i wrote this a few weeks ago so hopefully it's not too shabby.
happy reading!
sending my love,
krissy
❦
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NARI, WE NEED to talk.
The words are an incessant echo in the background as I plunge into the chaos of work. My phone blows up with notifications--slowly, people are starting to recognize and question my face on every entertainment tabloid in the city.
You're seeing him? Park Jimin? Stunned and curious faces blur in front of me at the office building. Others scorn me silently. Their whispers reach me from the shadows. Would you look at that. Our Creative Director with a murderer.
Minseok arranges to meet me that same evening. He suggested going to his place to avoid rumors, but I wasn't about to agree after what had happened the last time I was there. So he decided on a more secluded alcove at his office, a few floors below the EA offices.
I wait in the elevator now, heart drumming, as it sails down the short way to his floor. My hands sink deep into the pockets of a charcoal-black parka coat, my shoulders drawn in tight, as if preparing for a fight. The numbers slide downward. Fifteen. Fourteen. Past dal.komm.
Thirteen. The doors slide smoothly open into bright glassy halls.
"--because there isn't a lot we can do about the--"
"But that's what I'm saying, Jisoo. You're too ambitious."
Zhiruo opens her mouth to protest. But when she sees me, both she and Jisoo come to a grinding halt, their eyes widening.
"Ah," says Jisoo awkwardly. Smiling. "Nari."
I don't smile back. Somehow, every executive and acquaintance in the building has forgotten how to address me, as if I'm a different person because of my sudden exposure in the news.
"Evening," I say with a brusque nod, then dip my head and breeze past them into Minseok's office.
The doctor's office that Minseok works at is a round, glass-walled expanse glowing in swaths of darkening sunlight. Gangnam unfurls beneath us as I follow the halls toward the receptionist. A few patients eye me warily.
"I'm here to see Seo Minseok," I tell the woman at the front.
"Ah, you must be Yoo Nari. First right down the hall."
