CH 160

After the short outburst, he read her texts again. He read them over and over again. But she never told him where she was, when she would return, or why she was doing this to him.

And then he received another text from her. “I was mentally craving for people, warmth, and their chatter. I was able to satisfy it all through you. What are the needs in your life?”

Muyeol automatically frowned. He immediately called her, but she didn’t pick up. Yiyoung had planned this; she didn’t pick up the phone no matter how many times he called.

Muyeol’s hands trembled as he texted her, “Where are you? Come home immediately!”

Yiyoung didn’t reply. He texted and called her several times, but she gave no response.

Muyeol slammed the table with his fist, biting his lip so hard that it started to bleed. Never having felt such uncontrollable emotions, he was hit with dizziness, but he put his staggering self down on the seat.

It was like a nightmare. He’d never had a nightmare so immensely terrible before.

Out of anger, Muyeol grabbed his phone and texted, “Do whatever you want. Whether you come back or not, it’s up to you.”

“Don’t hide. Don’t doubt. Everything is as you think. I trust you,” Yiyoung finally replied.

But his phone fell completely silent after that.

* * *

A few days later, Muyeol returned to his house at midnight and closed the door after him, the sound of door slamming shut echoed louder than usual. Muyeol stumbled and leaned against the door, exhausted and on the verge of passing out.

He had a high fever along with a headache which was only getting worse, and there was only a day left until the stockholders’s meeting. He’d endured it with the help of an ice bag, but knew that nothing would cure his fever.

Because the cause of his fever was not by his side.

Nonetheless, his face remained stoic. He’d thought that he wouldn’t ever be normal again without her, but he’d been doing okay so far. Perhaps he would be fine like this from now on; he would continue to live just as he’d done before she entered his life again. Muyeol thought he was more trained than he had assumed, considering how he was still alive without Yiyoung next to him.

He’d been alone anyway. His inner peace was shattered now, but Muyeol reassured himself by telling himself that it would become alright eventually. He would go back to being normal, and he would live well, like nothing ever happened to him.

‘Everything will be alright as time passes by,’ he thought.

Muyeol had told Yiyoung to just… stay with him until she needed to leave, perhaps knowing ahead of time that a day like this would come.

“Darn it,” he cursed, “What’s the point of seeing the future?”

Muyeol was sick and tired. Every time he opened his eyes in the morning, it was like waking up to a living hell.

He drew himself up and walked inside. The moment he entered the living room, he undid his necktie, and just stood… The room was empty. He threw the necktie on the floor and headed toward the bedroom on the east side, the room which used to belong to Yiyoung.

He flicked on the light and looked inside. It was too quiet, to the point that it seemed almost eerie. As if shedding his skin, Muyeol took off his suit jacket and threw it on the floor as he made his way to the bathroom. He recalled how she’d fallen asleep in the bathtub once. He looked inside. Just in case. But she wasn’t there.

His steps became wider as he went to the second floor, and again, only silence greeted him.

He headed downstairs once again, moving to the bedroom on the west side while unbuttoning his shirt. But he stepped, his pace slowed down. As he opened the door, he hoped she would be in there. He turned on the light and quickly looked around, but she wasn’t there. Yiyoung never came back. She wasn’t here with him. Yiyoung was somewhere else, not with him.