✯ bank

@l jeno she nearly halts in her track at the failure to hear his footsteps receding, and she could already predict that she's upset him greatly—for the confusion that she was indeed his childhood friend, but at the same time, she wasn't and was never going to be now. that girl was too far gone. she tugs the lapels of her jacket closer for warmth and purses her lips in a desperate attempt to conceal that of her own threatening rivulets that coat her lash line in it's saccharine exposure. in all her nine years, this was her second time feeling as if she was swallowed whole, like she really was trapped in this endless, hopeless abyss of her mind. seeing lee jeno did that to her and when they met on the first day of grade school together, she had no idea just how much she'd mean to him, just as he'd mean to her in the long run.

nevertheless, he was a sliver of her past life, and no longer did she live that one. no, when she returned home, she'd have to pay the consequences of failing to capture a victim for the night, and the pain of the punishment received is what motivates her to ignore the beat of her heart, the rationality of her mind, and be olivia hye.

@s hyejoo jeno stares blankly at her, his brain refusing to process what he'd just heard. it's true that she seemed different—the way she dresses now: denims and leather jackets, with her hair longer and wavier than it was when they were younger, the veil of darkness on her visage that was alien to the amiable kid he once knew her as. it's impossible; this resemblance, the scar, the glint in her eyes... he was almost too positive that it was hyejoo, whom they all assumed to be dead some nine years ago. and the reality of it weighs on him, his eyes darts in various directions in a crazed fit. he is suddenly unsure if he'd just found out that he lived a lie, or if this was just him making up a story on a random stranger to find closure.

he doesn't spare the man a glance when he trudged away, only trained his vision on the girl before him, whose face contorted a little in annoyance as her date left her. he feels his sanity fleeting from him by the second, how despite all the puzzle pieces fitting inside his head, that the final picture still won't show up, and a simple "i'm olivia" and "i don't know you" could rattle his thoughts and confuse him so deeply that he's at a loss for words. his breath hitches as tears prickled at his eyes, sliding down his cheeks as he hastily looks away, dazed. he doesn't watch as she walked away, and makes no move to stop her. he just stands there for a while, feeling his tears dry as she turns the corner and fades from his sight, before he goes back to his bike, ready to head home and wash this encounter away in the shower.

@l jeno she closes her eyes to catch a momentary breather, though as he pursues on, it's more of a wince to how he says her birth name—partially worried that the drunken victim of hers would further inquire her, but as she remembers her given assignment, he's already stumbling his way off, probably finding the interaction between the two unworthy. damnit. he's costed her the mission for the night, but no, he was right; hyejoo is dead. the girl he recalls that was once full of purity, she's been long gone.

her face stiffens as he even dismounts his glasses, sporting his bare face for her to recognize and that only makes the ache in her chest rise. he's still as bright eyed and cute despite the timeline of nine years, but he was only reminiscent of everything she wasn't, that she could never get back; hope, a childhood. "i'm sorry, i think you have the wrong girl. my name isn't.. hyejoo," she murmurs to him, arms of hers now crossing over her chest as if to distance herself from him. "i'm olivia." it's funny—how in this particular moment, saying her new name leaves a distasteful feeling, almost as if it was untrue, but she manages to mask such with feigning a still expression. "and my ride just left, so if you don't mind, i'll be taking my leave," gesturing to the fading figure of her supposed 'date', she turns on her heel, nearly hurried to just avoid his countenance as she voice outs again. "i don't know a hyejoo and i don't know you.. jeno. trust me, we haven't met."

@s hyejoo he could pin it on his bad eyesight, or the long day at work, or both. maybe this girl just /looks/ like hyejoo, maybe he'd imagined the scar—and probably her face too. he could lie to himself and get consumed by his thoughts again, let the "who are you kidding, jeno? hyejoo's dead" stop him from pressing further and just walk away, embarrassed. but he sees it, the look in her eyes; albeit her attempt at concealing it, there was a glimpse of recognition. and the way she abruptly pulled away despite having gripped him firmly—almost as if she was ready to toss him over her shoulder—further pushes his narration. he spares a glance at the man next to her, grimacing at the miasma of alcohol hanging around him before his gaze settles back on her.

seeing her cold response, jeno grows desperate. "no, it's me, jeno! you're hyejoo, right?" he takes a step forward as she took one backwards, removing his glasses abruptly before putting them back on, thinking that she might not recognise him because of them. "i thought you were dead," he mumbles the first part of his sentence, the target audience was more to himself than anyone else. he suddenly remembers the devastation he felt when they told kid him about the news of her passing, his brims almost began to wet, but he holds them in before they could flow. "you're alive!" his eyes widens almost frantically behind his glasses, both of his palms held out to gesture at her.

@l jeno although she hears the evident sound of the bank doors opening, she doesn't care to turn around, for this encounter with the drunken man beside her is purely innocuous in all its ways - at least that's what it seemed. and just when she thinks she's got this victim in the bag, with his arm lazily slung around her waist, it's three things that have her halting in her step; first, the foreign force upon her shoulder that garners her attention, in which she turns to reflexively grasp onto the perpetrator's wrist. second, hyejoo. it's.. admittedly a name she hasn't heard in long awhile, not since she was renamed, that the way it rolls off his tongue has goosebumps crawling up her arms and her heart seizing in an abrupt rush of anxiety. third, his eyes. she could recognize those doe, umber irises from a dozen miles away. lee jeno. the realization of his identity has her recoiling her hand from his hurriedly, blinking as if he'd wisp away as a figment of her imagination, yet he doesn't. "...who? i don't.. i don't know who you're talking about," she says, now taking a cautious step back. "i don't know you."

@s hyejoo after suffering another day of being suffocated by his tie, jeno revels at the thought of being able to change into a set of comfortable clothes once he gets home. he loosens his tie a little and s his collar, pulling his worker tag off in the process. he then clocks out from work, stuffing his tag into his backpack before he strides towards where his bike was chained. normally he'd avoid glancing in any direction, afraid that he would meet eyes with people. but this time when he does, he finds himself doing a double take. as just half a foot away from him, talking to a shabbily dressed man, is a girl who resembled a deceased childhood friend of his. he didn't think it was possible, blinking his eyes and adjusting his glasses, convinced that what he saw was just an illusion, a phantom of his memory. but the resemblance was uncanny, and the similar scar on her right eyebrow was too much of a coincidence. seeing as she was already walking away with the man, he jogs up to them, palm reaching to pat her on her shoulder, his volume raised over the bustle of the city as he calls out to her. "hyejoo?"

@l jeno in all her time spent luring clueless, defenseless others to an unknown fate, couriered by hefty money, she's discovered that although it was easier to guarantee a mission success with little clothing, even a pair of denims and a leather jacket could get the work done. she's leaning up against a column of the bank, attempting to ignore the stench of alcohol wafting from the man's breath as he twirls her darkened tendril with his finger. "how about i take you back to mine?" he offers, now reaching to brush his knuckles onto her cheek, to which she (reluctantly) allows him to do so. with a voice so sultry-like, she responds with the mind to get this over with, "actually, i know a better place," she insists, straightening her posture to take his patted arm within her grasp. "you'll like it, promise."