Defence

17

- - - - -

Victoria awoke yet to another still morning. The sun shone in upon her irregularly early and she sat right up in bed. Her mind still at base time.

She was prepared to grab her black uniform and head out for a run before breakfast and crew training with the others. And she expected to see Jung Mo standing by the door waiting for her. When she jumped out of bed to reach for her black uniform on the table to her left where it always was, she found just a small wardrobe staring at her instead.

Where was she?

Victoria spun around the room and felt her heart beat fast then calm down. She was still safe. They hadn't yet located her. She was still in hiding.

"Are you up?" a voice boomed from the kitchen.

Ok Taecyeon, the man she'd threatened just a few days ago. The corny stuff she'd read out of a magazine in the City Hall of Kwangju was what she'd used against him. The reproductive system or whatever it was just a joke. It was amusing, however, to find that Taecyeon seemed so baffled and scared from the words she'd used. But to her luck that had shut him up and she was able to stay. Now that she looked him over, Ok Taecyeon seemed like everybody's ordinary man. Someone with a job, a home to come back to, a kind person--no, a naïve man.

"Yah! What are you looking at?!" he shouted with a pan in his hand from behind the table.

Victoria leaned against the interior of the kitchen entrance and smiled.

"Well, good morning to you too, sir." she said walking in.

He frowned at her in a disgusted manner as she sat down, "Yah, what's with you this morning?"

"Isn't it the same as any other morning?" asked Victoria pulling her plate toward her.

"Psh," he snorted, "what kind of a woman doesn't even offer to help out at all?"

"Hurry up," she tapped her spoon on the ceramic plate.

Victoria wolfed down the meal, set her plates in the kitchen sink, and hopped in front of the TV.

Taceyeon changed and walked out of his bedroom. Slipping his shoes on beside her he glanced at the TV.

"Don't forget to wash the dishes." he reminded and sounded like a mother. "Don't leave the water running, you got that?"

"Yes."

"Yah, are you listening?" he asked.

"I said yes!" she turned around.

"Wow," he exclaimed, "how old are you to be acting like that?"

"Do bring some chicken back," she said before turning her back to him shrugging his comment off her shoulders.

The door closed behind her and Victoria waited a while more before finally getting up to wash the dishes.

- - - - -

Donghae drove into the parking lot of his father's business that morning and just sat there for almost 30 minutes. For the first time in a long time he didn't want to go in. From when he entered high school he'd been encouraged everyday to live out his life following his father's shoes - something he'd given himself in to. There hadn't been once while growing up that he'd actually rebelled against his parents like his friends had against theirs. It was just because he held too much of a respect for them and they had always come before anything else in his life.

Was he suddenly tired of that kind of life?

Yes, he was. He wanted to break away for once. Driving out of the parking lot he found himself on the streets immediately aware of where he was heading.