emotions | love alarm

32 ~

Chapter Thirty-Two

Ae-ri sighs as she sits on the edge of her bed and huffs before tugging on her shoes. It was finally the evening of the banquet and she was more than excited to 1) spend some time socializing with her family and colleagues and 2) get it over with. It was always a good time; hopefully, this year wouldn't be too different, but she would be lying if she said she didn't want it to be done already.

Her mom and dad had already left for the venue and thought that leaving her with In-ho as her escort would somehow manage to dissipate the growing space between the two but Ae-ri knew better than to expect anything from him besides coldness.

She sends Sun-oh a quick text informing him she is about to be on her way, gathers her things, and adds some final touches before leaving her room and heading downstairs where In-ho is patiently waiting scrolling on his phone.

In-ho looks up at the sound of Ae-ri coming down the steps and it takes everything within him to slow down his heartbeat and not make his attraction blatant. His body yearned for her in a way he didn't know was possible and yet she wanted absolutely nothing to do with him.

Sure, he had a good chunk of the responsibility in their no-contact order after he called her a bitch but he didn't know how else to define his emotions and/or her blatant disregard for them. He wanted nothing more than to love her despite his prior intentions and the thought that it could never happen was slowly consuming him for the worst.

He was hurting and she could not have cared any less.

His eyes slip over her gently as he gets up to meet her where she stood at the base of the stairs and he feels his body warm at the curves of her body. She watches him carefully, cautious and calculated in all of her mannerisms that he had grown accustomed to. He bows his head gently in greeting, "You look lovely, Ae-ri."

Ae-ri stills for a moment and their eyes meet, a silent transaction for words that felt a lot like:

Pft. Okay.

I'm being honest.

To a bitch?

"Thank you," she offers him and motions her arm to the door, "Shall we get going?"

***

The drive was as awkward as she had pictured it would be and she was running out of things to look at outside the window. He had been very tense and incredibly still since they had mounted the car and she could only imagine the thoughts running through his head.

They hadn't had a real conversation in weeks and although it hurt a bit to lose someone she used to call a friend in such a drastic manner, she would be damned before she lost her self-respect and folded just to fix it. She had tried and been insulted. If he wanted to fix it, he would have to do it himse-

"Ae-ri, I'm sorry."

Oh.

She doesn't remove her gaze from the window but huffs quietly and replies, "For?"

"For calling you a bitch unprovoked. It was violently immature and you didn't deserve that from me. You were trying to fix things and I was just hurt."

"I accept your apology."

"Do you forgive me?"

"I don't know."

A few beats of silence pass through them, "Okay."

She could feel his anxiety spreading through the air like a nonconsensual hug, "Don't sweat it. I'm sure we will be fine, okay? I think we just need some time before things go back to usual."