"do you always hide behind your camera, or is it just around me?"
"i don't hide. i just don't waste my time on people who think they're better than everyone else."
˖⁺‧₊˚ᯓ★🎬 ── .✦📷ᯓ★˚₊‧⁺˖
-wherein seo yeseul accidentally snaps a picture of lee hee...
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YESEUL WANDERED the streets, her steps quickening with every turn. Her breath came out in shallow bursts as she retraced the path to the camera store. She could still remember the day she bought the root of the problem- the camera, a small, dusty shop tucked away on a quiet street. It had seemed charming back then, a hidden gem. But now, the same camera felt like a curse. The same photo she found in her drawer, identical to the one that had blown up on the university website, was proof enough that something was very wrong.
The memory of the photo had sent chills down her spine- how could such a private moment, one she hadn't even known was captured, end up for the whole world to see? She had been careful with the camera, using it sparingly and only when she was alone. But now she couldn't shake the feeling that it was somehow connected to everything that was happening.
As she reached the narrow alleyway where the shop had been, her heart sank. There was no shop. The space where it had once stood was completely empty, the windows boarded up and the paint peeling off the walls. It looked like it hadn't been touched in years. Her mind raced, trying to process the impossibility of it all.
She asked a passerby about the store, and they just shook their head. The owner of the stationery shop next door gave her a puzzled look. "That place? The guy who owned it died about ten years ago," the man said, his brows knitting together. "It's been closed ever since. You must be mistaken."
"But I was here just a month ago," she insisted, her voice trembling. "I bought a camera from him."
The man shook his head again, this time more firmly. "Miss, that store hasn't been in business since years. There's no way you bought anything from there recently."
Her hands felt clammy as she clutched the camera in her bag, her fingers tracing it's contours through the fabric. Her mind was a whirlpool of questions, none of them making any sense. If the store hadn't existed in years, then who had she bought the camera from? How was it even possible?
She glanced down at the vintage camera, its scratched surface and faded leather strap looking as real as it ever had. Yet, the weight of it in her hands felt unsettling. She tried consider just throwing it away, leaving it somewhere far from her, but the thought of another random photo popping out- revealing something even more intimate, or worse- froze her in place. She couldn't let go of it, not when she didn't know what could possibly show up next.
As she stood there, paralyzed by indecision, her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out to see Sunghoon's name flashing on the screen. Part of her didn't want to answer, didn't want to talk to anyone right now, but her thumb moved on its own, swiping to accept the call.
"Yeseul?" Sunghoon's voice was steady but there was a hint of something else there- uncertainty, maybe even concern. "Can you meet me at the children's park near our apartment at 5 p.m.?"
