run away, take my hand [jihye]

[DILL R.]

School was starting tomorrow. What a drag. The long summer was coming to a close and that was always sad, even if Dill didn't dislike school or even the season of autumn. Still, summer was loads of fun and he could spend all of his free time with his friends, instead of just the moments between classes and homework and other teenagerly duties.

He had been trying to spend the last few days of summer as best he could, but apparently everyone was busy right now. Dill was planning on meeting up with a few of them later on, but for now he was completely free and that was just strange to him. Sitting around the house was boring and if he was there too long, his mom would make him clean something. so he decided to go for a walk.

Stepping out of his house in the residential district, he made his way through the meandering streets until he stepped into the business district, the surface beneath his feet a rustic cobblestone instead of a practical asphalt.

Dill had always liked Primula, but then again, he'd never lived anywhere else. He had been to Victorialis City of course, almost everyone had. There were some things that Primula just didn't have...and it was fun to see bigger and "better" things. But in all reality the blonde teen just enjoyed the slow-paced small town that was Primula, and doubted he would ever leave. That could always change, though.

But Dill was one to live in the present. He didn't dwell on the past and he didn't spend much time thinking about the future. The past was gone and the future was yet to come; why not live in the moment you're in? That was his mantra anyways.

Walking through town he happened across a girl he had never seen before. This was strange, since she looked to be high-school aged and he knew everyone who was in high school, especially those his age. It was a small town; everyone knew everyone unless they just arrived yesterday or something. Maybe she was new in town! That had to be the explanation.

She looked different, though. Her hair was pink and insanely long, but that wasn't necessarily out of place in Primula. There were people with odd-colored hair...hell, there were people who could use magic and mermaids as well as alleged gods and goddesses. Long pink hair wasn't weird in Primula. But there was something about her face, her features, even her aura that was different from the natives of the peninsula and it intrigued him. Plus she was pretty cute, so that just gave him another excuse to study her face.

The girl didn't seem to notice him though. She was more preoccupied with something in her hands. What was that device? Oh...a cell phone. He had one but he barely used it. The cellular service in Primula wasn't the best, so it didn't work very well. Sometimes he wondered why people had cell phones at all. But this girl did, and she was very, very absorbed in it. What was she doing?

He inspected closer, and realized she was taking pictures with it, then judging them after each snap. A little interested, he stepped forward. Dill wasn't one to be shy, not in the slightest. He also wasn't very good at being tactful, so even though this girl was probably busy or not in the mood for talking (her expression said that much), he decided to say something to her anyways.

"You know, most people use actual cameras for that sort of thing," he said; even though his remark was a bit sassy, a smile was pulling at his lips. That's just how the tall blonde teen was, and that was how he tried to be friendly. How she would take that remark would be a different thing entirely.

[JI-HYE A.]

T

he dreadful waning of summer. That was what was making Ji-hye frown, as she paced back and forth between the walls in a random alley trying to get enough reception to at least check the online local newspaper in Busan. But alas, there was never enough to even read more than one article.

It wasn't as if she loved reading news articles online, but she liked to check in on how things were going back in her home city. What was going on, what had happened, what was going to happen. She was curious. And homesick.

Even though she had been living in Primula for, what, two years now, she still very much missed the city she had used to live in. And she definitely still couldn't get used to the poor cell phone coverage. What was up with that anyway? Why was the reception so bad in this town?

Ji-hye frowned down at the screen of her cell phone, waving it around a little to see if there was perhaps a spot she had missed, but the tiny bars in the top corner didn't change. The pinklette sighed, realising her defeat. She flipped the phone shut and put it in her pocket, while her legs brought her out of the alley and out into the streets.

Why she had tried to get reception between two buildings, no one knew. Ji-hye wasn't bright enough to understand that the best reception would be out in the open, not inbetween somewhere, blocking out the signal.

Well away from her starting point, Ji-hye was about to sit down at one of the benches outside a cute little bakery - where she intended to go inside and buy some kind of pastry as soon as she got hungry - and relax. However, as she apprached it, she spotted a brown tabby in the corner of her eye, sitting underneath the bakery's window sill.

Without thought, she instantly retrieved her phone from her pocket and flipped it open, moving closer - though very slowly - to take a picture.

"Please don't move, mr. cat," she whispered, "please just sit right there so I can take a picture, okay?" The camera function was ready, and she went on to snap a few pictures of the majestic looking tabby - really, Ji-hye's interests and fascinations were forces to be reckoned with - while she crouched down for a better angle.

