.05% | lty

14. Run

6 months later

"Da Reum! I'm going to leave soon!" Yuna called through his bedroom door.

"Wait!" The door flung open. "Don't forget your bag. Did you eat breakfast? Don't space out and not eat anything later like you always do. You won't die if you take a break from studying, but you will die if you don't remember to eat. You'll be home before it gets dark, right? Because you shouldn't walk home by yourself when it gets dark. Call me if you will be late and I'll go pick you up."

Yuna looked at him with a blank expression.

"Is this payback or something?"

"What do you mean?"

"I'm sorry, Da Reum." She patted his shoulder. "I will never nag you again. It was sweet back when I first started school, but now...I didn't know this is what it was like."

He rolled his eyes, then grabbed her shoulders and spun her around toward the door.

"Whatever, just be careful and have a good day and all that."

"I'm only going to meet Hyejin at the cafe near school to study, no need to act like you're sending me off to a war zone, gosh." She grumbled.

"Bye noona, see you later." He waved as she closed the door.

She got on the bus and put her headphones in, then laid her head back on the seat and closed her eyes. She had been on this bus many times before since starting med school a few months ago so she knew the scenery well enough that she could imagine it with her eyes closed. The gray concrete that blended building and ground together, the faded signs and tired faces of people trudging to wherever the were going to from wherever they came from. It could be considered drab and insignificant to some, but to Yoona it was the tangible part of her figurative path; an indication that she was going in the direction that she was meant to.

She was pulled from the peacefulness of her short rest when her phone rang in her hands. It was Hyejin. She quickly answered, hoping that her friend had not been waiting for her too long.

"Hyejin, I'm so sorry. I'm on my way now." She blurted before saying any form of greeting. "My brother was nagging me so I'm running a bit late. I hope you haven't been waiting long. I'm almost there."

Silence.

"Hyejin?"

"Yuna, something is happening. I'm leaving. Don't come here."

"What? Something's happening to who? You? Are you ok?"

She waited a second and looked at the screen. Call ended.

"That was weird. Maybe she's sick?" Yuna speculated. She shrugged her shoulders and assumed Hyejin had to leave because she wasn't feeling well. Her bus stop was the next one and she felt it would have been a waste to have come all this way for nothing so she decided to just continue and study there on her own.

The bus pulled to a stop and she got out, heading in the direction of the coffee shop down the street. A group of people ran past her in a hurry, who she assumed were late and running after the bus that had just departed. She walked slowly with her headphones still in her ears, passing a couple stores on the way. More people ran past her.

"That's weird, why is everyone running late today?" She questioned.

She heard a strange, faint hammering through her headphones followed by what sounded like a scream. She stopped in her tracks, not sure of the noises muffled through the barriers in her ears. She slowly pulled the headphones out and the hammering sounded much louder and came in short, staccato bursts.