Then, There Was Aine ✅

Third Movement

"You... who are you?" he asked as he tried to get himself into a sitting position. Countless hammers were still being hit against his head, but he ignored them.

"My name is Aine," she replied as she sat on the sofa beside him.

"Aniyo?" he confirmed, a hint of a smile tugging at his lips.

Her name was strange. It meant 'no' in Korean.

"An-ya," she said more slowly.

"Anya."

He wondered what her name actually meant.

"That's right. And you?"

"Me..." – he considered what to say – "...no one."

"No one?"

"No one," he repeated.

She looked at him in confusion then nodded slowly before moving to an armchair that was a bit farther away.

The shadow of his smile turned into a full out grin at her lack of subtlety, but she seemed unfazed. In fact, she looked defiant, as if daring him to say anything. Somehow, this amused him to no end.

It had been a while since he had talked to anyone. Aside from the delivery men who came to drop his groceries outside the door, no one came to break his solitary confinement. Even the press, who eventually lost interest in him after he had spent a few uneventful months at rehab, hadn't cared enough to track him down. He had informed his family, though, that he was going away, but he didn't tell them where. He wanted it to be that way, to simply disappear from the face of the earth. He had been too guilty and too ashamed.

Narrowing his eyes, he considered the situation that fate had brought before him. He guessed that she was a foreign tourist seeing as how she didn't speak the language and hadn't recognized him. This little island at the south of the Korean peninsula had certainly attracted lots of them over the years, but his cabin was off the beaten track. She probably got lost and took shelter from the storm.

"I will leave when the rain stops," she said, enunciating her words one by one, piercing the silence that had settled between them. She was pointing towards the windows, where gray skies and never-ending sheets of water obscured everything.

He looked at where she was pointing, grasping her meaning. He thought about his phone, which he still kept for emergencies. It would probably help to check the news.

"Okay," he finally replied as he stood up from the couch. A sudden wave of dizziness hit him and he nearly fell if not for the arm around his waist that held him steady.

"Hey, take it easy," she said. "You vomited a lot last night so you're probably feeling weak."

Aish, jinjja! (Ah, really!)

"No English," he said in frustration, finally giving up on trying to understand what she was saying.

With her help, he made his way to his room's ensuite bathroom. At least his was a one-storey cabin. They managed to get to their destination without incident. As they entered what should have been the place of his death, the smell of vomit and whiskey assailed him. He lurched forward and gagged by the toilet. She rubbed his back while he did so.