Then when she passed away a few years ago she left it for the kid to run.”
“What’s his name?” It was a highly stupid question, but it was the only one simple enough to think of whilst still in my state of surprise.
“His name? I’m not entirely sure actually… Kim something… JaeJin? JaeJoong? One of them… Not a lot of people know him, see. I don’t know anybody close to me who has ever actually spoken with him. He keeps to himself, that boy. Apparently never utters a word, not even to the people at his café. He’s a pretty strange kid, no doubt about that. Even when old Mrs. Choi was alive he kept to himself. I never really saw him after her funeral… The poor thing, he’s only in his early twenties and already been nicknamed the town’s hermit…”
“Hermit? Gosh…”
“Yes, he sure is a mystery, that one. Why, do you know him?”
“No, not exactly… I’d just seen him around a couple of times and wondered who he was…”
“Honey, no one knows who he is,” the lady chuckled, shaking her head at some other sympathetic thought left unsaid in her head before continuing to locate the rest of my brochures.
“Strange…” I muttered to myself, looking back out of the window at the retreating figure of the apparently infamous café owner.
“Yep… That’s the Green Pine Bay Hermit for you. He deserves his own pamphlet!” she chuckled to herself, holding out the small pile of brochures she had finished collecting for me.
“Thanks…” I murmured, but couldn’t stop my eyebrows from dipping into a frown.
That lady wasn’t as nice as I had originally thought… To insinuate that the café owner was some sort of attraction like in a ‘freak’ circus, worthy of his own information brochure just because his lifestyle was different to everyone else’s in town… It was a little mean.
What even gave her the right to sneer at those who were slightly different in society? Especially after admitting earlier in our conversation that she didn’t even know a damn thing about him! What an ignorant viewpoint to have!
I must admit I’d never met a ‘hermit’ before, but even so, I knew that being a hermit was a pretty sad thing. I wondered what the reason for his seclusion was… I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to withdraw from everyone in society except to get my weekly groceries… It was really quite depressing to think about.
Without giving the lady another thought (or look) I quickly tightened my grip around the pile of brochures and darted out of the door, stepping back onto the main street. The café owner was nowhere in sight anymore, but I had a feeling I knew exactly where he was headed - Café JaDe. Where else?
Sprinting until I passed the corner, I finally glimpsed the lonely figure walking a couple meters ahead of me. Trying to get my breath back I stepped beside him and shifted my pace until we were matching.
“Hi!”
The man didn’t reply to my greeting, continuing to walk onwards across the street. Either he was so dedicated to his hermit lifestyle that he had really turned mute, or he simply hadn’t been aware that I was in fact trying to start a conversation with him of all people.
“Hey!” I tried again, carefully reaching out my spare hand to lightly pat him on his shoulder. That caught his attention.
He looked up in shock and gazed at me in confusion. He was only a few centimeters shorter than I was but it still made a small difference. This time there was no intense gaze from him that made me feel like I was being x-rayed, just two large, doe-like eyes blinking up at me. It didn’t look like he even recognized me… Maybe that creepy eye contact we had shared days ago had been just a coincidence that I had completely blown out of proportion, after all …
Up close his face looked completely different to what I had imagined it to look like these past few days. He didn’t resemble your stereotypical hermit, nor did he even resemble your stereotypical male. The man was gorgeous! Absolutely gorgeous! From his porcelain-white skin and pouting lips to his long, straight nose and dark eyebrows, everything about him was what one would deem attractive. His features were surprisingly feminine compared to his lanky, bony, form and extremely broad shoulders. It was a slightly odd mixture and yet somehow it worked perfectly.
“Mm, hi,” I quickly repeated, trying to stop staring at him like a giant idiot. “I’m new in town! …See?” I let out an embarrassed no duh laugh at myself as I lifted up the pile of tourist brochures for him to see. “Sorry to bother you and all, but I heard that you’re actually the owner of Café JaDe!”
“Oh… Yes, I am…” His voice was much deeper than I had expected; it seemed almost odd to be coming out of someone with such feminine features.
