enigma ◇ ikon | jinhwan

2.2

It was more than a month since he last saw Eun Mi, more than a month since the day she ran away from him and left him confused and worried.

He was supposed to be back in the practice room for their upcoming comeback. He was supposed to be perfecting the steps he had learned the past week. Sure, he was working on a song with the others but he was running low on inspiration.

So there he was, sitting by the tree he had mentally appointed as their spot. It had been a week since he last came here, being busy with their comeback preparations.

Jinhwan was hoping she would be back already, that she would come by and he could ask her to help him with the song. Maybe he would find something if she was right beside him.

He had been sitting there for a while, earphones in his ears as it played the melody he and the guys had started experimenting with. A shadow came overhead and he pulled them off and looked up.

It wasn't Eun Mi.

"You're Jinhwan?" she asked and he nodded slowly.

Eun Mi's sister, who introduced herself as Eun Ji, explained to him what had happened.

Eun Mi overdosed on pills.

It took a moment for it to register in his head.

She's gone.

Eun Ji handed him something, a piece of paper with his name written in what must have been Eun Mi's handwriting.

Tears welled up in the girl's eyes and Jinhwan knew she was stopping them from falling.

"She wrote me one, too," Eun Ji said. "She told me where to find you, and that I should give this to you."

He took the letter, holding it gingerly. It was his last connection to her and he was afraid of losing it.

When he didn't say anything else, she muttered an excuse to leave. Jinhwan just stared at the piece of paper in his hand.

He didn't want to read it, for some reason. It only held the reason why she left. That's what he thought she would do.

He didn't want her last words to him be ones that put herself down.

But at the same time, he wanted to know what she had to say to him.

He took a breath, gathering up courage to unfold the paper.

What he read might have triggered the tears -- the ones he hadn't realized he was holding back -- to fall.

I'm sorry.