Brazen Love [Chapter 12]

 

Chapter 12:

When they reached Hwang Bo’s place, she sat in the car, not moving. She didn’t want to go inside just yet. Hyun Joong looked over. “Shouldn’t you hurry and go put some ice on your ankle?” He needed to get away from her. He could feel himself falling back into her world, and that’s something he couldn’t allow to happen.

Hwang Bo glared at him through narrowed eyes then indicated her ankle which was about three times the size it normally was or was supposed to be. “How do you expect me to get up two flights of stairs with my ankle like this.” Hyun Joong tossed his head in frustration. “Take the elevator,” he nearly growled. Hwang Bo felt her anger rise, she didn’t even know why she was angry, but his tone of voice and the pain throbbing through her leg wasn’t really helping her temper. “Don’t you think I thought of that? It’s been out of order for two days now and the technician won’t come for another week because of some grudge he has against the building owner. Whatever that problem is, it apparently goes for the rest of the technicians in the area. So you’re either going to have to help me up those stairs, or I’m going to have to sit in your car all night!”

Hyun Joong sighed, and then threw his door open. He walked over to her side and opened the door. Hwang Bo hurriedly unhooked her seatbelt, feeling excitement at the prospect of being carried in his arms again. Hyun Joong sighed again and lifted her from the car, making sure to be careful of her head and ankle. Hwang Bo knew Hyun Joong was irritated again about something so she marveled at how gentle his touch was. She laughed. “You keep sighing,” she said. He sighed again at her statement, causing Hwang Bo to laugh again. He almost smiled too seeing as the sigh had been involuntary, but he quickly caught himself.

He still took care to take each step as gently as possible and watch her ankle as they came close to a rail. Hwang Bo smiled to herself each time he had to pull her in tighter to go around a bend in the stair case. She nearly let out a sigh that would have shamed all of Hyun Joong’s when they reached her door, she didn’t feel like being put down yet. Hwang Bo took longer than necessary searching for the keys in her purse which she had balanced on her stomach after Hyun Joong had swooped her up. When she had unmistakenly ran her hand into her keys about three times, she quickly pulled them out of her purse when Hyun Joong threatened to drop her. She sent a sly smile up at him and unlocked her door. He quickly deposited her on the couch and turned to leave. Hwang Bo stared after him. “How am I supposed to get from here to somewhere else?” Hyun Joong spun around. “Hop!” Hwang Bo jerked back at his tone, accidently bumping her ankle against the corner of the couch. Hyun Joong hurried over. “Did you hurt yourself again? You should take off this shoe before you can’t get your foot out.” He started untying the laces even as he spoke, being as careful as he could.

Hwang Bo smiled down at him as he gently took her shoe off. His face scrunched in worry when he saw the bare ankle. It was swollen and a bit bruised. Hwang Bo saw his look of worry. “Can you at least fix me an ice pack before you leave?” she asked.

Hyun Joong didn’t even hesitate. He searched the kitchen for something to put the ice in, but only found the large towel Hwang Bo used to dry her dishes. He knew that the ice would melt and leak through eventually, but he figured it would be good enough to take the pain away for a while so she could do more stuff for herself. He emptied a tray of ice into the towel then hurried back to Hwang Bo. He took her ankle gently in his grasp and held the ice pack to it. He heard another sigh of pain escape Hwang Bo. He glared at the ice pack. “Why isn’t this thing working?” Hwang Bo laughed. “It just hurt a bit because it started getting cold. I’m sure the pain will go away in a bit.” Hyun Joong smiled up at her in relief, then realized what he was doing. Here he was kneeling in front of the woman who had broken his heart barely three nights ago and smiling back up at her like a dog who had forgiven their master for swatting them with a stick just because they gave them a pork chop. He cleared his throat and got to his feet. He handed the makeshift ice pack to a startled Hwang Bo and scratched the back of his hand. “I’m sure that once your ankle gets numb and you rest it a bit, it’ll be better. I should get going. I have a schedule in a few minutes.”

“Oh,” Hwang Bo said, disappointed. “You can’t come back later?” Hyun Joong was already shaking his head before she finished the question. “You’ll do fine without me,” he said. “Just keep the ice pack on there, and try to stay off of it as much as you can.” He started to walk quickly towards the door.

Hwang Bo gritted her teeth, then just before his hand touched the doorknob, she called out to his back. “What about that promise you made me? You said you would come when I call, stay when I asked you to. What happened to that promise?” She looked up just in time to see him stalking back toward her, a ferocity in his eyes she had never known the mild-mannered youth could exhibit.

