Work Text:
"Please come again!"
Do Ha smiles from behind his laptop as Sol Hee waves goodbye to a pair of older ladies. The café is slowly emptying as it gets later in the afternoon. From his position at the back of the café, Do Ha can see a pair of girls sitting near the entrance, having a muted conversation, and an older couple who have just ordered their drinks, but otherwise, the tables are empty.
Sol Hee walks by him on her way to the kitchen.
"Can I bring you anything?" she asks.
"No," he says truthfully. "I was planning to head back, and prepare us some dinner."
She smiles and takes his empty glass, placing it on her tray. She had become quite adept at balancing the many dishes. "Alright," she says. "I look forwards to it."
He smiles back. He had taken it upon himself to prepare dinner for them throughout the week, since he was home most often. Neither of them had experienced consistent home cooking, either at home with their parents or by themselves, so he tried to think of something special each day.
He packs his laptop while Sol Hee and Cassandra start cleaning the coffee equipment, having served the last round. Sol Hee drops by again when stands to leave. She presses a quick kiss on his lips.
"Drive safe," she says.
"I will." He reaches into the pocket of his jacket for his car keys, but frowns when he finds it empty. He checks his other pocket, and then those of his trousers, but with no luck.
He takes a deep breath, pushing down a stab of panic. It's fine. The keys must be somewhere in the café. He's sure that he held them in his hand when he entered.
"Sol Hee?" he calls out, glad that his voice is steady. "Have you seen my car keys?"
Sol Hee frowns, tilting her head as she thinks. "No? I don't think so. Cassandra?"
Cassandra also confirms a negative.
Do Ha retraces his steps from the door to his seat, searching beneath the tables and on the counter. His body is tense, and he nearly knocks over one of the chairs. The stares of the remaining costumers trail him as he moves by. He turns his back on them, his heart racing. With clammy hands, he checks his bag and pockets again, but they are still empty.
Sol Hee has helped in the search, but also comes up with nothing.
"Maybe in the back room?" Do Ha suggest. He's grasping at straws. He hasn't been in the back room. But it is hard to think straight.
Sol Hee frowns. "I don't-"
"Can't you check?!"
Do Ha flinches back at his own volume. He swallows, wishing to apologise, but his throat has closed off.
Sol Hee nods mutely. They both slip through the hidden door into the back room, which has been transformed into a storage room and private office.
They both do a quick search, but as expected, the keys aren't in the room either.
"It's alright," Sol Hee says. She approaches him hesitantly. "You can use my car. I'm sure the keys will turn up when we clean, and I'll take your car home."
He nods. That made sense. It was not a big deal. Everything was fine.
"Oh! I've got them!" Sol Hee exclaims.
Relief nearly sends him to his knees.
"Where...?" he gasps.
She is holding her handbag, and from it, she pulls his car keys.
The world screeches to a halt.
"What...?" he croaks. Something cold slips through his veins. The world seems very far away. "Why do you have those?"
She stares up at him, confused, but all he can focus on are the keys in her hand.
"I must have grabbed them thinking they were mine." She frowns. "Do Ha, what is going on?"
She takes a step forward, but he flinches back. Hurt and confusion flash across her face.
"Did you..." Do Ha starts, his stomach roiling. "Did you want to stop me from going?"
As soon as he says it, he knows it is ridiculous. She has helped him search. She is looking forward to having dinner.
She is not Eom Ji.
Why is he reacting like this?
The panic hits like a truck, breaking through his carefully controlled breathing. His heart rate spikes, and adrenaline shoots through him, flaring his senses into high alert. A sob tears from his throat, and then another, and then another, until he is panting through tears, desperate to get in enough air.
Vaguely, he hears Sol Hee call his name, and her hands guiding him into a chair. His legs give way beneath him, and he curls into himself, unable to keep himself upright.
He can't breathe. A whine escapes his throat.
Warm hands push his head down, until it is between his knees.
"Breathe with me! Come on, focus on me."
Sol Hee's voice pierces through the whine in his ears, and he tries to focus on her. Her face is swimming in front of him, and he manages to look at her until another sob wrecks through him.
Fresh tears spill from his eyes and unto the floor.
