The Truth Untold

Ⅳ

There he stood, Park Jimin the masked man, haunted by the storm of his own thoughts. Ghosts of memories and regrets circled his mind, relentless, never letting him rest. No one knew his name and no one cared to know.
To everyone, he was just
the "masked man."

He hated wearing his mask. But he hated taking it off even more. Since childhood, he had carried the weight of a painful past lies, betrayal, and abandonment. Neither mother nor father stayed with him. He could still remember his mother's smile when she saw him for the first time, thinking he was beautiful. Soft skin, blue-gray eyes. He was a dream of a child. But the happiness didn't last, she left him when he was only five.

After that, other kids taunted him, mocked him. Some even scarred his face, leaving a small mark. But the memories ran deeper than the mark of his dark past. He never felt love, never had anyone know him for who he truly was. His face to him, was nothing but a lie, a beautiful lie that people once adored, only to abandon.
One of the reason he became what he is today.

Isolated from the world, he grew up alone. People feared him. He barely spoke, had no friends. Only his wealth remained, but what was wealth without happiness? What good was it when no one wanted to be near him? The sight of his own face filled him with disgust it was a mask as well, hiding the wounds within. He hates his appearance, hates to look at his own face. Hates to show his face to anyone.

And now, there was a stranger, a girl of all people, who had wandered into his garden. Right in front of his eyes. She'd found his one true sanctuary, his flowers. She cared for his blooms, stealing them to sell, sensing the love that had gone into each petal.
There she was again.

"These flowers grow so beautifully," she thought, wondering who had poured such care into them.

Every day, she'd gather his flowers and take them to the town to sell. And every day, he would wait, knowing the exact time she would come. He would watch her quietly, his interest piqued, not out of anger but curiosity.

Until she didn't come for a few days.

His mind began to race.
What could have happened?
Why wasn't she there?
The questions pressed at him until he couldn't ignore them. He hates his curiosity. But he couldn't deny the fact that he wanted to know what happened to her. The girl who came to his own garden every day. It was like a routine for him to expect her in his garden. So, he left his location  and ventured into town.

There she was, her little cloth spread out on the ground with already picked flowers, still unsold. The townspeople were no longer interested in her flowers. She waited too long and they were no longer fresh.

"Good afternoon" he greeted her, his calm voice breaking the silence. She looked up, clearly tired and returned his greeting.

"What can I offer you ?" she asked, smiling politely despite her fatigue.

"All of them." he replied.

"What?" she stood there, stunned, not believing her ears. She couldn't believe the masked man had come back, especially after all the rumors she'd heard about him. But something told her there was more to him than the rumors said.

"I'd like to buy all your flowers." He lifted his mask just slightly, shyly, so she could hear him more clearly, but not enough for her to see his face. He'd promised himself that no one would ever see his face again.

"Really?" she asked, excitement lighting up her face. Did he really want to buy all her flowers? He must be incredibly wealthy, she thought.

What she didn't know was that he was buying them just so she'd return to his garden. He found her intriguing far more interesting than anyone he'd met before.

She quickly packed up the flowers, her hands moving faster than they ever had.

"Thank you so much!" she said gratefully, trying to hold back more questions.

„ No one has ever bought so many flowers from me before."

"I see" he replied, his voice calm, though a touch of mystery lingered beneath.

"They are beautiful flowers."

"Yes, they are," she agreed softly, gathering the blooms.

"But you know, sometimes flowers say what words cannot. Like I said, they have different meanings" she recalled their first meeting, telling him how each flower stands for something. She still remembers meeting him. Still remembers the disrespect he had to encounter from some people in this town.

No one had ever spoken to him this way, with such quiet confidence.

"You seem to know a lot about flowers" he remarked, his voice betraying a touch of surprise. Conversations with him were rare, much less ones that lasted this long.

A hint of a smile played at her lips.

"I do, actually. I learned from a book about the language of flowers. Each one has a different meaning, a story all its own."she said, while he regarded her carefully

"Tell me, then," he murmured, his voice soft yet distant, as if testing the delicate space between them, each word like ice in the cool night air.
"If flowers could speak
what would they say about a man like me?"

A chill settled between them, his question lingering. She could feel the tension in his gaze as he waited, his blue-gray eyes like stormy half moons watching her every move. She was caught off guard by his question, by the quiet challenge hidden within it.

"Maybe..." she ventured, her voice barely a whisper

"maybe they would say that the truth lies somewhere behind that mask."

His gaze stayed fixed on hers, unblinking. For a moment, it felt as if her words had struck something deep within him, like a stone dropping into still water, sending ripples of something unspoken, something raw and hidden beneath the surface. So she stood there. Inwardly she slapped her hands on her forehead for her cheeky mouth.

Neither of them spoke, both caught in the weight of that silence, the questions unasked and the truths left unspoken.

A