A firm advocate of keeping separate personas for work and home, Yeseul is both the successful associate editor of Han Weekly and the frazzled owner of a highly strung cat. When a younger man moves in next door to her crammed-neighborhood villa then...
"Even if it is a little bit of warmth, give it to me so that I can treasure it. I am already frozen and endlessly cold."
NELL < Stay >
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With heavy footsteps, Yeseul marches her way uphill, dizzy with the sun glaring above her head.
Outside her apartment building, she takes a moment to collect her breath, silently cursing her absent-mindedness. The late night alcohol in her system has been getting in the way of her usually systematic thought process in the morning.
Stepping into the ground floor of the tiny lobby, a familiar, raspy voice echoes from above the stairway.
Yeseul freezes in her Ted Baker embroidered pumps.
"As for the washer, there's a laundry right across the street. To get a ten percent discount for every visit, you just need to leave a good review for our agency on the app."
Of all the days to leave her thumb drive behind, it has to be a day where granny landlady is visiting, presumably with a new tenant. Granted, it is weirdly comforting to find the new tenant non-immune to granny landlady's unchanging tactics, her clouded mind darts to the date of the month. She flinches when she realizes she's two days late on her rent.
The lines between her brows wrinkle in nuisance.
Not wanting to cause a scene, Yeseul backpedals in stifling silence. Stepping out into broad daylight, she assesses her options urgently. A narrow space on the right side of the building, housing nothing more than a sturdy lamp post, calls out to her. Taking advantage of the shadowless noon, she keeps out of sight with her back against it, wiggling her concealed toes anxiously.
As beads of sweat begin to form along her temples, approaching footsteps become increasingly loud and clear. She holds her breath, waiting impatiently for granny landlady and her client to take their leave.
"Shall I carry you on my back, haelmoni?"
A male with a light, slightly nasal speaking voice brings up the question, smoothly, out of nowhere. It makes the elder laugh, while the crossed-arm woman behind the lamp post lets out a condescending sneer.
"If it's not too troublesome... Aigoo!"
Yeseul imagines the landlady grinning like a Cheshire cat as the younger man piggybacks her, down the hill, back to her office. But most of all, she imagines the fraudulent smile of the younger man who is doing everything in his power to win the landlady's heart and concession.
She rolls her eyes in part disgust, part disapproval.
When the street returns to quietness and tranquility, Yeseul comes out of hiding, pacing herself as she climbs up the stairway. Her pumps clicks and clacks confidently against the cement of the cold floor, until she comes face to face with the door of her unit.
