don't blame me

wide awake

They were losing their minds.

In an attempt to recover from their last fight, Myung-Dae and Young-Il had been laying low.

But that didn't stop them from sending their evil spirit army after innocent people.

The Counters were running all over Jungjin trying to stop these spirits and summon as many of them as possible.

While they were successful in summoning many of them, they were wearing thin on their energy.

After about 7 days of this, they had all only been getting about 3 hours of sleep each night.

Motak had taken a leave of absence from the police station and Chairman Choi was having his upper management take care of his company while the Counters were traveling all over Jungjin.

While Ms. Chu, So Mun, Jeok-bong, and Chairman Choi were outright worriers, Motak and her were the silent worriers.

So, as she looked at the clock hands showing the time as 4 am, she didn't feel tired.

No, instead she was wide awake.

She couldn't rest. Not until she finally wiped those smug faces off Myung-Dae and Young-Il.

So as her leg started twitching, all she could hear was the door opening and finding Motak walking up to her.

He had his hands pulling at the strands of his hair, a trait she noticed that Mun had picked up from him.

The thought of that made her smile slightly before looking at Motak in concern.

"What's wrong?" She asked softly.

"What isn't wrong is the better question." Motak said.

She let out a soft chuckle at that, the first time she laughed in so long.

Motak just had the ability to do that. He felt like a father figure to her, both protective and goofy to a fault.

As much as she tried to hide her vulnerability, Motak had a great eye for figuring out what was going on with her. Maybe that was the detective in him or maybe that was just from knowing Hana so well.

"You're thinking about something. So Mun, I presume?" He asked with a slight smirk.

Do Hana rolled her eyes at his comment with a fond grin.

Ever since that day he made her a promise, Mun and her have been weird. Weirder than usual.

Of course, that could be because she kissed him. Something new that had been happening more than she expected.

But she had never felt as powerless or weak as she did at that moment. Her pleas at Mun to fight were deeper than what she portrayed to him.

Not only was she trying to convince him, but she was trying to convince herself.

She thought he couldn't hear the thumping of her heart as she made him promise her to not give up.

But he did.

He always knew.

So, when he touched their foreheads together and whispered a promise back to her, she felt something present in her chest.

She knew what that feeling was.

She had been ignoring that feeling for so long.

Long enough that she hadn't even realized it never left.

Not since the moment she met him.

But she was scared.

She couldn't let him feel the way she felt.