Pop-Up Store 정호석

Chapter 26

Healing Her Wounds

Everyone stood there, watching the scene unfold. However, soon, everyone left and went back to what they were doing. Except Hoseok. He stood in a corner, watching Gayoung sitting on the ground with her elbow bleeding.  She wiped her tears away as she sat there, broken and weak.
She picked up the bracelet and squeezed it while sobbing and held it close to her chest. Hoseok's heart shattered into pieces as he watched her sob quietly in agony. However, as he hesitated on whether to help her, his eyes caught sight of her bleeding and scraped elbow. Without a shadow of doubt, he walked up to her.

"Here,"

He muttered, grabbing a plaster from his pocket and handing it to Gayoung who had her head down. Gayoung caught a glance of his canary sneakers and knew who it was. She looked up at him with tear-filled eyes that were red and swollen. Hoseok swallowed the lump in his throat as Gayoung slowly yet delicately grabbed the plaster off his hand.

"Give me a second,"

He muttered, sprinting off to the cashier counter and grabbing a box. He ran back and Gayoung realised that in his hand was a first aid box. He grabbed onto her arm, causing her to flinch and pull away. Looking into her eyes, he comforted,

"Let's go to the bench outside, okay?"

She nodded as he led her to the bench outside. Then, he placed the first aid box on the ground and grabbed out a bottle of disinfectant, cotton balls and tweezers. He had one knee up and one knee down as he grabbed her arm delicately, grabbing onto the cotton ball dipped in disinfectant with tweezers.
He delicately cleaned her wound as she winced. As his eyes were fixed and focused on cleaning her wound, Gayoung stared at him. She felt her heart flip as her nose stung. Somehow, she did not want to leave him. She wanted this moment to last. 

No matter how scared she was, she wanted to be with him.

Soon, Hoseok was done and he discarded the cotton balls and put back everything else. Then, he sat beside her on the bench. He turned his head to stare at her and asked softly,

"I'm not sure why you were mad at me but I care for you."

Hoseok stared into her hazel eyes, his umber ones sparkling. She felt herself being drawn to him.

"I would like to know what happened. I want to help,"

He muttered, as he stared at her. Gayoung's eyes started welling up in tears.

"Why?"

She asked, her voice cracked, quivering and broken, just like her. Her tears rolled down her cheeks as they both stared at each other. Hoseok, smiling softly as he raised his hand up and wiped her tears with his thumb.

"Because ever since I saw you, you stood out to me. You're special,"

He paused for a second, staring down at his feet before looking up at her again.

"Just like pop-up stores, I want to make your pain temporary,"