The day was exceptionally warm. It seems like real spring is finally coming. While ordering an iced Americano and waiting, I gazed absent-mindedly at the cherry blossoms fluttering outside the cafe window.

Mother also loved flowers so much.

For patients suffering from lung diseases like Mother, pollen allergies were very fatal.

Not being able to see or touch something so beautiful up close.

When the ordered coffee came out, Eun Jae headed to the hospital holding the juice box she had bought to leave in Mother’s room.

It was around the time she was heading to Mother’s room. A man walking quickly while flipping through a chart bumped into Eun Jae, spilling the coffee she was holding all over his clothes.

“Ah, it’s cold.”

“Oh no. I’m so sorry.”

Eun Jae put down the drink she was holding on the floor and hurriedly went into Mother’s room to grab tissues and came back out.

As she rubbed the tissues on the man’s clothes, she finally noticed the white doctor’s gown he was wearing.

“Ah… Doctor, I’m so sorr…”

Bowing and looking up at the man, Eun Jae’s eyes met his and she couldn’t finish her sentence.

“What are you doing here?”

She covered her mouth upon seeing the man covered in coffee.

“Y-Yoon Tae Gyu?”

Tae Gyu softened his furrowed brow and snatched the tissues from Eun Jae’s hand to wipe his gown.

“I thought I saw wrong.”

“…”

“It is you, Ji Eun Jae.”

“I’m sorry.”

As Eun Jae frantically pressed the remaining tissues on the gown to wipe it, Tae Gyu quietly looked down at her and bent over to meet her eye level.

“Who’s hospitalized here?”

“Oh, someone I know.”

She didn’t feel the need to mention that it was her mother who was hospitalized.

Tae Gyu grinned while glancing at Eun Jae as he wiped the coffee-stained gown, as if something pleased him. Even though he felt Eun Jae’s gaze looking at him with disapproval, Tae Gyu stared at her unabashedly.

“What’s with that expression? You’re thinking ‘why is this guy here’, aren’t you?”

“No. I’ll go get more tissues.”

As Eun Jae tried to head towards Mother’s room, Tae Gyu grabbed her wrist and spun her back around, saying with a slight smile:

“I have another gown.”

“…”

“I was distracted by this and couldn’t see where I was going.”

Tae Gyu laughed as he tapped the wet chart. Right. He hadn’t been running in a hurry, but that jerk had bumped into her while walking with his face buried in the chart.

“Ah, it’s all wet.”

“Anyway, it was my coffee… I’m sorry.”

Tae Gyu smiled as he pressed tissues onto the chart to dry it. Then he dropped a line with clear intention:

“If you’re sorry, buy me a meal. Don’t run away like last time.”

“Are you a doctor here too?”

Why is everything overlapping like this? Same surname, doctor, even the same hospital.

“Yeah. Why, do you know another doctor here?”

“Ah, no?”

Seeing Eun Jae stumble over her words, Tae Gyu smiled brightly and pulled something out of his pocket to place in her hand.

It was that teddy bear keychain Eun Jae had left behind on the table.

“Why do you have this…?”

“I’m off tomorrow, so I’ll call you. Answer it.”

After cleaning up the hallway and entering the room belatedly, Mi Ran asked Eun Jae with eyes full of curiosity:

“Who was that? That handsome young man?”

“What handsome young man. He’s a high school classmate.”

Mi Ran’s eyes narrowed at Eun Jae’s nonchalant response. Eun Jae flinched at Mi Ran’s gaze and pressed the coffee pot button. Then she picked up the instant coffee packets and paper cups placed beside it.

“What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

“You had such a good-looking classmate in high school? He looked like a doctor at this hospital.”

“We weren’t that close. What are you thinking? Our mom is so greedy.”

As Eun Jae cut off Mi Ran’s thoughts, Mi Ran slapped her knee as if something had occurred to her.

“Ah, come to think of it, there was one. Do you remember that boy? The one who always brought his friends to our tteokbokki shop and boosted our sales. He was so handsome, I wonder whose son he was. What was his name again… Yoon… something.”

Mom, why is your memory so good? That was the guy from earlier.

“Mom, you remember him?”

