Reserved [Book V]

His Fear

Zitao's face was pale as hell and it made Areum think if she was doing the right thing. This was supposed to be a silly – even cute – moment for the both of them, but she didn't realize right away how serious his fright was until it was too late.

He had been cussing under his breath for the two minutes and Areum cautiously watched. She was on high alerts, eyes back and forth between Zitao's expressions and the movement of Nog's hairy legs against skin. Zitao's fingers were trembling and Areum felt like he was fleshed out; tough-looking, scary-face, tall guy wavering at the sight of a small creature.

"She's not going to bite as long as you stay calm." Areum muttered, moving a little to see Nog better. She sat beside Zitao, who looked like he wanted to shake his arm every time the tarantula took its tiny steps. Nog went from Zitao's hand – palm side down – and now she was nearing his shoulder. "I've never seen her move so freely on a person besides me before."

He didn't speak but Areum could tell he wanted to bolt up and leave.

After his reaction to the spider at the bleachers, she convinced him painstakingly to face his fear like she did until Zitao just went along "to shut her up." So they went to her apartment and she introduced him to Nog, whose cage he almost pushed away and broke. He also saw the jar of worms she used to feed her pet and Zitao gave her a look that told her she was out of her mind.

"I think she likes you." Areum declared, smiling as if a spider crawling up an arm was a normal thing.

It is to her, anyway.

Zitao expelled a long slow exhale. "How much time left?"

"Half a minute." She replied, preparing herself to put Nog back in her cage placed on her study table.

Zitao endured and Areum's phone beeped as the timer hit zero. When she removed Nog from Zitao, he huffed, as if there was something blocking his lungs the whole time. Areum stood up and turned around to return her pet in the enclosure, while Zitao closed his eyes and rubbed his face, cursing a few more times before lying down on the bed deadbeat.

"You did it." Areum smiled again, sitting beside Zitao on her bed and flicking away the strands of raven hair stuck on his sweaty forehead. He panted for a few seconds and shook his head, gazing at her with an expression she couldn't quite explain. "Now you know how it feels."

She lied next to him and placed her arms on her stomach, staring at the ceiling.

"I'm sorry." Zitao whispered and when Areum threw him a glance, he smiled a little. She thought that was so courageous, because she wouldn't have been able to smile for who knows how long if exposed to her own stressors. "I thought you hated me for making you go through strength training, so Eunchae told me to find a new tactic and I asked your brothers."

"I did hate you." Areum agreed. "How much does Eunchae know about me?"

"Just the basics, I think. I mean they saw when you had that accident with Soojung during basketball. They know I'm seeing someone, they know it's you." Zitao answered. "In all honesty though, what kind of lunatic keeps a spider for a pet?"

Areum grinned and shifted to her side, facing Zitao completely. His legs dangled at the side of her bed. There was this certain charm on Zitao's face she hadn't seen before – or noticed – but it lit him up a tad bit, making the atmosphere better than before. All this while still trying to recover from Nog.

"I wouldn't change her for the world." Areum talked softly and Zitao faced her.

There was distance between them and Areum liked to keep it that way so he could breathe and release the tension in his mind. To her, this was intimate: Zitao lying on her bed and being vulnerable, while seeing the life she experienced and stored in all of the stuff in her room. Her books, her pieces of paper, her typewriter, her Nog.