apology

five

December 16, 2015, 9 p.m.

  Park Jimin.

  He's... trying to save me.

  "Yeah right, kid," my attacker spits, "I can kill both you and her within five seconds." He presses the knife into my neck. I feel the knife barely break through my skin.

  "Help me, Jimin," I cry.

  "Oh," the man chuckles evilly, pushing against me harder. "You know each other."

  "Don't touch her!" Jimin shouts, as he sprints towards the man. I grab my attacker's wrist, knocking the knife to the ground while Jimin tackles him.

  Holding the man's hands onto the ground, Jimin yells at me, "Minrae! Grab the knife!"

  I run over and grab the knife, bringing it far away from the man - apparently his name is Jinsoo, as his name tag says, and he works as a cashier at the convenience store.

  I watch as Jimin punches Jinsoo multiple times in the nose, making his face bleed. I hear the cracking of bones along with the cuss words thrown in by the cashier.

  "STOP, YOU MOTHERFUCKER!" Jinsoo screams.

  Jimin says nothing as he throws one last punch, knocking Jinsoo out cold.

  Getting off the criminal, I see that Jimin has blood all over his face, shirt and hands.

  "Are you okay?" he asks, concern in his voice.

  "I'm fine," I say while holding my throat.

  "You're cut," he mumbles, removing my hand from my throat and grabbing onto my chin, tilting my face to the side so that he can see the gash clearly. "Thank God it isn't deep."

  "Thank you," I say, trying to hold back my tears.

  Jimin looks down at me, hand still on my chin, and stares into my eyes. I start crying uncontrollably and pull him in for a hug.

  "I could have died," I cry into his shirt.

  He awkwardly ruffles my hair, before telling me, "We need to call 9-1-1."

  I nod, unwrapping my arms around him while crying some more. Jimin walks over to Jinsoo, looking over his shoulder and seeing how terrified I am. Sympathy and warmth flash in his eyes, before they are quickly converted into sternness and seriousness.

  "Call 9-1-1," he says again, pulling a piece of rope from Jinsoo's pocket. He had rope?! I shudder as I imagine what he could have done to me with it. Jimin wraps Jinsoo's hands around a pole and ties his wrists together.

  Jimin turns around, sighing exasperatedly when he sees that I'm still standing shell-shocked in my original position. "Call 9-1-1," he tries to shut out the annoyance in his voice.

  I quickly rummage through my pockets with shaking hands, before realizing that Jinsoo had crushed my phone underneath his boot.

  "He crushed my phone," I say shakily to Jimin, who's still fumbling with the rope. Jimin quickly throws me his phone, and I catch it.

  "911, what is your emergency?" the operator says.

  "I was-I-I was almost kidnapped," I cry into the phone.

  "Miss, are you safe?" the operator asks in concern.

  "Yes, a friend saved me. We have the attacker. H-he is tied to a pole. I'm at a convenience store... It's the 7-11 outlet at Sampoong," I tell her.