Chapter 3

Enrique at first thought that it was Dok Mi, but it was too high pitched to be her. It sounded like it was coming from the staircase. Enrique didn't want to leave before he found out where Dok Mi was, but she clearly wasn't in her apartment. He glanced at Jin Rak before running down the stairs.

Stairs… neither he nor Jin Rak ever checked the staircase for her. The scream clearly wasn't Dok Mi's, but that didn't mean…

Panic started to rush over Enrique. How could he be so stupid as to not check the stairs? And why would she walk down the stairs when there was an elevator right outside her door?

Enrique's brisk walk turned into a run as the sequence of events began to form in his head. He stopped dead in his tracks when he hit the second floor.

His eyes widened as he took in the scene at the bottom of the staircase. Turned away from him was a woman, the one who had screamed, Enrique presumed. But that wasn't what scared him. She was kneeling in front of someone. Enrique didn't want to believe it, but he was certain it was Go Dok Mi.

The first thing Enrique noticed was the blood. There wasn't a lot of it, but Enrique's panic turned the small in pool into an ocean from which his Ahjumma would never return from.

He ran forward and roughly pushed the other woman away and knelt next to her. He couldn't think clearly. She was obviously unconscious, but for how long?

Was she alive? He should check to see if her heart was beating, but he couldn't make himself move down to find a pulse. His entire world was lying unconscious in front of him, but he couldn't make himself do anything to help her.

He finally reached out and brushed a piece of bloody hair off of her forehead, "Dok Mi?" he asked shakily, "Can you hear me, Go Dok Mi?"

He shook her gently, but she gave no response. He wanted to do anything it took to wake her, but if she suffered a head injury… no, he couldn't think about her dying. Just the thought of it would make him useless and she needed him right now. Enrique looked back up at the stairs and saw Jin Rak at the top staring down at them blankly, "Jin Rak, go call an ambulance."

"Wouldn't it be faster to drive her ourselves?"

"We don't want to shake her so much. She could have brain damage or something. Go call an ambulance"

Jin Rak knew better than to argue, so he ran out the door cell, phone in hand. Enrique turned to Dok Mi again. The blood at least looked like it had stopped flowing. Now that Enrique's hysteria was at bay, he noticed her chest rising and falling. She was breathing. He let out a small sigh of relief.

He turned to the woman who was cowering against the wall, "I'm sorry for pushing you," he sighed, "I panicked"

"It's alright," she said softly, "I think I'm going to go now"

Enrique nodded and watched her walk up the stairs. He heard sirens a moment later. He would be swarmed by paramedics soon. He wanted Dok Mi to be in the hands of professionals, but he also wanted to be by her side. Was this how she had felt when he got hit by the car? No, she didn't even love him then. She couldn't have felt like this. He knew that Dok Mi loved him, but he sometimes felt that it wasn't possible for her to love him as much as he loved her.

When he said that she was his world, he had been telling the truth. He had games and animations, but he would have given it all up without a second thought if it meant being with her. He almost had, but he saw she wouldn't be happy if he gave up his dreams for her. She had been so stupid. She thought he'd miss it and leave her. But everything had changed for him when he met her. He'd realized as soon as he saw her looking at the ocean that he wanted to be with her as much as he could for as long as he could.

It had been difficult getting close to her. At first, he thought he would only have to climb the walls she had put up to protect herself, but he soon realized that he'd have to tear them down completely to get her to love him. He reached for her hand without realizing it and gave it a small squeeze, "You'll be alright, Ahjumma" he whispered, "I promised I wouldn't let anything happen to you."

He saw someone on the stairwell with his peripheral vision. A paramedic. He let go of Dok Mi's hand and let the Doctor get to work