“Amazing!” I grinned down at him. To think that I had mistaken him for a mere janitor the previous night! “Café JaDe has pretty much been our refuge since we first got here! Oh, and by ‘our’ I am referring to my best mate and younger sister. They all love the café as much as I do. How do you do it? Do you really manage all of it by yourself?”
I noticed him looking at me rather hesitantly before he eventually confirmed my inquisition with a small nod.
“Amazing!” I repeated, genuinely impressed. “I can’t even manage my own bank account!”
The shorter man didn’t crack a smile at the ridicule I had unleashed upon myself, but he did seem to relax just a tiny bit as we continued walking side by side towards his café.
“Are you heading over there now? Here, let me help you!” I offered without even waiting for his answer, reaching over to slip three of the shopping bags off of his arm.
“…Thanks,” I heard him mumble, staring down at the path in front of him without saying another word as he carefully shifted two bags from his right arm onto his now spare left arm.
“My name’s Jung Yunho, by the way! It’s really nice to meet you…if you haven’t already picked up on that,” I laughed at myself in slight embarrassment.
“Kim JaeJoong…”
“Normally I’d try and shake your hand but I guess that would be a bit impossible right now, eh!” I continued to ramble on, undeterred by the lack of responses from the shy café owner. “A metaphoric handshake shall have to suffice, eh, JaeJoong-sshi!”
I gave up on conversation after that, left to lurk in my own thoughts as I watched JaeJoong from the corner of my eye as he continued to stare down at the path as he walked. I really did wonder what made him such a timid little thing. Had he always been an introvert or had he merely grown more and more reserved as each year passed on by? It wasn’t exactly something I could ask him without stepping over multiple boundaries, but I guess the reason didn’t actually matter in the end. All that mattered was the present.
I let JaeJoong pass in front of me as we reached the café’s door, and waited patiently for him to push his way into the already crowded café. He stopped just in front of a wooden staircase leading up into what I presumed was the entrance of his living quarters above the café.
“Here ya go,” I smiled at him, passing him back the crammed grocery bags. “You must be having a party! You sure know how to shop for-” I was about to say ‘for one person’ but quickly stopped myself just in time. It would have been quite inappropriate and presumptuous of me. “Well, for your money’s worth!” I lamely finished.
Another nod, and I figured it was the closest I was going to get to a smile.
“Thank you…”
“You are very welcome!” I grinned, taking a step backwards having sensed I was very close to overstaying my welcome (so to speak).
JaeJoong turned to start staggering up the stairs and I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from asking him if he wanted me to help him. I figured that he wouldn’t welcome the intrusion into his living quarters as easily as other people would.
“One more thing!” I quickly called out before I could stop myself, taking a swift step forward to grab onto his shoulder before he could escape up the rest of the stairs. He looked a little uneasy as he glanced back at me again, but now that I had started the sentence I wasn’t prepared to back out of it. “Don’t let anybody get you down, okay?”
He stared at me for a very brief moment before turning away from me again without a word to walk up the stairs. I wasn’t sure at first if he had even heard me above all of the loud chatter that currently filled the café, but I had a feeling that he had. I hoped he took in what I had said; after all, sometimes the words from a stranger can be oddly more powerful than that of friends’…
To be honest, I wasn’t even sure what had made me say something like that to him. I guess I was trying to make up for the cruel comment I had heard the brochure lady say about him. Not that he had heard what she had said or anything… Guilt is a funny thing though; you can feel it secondhand from someone else’s actions and before you know it you are apologizing on behalf of them.
Glancing down at the slightly crumpled pamphlets still curled up in my hand, I took a step backwards. What was I even still doing here at the café? I had information to read up about, beaches to go to… Why Kim JaeJoong was the way he was had nothing to do with me; it was none of my business. I shouldn’t try to stick my head into things that didn’t concern me.
