Miho the Killer
Chapter 74: Miho the Killer

Chapter 74: Miho the Killer

"Miho," I asked my tigress as I was brushing her hair, sitting at the edge of the lower bed as she sat on the floor with her legs stretched out.

"Yeah?"

"How do you feel?" Her hair ran silky smooth through my fingers and probably didn’t need any brushing, but I wouldn’t have traded this chance with anything in the world, for I knew that this could be the last time I get to touch her beautiful hair.

"I’m feeling great. I have a good feeling about tonight. Everything’s going to be fantastic."

She spread her legs wide and took turns touching each toe with her hands, stretching.

"You don’t feel nervous?"

"Not at all."

She wasn’t lying to calm my nerves. There was a genuine sense of tranquility in her voice, with a hint of excitement looking forward to what was to come.

I’ve seen and helped Miho to get ready to go for work before though, so I knew despite her calmness it was clear that this was a big night for her too.

After gently brushing her hair a few more times, I used a black hair tie to give her a neat ponytail. I liked her hair in every style, but this was Miho that I first saw and fell in love with.

"But you didn’t sleep well."

"It’s OK. I’m sure I will sleep well tonight, heh."

Miho turned around, thanked me, and gave me a thumbs-up and a smile.

She then slid off the loungewear and turned her back to me again. I unfolded the neatly folded white shirts that I had prepared. She put her right arm through one sleeve first, and I helped her put the other one in as well. The blue and purple bruises on her arms from the training made my heart wrench, and all I could do was try my best not to imagine them as bleeding cuts and stabs.

"Turn around."

Miho duly obliged, and I started to button her shirt from the bottom button.

"Say, where do you want to go this weekend?" She asked.

"We are going somewhere on the weekend?" I wasn’t informed.

"Well, we must celebrate, right? Let’s go somewhere and do something fun."

I felt a knot in my throat.

Depending on how things turn out tonight, she may not be able to go anywhere for a long time.

Just what have I done to my Miho...

But this was all for the best.

I rather things fail and she survives than see her dead.

There was nothing romantic about death. This much I knew for sure now.

"Let’s... let’s go to beach..."

"Eh? Isn’t it a little cold now?"

"I..." I almost burst out crying but managed to hold back.

"I want to see the sea with you."

"Well, if that’s what you want, then it’s fine by me, hehe." She shrugged.

"We can have some seafood. I will give you the fish head."

"Eh? I don’t like them to be honest."

"Oh, really?"

"Yeah, their dead eyes give me creeps."

"Pfft"

How ironic that she once - supposedly - took out men’s eyes using a chopstick but gets creeped out by a fish’s eye.

After I did the top button, I pulled at the hems of the shirt to straighten them out. It was a perfect fit for her.

"Looking good already, Miho."

"Heh, thanks."

Then I passed her the black trousers, and after she put them on, repeated the process again, pulling the hems to ensure that they were nice and straight.

"I’ll try to not get them too wrinkled, or ripped." Miho joked.

"Silly girl. Take a seat."

I patted the spot on the bed and she sat down. I knelt down to put on the socks for her. She looked down at me, looking a little embarrassed.

"I can do it myself, you know."

"Just let me do it. This once..."

"You are too kind. Always."

She scratched the back of her head.

Now that she was dressed in white shirts and black suit trousers, Miho was starting to look like half the woman she was.

"Which tie would you like?"

I spread out five identical black ties on the bed, knowing that they were all the same but Miho was going to take her time trying to pick the perfect one for the night.

"This one here."

She picked the one in the middle.

"Good choice."

As she got up, I pulled and straightened the shoulders of her shirt once more, striving for perfection. I then pulled up her collars so I could put the ties around her neck, but my fragile heart couldn’t take it anymore and my mask finally slipped. I fell on my knees and started to sob.

"I... I just... I can’t do it, Miho..."

"Hey, hey, what’s wrong?"

She knelt in front of me and put one hand on my shoulder while gently rubbing my back with another one.

"Miho, let’s stop. We don’t have to do this. Let’s run away now. I’m sure we can find a place to hide. Let’s go far, far away from here. We can first go and stay at my parents’ place in Daejeon. No one will suspect you are there. Oh-, the autumn leaves are beautiful in that area, you know? There’s this temple that I used to go to with my parents when I was young. They have really nice cherry blossoms in spring and also all those golden and red leaves in autumn. In winter we can also go to a hot spring nearby. That region’s quite famous for it, you know? And then-"

"Sohee."

"And then we could move further South. We talked about living by the sea, right? There are many islands on the Southwest Coast. The weather’s much warmer there compared to Seoul as well. I will eat all the fish head, don’t worry. I even eat the eyes, you know? You can have all the meaty parts. Ah, I bet you are not good with the fish bones. Don’t worry, I’ll get rid of them for you so you can just chomp chomp and nom nom on the meat. Isn’t that great?"

"Yeah, that sounds great."

"Hehe, I knew you’d like that. But wait - yeah, why limit ourselves to Korea? Maybe we can go overseas. Even warmer weather, right? And even more beaches! Beautiful beaches. I’d love to live in those white beach houses. Well, I know they aren’t built with bricks and you want houses built with bricks... but you know, we will be safe there. We don’t need to worry about the wolves, right? Ha.. Ha, ha."

"We will go anywhere you want to go."

"That’s great! Then we can just chill every day - but of course, I know you like activities. But if we lived by the sea somewhere in Southeast Asia, maybe you could pick up scuba-diving? I bet you are good at it - like super good at it. You are good at all sports. You are amazing, Miho. I can’t really swim but if I have those oxygen tanks then I don’t need to swim, right? I guess I can just hang onto your back like a turtle as you dive - wait, turtles don’t do that, erm... yeah like koalas."

"Koalas dive in the sea?"

"You know what I mean."

"I’m trying to visualize it and it doesn’t make any sense."

"It’s OK. It doesn’t need to make sense. Just imagine you are the turtle and I’m a koala. Makes sense now?"

Miho did not answer. She just smiled and wiped the tears off my cheeks.

"And... and... we can-, what was I going to say-, yeah... I think if we just get away from here, like right now-"

"Sohee."

"No! Don’t say no! We can do it. I bet Shin’s really busy doing something now. Yeah, I’m sure he’s busy getting prepared. We can sneak out. I’m sure we can sneak out. We take his car and vroom vroom, we will be on our way!"

"Sohee."

"No, don’t-"

Miho then grabbed my head from both sides and placed her dry lips on mine, pressing on them for a few seconds before pulling away.

"We will do everything you want to do after this is over. I promise."

My heart was exploding with pain and joy.

She then helped me get up and led my hands to her tie.

With no more words left to say, I draped the tie around her neck, letting the wider end hang lower than the narrow one. Crossing them just below her collar, I formed an X, then slipped the wide end up through the loop. The smooth fabric slid through my fingers as I guided it underneath from right to left.

I lifted the wide end again, threading it through the neck loop from underneath. A symmetrical triangle appeared.

My hands were getting more steady now and following the standard procedure I managed to complete the Windsor knot, carefully sliding it upward toward her collar, ensuring it sat neatly at the base of her neck.

With a final tuck, I secured the knot, holding it in place.

As I finally took my hands off her tie, Miho placed her palm on my cheek and beamed me a smile.

Miho the killer was back.