What Happened to Enos'

Little Girl?

by KayCee1951

Part One

Chapter Eleven

The Effect of Moonlight on Crimson Thread

August 6, 2022, under a waxing gibbous moon

"You can put me down now," Esme said.

Min-jun either didn't hear or wasn't listening. He only held onto Esme tighter and gazed at her until she was afraid that she would become hopelessly lost in his deep brown eyes. Pulling her face into his shoulder, she buried herself in it until the longing to stop fighting it was manageable. How could she have fallen this far, this fast?

"Esmeralda…" he whispered into her soft curls and scrunched her even closer. "I don't want to let you go. I can't…"

They remained that way, neither daring to move nor yield until Esme whimpered, "I really need you to put me down."

When he didn't comply immediately, she begged, "Please, Min-Jun…"

He loosened his hold and let her slowly slip out of his arms. And then looked on helplessly as she held up the extra fabric of her gray pants and hurried to her room. With the door closed, she felt she could breathe. She had not been able to breathe while he held her in his arms. He embraced her with such an intensity that it overwhelmed her.

A few minutes later, there was a loud crashing sound and then Min-jun's footsteps fleeing the house. Esme sat upright on the crimson palette, staring at the door for the longest time, finally asking herself, "What did I expect when I decided I didn't want to leave…that I wanted to be with him? Am I ready to be 'with' Min-jun when everything about him is extraordinary and extreme?"

What if she couldn't live on the edge as he did? He'd never told Esme specifically what kind of soldier he was…he didn't have to. His dreams were enough to fill in the blanks. Outside the confines of the temple's harmony, he jumped from perfectly good airplanes into hell and ran headlong into situations from which others were fleeing. The hairline scar along his left jawline testified that he'd been wounded...badly. That was a scar that was visible. Was she ready for the ones she hadn't seen, or those hidden deep in his psyche?

After a couple of hours stewing over how to resolve her dilemma, Esme dressed in the jeans and tee Min-jun had laundered for her. Grabbing a bottle of water from the ice block cold storage she made a mental note that they would need a new ice block soon.

She was at the edge of the garden where Min-jun was attacking the ground with extreme prejudice before she realized how casual her thought about the ice had been…as if a part of her had already settled into a new reality.

Without a word, Min-jun picked up a long-bladed drain spade and handed her the old groundbreaking shovel and a pair of gloves to keep from stripping the skin off her palms. He plunged the spade into the corner of the pond where he had unearthed the coping stones and wiggled it a couple of times to loosen the soil.

"I thought we were going to clear the debris on the top before—"

He fixed an intense gaze upon her and said, "I figure we should find out how deep this goes before we move on."

Esme couldn't find any words or reason for him to be wrong. She began to loosen the soil in an adjacent area so that Min-jun's burden might be a little easier to bear. She was still afraid she would not be his savior but his downfall. To do what he must do in the world beyond this hideaway required him to be invincible. Yet she had taken him down with a few harshly spoken words. How was it that she was supposed to save him when she was the one who made him vulnerable?

While Esme was concerned about becoming his Achilles heel, Min-jun was afraid to broach the subject of his dreams and worried his growing desire for the feisty little redhead would overcome his good judgment. Regardless of his fear of luring her into a life with few certainties, parting from her before his leave expired was no longer an option for him. In the short term, he had to keep her there…with him…for as long as possible. It was now not only about his dreams. Maybe it never was. In the long term…he was almost afraid to think about that possibility.

Dinner at the Hanok house was neither silent nor distant, but a quiet anticipation that set in as they went about the clean-up chores. The food was put away, the dishes were done, and they took their turns in the shower without a single word passing between them.

They each retired to their rooms with only a generic "Goodnight." Esme couldn't guess what was going through Min-jun's mind, but hers was filled with a terminal ache. He deserved more than her indecision. It was no longer a game or light banter, this thing between them. The questions no longer plagued Esme. She no longer cared about how they came together or why.

The one thing she knew for sure was that the depth of the pond was no longer a mystery. It was deeper than a bottomless abyss and more intense than a California wildfire.

August 7, 2022,

just after midnight under a waxing gibbous moon

Min-jun slid the door to the bathroom open and found Esme standing in front of him wearing the girl clothes he had left for her that first night. His hair was wet from his third shower and he wore only a towel wrapped around him and tied at the waist.

Esme didn't have time to get out two words of apology she had practiced because he covered the distance between them and pulled her into a tight embrace. When he felt no resistance, he bent down to kiss her, but she made a preemptive strike.

Their lips didn't part even when he scooped her into his arms and carried her to his room. She was neither frightened nor ashamed. They shared a mutual desire that could never be quenched with just a kiss. When he whispered, "Salanghaeyo, Esmeralda," in her ear, any shred of misgivings or guilt she might have had before vanished. 1)

References and Translations:

"Salanghaeyou" means "I love you" in Korean.