CHAPTER ONE
( Childhood, Again )

YEON SI-EUN LIKES structure. He likes having everything perfectly aligned, plans made, and he doesn't like when something new barges in and wrecks his structure to the ground.

Perhaps that is why he doesn't like Cha Jaehwa. He never had a problem with her before — She was silent and so was he, and they had no need to converse on the days they accidentally ran into each other at the apartment complex — Until she arrives differently.

And Yeon Si-eun doesn't like different. He doesn't like the way she pretends they know each other.

"She's sick," His father tells Si-eun when they finish greeting the Cha family. His voice is too gentle, in a way that makes Si-eun feel as though he is a small child who cries for a love he is never good enough for. "Don't be rude to her."

And Yeon Si-eun thinks about it for a long time — He comes to the conclusion that Cha Jaehwa doesn't look sick, but he's not seven years old anymore, blindly believing what he's told — Like how his parents love each other as much as they love him, both lies that stick to Si-eun like a thick and heavy blanket in the summer heat. Perhaps Cha Jaehwa is sick, and when he acknowledges this possibility at last, he realizes that it had been obvious all along.

He begins to take notice of the way Cha Jaehwa stares blankly at him for a while before her eyes brighten in a dull way that Si-eun decides he doesn't like — They look glassed over and too, too empty — And she smiles and waves as though they've known each other for years.

Si-eun finds all the things Jaehwa wishes to keep hidden, like the bandages beneath her overly large sweater, or the plasticky bracelet that tangles against her wrist, looking thoroughly worn but unable to be removed. Or the most obvious hint of all, one that Jaehwa didn't put too much effort into concealing — The thick scar running from her neck to her lower cranium, and that thin patch of peach fuzz that is beginning to grow over her partially shaved head.

There is not enough fabric in her beanies to cover it, and it seems as though Jaehwa chooses to altogether ignore it.

Yeon Si-eun thinks as he looks at Cha Jaehwa, that they are both living in the wrong season, and for all the wrong reasons.

He chooses to ignore her, after that, because he can't stand the intimacy of being friends with someone that didn't — And would never — Mean anything to him. He couldn't stand the thought of Cha Jaehwa becoming anything more than a sick neighbor that Yeon Si-eun knows only in passing.

He's glad she cannot follow him into school — Seeing her smile twists something hideously reminiscent of guilt into the pit of his stomach, and he prefers to keep a clear mind when he learns — For the girl is not allowed anywhere near his school. Si-eun thanks Jaehwa's parents for their all-too-protective manner ever since their daughter arrived back home.

Si-eun doesn't pry into the mystery that is the Cha family, because the farther away Cha Jaehwa stays from him, the easier his life will be.

It is only inevitable that the things Yeon Si-eun wishes wouldn't happen are the only things that do.

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‎IT HAS BECOME a regular occurrence for Cha Jaehwa to stay confined to her room for the majority of the day.

She finds nothing better to do with her days, all of which seem to drag endlessly until she can no longer remember whether it is Monday or Thursday, or even August or July, but stay occupied within her small room.

Cha Jaehwa feels like a stranger in her own home; No matter how hard she screws her eyes shut and strains, the terrible crayon drawings tacked to the fridge bring her no recollection of her youth.

The one who tries the hardest, and inevitably struggles the most apart from Jaehwa, is Cha Si-woo. Si-woo is big and burly, with a weathered face and hands bigger than both of Jaehwa's palms put together. He is also her father, the man who shed tears at her bedside and cradled her as though she would slip between his fingers if he let go.

Jaehwa cannot remember the stories he tells her — When she first learned how to ride a bike, or when she got her first perfect score on a test ( There was not much of that same 100 written in thick marker in the following years ), or perhaps when she met her best friend — But she likes to think that some part of her does, because her heart always feels a bit fuller the more Si-woo tells her about the life she lived prior to the accident.

The accident. Neither Cha Si-woo nor Moon Boram ( Jaehwa's mother, who works full-time to pay for her daughter's hospital bills ) answers the only question Jaehwa wants the answer to.

They dance around the topic with frowns and pursed lips, before their cloudy faces grow sunny once more and they begin talking about something else with plaster smiles on their faces.

It makes Jaehwa feel as though something terribly wrong occurred.

Despite their efforts, Cha Jaehwa remains a blank canvas, only living the life her parents said she likes. Perhaps the Jaehwa of last month didn't have a good relationship with her parents.

Perhaps that is the reason they try so hard to get her to love them as they love her. Jaehwa does not like studying; Boram and Si-woo insist she loved it, once, but the Jaehwa of now doesn't.

She learns to turn away from their crestfallen faces as the realization that she is not the same Cha Jaehwa finally begins to settle within their old bones.

If there is one thing that brings them bittersweet hope, it is Jaehwa's affinity for painting. When they find her with a paintbrush in hand and a colorful canvas settled against her desk, a sliver of gnawing hope climbs up the pits of their stomachs.

Perhaps they can salvage the remaining pieces of their daughter, after all.

Jaehwa likes painting. However, she doesn't like the singular face that her mind seems to recall with alarming clarity — From the lopsided smile to the small crinkle between the eyes — And how it constantly finds its way onto her canvas.