Hyun Joong felt a rush of anger at her words. She dared to mention that? What about the promise she made him when she had finally agreed to be his girlfriend!? She never kept her promises...making him hope and then crushing that foolish hope right in front of his eyes. Before he knew it, he was looming over her. Hwang Bo was looking up at him with wide eyes. There was a lot that he wanted to say, but he was so angry that his mouth couldn’t form words properly. He finally found words to speak. “Why don’t you get your next date to make that promise with you?” He turned back on his heel and went back toward the door. He needed to leave because not only was he afraid of falling back into her web, but he was also afraid of hurting her again. As he had looked down at her, he had felt like shaking her until her teeth rattled.

Hwang Bo watched his stiff gait as he stormed out of the door and slammed it hard behind him. She was so frightened that she couldn’t even feel her ankle right now. She pressed a hand to her forehead. ‘Why did I have to say that? Things were going okay until I said that. Now..’ she sighed and leaned into the couch, cradling her ankle between both of her hands. She blinked back threatening tears and whispered into the silence, “I just wanted you to stay with me a little longer.”

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After Hyun Joong finished his work and made it back to his dorm, he realized that he should have taken the other members up on their offer to treat him to something to drink because now, here by himself, he could only think of Hwang Bo and wonder if her ankle was a little better and if she had been able to get up and around well. He wasn’t going to call her though. He planned to distance himself from her for a while.

Hyun Joong walked around the empty dorm. His eyes would roam time and again to the phone he had left out on the table. “I’m not going to call her,” he told himself the fifteenth time his eyes strayed to the phone. “I’m not going to-” his phone suddenly rang.

He hurried over to the table and looked to see who was calling. He was surprised when he saw that it was really Hwang Bo. He let the phone ring two more times so that she wouldn’t think he was anticipating her call. He picked it up on the fourth ring. “Hello?” he answered, his voice studiously bored. “Yah!” Hwang Bo yelled from the other side, startling him. She had thought about it for the last few hours and she had grown angrier by the minute. Why was he suddenly acting like this!? Wasn’t he the one that said they should start over? He hadn’t been very friendly with her recently, in fact, he had been pretty hostile. And when she had gotten up to get another ice pack and ran her ankle into a table leg, her anger had exploded and she had found herself calling his number. “It’s your fault that my ankle is like this! Shouldn’t you be responsible and take care of it?!”

Hyun Joong shot down a growing smile at her irritation. “How is it my fault that,” he let anger and the need to retort stop clouding his memory of the soccer game. “Even if it’s my fault...sort of... it’s not my job to take care of you. Why didn’t you just go home to your Mother? Then you wouldn’t have this problem.”

“And tell her how my “boyfriend” threw me down and injured me? She’d probably set me up with another marriage meeting before I could blink!” She paused. When she didn’t hear a response from the other side, she changed tactics. “I need groceries. I don’t have anything I want to eat here. And I can’t go with this ankle.”

“Order take-out!!” He shouted into the receiver.

Hwang Bo blinked, startled. He had never talked back to her like this. He used to come running for the smallest thing whenever she called. “Or get that guy with the wavy hair to do it!” she heard from the receiver. She let out a small scream of frustration. “Whatever! Hang up!” she yelled, hanging up the phone before he could say anything else.

Hyun Joong stared at his cell phone blinking. “What was that all about? Why did she even call me in the first place?”

His phone rang again after a few minutes. Hwang Bo lay on the floor of her apartment with the phone to her ear, the newly made ice pack laying on top of her ankle while the coolness of the floor comforted the other side. “Hyun Joong,” she said softly. “I miss you.”

Hyun Joong blinked to make sure that it was indeed Hwang Bo’s number that had dialed him. He sat quiet, stunned as he listened to the soft breathing on the other end of the line. *I miss you. I just wanted you to stay with me for a little while, that’s the only reason I brought up the promise.* Hyun Joong didn’t know what to say. Was she jerking him around again like always? Upsetting him, then making him forgive her in less than a minute? Did she think that would still work on him? Hyun Joong opened his mouth to speak, but Hwang Bo spoke again. *Can you come back over? For just a little while? I promise I won’t bring up anything that’ll make you upset, I won’t even talk. I promise. Just come and sit for a while.* Hyun Joong felt tempted, very tempted. “What would we do? Stare at each other?” He listened to Hwang Bo’s quiet laughter on the other end of the phone and felt the corners of his mouth lifting in response. *I don’t see why not. I feel like I haven’t gotten a good look at you in forever.* He heard Hwang Bo take in a sharp breath and exhale it. *I’m - sorry... about bringing up the promise a little while ago.* ‘Does she think that’s what I’m upset about?’ Hyun Joong wondered. “That wasn’t what I was upset about.” He could practically hear Hwang Bo’s smile. *Since you’re not upset, come over. I’ll order us both something good to eat, I promise.* Hyun Joong scowled at the phone... ‘Promise? Does she know the meaning of the word?’ He thought about the time almost a month back when she had told him she was going to make him something, had given him take out, and then had practically thrown him out of the apartment when he tried to get intimate with her. “I don’t think so,” he murmured. “I don’t think I can do that.”

