MWFL 21

Chapter 21

Sometimes. No—Countless Times

Shinwoo had never once called Harin directly before.

She stared at her phone for a moment, her eyes filled with puzzlement, then pressed the call button.

“Hello. This is Joo Harin.”

She answered in a businesslike tone.

—Where are you?

Why was he suddenly speaking so formally?

She briefly pulled the phone away from her ear and glanced at it before answering again.

“I’m at the company office. What is it?”

—What time are you leaving the office?

“I was planning to leave around two. Do you want me to leave earlier?”

—No. There’s no need.

Harin fell silent, thinking Shinwoo would soon tell her why he had called.

—All right. I’ll hang up, then.

But apparently, he had nothing else to say.

“…Pardon?”

—I said I’m hanging up.

“Player Cha Shinwoo, wait a moment.”

—Why?

“Didn’t you call because there was something you wanted to say?”

A brief silence followed Harin’s hurried question.

—What would I have to say?

You called me, so you should know.

Unable to find a response, Harin pulled the phone away from her ear again and glared at it this time.

If he said he had nothing to say, there was no reason to prolong the call.

“No. There’s nothing. Then I’ll see you later.”

—See you later.

Cha Shinwoo ended the call first, his voice light.

“What was that? What an unsettling call.”

She stared at the phone screen displaying the call duration, her brows furrowed.

“Was he checking to make sure I wouldn’t show up?”

But he wasn’t the kind of person who would worry about something like that.

“Manager Joo.”

Just as she was deciding that her suspicion didn’t make much sense, someone called out to her.

“Could you take a look at this? The schedule is all tangled up.”

“Yes. I’ll come over.”

She pushed aside her momentary confusion and returned her attention to work.

.

.

.

Harin rose from her desk and put on her coat. It was ten minutes before two in the afternoon.

As she gathered her bag and was leaving the office, the phone in her hand vibrated.

The moment she checked the caller, her brows instinctively drew together.

It was Cha Shinwoo again.

“Yes. This is Joo Harin. Go ahead.”

She answered immediately while walking toward the elevator.

—Have you left?

“No. I’m just about to leave.”

—Where are you right now?

Seriously, what is with him today?

Her brows furrowed even more at this sudden attempt to track her location.

“I just left the office.”

She answered calmly, without any emotion in her voice.

—I’m in the ground-level parking lot right now. Come here.

Harin’s eyes widened.

“The parking lot? It’ll take me about thirty minutes to get there.”

Naturally, she had assumed the man was at the stadium parking lot.

“But where am I supposed to go? All of our afternoon appointments are at the stadium.”

She asked somewhat urgently, wondering if Cha Shinwoo had changed the schedule on his own.

—I’m in Manager Joo’s company parking lot.

At that moment, she heard something completely unexpected.

“…What?”

Why did you suddenly come here?

—I’m waiting in Section C, so come over here.

Shinwoo told her where he was in response to Harin’s instinctive question. Then he hung up.

Harin, who had stopped walking without realizing it, blinked rapidly.

“Why did he suddenly come here?”

She voiced the thought aloud, then hurried away from where she had been standing.

Rather than wasting time trying to figure out the reason herself, it would be better to ask the person directly.

A short while later, Harin arrived at the parking lot Shinwoo had mentioned.

She looked around for his car when her phone rang again.

“Yes. Where are you?”

—Turn around. To your left.

Still on the phone, Harin turned around and immediately spotted Shinwoo’s car. At that moment, the car slowly moved out of its parking space and approached her.

The car came to a complete stop, and Harin climbed into the passenger seat.

Cha Shinwoo was dressed comfortably in athletic clothes without even a jacket, a cap pulled low over his head.

A faint, pleasant scent lingered around him, as though he had only just finished showering.

For an instant, a sharp ache pierced deep into Harin’s chest.

She knew exactly what had caused it.

You, coming straight to me after training, carrying that faint scent with you.

I had faced moments like this countless times before, just as I was now.

Moments when waiting turned into happiness, and longing turned into excitement.

Back then, I had been so happy that I needed nothing else.

The time that still remains so vividly inside me— you don’t remember it.

No matter how desperately she tried not to recall it, no matter how hard she tried not to think about it, there was no way to stop the pain that suddenly came rushing back.

“Hello. But why did you suddenly come here?”

