Road Trip

Chapter 3

Hyewon drummed her fingers on her expensive mahogany desk, staring at her phone while chewing on her bottom lip. She inched her hand towards the device but retracted as soon as her fingertip touched the edge, leaning back on her seat as she let out a huge sigh.

Being back in the big city brought an unexplainable uneasiness to her. She felt fidgety and restless with no apparent reason, and everything started when she left the Han Estate.

“Just call her,” she told herself, finally snatching the phone from her desk.

Scrolling down her contacts, she paused on Jihan's name before hitting the call button with her eyes closed.

Before they parted, she asked for Jihan's number, deeming that it was only fair since the latter already had her business card, but this was the first time she was going to contact her since they last talked and seen each other two days ago.

With a shaky breath, she pressed the earpiece on her ear and waited for the ring, only to be met by a recorded voice.

‘Sorry, the number you have dialled is currently unavailable.’

She frowned. “Right. Unavailable.”

 ——

Hyewon's laugh reverberated in the empty veranda, her weird chortles sailing through the air, making the other girl beside her chuckle as well.

“Why are you laughing?”

She still couldn’t believe it. Even though Jihan was already standing beside her, mirroring her position, she still thought everything was a joke.

It was too good to be true. The coincidence was so farfetched and crazy and just downright creepy that Hyewon couldn’t help but laugh raucously.

“Don’t you find this funny?” She tried to say in between her laughter. “Cause I do. I really do.”

Hyewon felt like she just saw a galaxy exploding into a million stars, because that’s how Jihan looked like when she snapped from her stupor at the sight of her, almost seeing the gears in her head spinning in catastrophic speeds.

The frown flipped and the furrowed eyebrows rose as the other girl finally connected the dots, and even Madam Lee couldn’t handle the building tension, silently leaving the two of them alone in the living room along with the bodyguards.

Still, that happened hours ago, but Hyewon was still feeling a little surreal until now.

“I’d like to think it’s fate.”

That stopped her from laughing.

Jihan's voice sounded shy but when she turned to her, she had the biggest grin on her face.

“I don’t really believe in fate,” Hyewon said and the frown that instantly appeared on Jihan's face almost made her burst out into another fit of laughter, “But that’s a lovely way to put it.”

It didn’t take long for the silence to dawn upon them, especially when no one wanted to speak up after that. Hyewon found it funny, though, because after sleeping together for a night, she didn’t think they’d still be shy towards each other.

“So… What now?” She asked, trying to ease out of the awkward air.

“I honestly don’t know…”

“Don’t you think we’re moving too fast, though?”

“What do you mean?”