Hwang Bo’s growing smile disappeared again. “What? Well...when do you think you can come over again? Tomorrow?” Hyun Joong sighed. “I’m going to be pretty busy for the next few days...And I think it’s best if we don’t see each other for a while anyway...” Hwang Bo’s breath shortened. ‘What!?’ she thought. ‘Even if only part of him, it felt as if she had just gotten him back and some semblance of her life had been put back together. Now it felt as if he was breaking up with her again.’ “What are you upset about?” she asked. When Hyun Joong didn’t answer, she asked again. “You said you weren’t upset about the promise so what is it? I don’t understand. It feels like this is coming out of nowhere.” Hyun Joong’s brows drew inward. The fact that she didn’t know why he was upset made him even more angry. “Nothing,” he said. “I’m not upset about anything.” Hwang Bo sighed. “Then come over!” Hyun Joong blinked and shook his head. She wasn’t listening to anything he was saying. He sighed. “Make me a five-star dinner and then maybe I’ll come over,” he said, believing that this would get her off of his back. If she couldn’t make him dinner when she was fully well, she definitely wouldn’t make it with a hurt ankle. “Huh?” she asked. “Yeah,” he continued. “But you have to prove to me that it’s not take out. I don’t trust you since that last incident.”

Hwang Bo frowned then smiled again. *Just come over and watch me make it for you, there’s no other way to prove to you that I made it myself.* Hyun Joong grimaced. He had practically sat himself up for that. He looked at the clock; 11:12pm. “Fine, I’ll be over there in about an hour. You better have started chopping the vegetables by the time I get there, and if even one ingredient tastes suspicious, don’t expect me to stick around.” He hung up the phone before she could answer. He pounded a closed fist against the side of his head. 'Am I being pulled back again? Why did I agree to come over? At least I didn’t go the instant she called, I guess that’s an improvement,’ he scolded himself sarcastically. Hwang Bo rolled around on the floor happily until she knocked her ankle against a table leg. Then she grappled herself to her feet, she only had one hour to find a way to get the ingredients she would need and be back in time to let him in so he could watch her cook for him. She glared at her ankle, then picked up her purse and made her way to the door. If she was going to get all of that stuff ready before Hyun Joong got there, and with her ankle like it was, she needed to get started immediately.

She rushed to a few neighbors doors to gather some ingredients and then rushed back. She only had time to lay the ingredients out before the doorbell rang. She rushed to the door as fast as she could with her injury. She smiled when Hyun Joong walked through the door and indicated the counter to show that she had already gotten the ingredients ready. “The vegetables aren’t chopped,” he said. “Strike one.”

Hwang Bo’s smile faded, but she hurried to pull a stool for him up to the counter. He didn’t even help her as she struggled to keep her balance while bringing over the heavy object. She turned back to her endeavors with the vegetables, chopping and slicing them while painfully keeping her balance on one leg. Hyun Joong took pity on her and offered her the stool to sit on while she prepared the ingredients, then he just stood silently beside her while she continued to make his meal. Hwang Bo hummed softly to herself even though she was in slight pain moving around the kitchen preparing the dishes and making sure the pots didn’t heat too much; she was just happy that Hyun Joong had finally come and was staying. She had made sure the meal was particularly complicated so that he could stay as long as possible, already an hour and a half had passed. Hyun Joong watched Hwang Bo smiling through her pain while she prepared his meal. He wanted to reach out and touch her...hug her, but with all of the complicated feelings running through him, and the way he knew she felt about him, that was impossible. With the meal finally finished, they sat quietly across from each other at her small table, not speaking.

Hwang Bo watched Hyun Joong expectantly, waiting for him to taste it. Hyun Joong looked at the food, not really wanting to touch it. Instead, he felt like saving it forever, but that was impossible. Since seeing how much effort she had put into it, it seemed more like a treasure than anything. Sure, she had cooked simple things for him before, but never something like this. “Well?” Hwang Bo asked. Hyun Joong broke out of his thoughts, and picked up his fork. But before he touched it, he looked up at Hwang Bo. “Can you bring me some water from the refrigerator?” he asked. As Hwang Bo limped toward the refrigerator, Hyun Joong took out his cell phone and snapped a quick photo of the meal.

