"You must have been out of your mind, Song Hyejin," she said to feather duster she was holding in her hand.

Every now and then the memory of her ambushing Hyunwon with that kiss on the cheek would float back into her mind, and it would make her cringe. Thinking about the stunned look on his face the second after was both comical and embarrassing for her at the same time, although she didn't stick around long enough to figure out whether or not that initial shock would evolve into a complete Hyunwon meltdown. In any case, they kept out of each other's way for the rest of that day, and the day after, and perhaps that would need to continue until they managed to get over that awkwardness between them.

"But there's nothing wrong with kissing on the cheek, right?" she asked the porcelain pug she was dusting on the shelf. "People give each other kisses on the cheek all the time! My grandmother used to do to me when I was a kid, and so did my aunts from time to time. At the airport you see people exchanging kisses with friends and loved ones at the departure hall too. It doesn't mean anything! It's just a friendly gesture, right?"

The pug didn't seem to want to give her an answer.

Sighing, Hyejin flopped down onto the leather sofa and buried her face against one of the expensive-looking cushions lying on it. When she had somewhat come back to her senses, she looked up and surveyed her surroundings. "This place looks much too sterile to be someone's home," she remarked. Other than a few old photographs in photo frames and that lonely porcelain pug figurine sitting on the shelf, there was little else to distinguish this particular apartment from a showflat. Even the expensive furniture looked like they were display sets shipped directly out of a high-end furniture store, with no signs of the wear-and-tear that you would expect to see in the furniture of a lived-in house.

Ares was out having an interview at some radio station, so he had just given her the entry code to his house so that she could let herself in. He lived alone in a small (but undoubtedly luxurious) apartment in the Gangnam area, and given that he only used the place to sleep in for a couple of hours every day, there was hardly any mess to clean up at all. In one hour she had already dusted every possible corner in the house and mopped the floor once over.

Leaving the feather duster on the sofa, she picked herself up and walked over to the kitchen. She flung open the refrigerator door, wondering if she could make herself more useful by helping him stock up on anything that he was running low on—to her horror, the fridge was completely empty save for some bottles of mineral water and beer.

"This isn't anyone's home, it's a freaking hotel," she mumbled to herself in disapproval.

Shutting the fridge door, she moved on to examine the various kitchen cabinets to see if the situation was as bad as the fridge. Sure enough, almost all the cabinets were empty except for some loose pots and pans (that looked brand new) lying around. She shook her head and went out to dig around for a memo pad so that she could scribble down a shopping list—this house was in desperate need of a rescue.

When she was done listing down all the things she needed to get for the kitchen, she moved on to search other parts of the house for items to add to her list.

"Should probably get more shampoo and conditioner," she murmured as she picked up the shampoo bottle in the master bathroom and realised it was feeling rather light. Scribbling the brand and type of shampoo down onto her list, she backed out into the bedroom and looked around. She absentmindedly opened and closed cupboards and drawers, curiously snooping around Ares's impeccably coordinated room. He had a drawer for socks, a drawer for ties, a drawer for knickers (she slammed that one shut rather hastily) and even a drawer for branded watches, which she found the most impressive of them all. Inside his wardrobe hung the most extensive collection of suits, shirts and casual wear she had ever seen ("That has got to be enough to open a shop."), and her jaw dropped in amazement when she realised that the wardrobe rack could be rotated like an automated conveyor belt when you pressed a button on the side.

"So this is what a top star's room is like," Hyejin remarked, rather impressed with the collection that he had.

Sliding open the bedside drawer, she frowned, picking up the first thing that caught her eye. It was a small white bottle with the word "Restoril" printed on the label. Flicking open the bottle lid, she saw that there were only a handful of white pills left inside.

"Sleeping pills? Can't help to buy more of those without a doctor's prescription." She recognised the medication because her father's physician had also prescribed some of these pills for him previously, so that he could get enough rest to keep his blood pressure down. Looking back down into the drawer, she saw that there were two other pill bottles sitting inside, although she didn't recognise the other two. "Is he unwell?" she mumbled to herself, placing the bottle of Restoril back where it came from.

A beep from the main door distracted her from her thoughts—she quickly shut the drawer and made her way back out to the living room.

Ares was kicking off his shoes by the door, one hand resting on the wall to stabilise himself. When he caught sight of her, his tired face broke out into a bright smile. "How's it going?" he asked. "It's not so bad isn't it? I tidied things up somewhat last night."

"Isn't the whole point of hiring a cleaning lady so that someone can do the tidying up for you?" Hyejin rolled her eyes, wondering whether or not Ares had a brain. "I did a round of dusting and I also mopped the floor. Some areas may still be wet, so be careful when you walk." Waving her shopping list in the air, she said, "I still have forty-five minutes to go so I'm just going to head down to the supermarket to pick up some stuff for you. It's ridiculous that you have no food in your fridge, and your shampoo also needs replenishing."