At least, that is what I kept trying to tell myself…
///TBC///
A/N: Yep, a really short chapter indeed, but would you believe me if I told you the next chapter is 19 pages long? XDD
Anyways, I just wanted to take this opportunity to just say a little something about the overall layout of this fic. I'm sure you guys would be starting to notice by now that the pace of this fic is really different to the Echo series. And I do apologise if it seems that the beginning chapters in this fic are a little slow, but since this fic is supposed to be about progression, discovery, exploration, mystery, etc, there is no helping the slow start. *sigh* It definitely will speed up, but right now it needs to be more subtle than BOOM BOOM BOOM, IN YOUR FACE like with the Echo series. ^^;;
So please do stay patient with me! *attempts to do some puppy-dog eyes* XD
Thanks for all of your comments guys! Love ya all~ <3
Author: wild_terrain (ie.
fi_chan )
Special Banner (Made beautifully by:
love_cassiopeia )
Chapter: [03 / ?]
Rating: MA15+
Genre: AU [FLANGST, mystery, spirituality, romance]
Summary:
Philophobia… The fear of falling in love or being in love. I didn’t know such a thing existed until I met him… Kim JaeJoong was my age-a youthful 25 years-and the owner of a popular café, yet he was already known around town as the mysterious hermit who had chosen to completely withdraw from the world. How on earth could someone so young be afraid of loving others to the point of secluding themselves from all human beings? What was he afraid of? What was he hiding? I just didn’t understand it. And by that stage, the need to understand it was all I could think about... In fact, he was all I could think about…
Jung Yunho… For all of my life I had grown up away from the limelight. I couldn’t stand being noticed by anybody, and for a long time I thankfully never was. But then you came and suddenly you were everywhere - waving to me as I swept the café after closing, saying hello to me as you cycled past the bench I was sitting on, helping me carry my groceries inside whilst talking non-stop to me as if we were actually friends… Why are you always around making my heart thump erratically? Why do you even care? The more you try to explore this town, the more I need to step up and protect you from your own curiosity, because I know It is out there and I know It wants to harm you…
Trailer: CLICK TO WATCH~~
ETA = moon1084 <3
A/N: Wahhhh. I've had this really annoying mouth ulcer for the past few days. I really need to stop myself from always randomly biting the inside of my bottom lip. Curses! T___T. Anyhoos, here's the next chappy for you. It's probably the shortest chapter of the whole fic, but I really didn't want to clog it up with useless spam. ^^;;
“We’re going to the beach again today, right?”
“Yes, HyunAe, we’re going to the beach again today.” My reassurance came out rather garbled due to the mouthful of pancake I was trying to chew through.
“What about tomorrow? On the weather report it looked like there was going to be a cold change coming through this afternoon…”
“Tomorrow we’ll find something else to do then,” I yawned, reaching over for my blackcurrant breakfast juice. “I’ll grab some brochures from that tourist place after breakfast.”
“What tourist place?”
“You know, that tourist place where you can get tour guides and information about what there is to do in town? It’s next to the swimsuit shop you were looking at yesterday.”
“Ohh! Right.”
“We could go on one of those bay watch cruise things if you want. Take a few seasickness tablets, cruise through the ocean to look for dolphins, etc.”
I couldn’t help but smile knowingly in response to the sound of my sister’s delighted squeals. Girls were all the same… God bless them.
“Maybe we could also hire one of those speedboats for the day. I’ve seen quite a lot of people using them lately. You haven’t ridden in one before, have you? It’s really fun.”
“Getting into a speedboat with you as the driver?” HyunAe drawled.
“Hey! I make life exciting…”
“Mum will kill us if she ever found out…”
“She won’t find out,” I promised, trying to ignore the fleeting pangs of guilt at the thought of being such a bad influence on my younger sister. “Besides, it’s a speedboat, not a motorbike…”
The sound of water gushing against tiles suddenly filled the room as Junsu finally got into the shower. Once he was out we’d be ready to head off to the beach again. I personally found it a little ridiculous to insist on having a shower when moments later the salt water would be ruining our hair and sun cream would be making our skin feel sticky, but hey, each to their own.
“Whilst Su takes his time in the bathroom I may as well run down to the tourist information office and grab us those brochures. You don’t mind doing the washing up whilst I’m gone, do you?”
