The tutorial center was less boring than it usually was, but Jisung knew it was only because his mind was preoccupied with what you said to him back at the school gate.

It was very much within his character to let his head linger on a stranger whose name he still has no idea of. More often than not, people give their condolences and they forget after a brief moment of grieving. At the end of the day, the disaster was not upon their life but another. But Jisung had always tended to put the responsibility on himself to feel as others do, and he remembers even after days and weeks.

Needless to say, Jisung felt extremely conflicted. He wasn't sure why he thought letting you slip away this afternoon would be a bad idea when he knew he has got a lot to tell you; a whole lot of heartfelt, encouraging, friendly words he wanted to say. And a big bear hug to temporarily release your hidden sorrows, if you would let him.

Breathing out a soft sigh to collect himself, Jisung walked along the dark path that would lead him back to his home. As he made his way past the convenience store located in between two residential areas, he glanced up at the sign for no apparent reason other than to change the position of his neck and to face a different scenery.

Then he caught sight of you. What a miracle coincidence! It took him a second to make sense of you before his heart leaped happily. You were sitting by the glass pane, where the bar tables and chairs were located, and you were too busy blowing at the instant noodle to care about the approaching figure outside in the street. It was only when Jisung made his way to the glass and started knocking gently at the window did you look up.

Your eyes rounded at his grinning face, and for one moment you almost let yourself glare him off. You thought better of it, considering that he probably meant no harm and only wanted to say hello before going about his night. But you did curse under your breath at this sudden encounter—how did you two bump into each other? This is a big district and there are hundreds of convenience stores! Why did it have to be this one!

Ignoring your vulgar thoughts against destiny and its irregular plans for you, you waved back half-heartedly at the enthusiastic Jisung standing before the glass pane, then you flicked your wrist to give him a shooing motion.

"Go. Leave. Go home," you told him, emphasizing the shapes of your lips.

His hand stopped and he tilted his head, most likely having understood you but not yet decided on whether he wanted to follow your wish. You watched as those brows of his furrowed a fraction and his eyes flashed rebelliously, then he shook his head and turned to walk over to the front door of the convenience store.

The grip you had on your chopsticks loosened in defeat as you deadpanned at yourself, waiting for Jisung's arrival.

"Good evening!" Jisung said once he was standing next to you, somewhere next to the stool at your side.

"Good evening," you greeted back, turning to glance at him briefly.

Jisung ignored the lack of enthusiasm in your voice, which he kind of knew was not from exhaustion caused by a day's worth of work but that you simply did not want to talk to him. It was abnormal of him to pester someone longer than welcomed, but the gravitational pull at his chest made him continue in his pursuit. He held the straps of his backpack just to take it off and dump it on the countertop. Jumping onto the tall stool, he adjusted his position before turning his head over to look at you.

He observed you for a moment, watching as you slurp at your noodle and disregard his presence. You stopped making that soft, angered expression, the one with the constantly furrowed brows and the pursing of your lips. Jisung took it as a cue for him to start talking to you again.

He carefully leaned a little towards your side to ask in a small voice. "How was your day?"

You did not look at him when you replied, "Everything is normal. Just eating some dinner, which you should too."

Jisung nodded, a look of realization dawning on his face at the mention of dinner. You felt a rush of relief when you saw him drop off the chair and look around the store, thinking he would finally leave you to your own devices. You were wrong.

After glancing around the store, Jisung returned his attention to you and asked, "Can you save me the seat?"

You looked at him with questioning eyes. "Why?"

"So I can get dinner," Jisung said, pointing towards the cashier. He then giggled, a light snort coming out of his nose. "Well, I know there isn't anyone here but just in case, you know!"

"No, I mean as in–" you paused, then you sighed in faint distress. "Go home, have dinner with your family."

He continued to smile at you for the next quiet minute. Not going to lie, it was hurtful when you kept trying to push him away like this. It made him wonder if he had done anything wrong. If he did, he wouldn't be able to catch on unless you specifically tell him, because the way he has treated you since the moment you two met each other is friendly, and friendly is never wrong in his eyes.