“He came almost every day for 3 years. Wouldn’t it be strange not to remember?”

So, why don’t I remember much when you say that?

Is this what they mean by only seeing what you’re interested in? It seems to have flowed out of my memory like water, as if it wasn’t something I paid much attention to.

“Our Eun Jae, if you meet a rich and good husband candidate and get married, Mom will have no more wishes.”

“A rich and good husband candidate wants to marry me?”

“Why? What’s wrong with you, Eun Jae? It’s Mom’s wish now. For our Eun Jae to live doing everything she wants and eating everything she wants.”

Eun Jae took a sip of the steaming instant coffee while listening to Mi Ran’s words.

“It was originally Dad’s wish.”

After parting with Eun Jae, Tae Gyu’s steps gradually slowed as he walked flipping through the chart, until he stopped in the middle of the corridor facing an uphill slope.

The corridor in front of him leading to the ward changed into the path to school in front of the school building.

He first met her not long after entering high school.

On a morning when the rain that had been falling all night had thoroughly soaked the ground. On the way to school, he saw a female student from the same school walking up the slope with difficulty, wearing sneakers with completely untied laces. Since it was a relatively early hour, only he and that female student were on that road.

“She’ll fall flat on her face before she realizes.”

Despite dismissing it as no big deal, he kept following behind her. Every time she walked, the white shoelaces that had become soggy from the muddy water flapped around, constantly irritating Tae Gyu’s nerves.

“How can she not notice that?”

Should I tell her the laces are untied, or is that too meddlesome?

As if hearing Tae Gyu’s inner thoughts, the woman who had been walking for a while stopped and squatted down on the ground.

Did she finally notice the untied laces? Now that thing disturbing my view will disappear, he thought, raising an eyebrow and about to move away. Just then, the rain that had subsided for a moment suddenly started pouring down again.

Tae Gyu quickly opened the umbrella he was holding. Then he ran towards the woman who was tying her shoelaces. It was an action he committed before he could even think about it.

The woman who was tying her shoelaces noticed Tae Gyu and lifted her head high, smiling brightly. He could see transparent raindrops flowing down her forehead, dripping from her wet hair.

The woman’s eyelids blinked slowly as she met Tae Gyu’s gaze.

“Thank you.”

The woman who had finished tying her shoelaces bowed her head once more in gratitude. Before he could say anything, the woman put her schoolbag over her head and ran like an arrow towards the school gate.

Shaaaaa—

The sound of rain sprinkling on the roadside could be heard. Tae Gyu’s white sneakers were gradually getting soaked by the rainwater, but he couldn’t move from that spot for a long time.

He didn’t know then.

That the woman’s insignificant smile would come to consume his thoughts.

“All sorts of things are coming back to me.”

What stopped Tae Gyu’s thoughts was a phone call ringing in his pocket. Although it was an unsaved number, Tae Gyu immediately knew it was Da Jin.

Even though he deliberately called her by a different name to turn her off, it seems Da Jin still has lingering feelings for him. Tae Gyu shoved the phone that hadn’t hung up into his pocket and hurried his steps again.

“Don’t go far this time, Ji Eun Jae.”

Do you know that an ordinary day you don’t even remember has made me like this?

Around the time the man was getting off work, the sound of the front door opening was heard. Eun Jae, who had been talking on the phone with Ye Rim in her room, hurriedly ended the call and went out to the entrance.

“You’re back?”

Without realizing it, Eun Jae reached out towards the bag the man was holding, then quickly withdrew her hand, thinking this wasn’t right.

An awkward air flowed between the two facing each other. It felt just like a newlywed wife greeting her husband returning from work.

“Y-you should wash up.”

“I should.”

Sun Woo walked down the hallway wearing slippers. In the man’s right hand were a briefcase and jacket, and in his left hand was a bottle of juice.

The juice looked somehow familiar. Ah, it’s that orange juice I bought and left in Mom’s hospital room this morning.

As if noticing Eun Jae’s intent gaze, the man turned around and looked at her.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“I thought you only drank fresh-squeezed juice, so I was surprised to see you drink that kind.”

“A patient gave it to me, but I was too busy to drink it.”

