𝑼𝒔 𝑨𝒈𝒂𝒊𝒏𝒔𝒕 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑾𝒐𝒓𝒍𝒅 :: 𝐄𝐍𝐇𝐘𝐏𝐄𝐍 𝟎𝐓𝟕 [ SLOW EDITING]

~~~𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟑

Chapter 3: A Lingering Encounter

—¤—JULY 1ST 2023—¤—

—HANEUL'S—

The sun had risen over Seoul, casting its warm glow through the windows of my apartment. It was my third day in the city, my second full day to be exact.The incident from yesterday had kept my mind awake throughout the night, leaving me feeling groggy despite managing to squeeze in a few hours of sleep. In fact, I had a video call with my long time best friend who's in the UK earlier this morning at 4 a.m.  Her name is Arwen River Alvarez. She's korean-filipino  but her parents migrated there when she was in her third grade. Her soulmate and my late fiance are cousins and she's actually the reason why I officially have met Declan .  We met when I was on my first year studying in the UK and we both graduated in the same university but with a different degree as she have graduated with an accounting and finance degree and currently she works in an investment banking back in the UK.

I'm seriously thankful for her because she stayed with me all throughout, especially when I lost my late soulmate last June 18th of 2021 . It's been 2 years since his passing, and it was rough for all of us. When he died, I thought I lost everything, as I have always seen him as a part of my future—heck, we are engaged! It took me a year to accept the idea of moving on and having a future without him in it. It was the hardest pill to swallow and now it's tougher considering how my friends and my family would remind me about  "opening my heart" and to put myself out there.

If only it was that easy to do. It was only recently when I fully accepted the fact of having another soulmate and when I told my father about it, he is genuinely excited for the time I would meet and find out who my soulmate is. While I on the other hand, is very much engulfed with fear and hesitancy. With many underlying and obvious reasons. Now, that video call earlier with my best friend somehow helped me to re-direct my mind to somewhere else. To be frank, despite managing to get a few hours of sleep, I still felt the weight of exhaustion pulling at my eyelids. I snapped myself out of my train of thoughts and sat up, looking like a corpse with my eye bags and puffy face. I look like I came back from the dead.

" Gosh, I look like a puffer fish—"

 Determined to shake off the lingering thoughts, I made my way to the bathroom to freshen up, splashing cold water on my face in an attempt to clear my mind.It's about 8:30 a.m. now and I plan to meet up with my friends tonight after doing the pre-planned schedule for today since they found out about me arriving to korea yesterday morning when the news finally broke. I don't have that much friends here in korea more so Idol friends, but I do make sure that I am still in contact with those friends.

As the water dripped down my face, I tried to forget about the encounter that had consumed my thoughts. In the rush of the moment, I had accidentally bumped into someone without being able to properly apologize or even catch a glimpse of their face. It gnawed at me, as I was a people pleaser at heart and not being able to make amends left me with a sense of unease. However, I had to remind myself that what was done was done, and I couldn't undo the past.My reflection stared back at me from the mirror, the tiredness evident in my eyes.