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They say,

a woman's resentment can call for snow,

even in summer.

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Taehyung stared at his plate. All the vibrant colour of his food and the aromatic scent tried to lure his senses but his mind was focused only one thing.

While walking towards the canteen with Jimin after confronting his father, his gaze fell onto the nearby man-made park. A bridge was what stood out to him the most. It was strange knowing that he saw that bridge almost everyday on his way to work but somehow, after that dream that day, the sole existence of that bridge was enough to chill him to his bones.

The bridge was almost identical to the one in his dreams. It was small and acted like an accessory to the park rather than providing aid. Clad in polished woord and heritage architecture, it was covered in dried branches and leaves of warm hues as winter was approaching soon.

"No-No one important, I shall take my leave now."

That voice-

"You don't have an appetite?" Jimin clinked his chopsticks on his plate causing the male to flinch.

"Jimin, please— eat your food first before talking. It's disgusting." Taehyung scrunched up his face in distaste.

The reprimanded man shot him a dirty glance as he chewed quickly like a squirrel before talking once again, "I was saying, are you not eating those?" He signalled towards the drumsticks, "I mean, if you don't feel like eatin-"

"Eat them if you want to, I—I will uh, take my leave first. I just remembered something important that needs to be done like right now, so," he took his coat and nodded slightly at his friend before he exited the canteen.

I have to ask Younggeum about this, my intuition tells me so.

Jimin could just watch his retreating figure in awe as he chewed on a piece of rolled omelette from Taehyung's plate.

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It was a room engulfed in what seemed like layers of untouched duvet of dust. Even if it was late afternoon, stong beams of sunlight fell upon the wooden desks loaded with unarranged papers sprawled all over them. One of the desks was near a window on which a portion of the glass was broken so to repair that, a newspaper cutting was attached with bits of white tape stuck to it.

And another desk was just in front of where she was standing. Folders of different colours lined up on the desk like a deck of cards but the thin layer of dust over them was enough to send alarming signals to the back of her head. The ornamental wallpaper at places was ripped off and even the paint on the wall was chipping off. Loose papers had attained foxing and the paintings hung on the wall seemed like a mere object coated with dust.

Clutching on the knob of the door tightly, she let her gaze wander off the the bookshelf just beside a strange looking rusted two-wheeler beside the door. The content in the bookshelf was homogenous all over with few yellow papers binded together with a black string that seemed too weak to hold them together. She let her stare divert from the cobweb adorned bookshelf to the huge coffee stain on the floor which had its ends darkened but the middle portion was nearly the colour of the tiles.

But what had her shaking wasn't this mysterious sudden appearance of this odd-looking room but rather than a half empty glass situated at one of the desks near the window that still had the water in it shaking. Droplets of water cascaded down the rim of the glass and it looked like it has just been drunk from.

Trembling slightly, she ignored her ruptured knees and dashed back into the hallway, allowing the door of the room to close by itself. Her breathing turned hysteric as soon as she reached the stairs and she nearly tumbled down while descending from them just in time for the main door to open with a swing.

Taehyung's coat dropped from his hand as his eyes averted to the shaking physique in front of him with fresh tears running down her cheeks and bloody knees and before he could ask her what was wrong, Younggeum succumbed to her unconsciousness right then and there.

Taehyung sighed as he felt a burning hot temperature radiating from her forehead. Even though he had laid her down and has been tending to her ever since, her fever just doesn't seem to lower even a bit.

God knows what had happened when he was not there.

As Taehyung was watching her in worry, Younggeum's eyelids cracked open and instantly, he was at the edge of his seat. There must be a reason she passed out while crying along with bruised knees and Taehyung was eager to know just that.

"Are you okay?" He asked but he didn't get a response. She simply stared at his face before her expression morphed into a scared one.

"Did you see it? Tell me you saw it, please— say you saw it," she choked on her own words as her chest heaved up and down and her breathing soon turned into panting as if she just ran a marathon.

"See what?"

"That," she sat up and held his hands to which the man flinched, "you saw that, didn't you?! It's your house for goodness' sake!" She begged and begged but Taehyung had no clue about what she was hinting at.

