The Close Strangers

t w e n t y - n i n e

Mark is currently lying on the bed, not on his own bed but on Yerim's bed. It's been two weeks since the day where Minhee and him kind of had a fight.

They are cool now, but the point of conversation that he had with Marcellaㅡ he has not found the answer until now. It's actually bothering him a lot. He wouldn't spend a day without thinking about it even for a minute.

These days, he even found himself lost in his own thoughts.

Mark closes his eyes and he can hear Minhee calling his name a second after that. He doesn't even have a will to get up or answer her call.

"I knew you're here again."

He now can here Minhee's voice coming from where the bedroom door is. She's probably already leaning against the side of the door, crossing her hands while looking at Mark in disbelief.

"They will come in about an hour," Minhee informs, "So, you better leave this room by the time."

"Uh," He replies as he places his right arms on top of his eyes, completely blocking the lights from outside.

"Anyway, I heard Arinnie will come today?" Mark thought Minhee has left, but it turns out, she's still right in there.

He suddenly remembers about the plan he has today. Arin will come to his house, just to spend some time with his family like she usually does. No special occasion is needed to make his girlfriend come into his house.

"She will," Mark responds, "And I have a bad feeling about that."

Around a week ago, Mark and Arin had a fight once again and it's all about Yerim again. On that day, for the first time in forever, Arin asked Mark to choose between Yerim and her.

And at that time, Mark couldn't answer it.

"Haven't you been feeling bad likeㅡ since ages ago?" Minhee asks, speaking out about the truth.

Mark groans loudly as he removes his arm away, so his eyes aren't blocked anymore. He looks up to the ceiling, agreeing to what Minhee said in his heart.

"Mark Lee," Minhee's voice sounds so soft, giving a sign of empathy, "I hope things will get better soon."

"Thanks, Minnie," Mark responds hopelessly.

Mark doesn't know how much time he spends already in Yerim's bedroom. He finally pulls himself to get up and wandering around the bedroom, looking at boxes that are placed all over there.

Those boxes are filled with all of Yerim's stuff that which caused this bedroom to be so empty now. Yerim decided to leave the house by moving her stuff to her new dorm with Hyewon. She called some services to take her stuff from this house to the new dorm, meanwhile, Yerim is still in Germany.

Mark sighs loudly, feeling like he's the most pathetic person on earth. It hurts him so much to realize that nothing would be left, besides the memories that Mark and Yerim had in this room.

The way he used to come in suddenly to disturb Yerim, the way they liked to study together in here, the way he used to wake her up in the morning because she slept too late on the nightㅡ there are too many things to be forgotten.

Everything will be back like before, like the time when Yerim was not here.

Mark is actually wondering why Yerim didn't choose to go home first, packing things up with his family, and then ask Mark to help her moving her things to her new dorm, instead of calling services to do everything while she's still in Germany.

In that way, they didn't have a chance to spend time together anymore.

Mark barely can hear Arin's voice from downstairs, causing him to check the clock on the wall spontaneously.