"You're ok." Sol Hee presses his forehead against her shoulder. Her hands land on the back of his head. He grabs on to her shirt, fingers curling tightly into the fabric.
"That's right. Breathe with me. You're ok."
She keeps repeating the words, breathing in steadily for him. He gasps air in and out, and gradually starts to match her rhythm.
Slowly, the panic ebbs away. His breath deepens. Tears continue to fall, but the tension in his chest lessens, leaving a deep exhaustion behind. His eyes slip close of their own accord. He is swaying in the chair, his body light and heavy at the same time.
"Do Ha?" Sol Hee pulls back from him, and his head jerks up as he looses her support. He blinks. Everything feels very far away.
She is looking at him, gaze searching.
"Do Ha?" she asks again. Belatedly, he realises that he should reply.
"Yeah," he says eloquently. It appears to be enough, because she sighs in relief. She is worried. He reaches up, his arm heavy and sluggish, and strokes her cheek with his thumb.
Her hand closes around his, and she squeezes gently before pulling away.
She stands. "Wait here."
He sits, unable to do much else, until she reappears with a glass of water and a wet napkin. He drinks with her support, but just holds the napkin, his mind refusing to comprehend what he should do with it.
Sol Hee sighs, and then also helps him clean his face. Slowly, true awareness starts to creep back in. He sits straighter up. The lights in the back room don't seem as bright.
Sol Hee is still sitting in a chair next to him. She isn't touching him any more, for which he is both grateful and disappointed.
The past moments repeat sluggishly in his mind. His stomach clenches at the thought of explaining to her what happened. But he should.
"Sol Hee - " he starts, trying to get his thoughts in order. But she interrupts him.
"Let's go home first, alright?"
He looks at her for a moment, trying to read her tone and expression, but he's too tired to interpret them. So he nods, and let's her lead him outside.
----
Cassandra has graciously offered to close up the café while Sol Hee takes Do Ha home, so she waves goodbye and leads him to the car.
Her mind is still trying to wrap around what had happened. While she understood panicking over loosing car keys - she had once lost hers on her way to a client, who had not been amused at her tardiness - his reaction had taken her completely off guard.
The sun outside is warm on her face, and she takes a deep breath, allowing the clean air and warmth to banish some of the weakness that still resided in her limbs.
First things first. Get home. Take a shower. Eat food. Then they could see how the evening would go.
She turns towards the cars, but then stops.
"Do you want to take my car, or yours?" she asks, suddenly unsure.
His eyes flicker back and forth between the two vehicles.
"Mine, please," he says finally. "I'll take you tomorrow."
She nods and slips into the driver's seat of his car while he settles into the passenger's seat. The drive is silent, each of them lost in thoughts. Once in a while, she glances over at him. He's staring listlessly out of the window, his head against the backrest. It feels eerily reminiscent of the time when they drove back from Changeung, and she has to suppress a wave of anxiety.
Things are different now. Back then, she had barely known him. Her attempts to help had been genuine, but not well thought out. And while she still doesn't know what she is doing, she is fairly sure that he won't knock himself out with sleeping pills again. Or disappear for three days.
She picks up dinner on the way, figuring that he won't be in the mood to cook and certainly not feeling up to it herself. They take the elevator up to their apartments in silence. At the doors, she hesitates.
"Why don't you go and take a shower?" she offers. "I'll come over in a bit with food."
He nods, face unreadable aside from the general exhaustion.
She slips into her own apartment and takes a shower herself. As the warm water washes over her, her thoughts start racing again. She had lost her own keys before, and she knew how stressful it could be, especially if you needed to get somewhere quick. But Do Ha had had a true panic attack.
She goes over the day, and vaguely remembers picking up some car keys from the counter somewhere that afternoon and putting them in her back. In hindsight, they must have been his keys instead of her own.
Oddly, his panic attack had truly started when she found his keys. Not when he lost them. And he had said something about wanting to keep him from leaving. Which didn't make sense.
She sighs and turns of the shower. She wouldn't know more unless she talked to him.
When she enters his apartment, she finds him sitting on his couch, knees curled up. There are two cups of tea in front of him, and there is soft, peaceful music playing in the background, which she takes as a good sign.
She quickly prepares the food, and places it on the table for easy picking. Then she settles in next to him.
