Page 137 of You Had Me At Annyeong!
‘Relax, your phone and bag are both fine. Safe with Alice.’
‘How do you know? How do you know Alice? Wait, what have I missed? Ah, of course. You knew I’d be there. At the pub. You knew everything. And they did, too. You plotted this with those two. Traitors! I’ll kill them!’
‘This is only partially true. To be entirely honest, you said you’d be here,’ fishing out the letter she had left in Hanee’s bag for her to find and give to Haneul. She had forgotten about it.
Oh, crap! How did I forget about it? And why didn’t Hanee tell me she’d found it? Shaitan child!
Seeing the letter in Haneul’s hands, Timira is a little embarrassed but her embarrassment is trumped by her genuine excitement at it having reached its intended recipient.
‘She found it! You read it! And it still took you so long to find me.’
‘I’m sorry. I’m not too late, I hope …’
‘That depends on how well you answer my next few questions.’
Haneul clears his throat. His eyes are full of affection and mischief, but his voice sounds serious when he speaks.
‘Bring it on!’
Timira shoots off a bunch of questions, and Haneul answers patiently.
‘Why didn’t you call all this while?’
‘Why didn’t you find me after your, er, “incident” with Rodrigo?’
‘What took you so long to come to me?’
‘I have no excuses, Timira, but please know that I came as soon as I could. But I will try to answer your questions. I was too blinded by anger and betrayal when I saw you with Rodrigo. And then what he said on TV. Anybody would be affected!’
‘But you could’ve asked me what was going on! I called so many times. You just vanished. How could you just cut off all communication?’
‘I’m sorry. I know now that how I handled it was completely wrong. And it’ll never happen again.’
‘That depends on whether I give you another chance. Now answer the rest of my questions!’
Timira is beginning to thaw but is trying hard to not let it show.
‘Right. So, why didn’t I call you all this while. Right, let me see how best I can articulate my thoughts. So, I first wanted to handle things well with Mina …’
‘Don’t lie! I know she’s the one who broke up. She called to check on me. Even SHE called, but you didn’t!’ Timira cuts in, slightly annoyed.
‘You have to let me finish, Timira! With Mina, it wasn’t just she and I but our families, too. I wanted to sort it out completely. I returned her father’s investment with a loan from the bank,and that took a little time. I wanted to be free of my family’s leverage on me. Nobody aside from you gets to manipulate me!’
‘You wish to be my puppet?’ Timira sticks her tongue out at Haneul.
‘I will be whatever you want me to be, Timira.’
Timira looks away, feeling shy and turning a little red.
‘And why I took this long to come to you is because I wanted to finish all work on the SecondSkin product launch. I didn’t want anybody raising fingers at my professionalism. That way you wouldn’t be proud of me, would you?’
Timira cannot disagree but she isn’t entirely satisfied.
‘But I still don’t understand why you couldn’t have called me!’
‘And told you what? That I wish to be with you, but I can’t because I’m busy cleaning up my messes? Timira, level with me here. Do you realize how idiotic that would’ve been? I anyway felt terrible that I couldn’t be with you when you needed me most!’
Timira can sense the desperation in Haneul’s voice. His eyes, bathed in moonlight, are a little moist.
