Their eyes met and for the first time that night, she felt she was being taken seriously.

“Start from the beginning.” Calm and soothing, very different from the playful tone she heard the first time they met.

Ana took out her phone, accessed the weird messages she had received and extended the device towards him.

“I’ve been getting these strange messages from an unknown number and today when I got home there was a bandaid in my kitchen counter.”

After checking the messages he gave her back her phone.

“Are you sure you don’t know the person who sent the messages? Did you ask your friends or family about it?”

She had meant to ask but in truth she forgot. Feeling stupid, Ana passed one hand through her face and nodded a negative.

“I forgot. But what about the bandaid?” She was now doubting everything that she thought before and that showed in her voice.

“Ms…” he paused a second looking up her name in the computer “Aguiar. Are you sure you didn’t put it there yourself and then forgot about it? Living in another country can be difficult. Make you on edge.”

In contradiction to her own words, she banged one fist on the desk

“I’m not stressed!”

____________

Beak Hee-Joon looked carefully at the woman in front of him. All he heard from her until then, sounded like a big misunderstanding caused by a stressful situation. There was not a single red light in her story, nothing that made him want to investigate. However, comparing the strong personality he met a few days back and the scared woman dressed in pajamas sitting in a police station, trembling, he could not just ignore it.

“Look. Here’s what we’ll do.” He got up from the chair and grabbed his jacket hanging in the back of the next chair.

“I’ll take you home and give a look around your apartment. We’ll take it from there, ok?”

She seemed to calm down at the suggestion and got up also.

The building where she lived was close to the precinct and it did not take them long to get there. The neighborhood was quite at that late hour and the building had a security guard. She greeted the man behind the desk and was greeted back with sympathy and a curious look. Which showed she probably did not bring many strangers home. She pressed the elevator button and they patiently waited.

“The guard has been here long?”

Her pretty brown eyes looked up to meet his.

“At least since I started living here.”

The bling of the elevator sounded and the doors opened, they went in. He looked around and located the security camera in one of the upper corners. Ana had pressed the 5th-floor button and the elevator moved. Up until that moment, with them both stuck inside a small closed space, alone, he had not realized how petite she was or how her hair was leaving a trail of the scent of flours in the air. The doors opened and she was the first to step out, showing him the way. He let her press the code of the door and made a gesture for her to let him in first. The apartment was clean and quiet, it had a minimalist decor with soft but bright colors. As a sign of respect, he took off his sneakers and roamed around the place looking carefully at anything that seemed out of order. Going back to the kitchen he stared at the bandaid on the countertop. Ana had already gone inside also and was now standing in front of him with an anxious expression in her eyes.

“There’s no one here. And, as far as I can see nothing seems out of place.”

She nodded with her head and bit her lip.

“I’ll wait here as you take a look around, make sure everything is where it usually is ok? By the way, do you have a small plastic bag and tweezers?”

Hee-Joon watched as she looked inside the cabinets for the bag.

“So, you’re a Portuguese teacher. Where are you from?”

Her light brown hair looked soft as it waved around with her movements.

“Lisbon. Is this ok?”

The innocent almost child-like facial expression took him by surprise and his body reacted twinkling.

“Perfect.”

This was not appropriate at all. He was there in a work-related situation, but his body did not seem to care about that. She did not seem to notice his reaction and walked in the bedroom direction

“I’ll look around then.”

She almost whispered visibly still concerned. Heading to the living room window, Hee-Joon looked at the windows of the next building. All the lights were off and the curtains down.

“Here are the tweezers. Nothing is out of place.”

Her fingers were ice cold as he accidentally touched them picking up the tool

“Thank you.”

Heading to the counter he carefully picked up the bandaid with the tweezers and put it inside the plastic bag. Before her surprised look he smiled

“I will collect a favor and let you know.”

She nodded

“In the meantime here’s my number. If something happens, call me.” As she picked up the business card from his fingers, she smiled thankful.

The brightest, most beautiful smile he had ever seen and his body agreed.

“Thank you for not treating me like a mad woman.” He smiled back at her “Try to get some sleep and don’t forget to change the entry code.”