Son Areum and Lee Suhyeok have been childhood best friends since they were ten years old. Eight years ago, ten-years old Areum and her mother, Son Yeri, were recently moved from Seoul to Hyosan to live with Areum's grandparents. One of the reasons the mother and daughter were moved to Hyosan eight years ago was that Areum's mother was being transferred to their hometown hospital, Hyosan hospital. When the director of the hospital where Son Yeri's work asked for her decision, she gladly accepted the transfer as she could work at her hometown and she would not worry about her daughter, Areum, being alone at the house when she was busy working at the hospital. Moreover, Areum's grandparents were delighted when they heard the news about them moving to Hyosan as the grandparents rarely spend time with their daughter and granddaughter due to the different location.

On the day they officially moved to Hyosan, Areum's mother and grandfather were busy carrying the boxes and workers busily carried their furniture in the apartment. Areum was happily munching the pear that her grandmother peeled while curiously watching them work.

"Areum-ah, are you happy to live here with halmoni and haraboji?" Areum's grandmother asked while peeling more pear for her granddaughter. Instantly, Areum happily nodded her head with the pear that she was eating using the small fork on her right hand.

"Yes! I'm really happy to live with you, haraboji and omma." little Areum exclaimed as she continued munching her pear. Her grandmother was smiling as she lovingly watched her granddaughter adorably eating her fruit. Areum's mother was unknowingly watching their interaction as Areum's grandfather gave some instruction to the workers on where to put the furniture in the room. Leaving her father doing the job, Yeri walked her way toward her mother and daughter and mentioned to her mom that she should take Areum around the neighborhood while they finished arranging the boxes and furniture in the apartment. Areum's grandmother agreed with Yeri's suggestion and Areum along with her grandmother went around the neighborhood after they finished eating the pear.

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Outside the apartment building, Areum held her grandmother's right hand as they walked around the neighborhood while they happily conversed with each other about small things. They stopped their walk for a moment when her grandmother's friends spotted them and chatted with her grandmother. Being a good child in her family, Areum patiently waited beside her grandmother as they chatted and started to observe her surroundings until she spotted a few kids around her age playing at the playground near their apartment building.

"Oh my. Is this your grandchild that you always talk about, Kyunghwa?" little Areum heard her grandmother's friend ask.

"Yes. This is my granddaughter. Areum, say hello, dear." Areum's grandmother, Kyunghwa, said as she smiled down at her young granddaughter beside her.

"Hello. My name is Son Areum. Nice to meet you." Areum beamed as she bowed down to show respect to her grandmother's friend.

"Hello, dear. I'm your grandmother's friend. You can call me Youngsook halmoni. You want to play there?" Youngsook halmoni pointed toward the playground as she had noticed how the young girl constantly looked at the playground when she was talking to Kyunghwa. Areum shly nodded her head as she stood beside her grandmother as she was still holding her grandmother's hand.

"You can play there, dear. My grandson is also there. Perhaps, you can play with him?" Youngsookhalmoni smiled at the shy girl.

"Can I play there, halmoni?" Areum asked permission as she looked at her grandmother. Kyunghwa halmoni nodded her head and chuckled lightly when she saw her granddaughter brightly beaming at her.

"I'll be here with Youngsook halmoni. You can play, dear." Kyunghwa halmoni stated. As soon as she heard her grandmother, Areum excitedly ran toward the playground, eager to play.

"Be careful, dear." Areum's grandmother warned as she watched Areum sprinted toward the playground, worried that her granddaughter might fall while running.

"I will." Areum shouted, still running toward the playground.

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Areum was happily playing with sewing alone on the playground. Unknown to her, a ten-year old boy was watching her from afar. He was fascinated by the young girl on how well she can do the sewing alone without other people's help.

Before the young girl played at the playground, the ten-year old boy watched his grandmother talk with Kyunghwa halmoni, one of his grandmother's friends that he was close with. The young boy was about to continue to play with his sand castle until he spotted the young girl standing beside Kyunghwa halmoni. The young girl was holding Kyunghwa halmoni's hand as she looked around her surroundings.

'Who is she? I've never seen her before.' the young boy wondered.

The ten-year old boy became alarmed when he heard someone in the playground scream, making him come to his senses after watching the young girl. He looked for the source and spotted Areum fell from the sewing.As his grandmother had taught him to be good to other people, the ten-year old boy went to help Areum.

"Are you okay?" the young boy asked as he crouched down to Areum's eye level and checked on her. Areum looked up with teary eyes and saw a boy around her age watching her worriedly.

