CALL ME • MYUNG JAEHYUN - Chapter 16: Chapter 16

There was a kind of silence that didn’t feel empty. The kind that stretched between two people who didn’t need to fill it—just let it breathe.
Jaehyun sat beside me, close enough that I could hear the soft scratch of his sleeve every time he shifted. The sun filtered through the pale curtains, casting warm shapes across the white floor. Outside, I could hear the city carrying on without us. Cars. Life. Wind.
Inside, everything stayed still.
“I forgot what quiet like this felt like,” I said after a while, staring at the ceiling. “Not the lonely kind. Just… quiet.”
He leaned back in his chair, arms folded over his chest, head tilted like he was trying to see the same sky I was.
“Maybe that’s why I stayed,” he said. “You looked like you needed it.”
I smiled faintly. “I don’t remember asking.”
He chuckled under his breath. “You didn’t have to.”
The silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable.
But then, he shifted forward. Elbows on his knees. Voice a little more serious.
“…I put my old number back.”
I blinked, turning my head slowly toward him. “What?”
He rubbed the back of his neck, almost sheepishly. “The one you used to text. The one that probably bounced everything back to you.”
I froze.
My hands instinctively gripped the edge of the blanket. “Why?”
He didn’t answer right away. Just stared at the floor like the words were buried under it.
“Hyejin told me,” he finally said. “About the messages.”
A flicker of heat touched my face, the kind that comes from being seen when you didn’t think anyone ever would.
“She said you kept texting. Even when I wasn’t there to read them.”
I looked down at my hands. “I didn’t think they’d go through. I just… I had nowhere else to put those thoughts.”
His voice dropped a little, like it was meant just for the space between us. “Now they will.”
I glanced at him. His eyes didn’t waver.
“She helped me get the number back. Just in case.” He swallowed. “In case you ever want to send something again. Or call.”
My throat tightened.
“But what if I don’t?” I whispered. “What if I don’t have anything left to say?”
“Then don’t.” His gaze stayed soft. “But if one day, you do... I’ll answer this time.”
I closed my eyes for a second, just to breathe.
That stupid, reckless part of me wanted to believe it. That maybe we weren’t too far gone. That maybe, somehow, we had a chance to rewrite even just one moment.
He shifted again, standing slowly. “I’m not going anywhere. You don’t have to say anything now.”
He hesitated, then pulled out a small slip of paper from his pocket—scribbled numbers, his handwriting unmistakable.
He left it on the table beside the bed.
“I’ll be back tomorrow,” he said gently.
As he moved toward the door, I found myself gripping the blanket tighter.
“Jaehyun.”
He turned.
I looked at him for a long moment, the way you look at something you know you might lose again.
“…Even if I don’t call,” I said, voice small, “just—stay for a while when you’re here, okay?”
By the time the sky outside turned to a dim orange melt, I could feel the room around me dimming too.
Not in color—those were long gone from my world now. But in the way sound softened, how the breeze through the half-cracked window got colder. How the weight of time felt heavier across my body.
I heard the chair creak beside me. Then the faint rustle of fabric, the shuffle of sneakers. I didn’t need to see to know what it meant.
“You’re going?” I asked, voice quieter than I meant.
Jaehyun stilled. “Yeah… it’s getting late.”
I nodded once, letting the silence settle between us again like dust. I counted his steps until they stopped beside me.
“I’ll come back tomorrow,” he said, and this time his voice wasn’t soft—it was sure.
I almost smiled at the certainty in it. Almost.
“Okay,” I murmured. “But if you don’t… I won’t know anyway.”
He let out a small breath. “You’ll know. I talk too much for someone trying to sneak out of anything.”
That made me laugh a little, just enough to feel my chest lift.
I reached out, hand grazing the air until I felt his fingers brush against mine. Warm. Still here.
“…Can I ask something stupid?” I whispered.
“Yeah.”
“If I never see you again… not just today, I mean—ever—can you tell me something now? Something I can hold on to?”
He was quiet. The kind of quiet that made the air feel thick.
Then he sat back down, just for a moment. I could feel his presence settle beside me again.
“I still remember the first time you said my name,” he said softly. “It was raining. You were annoyed at me. Said I was being loud and immature.”
I frowned. “That sounds like me.”
He chuckled under his breath. “I liked the way you said it. Like it meant something.”
I turned my face toward him. “It did.”
A pause.
“I’m sorry,” he added, voice cracking in a way I hadn’t heard from him before. “For not answering sooner. For not being there when you needed someone the most.”
My throat tightened, but I didn’t cry. I couldn’t. Not when he sounded like that.
“You’re here now,” I whispered. “That’s enough.”
I heard him stand again.
This time, he didn’t step away right away. Instead, I felt his hand lightly squeeze mine.
“See you tomorrow, Eunhye.”
“Promise?”
“I swear.”
And then, he was gone.
I lay there in the soft hush of the room, replaying the way he said my name. The way his voice held onto it like a secret.
Even blind, I could see that much.
And somehow, it felt like enough for one night.