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CHAPTER SIXTEEN ( Where The Moon Goes )
SOMETIMES CHA JAEHWA feels like a lonesome planet, distanced from the others by the sheen of chaos that perpetuates her interior and crumbles her into a small sphere of cold weather and bleeding thumbs.
She feels as though the closeness and the warmth that surround her slowly ebbs away, stolen by the insatiable hole in her heart. All that remains of her is perhaps empty bones and a need to take in the world as she once knew it, for her touch to linger on remembrances of remnants she can no longer recall.
Yeon Si-eun is not one of those remnants, yet still, his mix of smooth and rough edges feels so nostalgic, as though Jaehwa has known his touch from the moment she knew what warmth was.
His fingers curl around her own, and even through the thick barrage of rain permeating her fragile skin, breaking through that barrier of glass that she has always hidden behind, Cha Jaehwa can feel the scorch of his fingertips and the lingering of his beating heart.
"There's a store over there! Hurry!" Jaehwa points with her free hand, tugging the boy in her grip forward.
Together, they stumble into the brightly lit building, shaking water from their eyes and hair like wet dogs. Jaehwa clings to her thin clothes with a shiver, the beginnings of regret creeping up her damp flesh.
"Are you cold?" Si-eun asks, and his warmth is gone from her fingers, eyes scanning hers for any sign of discomfort.
Jaehwa wets her drying lips and nods slightly. "A bit. I didn't think it was gonna rain so I wore light clothes."
The boy frowns, the glow from the overhead lights reflecting a myriad of stars in his big, sad eyes. Jaehwa musters up a tepid smile, hiding the tremors of her shoulders beneath the stretch of her lips.
"It's fine. Let's just get an umbrella and go." She urges the teen.
Si-eun, so meek when it comes to his words, only nods and does as he's told. He wants to ask more, know more, but he stays silent, pushing away the image of Jaehwa's purpling lips and paling cheeks.
( He has done it all this time — Doing it again shouldn't be any different ).
Dim music flows through the room, an upbeat song that gets blurred in Jaehwa's need for warmth. Si-eun quickly locates the umbrella stand and plucks a sizable one from the rack, and they head over to the register.
Yeon Si-eun pauses at an aisle for a second too long, igniting a curiosity in Jaehwa that she has to peek over his shoulder to see what is so interesting. A short-haired girl with bangs and purple highlights spits a tube of lipstick into her purse, humming along to the music. Jaehwa looks at her in surprise when she directs her gaze towards them.