"No. It hurts." Areum whispered, trying to hold her tears. Even though she was whispering, the ten-year old boy still could hear her. The young boy began to inspect for her injury until he spotted a small wound on her knees. The young boy then took out band aids from his trouser pockets that he usually carried around him whenever he went at the playground as he tended to injure himself while playing with other kids.

"Here. This will help with the injuries. I usually hurt myself when I played with my friends. So, I always carried these with me. My grandmother told me that using this will make you strong. So, don't cry, okay?" the young boy mentioned as he covered the small wounds on Areum's knees with the bunny cartoon band aids. Areum's nodded her head and looked at the band aid on her knees.

"The bunny is cute." Areum giggled as she looked at the cartoon band aids. Hearing the girl giggled made the young boy smile at her.

"I'm Lee Suhyeok. That's my grandmother." Suhyeok introduced himself, then pointed to Youngsook halmoni. Areum watched where he pointed and this made her realised that the boy in front of her is Youngsook halmoni's grandson that she mentioned earlier.

"That's my grandmother beside Youngsook halmoni." Areum pointed toward her grandmother who was still talking with her friend. "My name is Areum. Son Areum."

"Oh, so you're Kyunghwa halmoni's granddaughter? The one that just moved in?" Suhyeok asked when he connected the dots from observing their previous interaction. Areum hummed in agreement as she nodded her head.

"What do you think of Hyosan?" Suhyeok asked as he tried to make a conversation with the young girl in front of him.

"I don't know yet. I only just got here but I hope I can stay here for the next few years with my grandparents and mom." Areum replied as she watched other kids play around the playground.

"Why do you say that?" Suhyeok furrowed his eyebrows when he heard her reply. He stared at her for a moment, waiting for her answer.

"It's just that we always moved around because mom's transferred job." Areum stated as she continued to watch other kids play with their friends. Suhyeok noticed that Areum's attention was somewhere else and instantly he spotted what she saw. Trying to lighten the atmosphere, Suhyeok stood from his crunch position and held his hand out to Areum. The young girl just stared at his hand, not knowing what his intention was.

"Then, I hope you'll stay at Hyosan for the next few years with your grandparents and mom too. Maybe throughout the year, we'll become best friends. Let's go play with the other kids." Seeing Areum hesitated to take his hand, Suhyeok continued, "Don't worry. I'll catch you if you fall again and I'll protect you. I promise"

Suhyeok smiled as Areum held his hand, pulling herself to stand beside the young boy. Then, Areum returned the smile and said "Let's go and play."

Without wasting any time, the young boy gently dragged the young girl to the center of the playground. Unknown to the two ten-years old, both of their grandmothers were watching their interaction from the bench near the playground.

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Throughout the years Areum lived at Hyosan, Suhyeok's wish when he was young had become true as both Areum and himself had become best friends.

Over their middle school years, Areum and Suhyeok mostly spent their time with each other. Due to this, they have learned about each other's strengths and weaknesses.

Knowing Areum for the past few years, Suhyeok have noticed that Areum have turned into a beauty and kind young women who always smile toward others, friendly, cheerful and have positive attitude towards other people, always helped a person in needs, speak whatever her mind think are right and always think about other person before herself. These kinds of traits have attracted other students' attention, especially male students, whenever they saw Areum walk past them, either at school or at the neighborhood. This made Suhyeok feel protective of Areum as he over the years had started to develop feelings toward his childhood best friend.

He also learned that Areum can be quite clumsy as she tends to injure herself whenever he is not around. Because of this incident, Suhyeok always stored some band aids inside his school uniform trousers before he went to school.

Meanwhile, after a few years of knowing Suhyeok, Areum had noted the changes of the ten-years old Suhyeok into a handsome, kind, funny, reliable and independent man. She also learned that Suhyeok is very athletic as she always spotted him playing basketball or football with his friends whenever he finished his lunch meal at school. She also noticed that most of the female students in the school seem to have a soft spot for her best friend.

How does she know this? One day Areum accidentally heard a group of girls gossiping in a hushed tone about Suhyeok when she went to the library alone during lunch hour. Even in a low tone voice, she could still hear them talk about her childhood best friend whenever she looked at the cover page of the books at the library. Throughout the day, Areum has been quiet, not liking the raging feeling inside her after the incident at the library. This had caused Suhyeok to notice her change of attitude. Whenever they were together, Areum was the one who initiated the conversation while Suhyeok listened to her. Not liking the way Areum had been for the rest of the day, Suhyeok asked her if she had any problem when she was at the library as they walked side by side to their house after school hours. Suhyeok sighed when Areum told him to not worry about it.