She takes his hand and squeezes it gently. He squeezes back.
"Hi," she says.
"Hi," he replies.
They eat some, she more than him. The largest hunger stilled, and in a more comfortable head space, she turns back to him.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asks, realising she never checked that with him. "You don't have to, if you don't want to. I'd understand."
"No, I do," he says. "You deserve to know." He winces, but then amends in a soft voice, "I want you to know."
It rings true, so she relaxes, and prepares to listen.
---
Do Ha swallows. The routine of showering and preparing tea had helped clear his head, and it is easier to think. But he hadn't thought about what exactly to tell Sol Hee. Or how to tell her. Or how to begin. His mind flutters around, darting through memories, but never daring to land on one.
"Does it help if I ask you a question?" Sol Hee says, breaking through his thoughts.
He nods, grateful, even as his stomach churns. She tilts her head, thinking for a bit.
"Someone took your keys once to keep you from leaving, right? That is what you said."
He tenses. "Yes." He hesitates. "You know that Eom Ji threatened to kill herself."
He looks away from Sol Hee, unable to keep her gaze.
"She used to..."
His voice wavers, his throat locking up. Flashes of memories cross through his mind, evoking a familiar cocktail of pain, guilt and anger. He presses on.
"She didn't want me to leave. So she took the keys. Hid them."
Bile raises in his throat. It feels wrong, speaking ill of her. She was murdered. Part of him missed her so badly. The other part still feels the anger he had felt that night, done with her constant manipulation.
Sol Hee squeezes his fingers, bringing him back to the present.
"I know you wouldn't do that," he says urgently, the thought suddenly in his mind. "I didn't mean... I wasn't..."
"I know," Sol Hee says, voice calm and sure. "I know you didn't."
They are both quiet for a moment.
"She threw the keys in the sea once," he says after a while. "My mother was so angry, and I had to pay for a replacement myself."
He'd taken the bus home, which had taken him hours longer than planned. His mother had waited up for him, and he had lied to her. Told her it was his fault. She had lectured him for another hour about responsibilities.
Fresh tears well up in his eyes. He is so tired. Tired of feeling guilty. Tired of feeling angry. Tired of mourning a person he loved and hated at the same time.
Sol Hee's arm circle around him, and he presses his face into her shoulder. She rubs his back as he cries, sobs wrecking through his body, until finally the tears subside, and he is just leaning against her, taking comfort in her presence.
"My mother would always ask me for money," Sol Hee says softly. "Or to detect lies for her."
She laughs without humour. "Remember she pretended to be mute? With the cards?"
Do Ha pulls back so he can look at her. "Yes," he says. They hadn't known each other that long. Standing on their balconies after had been their first moment of true connection.
"I always brace myself against it. Knowing that she is like that. And yet it always works."
She reaches up and brushes a tear from his cheek.
"We've had some very manipulative people in our lives, don't we?"
Do Ha chuckles darkly. "Yeah," he mutters.
"Do Ha. I don't want to speak ill of the dead. But what she did to you, that's not normal. Normal girlfriends don't throw away car keys. Or threaten to kill themselves."
"I know," he says.
"You were right to want to stop that. You were right for choosing yourself. No matter what happened."
He stares at her. She says it with such gentle conviction. Part of him reels against it. Wants to blame himself. The other part, hearing her words and the truth of it, feels an immense relief.
Everything that happened with Eom Ji before her death had been overshadowed by the horrible time after. By the guilt and grief.
He leans into Sol Hee again, trying to process her words.
"Do Ha," Sol Hee says after a while. Her voice is less sure than before, so he pulls back again to be able to look at her.
"I think we need help with this." There are tears in her eyes as well. "We can't do this alone. I really didn't know how to help you."
His first instinct is to deny it. He'd had help before, offered by the government as some kind of consolidation. But he knows that she is right.
"Alright," he says hoarsely.
She smiles, relief clear on her face.
They put on a football match, some playoffs for the World Cup tournament. When it is time for bed, she invites Do Ha over to her apartment, and they fall asleep together, both exhausted from the unexpected emotional journey.
The next day, when she comes home from the café, he has prepared Japanese styled ramen, which he presents with a smile.
There would be other moments like the day before, when their pasts catch up with them. But from now on, they could face them together.