"See what?" He asked once again, now slightly irritated.

"The room, the strange room on the first floor." She answered, "there is a sixth room in your house Mister Kim and I— and I swear on my life I am not lying." She vigorously shook her head and stared dead at his eyes.

"Younggeum," Taehyung began as he lifted his eyelids up in exasperation, "There are only five rooms in this household."

"No!" She screamed, "No there isn't! There is a si-sixth room too! There are...two desks there and a bookshelf and there was even a glass of water that seemed like it was just drunk from!" Her voice cracked at different parts of her explanation but her fear worsened as soon as she saw the frown on his features deepening.

Taehyung said nothing as he got up and pulled her along with him. They walked over his room near the kitchen and pivoted around to look at her who was confused to ends, "This is the first room which is mine,"

He then ambled to the other one across the kitchen and near the living room, "this is the second room in which you're staying at."

Ascending up the stairs, he walked leftwards and arrived in front of the door in which Younggeum never showed any interest, "this is the third room, my study."

He walked along with the circular shaped railing and stopped at another one, "the fourth one, it's a storeroom."

And then he neared the staircase once again as he stood in front of the last visible door in this whole house, "the fifth one, it is yet another guest room."

He slowly turned to face her and let go of her hands before he looked at her with what seemed like, pity, "I know that you're mentally not stable but that's no reason to incite imaginary circumstances and trouble me who's been nothing but hospitable towards you!" He raised his voice slightly but he had maintained his poise. He just wanted to get his point across.

"Ever since you came here, I agree that you were helping me with the chores but you're still a stranger at the end of the day whom I know nothing of. That day too when we were playing Ten Questions, I couldn't help but get suspicious at your little act of not remembering when and how you got here."

Younggeum felt a tiny sting near her ribcage when he mentioned the word 'stranger'. They were married and no wife would like to be referred to as a stranger by their partner and she has been nothing but of help to him.

"So please, I want you gone before I come back. And don't tell a soul where I reside."

It had flowed out just like that before he could count to three before doing something impulsive. He wasn't even sure if he meant it or not.

And then he stormed out of the house leaving Younggeum behind as a single teardrop crept out of her eyes. And it wasn't because of the fear, but the slight aching within her.

As if she had just lost a part of her.

But that part didn't even belong to her in the first place.

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I let her go.

Then why don't I feel free?

Walking in the cold night with nothing to cover himself, Taehyung sighed as his gaze fell on the honking cars near the crossroads and then on the waning moon. The nights were getting colder and colder and more and more trees were getting naked.

Cursing himself for forgetting his coat near the door, his eyes finally found a little shop down the road which had a yellow neon coloured signboard with only a few letters illuminated. His stomach betrayed him by gurgling and his brain betrayed him further by making him remember how Younggeum would stay till late night until he got home and would only go to sleep until his plate was clear of any speck.

A sudden rush of regret passed through him like the cold, slicing land breeze. Maybe he shouldn't have lashed out on her just because he was not in the right state of mind. After all, she did make his house feel a lot like home even though she was a mere stranger with intentions he had no knowledge of.

But she was lying.

No she wasn't, she was just scared because of the change in her surroundings.

No you delusional idiot.

Before he knew it, he found himself standing infront of the very shop while his eyes followed the vigorous movements of an aged woman wiping tables aggressively. A cloth was tying up her hair with a muted baby blue apron across her waist. As she was about to turn off the lights for the day, her eyes fell onto the lonesome figure standing outside, shivering slightly.

Sighing to herself, she walked out and shook Taehyung's shoulders slightly to which the man didn't even show an ounce of response.

"Son, you there?"

It was her rough voice that brought him back to his senses. Taehyung flinched as he panickedly looked elsewhere before bowing before the woman when he found her.

"Sorry mam, I was just leaving—" a loud roar reverberated in the air as the woman looked at the source of this sound with mild distaste while Taehyung sheepishly grinned out of embarrassment.

The woman had never witnessed someone slurp his noodles so fast before. Her eyes almost bulged out when the boy finished the bowl of black noodles within seconds of plating. She didn't expect him to pay up because of his kind of homeless attire but her eyes turned into soccer balls for the second time that day when Taehyung placed a hefty amount for just a bowl of noodles.