The next day, Suhyeok began investigating what had happened to Areum in the library by asking the students around the school. Once he knew what happened to his best friend, Suhyeok smirked in amusement when he heard the explanation from one of his classmates.

For the whole day, Suhyeok was beaming to himself when remembering the earlier event as he was assuming Areum was jealous when she heard a group of girls talking about him. This had caused Areum to weirdly look at the beaming boy when she walked beside him and she was curiously wondering what happened to him today.

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During their high school years, most of the students in Hyosan have seen their friendship as well as their interaction, which led the students to spread the rumors that both Areum and Suhyeok were a couple. Both best friends were oblivious to the spread rumors around the school as they tend to spend their time together until Suhyeok befriends the wrong crowd of students during 10th grade

Because of this, Areum was worried about her friend's safety and well-being when he hung around with the school bully after school. Whenever she saw Suhyeok alone after school hours, she always took the chances and approached him as she tried to convince him to stop befriending the school bullies. It hurt her seeing her best friend make the wrong decision that may have affected his life.

The only response that Areum would get from Suhyeok was him telling her to not worry about him as he can take care of himself. Despite being told by her best friend, Areum still continues to worry about his well-being. Therefore, she would mostly observed Suhyeok from afar whenever she saw him around school area and hope for the best that he would come to his sense and stop hanging around with the bully.

Areum's hope have been heard the next two months. Areum was on her way home when she spotted Suhyeok's group of friends hanging around the alleyway near the school. She was minding her own business when a figure standing in front of her, causing her to halt her movement. Areum looked at the person who stopped her and her heart sank when she saw one of the bullies, Yoon Gwinam, smugly smiling down at her. Areum was trying to move in a different direction however she was blocked by his other two friends. Panic began to arise in her as Areum began to move away from them.

"Leave me alone." Areum speaked as she continued to move away from the bullies. Seeing her fear made the bullies smirked at each other. One of the bullies, Son Myunghwan, roughly grabbed Areum's left arm, causing her to shriek in surprise.

"Don't touch me." The black hair girl warned as she tried to pry his hand away from her.

"Aren't you Suhyeok's little girlfriend?" Myunghwan mockly questioned as he roughly moved her closer to him, so that he could see her face clearly.

"I was right. She's Suhyeok girl- Ack." Myunghwan was cut when a tall figure forcefully pushed him away from Areum. His other two friends were skeptical with what happened and they immediately went to help him stand up. Seeing Suhyeok was the one who pushed him, Myunghwa instantly saw red as rage began to consume him. He pushed both of his friends and began charging toward Suhyeok, who was checking on Areum's safety.

"Hey! You little piece of -." Once again, the leader of the bullies was cut off when he saw Suhyeok glared at him.

"Stop it. Didn't I tell you not to disturb her?" The tall boy mentioned, stood in front of Areum, blocking their view from seeing the black hair girl behind him.

"Hey. We're just asking her some questions. No need to be mad, Suhyeok." Gwinam stated, poking his index finger at Suhyeok's shoulder blade in order to annoy him. Myunghwa nodded his head in agreement with his friend's statement.

Not wanting to deal with their action and attitude any longer, Suhyeok intertwined his hand with Areum and gently dragged her toward the direction of their house. Before they completely leave the alleyway, Suhyeok turned his attention toward the group of bullies and told them that shocked Areum.

"I'm leaving the group. I don't want to be seen as a bully anymore. What I've seen today made me realised of how pity I was the whole time being with a group with bullies. Seeing Areum panic like that makes me realised how a shit person I've been to other people." Suhyeok told them as he stared at Areum's brown eyes. Areum held a small smile as she stared into Suhyeok's black eyes when she heard her childhood best friend's words. Feeling happy that Suhyeok realised his mistake before it was too late. Leaving the group of bullies, both Areum and Suhyeok continue their journey to their home.

From that moment forward, Suhyeok had promised to himself to be a better person as he tried to redeem his past actions by helping the bully's victims being victimised by the school bullies as much as he can. He is also determined to protect Areum by preventing earlier accidents from happening to her in the future.

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Hello! Welcome to the first chapter of this book😁

Hope all of you enjoy the prologue for the begining of the story

Don't forget to comment while reading the story🙂😉