Sanctuary

Eleven. (Hiding My Heart)

I wish I could lay down beside you when the day is done
And wake up to your face against the morning sun
But like everything I've ever known, you disappear one day
So I spend my whole life hiding my heart away

Spring melts into summer and her anger mellows into muted despair.

It happens gradually, sometime between Seoul's blooming pink cherry blossoms and muggy summer rain. Sorrow drapes itself around her like a cloak, engulfing her like a familiar friend, and it almost makes her miss the anger. There was something fearless about the anger, a sense of recklessness that made her feel superhuman. When being in her suite at the Victoria Jungfrau made her body ache – the place that was beginning to feel like home suddenly becoming a prison –she fled the Interlaken like a wounded bird, escaping the air because it smelled like him. She powered through the closing ceremony of the program and raced to the airport, flying to Seoul on a private jet that cost way too much but was worth every penny.

Those first few weeks back, the rage sent her paragliding on windy days, in the same spot where a tornado had twisted her away years ago. When three times didn't do the trick, she drove to Ansan and went on a tandem skydive, but the adrenaline still did little to scratch at the numbness inside her. Every day for weeks, she skipped breakfast and had too much coffee as if he could see her and disapprove, as if she could spite him by doing all the things she knows worry him.

Instead, her mother worried, and so did Manager Hong, who babbled nervously at her before every one of her paragliding sessions. The wind is too strong. I don't think I could handle another disappearance, Ms. Yoon. Please don't go. What if you end up lost again. He didn't know how much she wished that would happen, so she just smiled at him and reassured him. And then she took flight. She always came back to solid ground just where she expected. Nothing sent her hurtling back into Ri Jeong-hyeok's world, where she could find him, give him a piece of her mind, and kiss him senseless.

That was the anger. After it came the revelation, and the revelation brought the despair. Umma now says an unforgiving sadness lives in her eyes, and Manager Hong has started treating her like she's seconds away from a breakdown. She feeds them both half-lies and offers unconvincing smiles. It keeps them off her case, and July doesn't remind her of him. Little does anymore, besides Park Min-ji and the revelation. The former Se-ri sees once a week, and last week she started a new hard-earned job as a kitchen aid at one of the best Italian restaurants in town. It turns out Min-ji is a chef in the making with a passion for pasta. The latter lives inside her, and she's never quite without awareness of its presence.

"Ah Se-ri-ya, I'm sorry to keep you waiting. This interior designer remodeling our bedroom is driving me insane!" Umma huffs as she strides into the living room on a pair of burgundy stubbed-heel Ferragamo shoes.

Shaken out of her thoughts, Se-ri comes to her feet and warmly embraces the older woman, who presses a motherly kiss to her cheek. "I don't mind waiting," she says honestly, held in place by her mother's hands gripping her elbows. Her dark gaze studies Se-ri's face, and if the frown that mars her features is any indication, she doesn't like what she finds there.

"How have you been?" she asks and reluctantly lets her go. There's a brief lull as Se-ri ponders the question and they settle side-by-side on the four-seat sofa in her parents' mansion on the hill. Everything is so beautiful and well put-together in the vast living room. Despite how close she has grown to her mother, these walls still feel cold and forbidding. Her parents never loved each other, and it left her and her brothers with few pleasant childhood memories. There were no displays of affection growing up, no love to aspire to. Funny how you turned out to be such a hopeless romantic, she muses to herself.