Pollen's P.O.V.
I am waiting for Kim outside. We decided to walk on the island shore together. I'm really curious about how he's the only person whose mind I can't read. It's peaceful and I'm happy for that.
I hope I can go back to my normal self.
Walking a few paces ahead, I picked up a stick and knelt down on the damp sand. I am writing something on the sand.
"Go back to normal self."
The deep voice sounded right above me. It was Kim. He was standing there wearing his sunglasses, and he smiled at me. Then, he offered his hand to help me get up and I accepted it. As I held his hand, I felt so warm in my palm. His hands are always warm, unlike his cold gaze.
"Why did you write that?" he said, looking down at the "Go back to normal self" I wrote on the island sand.
Looking at the ground, I felt like a completely different person. Lately, I feel like I have superpowers, like someone straight out of a sci-fi movie.
Desperate to snap myself out of my thoughts, I pinched myself.
"Ouch," I said to myself, touching my cheek.
Suddenly, I felt a warm hand on my cheeks.
"Why are you pinching your cheeks?" Kim asked, leaning down slightly.
"You look so different than yesterday."
It looks like our situation completely changed. Just yesterday, I was the one who was approaching him, and yet now I can't even say a single word in front of him.
Realizing his hands were still on my cheeks, I did my best to approach him in a nice way. I kept my head down, looking straight at the ground because I simply couldn't look directly into his eyes without losing my composure entirely.
I raised my fingers and tapped his hands lightly, clearing my throat to find my voice.
"You—your hands…" I said, my voice slightly trembling as the warmth of his palms continued to radiate against my skin.
He immediately removed his hands from my face, stepping back a tiny fraction.
"Sorry," Kim said quickly, his usual smooth cadence faltering for a brief second.
"I was just checking if you got a bruised after you pinched yourself."
"Pftt… haha!"
A sudden burst of laughter escaped my lips. I looked up at him, still giggling at his ridiculous medical logic. Seeing my reaction, he slowly reached up, removed his sunglasses, and hooked the frame securely into the collar of his shirt.
"No person gets bruised after pinching their cheeks," I said, a wide smile breaking across my face as I kept giggling.
A gentle, refreshing morning breeze swept across the shoreline, making the bright blue ocean water lap softly against our feet. The wind caught our hair, blowing the long strands across my face and rustling through his dark locks. Under the bright, unfiltered sunlight, his eyes looked remarkably deep and clear without his lenses blocking them. The light, airy atmosphere between us made the beach feel peaceful.
"Well, you pinched yourself pretty hard," Kim countered defensively, though the corners of his lips twitched into a subtle smile as he watched me clear my throat.
"I had to be certain you weren't trying to hurt yourself."
"I was just trying to wake myself up," I explained, the lingering awkwardness from breakfast completely vanishing in the wind.
Kyles P.O.V.
She was laughing now. Looking down at her bright, smiling face, she looked infinitely happier than she had earlier at the breakfast table, where she had been sitting so quietly.
I felt a sudden, profound wave of relief wash completely through my chest.
"So, what's with 'going back to normal self'?" I asked her, keeping my tone casual as I unrolled a thick, canvas picnic blanket over the soft sand for us to sit.
She looked thoroughly surprised, her wide eyes darting from the blanket up to my face.
"Are we going on a picnic?" she teased, her eyebrows lifting playfully.
"I was just being a gentleman," I countered smoothly, trying to mask the slight warmth rising to my collar. I swayed down the edges of the fabric and gestured for her to take a seat.
"Let's just rest here for now and talk."
Pollen quietly sat down, tucking her legs beneath her as she stared out at the shimmering morning waves. I sat beside her, keeping a respectable distance, yet close enough to feel the steady presence of her focus. More than anything, I genuinely wanted to know her better. I wanted to discover the things she liked, the thoughts that made her drift off into deep daydreams, and the reason she carried such an intense exhaustion behind her brilliant eyes.
"You never answered my question," I prodded gently, leaning my forearms against my knees.
"What makes you feel like you aren't your normal self lately?"
"It's nothing serious," she murmured, a faint, melancholic smile brushing her lips as she traced a pattern on the edge of the blanket.
"Just… city life, I guess. Sometimes the noise of the world gets too loud, and it makes you feel like a completely different person. Like you're constantly trapped in a chaotic movie."
"Well, the noise can't reach you here," I said softly, the ocean breeze catching my words.
"On this island, you can just be exactly who you want to be. No expectations."
Pollen turned her head to look at me, her gaze lingering on my face for a long, silent beat. For a second, I thought she was trying to figure me out, but she just seemed to be enjoying the peaceful silence.
"What about you, Kim?" she asked curiously, tilting her head.
"What brings a guy like you to a secluded paradise like this? What do you do back in the city?"
My chest tightened slightly at the sudden interrogation. I couldn't exactly tell her that I owned this building and invited her here to apologize for the deep background checking I had on her.
I looked at the ocean for a moment, letting the steady, crashing rhythm of the turquoise waves ground my thoughts, and then turned my gaze back on her.
"I just do standard administrative work," I lied smoothly, offering a relaxed shrug to keep my demeanor completely ordinary.
"Data analysis, managing schedules, fixing system errors. It gets tedious, so I needed a complete escape from the grid."
Thump, thump.
My heart was racing against my ribs, the rapid beat echoing loudly in my ears under the open sky.
Yesterday, I realized something important. That was the exact reason why I finally found the courage to sit here, talk to her directly, and not look away from her anymore. I had spent so many hours over-analyzing my own behavior, but I finally felt comfortable and entirely at ease after repeatedly telling myself that I was just tired from work.
Yes, that had to be it. I was simply mentally exhausted from managing endless corporate metrics back in the city, and this strange, hyper-fixation on her was just a byproduct of that fatigue. I was completely denying the deeper shift happening inside me, stubbornly convincing my own rational brain that these sudden flutters in my chest were nothing more than a temporary physical reaction to a much-needed vacation.
"So you're just like me—an office worker," she said, a soft, relaxed smile gracing her lips.
She turned her face upward to look at the bright sky, closing her eyes for a brief second to soak in the morning sun. Stretching her arms wide above her head to relieve the tension in her shoulders, she then leaned back slightly on the blanket. She placed both of her hands flat on the sand behind her, locking her elbows to support her weight as she tilted her face up to enjoy the warmth and the crisp ocean breeze.
As I was looking at her, I noticed she was smiling, yet her eyes were filled with a deep, inexplicable sadness. Or maybe I was just imagining things. Or perhaps it was simply because I was exhausted from everything back in the city. Either way, she looked remarkably pretty up close. Sitting just inches away from her on the canvas fabric, I found myself completely captivated, unable to help but stare directly at her side profile under the bright morning sun.
Thump, thump.
My heart was still racing violently against my ribs, but I tried to rationalize it, convincing myself that this sudden acceleration had everything to do with my own lingering nervousness. I was intensely anxious that she would eventually become uncomfortable around me if I stared too long, or worse, that I might do something to shatter this fragile, peaceful bubble we had finally managed to build between us.