The Crown | myg

forty-six

The man in front of me stands there in silence, a look of awe strewn across his face. He furrows his brows at me for a moment and then turns around to look at the car behind him, his hands coming up to his forehead to shield his eyes from the light so he can see better.

I follow his gaze and see the man in the car nod before getting out. The door to the black sedan opens promptly and a man dressed in all black steps out. I keep my eyes on him as he begins to walk in this direction, his walk confident, but lacking. Something about this guy is stopping him from being completely confident in his abilities, and I'm going to figure out what it is.

The man is tall, and he's wearing a wide-brimmed hat. His head is tilted down ever so slightly; just enough to hide his face from our gazes. He stops in front of me, his body so close to mine, yet I still can't see underneath his hat to figure out who he is, for it is too dark; there is no light that can shine underneath the brim of his hat.

"Hyuntae," the man speaks, his head still tilted downward, the brim continuing to cover his face. He speaks as though he has met me before. Like he has known me for a while, not just bumped into me in public before and learned my name. The way he speaks my name makes it seem as though we've had a previous relationship. There is emotion to his tone, knowledge... love.

The way he spoke was calm, almost apologetic in a way. There was no hesitation, no thought to try to remember or even know what my name was. He already knew me, he had known me for a while and just the tone of his voice is giving me everything I need to know, but I can't seem to put my finger on who he is.

"It's been a while, my dear," he speaks again. His tone remains the same, but there is a touch more love behind the words he speaks, this man genuinely cares about me and I can't seem to remember who he is. The cockiness in his voice is obvious too, but it only shone through the second time he spoke, not the first. It's almost as if he's trying to give me hints as to who he is without directly telling me.

My dear. Only a small handful of people have ever called me that; old people in the street, my grandmother, old men trying way too hard to try to get into my pants and... oh no.

A sharp gasp escapes my lips and I try to shuffle on my knees to move away from him. If I'm right about who he is, I don't want to be anywhere near him, not like this, not while I have zero way of fighting him back if I need to. If he's still the same man I knew, and he hasn't changed in the time we've been apart, then I know I'll have to fight him back at some point, it's just who he is as a person – an abusive, manipulative prick.

He lets out a deep chuckle. "I knew you would figure out it was me," he brings himself down onto his knees and gets close to me, the brim of his hat still covering his face. I don't need confirmation on who he is to know that I should be terrified right now. I know this can't end well.

I turn my head to the side as he tries to cup my face with his hand, his thumb grazing over my cheek gently.

"Oh, how I've missed you," he whispers into my ear, his voice filled with violent intent. From what I can remember, he's going to try to get me alone so he can abuse me like he used to, so he can do everything he used to do to me behind closed doors. Something that no one ever learned was what he did to me, and he was around me all the time. What he did to me is one of my best-kept secrets.

I look up to see my friends all on their knees off to the side, the same place they were all in when I was originally grabbed. They're all still crying, their cheeks stained with tears, but their eyes are filled with fear. Not a single one of them has ever seen me this terrified, some of them have probably never seen me scared before, so seeing me like this is a clear sign that they should be just as terrified as I am, if not more.