"Give me a moment, I'm just going to get a change of clothes and then I'll come with you," Ares replied, walking towards his bedroom.

"You don't have to. I can go on my own!"

"Do you know where the nearest supermarket is?" Ares hollered.

Hyejin scratched her head, thinking about his question seriously for a second. The answer was no, she didn't know where the nearest supermarket was—in fact it had taken her an entire hour of being lost before she found Ares's apartment block. Even though she had been working at the Cutting Edge for a while now, the only routes she recognised were from the station to the salon and from the salon to the cafe where Hyunwon liked his coffee from.

She followed behind Ares as he led her two streets down to a 24-hour supermarket that was oddly rather empty at this time of night—apparently the residents of Gangnam hardly ever did their own grocery shopping. Hyejin figured they were mostly like Ares and hardly spent enough time at home to warrant stocking up the fridge.

Looking down at her list, she went down the aisles searching for what she wanted to buy, with Ares pushing his trolley behind her.

"Aren't you afraid that someone will see you?" she asked as she picked up a carton of orange juice and apple juice, holding them up in front of him.

"Orange," he said, pointing to the orange juice carton, "but without pulp." He wasn't wearing a cap today like he usually did when he was out incognito, instead he had simply thrown up the hood of his grey jacket. "It's fine, there are more famous people living around here than me. Didn't you see Lee Minho leave the supermarket when we were entering? He lives in the next block. Anyway it's not that newsworthy to snap pictures of celebrities shopping for carrots these days."

"Lee Min-who?" Hyejin blinked. Must be another celebrity that she didn't recognise. She still put the carton of orange juice, with pulp, into the trolley anyway. "Pulp is good for bowel movement," she declared.

Ares grinned, saying, "That was what my grandma used to say too."

Since Ares wasn't at home most of the time, Hyejin decided it wasn't wise to buy too much food that he wouldn't be able to cook and eat anyway. She picked up some bread rolls for breakfast and vegetables for salad, which she figured should be easy enough to put together to store in the fridge.

"Just curious, but do you have trouble sleeping at night?" Hyejin asked, suddenly recalling the bottle of sleeping pills as they happened to walk past the pharmacy.

Ares gripped the handle of the shopping trolley a little more tightly, letting out an uncomfortable laugh. "Sometimes," he replied. "I don't get very many hours of sleep a day because of my schedules, so I need to make sure that I'm actually asleep for however few hours I get."

"Your bottle of Restoril is running out, you might want to get more from the pharmacist, although I remember it needing a doctor's prescription. I saw two other medicine bottles in your drawer though—sorry I wasn't trying to snoop but I was just looking around to see if anything needed buying—what are those for?"

"Umm, they're just some normal painkillers. For when I get muscle aches and cramps, or headaches sometimes."

Hyejin reached out to pick up a new bottle of shampoo, but she paused when something didn't sound quite right. Why would anyone need two different bottles of painkillers? And surely off-the-rack paracetamol would suffice? Turning back towards Ares, she was about to ask him more questions to satisfy her curiosity, but she realised he had already pushed the trolley further ahead and was now rounding the aisle corner.

"Life must be tough as a celebrity," she remarked to the shampoo bottle, before grabbing another bottle off the shelf and chasing along after him.

#

Hong Kong would be the first time Hyejin had left the shores of Korea, the furthest she had ever gone being Jeju island. As a result, she pretty much had no idea what to pack and so brought every single item she thought might be vaguely useful, including two tupperwares full of home-made kimchi just in case there wasn't any in Hong Kong.

Lugging the suitcase she had borrowed from the neighbour behind her, she struggled through the front door of the airport, looking around in search of the counter where they were supposed to meet. Adjusting the strap of her ridiculously heavy duffel bag, she peered around the departure hall, a little disoriented by the sheer number of people milling about.

"Aha!" she exclaimed when she finally caught sight of the huge number "7" sticking out from one row of counters. Dragging her luggage behind her, she huffed and puffed until she finally managed to get everything to the correct counter.

"We almost thought you weren't going to make it," Hannah drawled, lowering her Chanel shades to toss Hyejin a look of disappointment. "We were going to check-in without you."

Hyejing ignored the girl, pushing past her to where Remington was collecting passports for check-in.

Remington took one look at her luggage and couldn't disguise the shock in his eyes. "We're only going for three days, Hyejin. Is all that truly necessary?" he asked in his slight French accent. His chic, branded luggage bag sat beside hers, looking like it was about to be swallowed alive by her outdated monstrosity.

Hyejin gave him an embarrassed smile, realising just how out of place her luggage looked among the rest. She quickly handed over her passport and retreated away, wishing she could just fade into the background.

Standing alone in one corner, she watched as Remington expertly handled their check-in and all the suitcases went down the conveyor belt one by one. Hannah was standing with Julya, the only other trainee who would be with them on this trip, and neither of them looked particularly interested in involving her in their conversation. As her eyes continued roving, she spotted a lone figure sitting on one of the chairs, casually reading on his iPad.

