I saw you before I met you.

002

"so, you've just moved here?" a deep yet silky tone question through the invisible, thick mask of haze. it was so hard for her to hear him and for some reason she couldn't make out his full features. all that were visible was details-- ones she knew were important, like how long his fingers were as they wrapped around a coffee cup. or how his skin was the color of caramel and he wore an expensive looking suit. if she had to describe it, she'd say the blue had a glowy hue that drew her gaze there instead of his face.

"yeah, i just graduated from college and wanted to teach English." she smiles, eyes wandering up to meet his own. it's not...like most smiles. there's no falsity nor does it appear forced. in fact, all she can see clearly is the lower half of his face and how his dimples lightly forms. his chiseled features and plump lips. even his nose is clear for her to make out it isn't pointed, but slightly flat and button-like.

he speaks again and this time she doesn't hear him. it's as if she can't even speak or move. the last thing that she remembers is his smile before she wakes up in a cold sweat.

this man was an unknown figure, along with herself. she finds herself questioning the things she could remember but even then, it was all like a distant memory she was recalling years later and not the night before. his voice wasn't one she has ever heard in the real world-- it would be too clichè to say it sounded unrealistic and dreamy, but that was the only way one could describe it.

a certain amount of exhaustion still lingers in her body. she slept soundly and yet, sleep felt like it was creeping upon her once more.

but our heroine can't sleep yet, she has work to do. reality to focus on and so she does. "kimura, hurry up! we're already running behind as it is!" her mother calls from the front door, barely harboring patience for her daughter's lack of consideration for making good time.

this is her first job, not the ideal one after graduating high school, but it brings in money. janitorial service doesn't suit you. are the replies from fellow coworkers who quit so often she didn't bother to befriend them. their words, while kind, still linger the more she lifts stinking garbage and wipes off more than a hundred desks and table tops a night.

this job doesn't suit her. not because of her looks that most people commented on, but because she always dreamed of doing something better, something that would make her parents proud. fate had this torture lined up from the beginning, you see. because it's this job that started it all.

"hey mom, my friend told me about these boys in south korea. said they're a popular boyband, but you know how her taste in music is." kimura teases, drawing her mother's hardworking attention to her lazing by a vacant computer in the lab.

"no one should be coming up here anytime soon since the shift just started, " her mother replies, setting her rag aside and moving towards the back of the room. "perks of being the supervisor."

god, kimura considers herself lucky working for a job where her mother is supervisor, allowing her the sweet luxuries such as youtubing up kpop idols and checking them out. "the first song is playbook," she murmurs mostly to herself as she types it out.

werewolf was a new hit by the korean band called exact and from the look of the views from the live filming of their performance, kimura has hope for them after all. such hope that nearly fades the second she realizes none of the lyrics. their faces seem to go by too fast, but her mother catches one in particular that has her humming in admiration.

"who's the one with the braids?" she's practically leaning over kimura and the young girl has to go back so she can make out the person.

"that's dex. he's apparently the overly popular one jenna was drooling over." she deadpans, not thinking twice about the male once the scene ended. that's the weird part about fate, it can be so cruel to show someone their soulmate right before their eyes but also not ring any bells.

the only good part was that his name was known. and for whatever god knows only reason, kimura's mother had surely taken a liking to him on first glance.

"i stand corrected about jenna's taste in music and men. this time, she wasn't wrong about those boys, especially dex. he's a handsome guy."

kimura shrugs, not understanding the hype behind the guy. "the song was nice and they can really dance, but dex...i don't get the hype. it's twelve boys in one group, why was the camera so focused on him?" she wishes she had time to read the comments, thinking they would have given her some form of insight on how the guy was a fan favorite.

"did you see him? he was the best looking one in the group! and he was probably the best dancer too." her mother sounds...different in her opinion. usually she didn't understand any of the millennial obsessions with boy bands and trends. to top it off, she didn't even know what a meme was. but one look at this dex and she had become a mother who approved of the man she brought home.

it's not noticeable enough to deem suspect and investigate dex a little more to see why her mom had liked him. kimura just assumes that perhaps in the near future, she'd get to the bottom of what his charm was but for now? she was perfectly fine with listening to all their songs.

fate can see the red line straining in the distance with each song kimura listens to. she now has a name...and soon, a face.