It kills her, to remember such a face with clarity, and yet be unable to attach a name to his features.

It is Moon Boram who does so, one late evening. She arrives the way she always seems to, with her limbs dragging to the couch as she collapses on the old leather.

Jaehwa turns to her, and the woman smiles tiredly. The lines around her forehead and eyebrows are especially creased, as though all she's done for the past few years is scowl.

"Is something the matter?" Boram asks, turning her attention back within her own comfort, shifting her closed eyes to the ceiling.

Jaehwa pulls at her bottom lip with her teeth, and the silence consumes the room. The teen pulls from behind her back a rolled-up paper and hands it to her mother.

She feels like a child, small and insignificant in a house with reminders of her on every wall and surface, but unable to remember it at all.

"Was I a secretive person?" Jaehwa's voice is meek and tentative. She looks at her mother through her lashes, shoulders hunching into each other.

She wonders, but no matter how much she wants to find the answer on her own, Cha Jaehwa is incomplete, and she cannot fix herself on her own.

Moon Boram lets her eyes flutter open, and her stern gaze fixes on Jaehwa. Her lips curve in a smile that doesn't look as genuine as the girl hoped, and her eyes warm in the slightest.

"No," She comments softly, her aged voice wavering with fatigue. "You told us everything."

Jaehwa lets the words sink in, and they settle awkwardly in her stomach, too deceitful to be the truth. Still, she chooses to believe, because Cha Jaehwa is afraid.

She is afraid of losing the fragments of herself she desperately clings to. She is afraid, that once these people that claim to love her realize she is not the same daughter they once cherished, they will discard her like waste from their home.

She is afraid of what she cannot remember — And she is afraid of what fragments she can recall.

Cha Jaehwa gingerly watches as her mother slowly unfurls the rolled-up paper. She feels afraid, as though all her secrets are written on that sheet, and she is dooming herself.

A small dagger buries itself into her chest when Moon Boram begins to cry. Her tears are silent, falling from her cheeks and onto the paper. She wipes them quickly, but Jaehwa can still see her tremulous fingers as they grip the page, crumpling it slightly.

"Do you remember him?" She says shakily, and Jaehwa can't help noticing the anger that begins to simmer in her voice.

( As though saying 'Why remember him, and not us?' Jaehwa pushes the thought away ).

The girl shrugs, a mixture of unsureness and fear. "I don't know who he is, but I remember what he looks like."

Boram smiles bitterly. "Ahn Suho."

Jaehwa lets her mind repeat the name. She would be lying if she said she could recall anyone by the name of Ahn Suho, but even then it felt as though her heart remembers.

Ahn Suho.

"He was your best friend." The words fall flatly off of Moon Boram's tongue. They sound none too cheerful, or even reminiscent.

Just hurt and tired.

Jaehwa lets her own eyes cloud over with tears. The notion that she has truly forgotten all that she once loved finally washes over her.

Moon Boram only offers her arm, and the two stay in an awkward embrace; A mother who has lost her daughter, and a daughter who is lost.

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‎SOMEWHERE A SHORT distance away, Ahn Suho twists and turns in his small couch bed, a bag of chips against his chest and his phone propped against his stomach.

He feels his ear itch, and he scratches it with a small hum of annoyance.

It is almost midnight, and Suho's bones ache from moving all day. He buries himself deeper into the couch.

Most of all, his knee burns with a ghost of pain further than injury, and he remembers the things he doesn't wish to recall.

The video he's watching pauses itself as a banner pops up on the upper side of his screen. It is from his calendar.

With nothing else to do but wait for sleep to approach him, Suho clicks on the notification.

His fingers still as they hover over his phone screen.

6 Year Anniversary — Confess ?

Ahn Suho shuts off his phone and tosses it somewhere to sink beneath the couch cushions. He closes his eyes and ignores the burn they seem to invoke as he holds back his emotions.

He chose not to care for Cha Jaehwa. She had long done the same, anyway.

His knee gives another ache.

Suho turns and makes himself comfortable on his side.

"You're coming to the match, right?"

He screws his eyes shut.

"Do I have to?"

Laughter rings in his ears.

"Kidding! You know I'll be there."

Suho grits his teeth, and he feels his skull throb with the pressure. Cha Jaehwa broke her promise, and Ahn Suho would never forgive her.

"I like you."

Suho curls into himself. He never got an answer to his feelings, and he thinks he never will.

( Somewhere nearby, Jaehwa stares at her ceiling, thinking of a boy with tousled hair and a lopsided grin ).

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‎ ✧ AUTHOR'S NOTE !

i caved and made a whc1 fic at last!!

never made a fic that incorporates amnesia so this will be interesting ... this chapter did not go the way i wanted it to but i'm publishing it anyway because i can't leave a fic without its first chapter !!

hopefully the rest of the chapters go better than this one!! idk if i'll continue to use this 3 person pov or if it was just for the first chapter but we'll see 🤗

other than that pls lmk if there are any mistakes in the spelling or anything so i can fix it !

also don't b afraid to vote or comment, i will probably (very likely) reply!!!! and if you don't understand something, plsplspls lmk!! i want yall to fully understand what's going on

happy reads!

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─── ANNIE