He also took a quick photo of Hwang Bo’s back as she leaned into the refrigerator to bring him a water, just so that he could remember the night more properly. He smiled as he accepted the water from Hwang Bo, then brought a sthingyful of the food to his mouth. It was delicious, maybe more so since she had cooked it for him while she was injured. He pulled out his phone to look at the picture again. Hwang Bo sighed in frustration, her own food barely touched in front of her, the pain in her ankle had taken away her appetite, the only reason she had cooked the meal in the first place was so she could be with Hyun Joong, now here he was taking time out of eating to check the time. Hyun Joong looked up quickly when he heard her sigh and put away his phone. She was now glaring at him with her arms folded across her chest. Hyun Joong let out a low laugh then stood up and came across the table to her. He planted a light kiss on her cheek. “Thank you for the food, but if I stay any longer, you’ll have to cook me breakfast too.” Hwang Bo touched her cheek and said without turning around. “Then stay. It’s not like you have time to sleep even if you go back, you might as well finish eating. And I will cook you something if you’re still here when I wake up.” Hyun Joong walked back to the table and sat down in front of his food again. “I guess I should finish eating, but I make no promises about the rest.”

Hwang Bo absentmindedly brushed her cheek with her fingers again, where he had kissed her. Hyun Joong noticed it. He was aware that he had probably offended some of her personal boundaries, but he couldn’t resist. He ate another sthingyful of the food. “Why aren’t you eating?” he asked. “My mouth tastes like iron,” Hwang Bo joked, laughing as she spoke. “That’s not a good thing, is it?”

Hyun Joong’s forehead wrinkled in concern. “Does your mouth really taste strange? Is that why you’re not eating.” Hwang Bo nodded. Hyun Joong laid down his fork. “Are you sure you shouldn’t see a doctor?” Hwang Bo nodded again. “It’s just the pain in my ankle. I took medicine for it, but I think the medicine made my mouth taste like metal, and really didn’t do too much for the pain in my ankle.” Hyun Joong sighed, feeling a bit bad about each tasty bit of food that had gone into his mouth. “You should probably sleep off the pain or something. How about I stay with you until you fall asleep and call your mother over to take care of you. I can do that as a concerned ‘boyfriend.’” He suggested. Hwang Bo smiled and accepted the idea. “I’ll just change into my pajamas while you call my mom. I should have listened to you earlier and just took a taxi to my Omma’s.” Hyun Joong laughed and walked across the table to pat Hwang Bo on the head. “I guess you’ve learned to listen to me, now?” Hwang Bo ducked away from his hand and tried to hop to her feet, she ended up falling forward into him. He wrapped his arms around her as they crashed to the floor.

Hwang Bo groaned against his chest as a fresh pain shot through her ankle at the impact. “Are you okay?” Hyun Joong asked. “You should be more careful or your ankle’s never going to heal.” He was mostly just talking because he didn’t want to let her go. He still lay with his arms around her. Hwang Bo felt the same. She just lay with her head resting against his chest. “I was just startled. Don’t pat me on the head.” ‘It’s what you do to Amber,’ she thought. “You can get up now,” Hyun Joong said, though he still held her. “No, I can’t,” Hwang Bo replied. “My ankle hurts too much. You have to carry me to my bedroom.” It was true. Her ankle was throbbing and she was drained of so much energy from cooking.

Hyun Joong looked down at the top of her head and from what he could see of her forehead, she had gone pale and had broken into a light sweat from the pain. He stood carefully and lifted her up into his arms. He walked her into her bedroom, then laid her gently on her bed. He propped up a few pillows behind her. He went down to her feet and pulled the sock away from her ankle so that he could look at it himself. It was a giant purple and red mass. He turned shocked eyes to her. “This looks really bad. The minute your mother gets here, I’m telling her to take you to the hospital.” He pulled out his phone, and after he had managed to drag Hwang Bo’s mother’s number from a reluctant Hwang Bo, he placed the call. Her mother sounded sleepy and a little angry when she answered the phone, but when she heard Hwang Bo was hurt, she said she would come over right away, so would be there in about an hour. He told Hwang Bo the news then suggested he would go and wait for her mother out in the living room. Hwang Bo grabbed his hand as he started away. “Can’t you just stay in here with me? It’s going to take my mom forever to get here.”