She didn't expect someone to come up behind her, however, and as soon as they opened their mouth, Ji-hye was so startled she managed to step on her own hair - having been crouched down - and eventually trip, face-forward.

The cat, after enjoying washing itself, was startled too, and immediately ran for it as soon as Ji-hye hit the ground.

The pinklette groaned, pushing herself up from the cobblestones onto her knees in a sitting position. However, she wasn't angry with having been interrupted. Instead, she simply responded to what he had said to make her fall.

"This has a camera," she said casually.

The hand that held onto the phone - why hadn't she dropped it when she tipped over to catch her fall? - stretched out towards the male to show him. She hadn't yet looked upon his face, but she could see his feet as she finally pushed herself up on her own.

"My phone can take pictures just as good as any ordinary camera," she faced the screen of her phone back to herself, "so I don't have one."

         

MADE BY HABBUE

[DILL R.]

He hadn't expected the girl to just fall over like that. It startled him too and as the cat jumped away, he jumped back a little bit. Had he really been that sneaky? He hadn't thought so. Still, the girl was probably absorbed in her photography — if you could call it that, with a phone — of the cat that had ran away.

"Sorry," he mumbled, moving to try and help her up, but she seemed to have it on her own. Besides, she didn't seem angry. That was a good sign. At least he hadn't pissed her off...even though he thought she was weird for being so apparently attached to her phone, she was still super cute. What he could see of her face, anyway. It was mostly covered by the phone.

"Cell phones aren't really a big thing here," he shrugged in response to what she said. "So most people just use regular cameras. There isn't very good signal in town because of the buildings." Dill wasn't the smartest person on the peninsula but he knew to get good service you had to go out into the less populated area. It seemed counter intuitive but since there weren't any buildings out there, the signal didn't get trapped or blocked.

All of that aside, though, he was still really curious who this girl was. Smirking a little he shoved his hands in his pockets casually, resting a leg while the other held his weight. "So...what's your name? I haven't seen you around and that's weird, because I know almost everyone in town. Kind of because it's small but mostly because I'm just super popular."

He really wasn't super popular...not that he was an outcast by any means. Dill was too outgoing to be an outcast. But he wasn't a stereotypical popular kid, though there weren't many of those in Primula. The ones that acted like that were actually the ones with the least amount of friends, unlike what TV shows and movies said.

[JI-HYE A.]

S

he started flipping through the few pictures she had gotten to take before she was - quite rudely - abrupted. At least she heard him apologize, though it was very quiet, even though that went a little over her head as she looked at the pictures of the tabby on her phone. There was no smile, though, only an inner satisfaction out of the few good ones she had taken.

Having gone through the pictures, Ji-hye closed the album of cats she had saved on her phone, and then put the device to sleep. Her hand lowered, so the part of her face that hadn't been covered earlier was now showing - like her left cheek that had a few scratches on it, but nothing serious. No real bleeding or what could be permanent damage to her face. Ji-hye didn't really care, anyway.

"Why aren't phones a big thing? Don't you guys text each other? Or call?" She wasn't big on calling with her cell phone, herself, but people usually did that with phones, didn't they? Or did everyone in this rural town own old home telephones, or maybe they even had those even older things - what were they called? Telegraphy or something? Ji-hye didn't really know, or care.

"I've noticed that," she mentioned at the notion of bad cell phone reception in town. She checked her phone again - her eyes never being away from the wee little screen for too long - only to see the smallest bar in the top corner showing. The pinklette sighed, defeated, and dropped her hand that held the phone again.

While not noticing the smirk the blonde put on, she did take note of the shift in stance, and tilted her head at him a little, taking in what he was saying to her.

"My name's Ahn Ji-hye." It came out almost as an automated response, as she had replied the exact same sentence to so many others. However, something about this guy peaked her interest. "I haven't really been to school much, 'cause I don't see the point. And I think I've just been mostly at home, or in Victorialis City. Do you guys realise how boring it is in this town?" Her comments often came out a little more rudely or sarcastic that intended most times, but she was just ruthlessly honest, in her own opinion.

She laughed as he said he was 'super popular', though. Either he had self-inflicted irony or he was dense, but then again so was she. He did seem like a fun guy, but how come she hadn't seen him either? Usually she found herself in the background, looking over things as they happened instead of taking part in them herself, so she should have seen him. Especially having lived in Primula for two years now.

"What's yours?" she added, not thinking to mention that she was asking for his name in response to giving her own. Asking what she did so bluntly could've meant a lot of things, so hopefully he'd understand what she meant.

         

MADE BY HABBUE