“Nope. Go get us those brochures, Oppa, and don’t forget the dolphin cruise one!”
I rolled my eyes at her and slipped into my runners, making sure to shove my sunglasses on as soon as the bright morning light rushed through the open door. I made my way down the steps and then jogged down the long driveway to get to the main street. It was still fairly early, nine o’clock to be specific, and the streets were already crowded with other tourists. I maneuvered through the crowds and stopped to catch my breath outside of the small tourist information office.
I pushed open the door gently and squeezed through into the small room. Brochures of every imaginable size covered the walls and stands. Even behind the lady at the desk, there were stacks of colorful brochures offering snorkeling classes and fishing classes.
“Good morning!” I smiled towards the middle-aged lady, glancing around me to find what I was looking for. The dolphin cruise pamphlets were neatly displayed to my right and I grabbed two of them before I could forget.
“Are you looking for anything in particular?” I heard the middle-aged lady politely inquire.
“Erm… I’m not sure. Possibly… Is there any information on hiring boats?”
“What sort would you like? Rowboats? Paddleboats? Fishing boats? Speedboats?”
“Wow, that’s quite a selection,” I grinned in anticipation. “Maybe just the speedboats and paddleboats for now…”
“Here you go, sir.”
I eagerly reached over for the pile of pamphlets the lady had complied for me, staring down at the alluring, glossy photo of a gorgeous white speedboat calling to me from on top of the first pamphlet.
“Is there anything else you were interested in, sir?”
“Erm… Yeh. You see I came here with my male best friend and my younger sister, so would you be able to perhaps recommend some activities that might suit us?”
“Let’s see…” the woman pondered, getting up from her seat to wander past me towards the corner of the room. “We have some nighttime bonfire activities, karaoke competitions, beach ball game competitions, bush walking tracks…”
“Would it be incredibly greedy of me if I said all of them sounded great?”
The lady smiled at me and shook her head before darting around the room to find each brochure she had listed. I tried to help her out but there were so many damn brochures it was like trying to find a particular tree in a forest!
Trying not to disturb the woman’s concentration, I stood nearby the window out of harm’s way. There were still a lot of people rushing around with shopping bags and there were several kids licking away at some ice-cream cones as it melted all down their chins and left little dots of melted ice-cream on the path as they walked. It was pretty cute, but at the same time I was glad that my sister was firmly past the age of seven already…
A few buildings down I saw a few people exit the busy grocery store. One was an old man carrying bags of what looked like boxes of cereal, the other was a young woman nibbling on the packet of chocolate she had just opened up, and the other was…
I almost gasped out loud as I saw the third figure slowly exit the grocery store and make his way down the opposite side of the street. It was the creepy janitor! In daylight! He had about five bags of groceries hanging off his skinny arms, making the muscles barely visible behind the short sleeves of his black t-shirt bulge from the weight of everything he was carrying.
I hurriedly turned around to face the helpful lady still rummaging around for brochures. “Excuse me, madam!”
She looked up a little startled.
“Do you know that man over there?” I asked hopefully, pointing towards the lanky figure slowly walking farther away. “The one in the black t-shirt with the grocery bags…”
“Oh, him. Yes, I do know him.”
“And?” I accidentally pushed a little too rudely in my excitement.
“He’s the quiet little kid who owns Café JaDe.”
“Wait, what?” I could feel my eyes bulging out in shock. “Did you say ‘owner’?!”
“Yes,” she politely replied. “He used to live with this nice little old lady who was the previous owner. Back then it was called Waterside Café… Then when she passed away a few years ago she left it for the kid to run.”
“What’s his name?” It was a highly stupid question, but it was the only one simple enough to think of whilst still in my state of surprise.
“His name? I’m not entirely sure actually… Kim something… JaeJin? JaeJoong? One of them… Not a lot of people know him, see. I don’t know anybody close to me who has ever actually spoken with him. He keeps to himself, that boy. Apparently never utters a word, not even to the people at his café. He’s a pretty strange kid, no doubt about that. Even when old Mrs. Choi was alive he kept to himself. I never really saw him after her funeral… The poor thing, he’s only in his early twenties and already been nicknamed the town’s hermit…”
“Hermit? Gosh…”
“Yes, he sure is a mystery, that one. Why, do you know him?”