She greeted him while immediately asking about the reason for his unexpected appearance.

“I came to pick up Manager Joo.”

Shinwoo answered lightly and started the car.

“I mean, why did Player Cha Shinwoo come to pick me up?”

The man stared straight ahead, then slightly raised both eyebrows.

“Is there some law saying Cha Shinwoo can’t come pick up Joo Harin?”

Of course there isn’t.

Harin swallowed the words she couldn’t bring herself to say.

“I wanted to come pick you up, so I did. Is that a problem?”

“No. Of course not. Thank you.”

Having nothing else to say, Harin decided not to press the matter further.

“Are you uncomfortable being alone with me?”

“You seem to enjoy asking about things you already know.”

“Because the other person might feel differently. Isn’t considering that usually called being considerate?”

Why does he seem to be getting more and more shameless?

Harin only shifted her gaze toward Shinwoo.

There was a faint smile on his face.

“But why are you suddenly speaking formally?”

She wasn’t trying to challenge him. She was simply curious, so she asked in the calmest and lightest tone she could manage.

But Shinwoo fell silent, as though it were a question that required some thought.

Harin watched as his smooth brow gently furrowed and wondered if she had brought up something she shouldn’t have.

Then—

“Would it make sense if I said I received mirror therapy?”

His voice carried the faintest trace of laughter.

Shinwoo glanced sideways at the woman, whose eyes had widened in confusion.

‘You came with Joo Harin yesterday, right? Do you work with her?’

‘You didn’t bring her today?’

The moment those words had spilled from that bastard’s mouth, speaking so carelessly about Harin, something inside Shinwoo had twisted.

Afterward, he had gone over his own attitude and the way he had treated Harin.

How am I any different from that bastard?

He had thought about it carefully, only to arrive at one conclusion.

They’re both the same.

“What does that mean? Mirror therapy?”

“You don’t need to know the details. Anyway, I suddenly realized that from the very beginning, I’d been speaking casually to Manager Joo and acting like a complete asshole.”

“It wasn’t the casual speech itself that was the problem. Wasn’t it more the tone and the nuances?”

He hadn’t even been hoping to hear her say that it was okay.

“Your facial expressions were a problem too. Even if you speak formally, making that kind of face doesn’t exactly make you any less annoying.”

But Harin had started pointing out his faults one by one.

Right. This is Joo Harin.

Joo Harin, who never gives an inch.

“Ah. That hit me right in the bones. It hurts.”

Shinwoo chuckled, realizing once again that the woman beside him was anything but ordinary.

“Don’t say things you don’t mean.”

And yet she was telling him to shut up.

Shinwoo frowned, then soon let out a quiet snort of laughter.

At that moment, the car stopped at the red light.

Shinwoo turned his head and met Harin’s eyes directly.

His eyes were filled with amusement as he quietly studied her pale face.

“Why? Should I not?”

His lips curved into a relaxed smile, as though urging her to give him an answer.

Harin stared quietly at the man and gently bit the soft flesh inside her mouth.

Why is he smiling like that?

It had been such a long time since she had seen Cha Shinwoo smile at her so freely, without a trace of restraint.

Sometimes.

No—countless times, she had missed moments like this.

As her heart began pounding, irritation quietly crept in.

Here she was, with Cha Shinwoo, who remembered nothing, while she alone was being tossed around by her emotions.

Why had she gone out of her way to pull someone beside her who had no intention of doing anything in the first place?

And then, as if deliberately giving her a dose of medicine after poisoning her, his attitude only made her more annoyed.

“Anyone listening would think I’m someone who does whatever you tell me to do—if you tell me to, I do it, and if you tell me not to, I don’t.”

Since when have my opinions mattered that much to you?

“Player Cha Shinwoo, do whatever you want.”

If you’re going to do whatever you want in the end, then don’t ask me.

She finished speaking with a distinctly rebellious look in her eyes.

“All right. I was already feeling a little embarrassed about it myself. I guess I shouldn’t do things I normally wouldn’t.”

See? See?

He never intended to do it in the first place.

“Instead, I can just use a nice tone and make a nice expression.”

He said it without inspiring even the tiniest bit of expectation in her, then flashed a grin and looked straight ahead.

“But why don’t you drive? You said you have a license.”

He asked in a light tone.

Harin’s delicate eyes froze for a moment, and she unconsciously held her breath.