#innayh

     had you asked two years ago, what makes a home? she’d smile and laugh and say “home is where mom and dad are. its where i feel the safest.” dismantle the foundation, break down the walls and learn the secrets behind them. what is she to do when the two people she were meant to trust with her life were the very ones she should be afraid of? the weight of losing everything hunched her shoulders, foreign cots and makeshift sheets could not stave off nightmares of evil people and their misguided intentions. 

     she distinctly remembers the first morning she’d awoken, fully rested without the plague of restless anxiety. it had been months since then, fight or flight on constant high, worried that at any moment she’d be dragged back to the cage she was brainwashed into thinking was her safe haven. that morning she’d opened her eyes, feeling the warmth of the three strips of sunlight that peeked from her blinds, the peace that blanketed over her knowing she got to sleep in on a sunday morning. then, came the smell of freshly brewed tea from the morning, and yerin thought, right. this is home. 

     there was a certain gratitude held for kwon inna, to take a chance on a stranger and extend a home to someone she’d only known briefly. memories of domesticity with family was marred with distrust and betrayal, but now yerin thinks, perhaps those memories could be replaced. 

     she doesn’t know when she slipped into routine so seamlessly, the highlight of her day being able to share a meal the other after a long day of work. some nights the teahouse owner was busy, which she understood, but nothing beat coming home to the aroma of a home cooked meal. yerin sat, deflated in her seat after stuffing herself to the brim with inna’s cooking. 

@innayh

with the way things are going, yunhwa's starting to look like a hub for old faces than fresh, new ones. not that she minds particularly—life deals its due however it likes, reminders and all. exhibit a: the "draft" folder that's buried deep somewhere on her hard drive that's collecting virtual dust, near-forgotten until the email that popped into her inbox a couple days ago. the sender wasn't unexpected, past associations and exchanges considered, but the request sure was. 

it’d never crossed her mind that she would ever see kwon inna and the word “freelancer” sitting in the same sentence, but eunsoo’s gone and seen enough to understand that people won’t always be in the same spot where you’ve first found them. so hey, why not just take this for what it is and hold off on the curiosity. she shoots a text, gets a response, and now here they are, situated at a table at some joint’s outside seating, basking in the afternoon sun.