“No, not exactly… I’d just seen him around a couple of times and wondered who he was…”
“Honey, no one knows who he is,” the lady chuckled, shaking her head at some other sympathetic thought left unsaid in her head before continuing to locate the rest of my brochures.
“Strange…” I muttered to myself, looking back out of the window at the retreating figure of the apparently infamous café owner.
“Yep… That’s the Green Pine Bay Hermit for you. He deserves his own pamphlet!” she chuckled to herself, holding out the small pile of brochures she had finished collecting for me.
“Thanks…” I murmured, but couldn’t stop my eyebrows from dipping into a frown.
That lady wasn’t as nice as I had originally thought… To insinuate that the café owner was some sort of attraction like in a ‘freak’ circus, worthy of his own information brochure just because his lifestyle was different to everyone else’s in town… It was a little mean.
What even gave her the right to sneer at those who were slightly different in society? Especially after admitting earlier in our conversation that she didn’t even know a damn thing about him! What an ignorant viewpoint to have!
I must admit I’d never met a ‘hermit’ before, but even so, I knew that being a hermit was a pretty sad thing. I wondered what the reason for his seclusion was… I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to withdraw from everyone in society except to get my weekly groceries… It was really quite depressing to think about.
Without giving the lady another thought (or look) I quickly tightened my grip around the pile of brochures and darted out of the door, stepping back onto the main street. The café owner was nowhere in sight anymore, but I had a feeling I knew exactly where he was headed - Café JaDe. Where else?
Sprinting until I passed the corner, I finally glimpsed the lonely figure walking a couple meters ahead of me. Trying to get my breath back I stepped beside him and shifted my pace until we were matching.
“Hi!”
The man didn’t reply to my greeting, continuing to walk onwards across the street. Either he was so dedicated to his hermit lifestyle that he had really turned mute, or he simply hadn’t been aware that I was in fact trying to start a conversation with him of all people.
“Hey!” I tried again, carefully reaching out my spare hand to lightly pat him on his shoulder. That caught his attention.
He looked up in shock and gazed at me in confusion. He was only a few centimeters shorter than I was but it still made a small difference. This time there was no intense gaze from him that made me feel like I was being x-rayed, just two large, doe-like eyes blinking up at me. It didn’t look like he even recognized me… Maybe that creepy eye contact we had shared days ago had been just a coincidence that I had completely blown out of proportion, after all …
Up close his face looked completely different to what I had imagined it to look like these past few days. He didn’t resemble your stereotypical hermit, nor did he even resemble your stereotypical male. The man was gorgeous! Absolutely gorgeous! From his porcelain-white skin and pouting lips to his long, straight nose and dark eyebrows, everything about him was what one would deem attractive. His features were surprisingly feminine compared to his lanky, bony, form and extremely broad shoulders. It was a slightly odd mixture and yet somehow it worked perfectly.
“Mm, hi,” I quickly repeated, trying to stop staring at him like a giant idiot. “I’m new in town! …See?” I let out an embarrassed no duh laugh at myself as I lifted up the pile of tourist brochures for him to see. “Sorry to bother you and all, but I heard that you’re actually the owner of Café JaDe!”
“Oh… Yes, I am…” His voice was much deeper than I had expected; it seemed almost odd to be coming out of someone with such feminine features.
“Amazing!” I grinned down at him. To think that I had mistaken him for a mere janitor the previous night! “Café JaDe has pretty much been our refuge since we first got here! Oh, and by ‘our’ I am referring to my best mate and younger sister. They all love the café as much as I do. How do you do it? Do you really manage all of it by yourself?”
I noticed him looking at me rather hesitantly before he eventually confirmed my inquisition with a small nod.
“Amazing!” I repeated, genuinely impressed. “I can’t even manage my own bank account!”
The shorter man didn’t crack a smile at the ridicule I had unleashed upon myself, but he did seem to relax just a tiny bit as we continued walking side by side towards his café.
