The Cutting Edge

034

When Hyejin picked herself out of bed the next morning, her entire body felt battered and bruised, and when she slowly crawled her way to the bathroom she felt as if someone had tied lead weights to her feet. Lifting up the hem of her pyjama top, she winced when she saw the angry purple bruise that had developed at her waist area. The girls hadn't held anything back when they kicked her last night.

As she let the cold water from the shower soothe the pain, the events from last night surfaced once more in her mind.

After their momentary pause by the Han river, Hyunwon had driven her all the way home in silence. She could still feel his anger and annoyance radiating throughout the journey, though she knew better than to ask too many questions. Even when he dropped her off at her doorstep, the only thing he said to her was, "If you're not feeling well tomorrow then take the day off." Then he sped off into the night.

He probably thinks I'm creating unnecessary trouble for him again, she thought to herself. She didn't blame him for thinking that way.

The memory of Hyunwon lifting her off her feet and carrying her into the lift kept floating into her mind, and when she looked at her own reflection in the mirror she realised that her cheeks had gone bright pink. She could almost still feel the warmth of his chest and the steady heartbeat that was coming from within.

"Stop it, Song Hyejin," she chided her reflection. "He's someone else's fiancé now."

The voice of her father calling her name from the living room distracted her from her monologue, and she quickly threw on some clothes and headed out to see what the commotion was about. To her surprise, she found Ares standing in the living room, with her puzzled father beside him.

"This boy says he's looking for you," her father said, studying Ares warily from head to toe.

"Ares! What are you doing here?"

"I thought I'd give you a lift down to work. You disappeared from the dinner so abruptly yesterday and you didn't pick up any of my calls—I was really worried about you," he said.

Hyejin ran back to her room and picked up her phone, only then did she realise that she had switched her phone to silent mode at the start of the dinner and that she had received fifteen missed calls from Ares over the course of the night. Scrolling through her call log, she frowned, walking back out to the living room.

"Sorry, my phone was left on silent. But why did you call me throughout the night?" Then she noticed that he was still wearing the same clothes that he had been wearing at the dinner, and that there were visible dark circles around his eyes. "You haven't gone home? Were you waiting outside my house all this while?" she asked incredulously.

She had always known that Ares had a penchant for doing strange things, like roaming the streets in the wee hours of the morning, but this was a little too much.

"Who is this boy? What do you mean he has been waiting outside our house all night?" her father demanded. He waved his newspaper threateningly at Ares, saying, "Are you some kind of stalker? Leave my daughter alone!"

Ares flashed the older man a tired smile and said, "Don't you recognise me anymore, Uncle? You used to cut my hair for me when I was a kid. My grandma would bring me to Gongja barber shop and you would give me sweets because I didn't like getting my hair cut."

"What?" Hyejin's father looked surprised, but seconds later a knowing look appeared in his eyes. "You're that chubby kid! Of course! What's your name? Minhyuk? Minhyun?"

"I'm Hwang Minhyun."

"That's right, that's right! Look at you, all grown up now. You look so different from when you were a kid! Where did all that baby fat go?"