It was so easy for him to just leave you alone, though. There were absolutely no important reasons why he should stay and put in effort just to befriend you. He simply wanted to. Jisung wanted to get to know you, which he supposed was a reason important enough for him to pursue his goal. He assumed you were lonely. And weirdly, every time he glances at you, there seemed to be this magnetic pull yanking him towards you.

Jisung thought it was a small crush he developed, a feeling that sparked from you helping him during the morning. It could disappear soon but as of now, he had chosen to act upon it. Despite knowing it was very impolite of him to continue his curious advances, Jisung decided that as long as you haven't explicitly told him to leave you alone yet, he just wouldn't.

"No." He smiled.

That was an upfront refusal. It was even comical. You were unprepared for such a reaction and as a result, you offered him silence as you frequently did. Jisung patted his bag and sent you a nod, then he turned to go around the store so he could find something to eat. Meanwhile, you continued to devour the cup noodle in your hands and tried to pay no attention to the warning signs in your head.

Dealing with people on a long-term basis has never been your thing. You have been alone ever since a young age, in a place where people were completely different from you and where people had not been the nicest to your kind (the magic-wielding kind). You doubted their indecency stemmed from hatred, though. It felt more like general uncertainty, something of caution, which to be fair, you held the same over them. If anything, you were more aware of the advantage you held over these regular people.

Due to that, you were left unwilling to befriend anybody and you would much rather be left alone most of the time.

It was the first step for you, a giant step as it seemed, to have a meal with someone else. You were so used to staying quiet as you eat that the foreign concept of chit-chatting and eating was almost exciting to you. Gulping a dry patch down your throat, you glared down at the soup and clenched your jaw in dismay.

Not only did the act itself goes against your life compass, but you were also left feeling confused about your feelings because while your head was telling you it would cause you trouble if you let the boy into your life, your heart felt giddy and nervous upon the encounter.

"You are being really tense."

Jisung's sudden input made you relax, not because he calmed you but because you wanted to go against his observations and silently prove him wrong.Your muscles loosened up immediately and your let out a breath you have been holding when you were too busy thinking up all the ways you could fuck up this little dinner time with—what was his name?

"What is your name? My name is [Name]," you blurted out, the tension that you let go of traveled back and became visible at once. Your fingers tightened around the wooden chopsticks, giving its structure a small crack as you did do.

Jisung blinked at you in shock. He was in the process of putting down his previously microwaved box dinner, carefully minding the way his fingertips touched the edge of the plastic container because it was so hot there was smoke coming from the graphic surface. But every thought that littered his mind was blown away now that you had, for the first time, initiated a conversation and asked for his name.

"Nevermind. I never asked." You turned away to hide your face when he didn't give you a response, thinking perhaps your approach was too abrupt, which it was but Jisung didn't mind that aspect one bit.

"No, no, no! My–my name is Jisung! Han Jisung, or just Jisung," he quickly replied when he saw your change of mood. He got onto the stool clumsily, having all his attention focused on your turned head. His eyes seemed almost desperate if you had given yourself the chance to look at him.

He grabbed onto the edge of the counter as he spoke, "Sometimes people call me Han too, but you can call me whatever you like."

The fact that he sounded just as nervous as you made you feel slightly better about yourself. Your mind relaxed into a more natural state where for once it was not overthinking everything, and you slowly turned your head to face Jisung, whose eyes brightened at soon as you reacted. He could almost see your soul open up to him, the way you let your guard down when you finally offered him your first smile.

"Hello, Jisung," you said softly.

"Hi, [Name]!" Jisung grinned.

Your heart was giddy again. It thumped closely to your ribs in hopes to get closer to the vessel of warmth sitting next to you. How long has it been since you've made a friend in an unprofessional setting? You only knew it has been years. All the friends you currently have are colleagues much older than you; those stressing about universities, or those who have multiple mouths to feed back home. It has been a while since you last made a friend the same age as you. The accomplished feeling dwelling in your chest was overpowering the alarms blaring in your head.