“Are you heading over there now? Here, let me help you!” I offered without even waiting for his answer, reaching over to slip three of the shopping bags off of his arm.
“…Thanks,” I heard him mumble, staring down at the path in front of him without saying another word as he carefully shifted two bags from his right arm onto his now spare left arm.
“My name’s Jung Yunho, by the way! It’s really nice to meet you…if you haven’t already picked up on that,” I laughed at myself in slight embarrassment.
“Kim JaeJoong…”
“Normally I’d try and shake your hand but I guess that would be a bit impossible right now, eh!” I continued to ramble on, undeterred by the lack of responses from the shy café owner. “A metaphoric handshake shall have to suffice, eh, JaeJoong-sshi!”
I gave up on conversation after that, left to lurk in my own thoughts as I watched JaeJoong from the corner of my eye as he continued to stare down at the path as he walked. I really did wonder what made him such a timid little thing. Had he always been an introvert or had he merely grown more and more reserved as each year passed on by? It wasn’t exactly something I could ask him without stepping over multiple boundaries, but I guess the reason didn’t actually matter in the end. All that mattered was the present.
I let JaeJoong pass in front of me as we reached the café’s door, and waited patiently for him to push his way into the already crowded café. He stopped just in front of a wooden staircase leading up into what I presumed was the entrance of his living quarters above the café.
“Here ya go,” I smiled at him, passing him back the crammed grocery bags. “You must be having a party! You sure know how to shop for-” I was about to say ‘for one person’ but quickly stopped myself just in time. It would have been quite inappropriate and presumptuous of me. “Well, for your money’s worth!” I lamely finished.
Another nod, and I figured it was the closest I was going to get to a smile.
“Thank you…”
“You are very welcome!” I grinned, taking a step backwards having sensed I was very close to overstaying my welcome (so to speak).
JaeJoong turned to start staggering up the stairs and I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from asking him if he wanted me to help him. I figured that he wouldn’t welcome the intrusion into his living quarters as easily as other people would.
“One more thing!” I quickly called out before I could stop myself, taking a swift step forward to grab onto his shoulder before he could escape up the rest of the stairs. He looked a little uneasy as he glanced back at me again, but now that I had started the sentence I wasn’t prepared to back out of it. “Don’t let anybody get you down, okay?”
He stared at me for a very brief moment before turning away from me again without a word to walk up the stairs. I wasn’t sure at first if he had even heard me above all of the loud chatter that currently filled the café, but I had a feeling that he had. I hoped he took in what I had said; after all, sometimes the words from a stranger can be oddly more powerful than that of friends’…
To be honest, I wasn’t even sure what had made me say something like that to him. I guess I was trying to make up for the cruel comment I had heard the brochure lady say about him. Not that he had heard what she had said or anything… Guilt is a funny thing though; you can feel it secondhand from someone else’s actions and before you know it you are apologizing on behalf of them.
Glancing down at the slightly crumpled pamphlets still curled up in my hand, I took a step backwards. What was I even still doing here at the café? I had information to read up about, beaches to go to… Why Kim JaeJoong was the way he was had nothing to do with me; it was none of my business. I shouldn’t try to stick my head into things that didn’t concern me.
At least, that is what I kept trying to tell myself…
///TBC///
A/N: Yep, a really short chapter indeed, but would you believe me if I told you the next chapter is 19 pages long? XDD
Anyways, I just wanted to take this opportunity to just say a little something about the overall layout of this fic. I'm sure you guys would be starting to notice by now that the pace of this fic is really different to the Echo series. And I do apologise if it seems that the beginning chapters in this fic are a little slow, but since this fic is supposed to be about progression, discovery, exploration, mystery, etc, there is no helping the slow start. *sigh* It definitely will speed up, but right now it needs to be more subtle than BOOM BOOM BOOM, IN YOUR FACE like with the Echo series. ^^;;
So please do stay patient with me! *attempts to do some puppy-dog eyes* XD
Thanks for all of your comments guys! Love ya all~ <3