“No one is fighting over that fact with you.” I could almost see him rolling his eyes. “Keeping in touch with him won’t change the story or the narrative. He’s a killer. Will always be a killer.”
The truth, they said, hurt. Indeed, Kenzo’s comment was a cold slap to the face. I hated to hear it, but it was the truth.
Or it could be a lie. Maybe he was a runaway spy. And because he didn’t want to come back, they threatened to either hurt his family or he agreed to confess to a heinous crime so all the secrets of the country he had learned would remain sealed off with him behind a prison wall. So dad being a very selfless, family-loving man, sacrificed his life to save his family.
I mean, what if?
“What do you think about soju?” Kenzo asked from the kitchen, breaking into my thoughts.
“You have soju?” My tone brightened at the idea. I would love something to burn through this disgusting thing swirling in my chest.
“Yeah.” His footsteps echoed into the living room as he returned with five bottles of soju and two shot glasses. “Got them yesterday.”
He sank to the floor next to me, his back to the couch. He pushed two bottles and a shot glass towards me, then reached for the bowl and grabbed another drumstick.
“So…” He stretched his hand for the remote control next to my laptop on the table. “Asian or Western?”
“Asian,” I replied, pouring soju into the shot glass.
“What to watch, what to watch, what to watch…” he said in a sing-song, hushed voice, as one hand flipped through drama channels while the other held his drumstick firmly to his mouth.
“This sounds like Cinderella.” He glanced at me, needing confirmation.
“Rich man, poor woman?” I read out the name on the screen, my face squeezed from the burning sensation of the spirit going down my throat. “Sounds cliche. Let’s watch it.”
“Okay,” he cheered, selecting the series. He pressed a remote he nabbed from the couch and the lights in the room suddenly dimmed.
The theme song of the series kicked in, the characters introduced through comic-style animation as they floated around the screen.
For the first few seconds, there was nothing but silence except for the faint, hollow sound of me gulping down my third shot of soju.
“I’ve been meaning to ask.” He broke the silence, his voice clear of teasing.
My gaze shifted reluctantly from the screen, a piece of drumstick frozen between my lips.
He wasn’t looking at me, but his words hit with precision.
I pulled the chicken from my mouth, a slow, deliberate motion. “Ask what?”
“What’s really up with that dude you’ve been talking to?” His tone was casual, uninterested, but I knew better. He didn’t even bother saying his name. Because he didn’t really know it. Because he never cared enough to ask.
At the thought of Callan though, heat spread across my cheeks again. The mere mention of him dragged him into the room like a ghost, his presence flooding, painting over reality in a shade of him, his eyes, his voice.
I hadn’t heard from him since, well, yesterday, when he abandoned me at the movie theatre.
I had suggested a movie date. And for four days straight, he always found a way to turn me down after promising to show up. Yesterday, he missed it again but luckily, the movie was being aired twice. So he came for the second one.
Everything was going okay until I suddenly noticed how uneasy he became. My head was rested on his shoulder but I could hear the echo of his pounding heart. I thought it was another panic attack, the type he had at the bookstore that day and abandoned me. I grew worried.
I asked if he was okay and he said yes. But then he suddenly excused himself, said he needed to use the restroom. And that was it. Nearly fifteen minutes and he didn’t return. I went searching all over for him. And the spot where his car was parked was empty.
Then a flurry of texts entered my phone. The wordings, the punctuation, and the gaps were all wrong. It felt like a text message from a drunken person.
‘I haze to leave’
‘Urgent’
‘I’m sorry’
