The men across the street

9 : The Writer

The last two months of the school year flew by in an instant and you were so busy that you had almost completely forgotten what a social life even was. The only social interaction that weren't related to school that you had during these months were the two times you had gone out to eat with a few friends and your late night supermarket trips where you had often ran into Jong Woo making you walk home with your neighbor, whom you had started to grow surprisingly font of. This sort of appeared to be one of the few times you would run into each other since you hadn't seen much of both of your neighbors to be honest, maybe it was just because you had been busy or maybe because both of you seemed to be busy, but lately the two men across the street from you never seemed to be home. Most definitely the dentist seemed only to be in Seoul for a couple of days at a time, which was something the writer also wouldn't explain to you when you asked him about it during one of your convenience store trips, he just repeated that the both of them were currently very busy. You didn't know if your disappointment of them being busy was because you had started to become accustomed to them, them being the only ones somewhat close to your age or if it was because they had strangely enough crossed your path in so many ways.

It was on a rainy night when you had accidentally forgotten your house keys while your parents weren't home that you were most delighted to see a light on across the street and the black KIA belonging to Jong Woo parked in front of the house. A bit ashamed of your clumsiness in forgetting your keys, you rang their doorbell with some hesitation before turning to look back at your own house, looking if maybe, just maybe you saw a light on there as well, which of course there wasn't.
After a few seconds you could hear the door separating the couple's living room from their hallway opening, before seeing a light being turned on in said hall way, the shadow of a man approaching. It took him another few seconds to open the door once he reached it, most likely to look at who was standing in front of his door through the camera of the doorbell.

He opened the door a few seconds later, clearly confused before asking you what you were doing at his doorstep in the middle of the night. You immediately noted the smell of wine in his breath and the look on his eyes told you that he hadn't just had a glass, but more like an entire bottle.
"sorry, I forgot my keys and my parents aren't home, they're visiting family in Busan" you explained as you stepped inside, the writer clearly looking at your drenched form, feeling like he had no other choice but to let you in. He told you to wait where you were before disappearing up the stairs and returning a couple of minutes later with a towel.

"when will they get home?" he asked worried as he took in your appearance one more time.

"tomorrow in the afternoon" you replied, laughing a bit uneasy while the writer turned to look at you in shock.
"And I kind of have no place to go right now" you continued as this was your moment to ask whether or not you could crash at your neighbors place or not.

"you're asking me if you can stay here over night?" Jong Woo asked confused, his eyes not leaving yours like he didn't really know what to do.
"Uhm, yeah sure. Just follow me, we need to get you some dry clothes first. You think mine will fit you?" he continued after a moment of silence before starting to walk back up the stairs where he had come from just earlier when he had gone to grab you a towel.

"yeah, I think so" you replied, following the writer up the stairs as he told you to do so. After handing you some dry clothes, he directed you to the guest bedroom where you could spend the night before showing you the bathroom and telling you to take a nice warm shower before heading downstairs, before heading back downstairs himself.
After washing up and hanging your clothes to dry in the guest bedroom, which you discovered was quite nice for people who didn't really seem to have people over, you did as told and headed downstairs, hearing Jong Woo talking to someone, most likely on the phone you assumed, telling the person on the other side of the line that you were staying over since you had forgotten your keys.