"That was the most delicious noodles I've ever had in my life so thank you mam. I will be leaving now, thank you again for the delicious food." Taehyung got up to leave but the woman slapped on the wooden table causing the figure to flinch and turn around fearfully.

With a scowl adorning her wrinkled and drowsing features, she recollected his previously disturbed expression when she first spotted him outside her shop.

"You know my son's around your age so you can share what's troubling you at the moment. I'm a stranger to you first so your secret is safe with me, not that I've enough sources to spread your problems all around Seoul." The woman wanted to appear harmless but her last sentence caused both of Taehyung's brows to rise in fear.

"I think I should really leave now—"

"Girl problems?"

Taehyung fell silent.

And that is how Taehyung found himself sipping on some chrysanthemum tea in the middle of the night while an old woman in her mid-fifties accompanied his solitude.

"So you are saying that a completely unknown girl somehow found herself in your house and has been living there ever since on her own accord until now when you finally kicked her out after a week. And she has been taking care of the house in your absence and you just let her leave even if she was a great help to you—?"

Taehyung hesitantly nodded his head. God, why does his situations seem really stupid when someone narrates it out for him?

"My sister said she might be an assassin or a burglar." Taehyung reasoned to notch down his guilt.

"And it took you a whole week to acknowledge that?" Taehyung shut his eyes out of embarrassment, "Furthermore, if she wanted to kill you, she would have done it already while you were sleeping, don't you think?"

Taehyung slowly nodded his head in realisation but a speck of doubt still consisted in his heart, "But she pretended to lie about loosing her memories and created a ruckus today to earn pity!"

"Do you have proof that she lied? Or did she seem suspicious?" The women counterattacked to which Taehyung found himself ridiculously speechless.

It was true though, he didn't know for sure that she was faking the incidents nor did she show any signs of suspicion.

But that's what all criminals do you fool.

"I- I don't know anything, anymore. She could be a crook or the nicest person for all I know." Taehyung savored the last drop of his tea as he got up and bowed to the woman who was blankly staring ahead, "If there's nothing else, then I shall take my leave now. Thank you for tea." He said and advanced towards the door.

As Taehyung was about to leave, the woman suddenly spoke.

"If your brain and your heart oppose in their actions, then there is really a problem that you overlooked. If both of them agree, then know that you have made the right decision." She looked at him with a warm smile and Taehyung couldn't help but feel envious of the boy who's her son.

"Thank you for the advice," Taehyung replied with genuine smile but a strange sadness of his departure blinded his cognitive skills and the smile came out looking forced and unnatural, "I'll keep that in mind."

And then he left without looking back, unaware of a pair of eyes watching his retreating physique in pity.

"What a nice boy, I hope he finds himself out of the trouble soon." She sighed and got up with a few crackling of her bones, "Dear lord I'm getting old."

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Still freezing to his bones, Taehyung decided that it was finally the time to go back home. If he found her inside then he would keep her as a maid, if not then he would live his life like he always did. This was his decision and he couldn't help but feel stupid. No wonder his father didn't advise him to interfere with the law.

His phone tinged a couple of times but it was something else that needed his attention more than his constantly ringing phone.

His apartment was just a few blocks away when he looked again towards the building with a screen along with an enormous crowd surrounding it. His curiosity was poking endlessly so he found himself pushing past the heavy crowd to reach the clearance.

And when he found out what was this all about, his jaw dropped flat to the ground.

Dohui Life Sciences, the only part of Kim Corporations with the highest stocks, was liquidated.

All the muted wailing and fierce cursing slowly came to life as the weight of the situation dawned upon him. The country might soon face an economic crisis if companies get bankrupt and liberate people's pay.

That means, South Korea was going to get penniless and there was nothing Taehyung could do about it.

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A/N: IM SAYING THIS AGAIN. This is a fiction. South Korea is NOT going penniless.

Btw I can't guarantee the consistency of upcoming updates. Studies are getting a tad bit more tedious. It was a nice one month long break from writing but now I've to go brainstorm the next chapter, just wow-