As soon as he reached the table, the man opened the bottle and downed the juice in one gulp, then headed towards his room.

The image of Mom smiling brightly, saying the professor takes such good care of her, comes to mind.

The man never once showed off, even while doing things no one would know about unless told.

Sun Woo, who was coming out after showering, hesitated for a moment when he ran into Eun Jae.

It was because he had come out wearing just a robe. He had seen her when coming home from work, but was surprised to see the woman standing in the living room.

Having lived alone for nearly 10 years now, he would occasionally be startled when he came out without thinking and ran into the woman.

“Have your meal.”

The scenes from this morning flashed through his mind. It felt like the positions of the man and woman had been reversed.

Sun Woo’s gaze lingered for a moment on the woman’s pink linen apron as she transferred side dishes into white bowls.

“I’ll just change clothes and come out.”

A moment later, Sun Woo came out to the living room dressed comfortably. Eun Jae picked up the empty soup bowl and ladle as if she had been waiting. The man who had approached from the side peered into the kitchen.

“Is there anything I can help with?”

“No, please sit down. I just need to serve the soup.”

As the man sat at the table reluctantly, Eun Jae placed a bowl of soup she had kept warm in front of him.

It was the Korean beef bone soup they had eaten at her family home last night. She remembered her aunt in Seongsan telling her not to leave any leftovers, saying she had simmered it for fifteen hours with care until her ears hurt from hearing it so much.

Eun Jae placed a soup bowl in front of herself and sat down. Sun Woo scooped up some soup with his spoon and asked:

“What did you do today?”

“I went to the hospital.”

She swallowed the words about meeting her classmate Yoon Tae Gyu and possibly having to eat a meal with him tomorrow as punishment for spilling coffee on him, along with her food.

“You came all the way to the hospital and left without saying anything?”

“You’re busy, aren’t you?”

He was busy. Feeling bad about making the woman wait yesterday, he even ate breakfast which he usually skipped, and arrived at work on time, leaving no room to spare.

Though he hadn’t been expecting her to contact him, he thought she might at least stop by to see his face since she came to the hospital, so he felt a bit displeased that she left without contacting him. He didn’t know why. It was nothing, but it still bothered him for some reason.

“I have time to see your face briefly. Contact me next time.”

“Okay, I’ll do that.”

A smile formed on Sun Woo’s lips at the woman’s forthright answer. The woman’s eyebrows moved again as she put a tofu dish in her mouth.

Sun Woo’s gaze was directed at Eun Jae as she chewed.

“Dubu-seon.”

“Pardon?”

“What you just ate.”

“Ah, it’s really delicious.”

“Eat a lot. Tofu is a plant-based high-protein nutritious food.”

Adding to his words, as Sun Woo picked up the dubu-seon and was about to put some green onion sauce on it, Eun Jae couldn’t hold back her laughter and let out a sound.

“Pfft.”

“Why are you laughing?”

“You sounded just like a doctor right now.”

Sun Woo snorted and put the dubu-seon in his mouth.

“I am a doctor. In emergencies, I’m mister.”

“If we’re going to greet people next week, we should decide on how to address each other in advance, right? What do you prefer?”

“I think it would be better to call each other by name.”

“…Okay, Sun Woo.”

After hesitating for a moment, the woman called Sun Woo’s name. If there had been food left in his mouth, a terrible thing would have happened. Sun Woo coughed and choked, grabbing a tissue to wipe his mouth.

Unlike his startled reaction, the woman continued speaking calmly.

“It’s practice, so I don’t make mistakes later.”

“Practice… right. We should do it a lot.”

“They say your grandfather is very perceptive. What if I make a mistake? You know I don’t have money to spit out.”

As she spoke, the woman ate some soup and began sharing her impressions of the soup, starting with how savory it was.

Sun Woo couldn’t help but smile at her talking about things he had never thought of while eating soup.

Sun Woo recalled the appearance of the set table, and putting the dishes on the countertop last night.

“About the part-time job.”

“The part-time job?”

“I don’t think you need to look far.”

“Are you offering to introduce me?”

When Eun Jae asked with a bright expression, Sun Woo nodded with a smile.

“Let’s talk over tea later.”