Love Again | Baekhyun

13 | Ghost

Sarang didn't set foot even an inch outside of her apartment for five full days, counting down the time until Yongshik would move out from the unit next door. She had asked to be informed once he left and on Sunday, a building staff finally knocked on her door to tell her unit 304 was officially vacant.

It took one weight off her shoulders, but Sarang had plenty of it to go around. She was a wreck. Guilt and heartache throbbed painfully in her chest everyday. The moment she opened her eyes in the morning, her heart would sink at the reality she was in. The cruel words she told him still rang in her head, her own voice, purposefully driving an emotional knife in his heart.

Besides the guilt, there was regret. She did the right thing, she was sure. But his face was plastered on her mind, his smile ever present in her everyday life, his laugh echoing in her ears.

Baekhyun, who she fell in love with in such a short amount of time, wasn't here anymore. He had looked at her like a stranger, he had stepped away from her with pained eyes like she was a disease to avoid. And it was all her fault.

She wondered constantly, did he hate her? All those cruel words, did he believe everything? He said he'd wait for her to talk to him, was the bitterness growing in his heart each day she chose not to contact him? Sarang's chest tightened at the possibilities, knowing that if any of it were true, he had every right to feel every ounce of hatred.

After the kind of night they had, after breathing each other and getting lost in each other and pouring their hearts out for each other.. She could only imagine the feeling of betrayal.

But there was nothing else she could've done, not with how dark the comments could get. Staying with him stopped being an option after she read the worst of the hate. Every time she saw all the unspeakable things they wrote, her mother's face would linger in her mind, smiling.

A smile she hadn't seen in years.

"Ma'am? That'll be ₩31,307." The cashier spoke, breaking her out of her trance.

Sarang blinked and shook off her long-winding thoughts, "Oh, of course. Sorry." She quickly prepared her money as the cashier started to bag her small bunch of groceries.

"Do you want to separate Baekhyun?"

Sarang looked up in surprise, staring at the man behind the counter in a moment of stunned silence. "What?"

"The bacon. Do you want me to pack it separately?" He repeated, still next to no interest in his tone.

It felt like her heart had stopped for a moment there, but she quickly let out a breath. "No, thank you." Sarang then gathered her plastic bag from the counter and hurried off.

Yesterday, Sarang had taken a walk at the park just to breathe some fresh air. Sitting at the bench, she saw a girl who looked like a teenager with her assumably toddler baby brother. The little boy was aggressively tugging on his sister's shirt before she crouched down, flicked his forehead, and picked him up in her arms. Sarang's mind flew back to that night in Baekhyun's car.

The day before that, she had went out to meet her friend, Hyojin, who had only recently arrived back in Seoul. As they chattered over flavored tea in a small outdoor restaurant, Sarang accidentally noticed an old couple in the table nearby, huddled over a plate of spicy tteokbokki. She couldn't help reminiscing that rainy day in Mr.Han's shop.

One week since she broke up with Baekhyun passed by and turned into two weeks. Each day, Sarang counted down the time and waited patiently for him to leave her mind, but he was always there. Always present in some form around her, haunting.

Like a ghost.

Everything reminded her of him. Every song she compared with his, every car looked like his, every passing couple on the street was doing something she'd done with him before, every word sounded like his name.