By now her shoulder was aching from carrying her duffel all the way, so she let it drag on the floor as she made her way towards him. When she sat down beside him, his back immediately straightened itself a notch, and he quickly withdrew his elbows from the armrests. Other than that, he generally pretended that she didn't exist.

"Morning," Hyejin said cheerily. All she received was a grunt in response, and Hyunwon continued keeping his eyes glued to his iPad screen. "I think I packed a little too much for Hong Kong, but I've never been there before so I just ended up packing a little of everything to be safe." Right now, Remington was struggling to lift her luggage into the conveyor belt. "You must have been there many times, right? What's the place like?"

Hyunwon jabbed at his iPad screen and swiped the page of the e-magazine that he was reading, finding it increasingly difficult to treat her as empty air when she was continuously jabbering on like this. "It's just an average city," he said curtly.

"Oh, is that it?"

"Yeah that's it."

"But what's there to do in Hong Kong? I heard that there's a lot of good food over there. One of my schoolmates went to Hong Kong with her family once, and she said the dimsum there is a must-try because it's cheap and delicious. Oh, and she showed us lots of photos of them at Hong Kong's Disneyland! I've always wanted to go to Disneyland, but they just refuse to build one here in Korea."

Does this girl not know when to stop talking? Hyunwon thought to himself in annoyance. He thought he was already making it bleedingly obvious that he didn't particularly want to entertain her right now, yet she didn't seem to be getting the hint. He turned his head towards her, wanting to open his mouth to tell her to just keep quiet, but the moment their eyes met he quickly changed his mind and diverted his gaze. Just looking at her made him recall the flaming sensation on his right cheek where she had left her mark.

Hyejin stared at Hyunwon curiously, wondering why on earth his face seemed to be getting redder and redder by the second. It was then when it finally hit her. Is he still embarrassed because of that? Immediately after she had kissed him on the cheek, Hyunwon's face had gone bright red as well, two shades redder than it was now. And that was when she had taken off because she didn't want to have to deal with the aftermath of her impulsiveness. In her haste to find someone familiar to talk to in the airport, she had completely forgotten about that.

Her hand flew to her mouth, trying to stifle a giggle. Hyunwon looked quite adorable in his blushing awkwardness, and as much as he was trying to hide it, the way he was frantically swiping at his iPad gave everything away.

Thankfully, Remington came over to rescue him from self-imploding, handing out their boarding passes to them. "Here you go, the two of you are on 35A and 35B respectively—35A is a window seat. Lucky you, Hyejin," he said with a wink.

Hyunwon stood up and dragged Remington a couple of steps away by the sleeve of his blazer. "Why are the two of us seated together?" he hissed in his friend's ear.

"What's the matter with that? It's a small plane, so all the seats are in pairs. Hyejin isn't exactly on the best of terms with the other two trainees and the others have all figured out who they're sitting with, so there's only you left."

"What about you! Why can't I sit with you?"

Remington laughed sheepishly, holding up his own boarding pass. "I sort of used my frequent flyer miles to get myself a free upgrade to business class," he said.

Hyunwon baulked at his response and shot him a hateful glare. "I always knew you couldn't be trusted," he said, giving Remington a shove on the shoulder before walking back to the row of chairs. Hyejin was still sitting there, peering at him curiously. He avoided her gaze and hastily threw his iPad into his bag, before turning to head towards the departure hall.

As he was queuing up to get his passport checked, he glanced down at his boarding pass once more, frowning at the 35B that was printed on it. Turning round, he looked around to see where everyone else was, catching sight of Hyejin having some difficulty dragging her huge duffel bag towards the customs checkpoint.

"What on earth did she bring along? Gold bars?" he muttered under his breath. Sighing, he did a U-turn and left the queue.

Hyejin was beginning to regret bringing along her thickest winter coat (that basically weighed a ton) and her favourite copper pot for cooking ramen in the hotel room in case she wasn't used to the food in Hong Kong—the portable induction cooker was in her suitcase, but the pot simply wouldn't fit. She was still struggling to get her bag from point A to point B when Hyunwon suddenly appeared out of nowhere and grabbed her duffel off the floor, swinging it across his shoulder.

"The salon isn't going to pay for a second air ticket for you if you miss the plane because of your stupid bag," he said coldly. With that, he simply marched off in the direction from which he came and re-joined the queue like he had never left.

As she watched him standing there in line with that godawful duffel bag round his shoulder, Hyejin couldn't help but smile. You can stop pretending, Kang Hyunwon. If you want to be helpful, then just say it, she thought to herself. But then again, if he did, then he wouldn't be Kang Hyunwon anymore, and perhaps she wouldn't like him quite as much as she did.

#

Sorry for the long wait everyone! The festive season has just been too busy :( Happy 2019 folks! May you all be blessed with a wonderful new year!