You two went about to do your own thing after the brief but needed introduction. You continued to enjoy your cup noodle, even though you were almost finished with the entire bowl. Jisung went ahead to devour the box dinner he just got, inhaling the food so quickly that he was almost caught up with you at finishing his dinner.

You two were surrounded by sounds of chewing and plastic bottles being gripped. It was anything but words, and it was getting distastefully awkward that you were starting to shrink back into your personal shell.

Jisung had been too busy deciding whether he wanted to bring up the sensitive topic of your deceased parents. You had finally opened up a little part of yourself to him by giving him your name, the last thing he wanted was to scare you away by reminding you of a traumatic past.

Heaving a sigh, he casually shifted his head over to your side in an attempt to stretch his neck out a little, then something lining up your forearm caught his sight.

The identical red string he saw you play around in the morning lingered tightly on your forearm. Sitting perfectly next to it were two more strings of two different colors: green and black.

Chewing as he stuffed another spoonful of rice into his mouth, adding more roundness to his already full cheek, Jisung blinked in thoughts at the strings around your arm.

You clicked your tongue to get rid of the piece of green onion stuck to your teeth. Jisung was not trying to hide the fact that he was staring whatsoever, or perhaps it was you who was just too alert of your surrounding.

Either way, with a clear assumption of what he would be asking in mind, you turned to him and spoke, "If you have something to ask, just ask, Jisung."

He blushed faintly at the sudden confrontation but immediately jumped at the chance to talk about what has been concerning his mind almost the entire day. Pointing at your arm, he asked, "What are these strings for? They don't look like bracelets."

You glanced down at your hand and cursed under your breath. You hadn't taken them off since you did not expect Jisung to appear for the rest of the night, and you had been too careless a while ago that you forgot to take them off when he was away either.

Those colored strings were a family heirloom of some sort. You never did consider the product of a family business an heirloom, though. Only your family has the steps and ingredients to create this kind of strings that are utilized by magicians who specializes in string magic. However, ever since the tragic wipeout of your family name, the manufacturing has stopped and you were left with roughly a box of these strings to use for spell-casting purposes.

It didn't matter much anymore. Everything happened years ago and there was none of your past you intended to reveal to Jisung.

"They are bracelets." You shrugged, but your voice was so unusually gentle that Jisung could not help but overthink the context of those three simple words.

His gaze moved up to look at you, and he let himself freely scan your expression when he found that you weren't paying attention to him. He pursed his lips in sympathy when he saw the lack of emotions visible in your eyes. There was only a speck of light but it was being dimmed gradually the more you stared at the strings around your arm.

"They are bracelets, it doesn't matter." You straightened up. The vulnerable moment you enjoyed over within a blink of an eye and it was time for you to toughen up and get over it as you have always been told to. Clearing your throat, you looked down at your empty bowl and clumsily, you reached out for it before dropping off the stool. "I am finished so I am going to leave first."

Jisung's jaw dropped a little at your sudden change in attitude. He must have said something wrong. His heart beat in a panicked rhythm as he watched you grab all the trash on the table and wore your bag again. He wanted to apologize, he wanted you to stay, he wanted to chat more with you. Yet he was unable to say anything due to being afraid of making things worse for both you and him.

"Goodbye, Jisung," you said quickly and brushed past him to head to the front door.

"Wa–wait! [Name]!" He called out loudly, causing you to pause and look at him with widened eyes that showed a familiar gleam of anxiety. He flicked back for a second before he turned the volume of his voice down and asked, "Do you have a place to stay? Somewhere to go back to?"

You inhaled a large breath and licked your bottom lip. You home was far away, and it wasn't really a place you wanted to go back to. You have been working jobs to pay yourself food and hygiene products, which were things you deemed more important than having a roof over your head. Because of the safety provided with your magic, you were able to rest anywhere you wanted: trees, parks, streets.

The district itself was your home. But you supposed he was asking about a physical place.

Reaching out to touch the knob of the glass door, you tightened your grip and opened the door first. Then you turned to look at Jisung, who was still staring at you with utmost concern etched in his eyes.

"No," you replied and you left the store.