CHAPTER 10: BACK TO NORMAL

The rest of the weekend passed by very quickly. I met up with Youngmi who had been very worried. I also went shopping with Eunwoo and had to cook at home because aunt told us she was sick – I knew it very well she just didn’t want to show her injuries to her son and that’s why she stayed in her room for most of the weekend. I still didn’t accept her decision to be silent, but I was just a teenager, and not even her daughter at that; what could I have done?

Monday morning became reality very quickly, but for some reason waking up and getting ready felt easier than the week before. I was ready at the door, waiting for Eunwoo to get his shoelaces tied. Even when the bus came to the bus stop, I was the first one who stepped into the vehicle and greeted the driver with a smile.

The second we arrived at school and got into our classroom, anyhow, made my smile wither and my blood pressure rise. Mikyung, my arch enemy, the one who was always bothering my daily life at school, was sitting at her desk like she hadn’t done anything wrong. I was 100% sure she saw me going to the restroom the day we got left behind. She was the one who was in charge of name list, so as much as she disliked me, she should’ve told the driver to wait for me.

As she noticed me and Eunwoo walking into the classroom, she flashed me a wide smile. “Well isn’t it Minji!”

I returned the smile back to her. “Hi there, Mikyung. Did you have fun in the bus back home?”

“Sure I did!” she said. “I don’t think you were very comfortable in the mountains, though…”

“What? But we had such a great time in the nature!”

My eyes grew bigger as I heard Bin’s voice right behind me and felt him place his hand on my shoulder. Eyeing Mikyung, her reaction seemed to be the same. She got up from her desk and blinked, she clearly looked apologetic and tried to find the right words. I knew it, she didn’t leave Bin off the ride on purpose. Bin’s name was probably called before he went to the restroom – just like mine was.

“Bin! I’m so sorry, it was a mistake!” she apologized. “I didn’t know you went to the restroom…”

“But you did know Minji went, right?” Bin asked. “Strangely you aren’t apologizing to her.”

Mikyung blinked, clearly left speechless, and sat back down. Bin flashed me a smirk while he went past me and sat down to his desk. I felt super awkward sitting in front of him, because I could feel him staring at me all the time. I pretty much missed the first lesson because I really couldn’t concentrate. I just stared out of the window and doodled in my notebook.

The first lessons went by so painfully slow I thought I’d grow old before lunch break, but finally I could get out of the school building to get some fresh air and relax. While walking to the cafeteria with Eunwoo and Youngmi, I heard Minhyuk shouting my name and running from behind to join us.

“Hey!” he said, smiling. “Are you going to eat?”

“No, we’re going to burn down the cafeteria”, Eunwoo stated and rolled his eyes.

“Sounds good. Then Minhyuk can cook for everyone!” I said and smiled at the younger boy.

He smiled widely. “I guess I have to stop attending school and just cook for money.”

“You really should consider that!” Youngmi laughed. “After you graduate, that is.”

After stuffing ourselves with food, Minhyuk hurried back to his classroom to do some last-minute notes before the lesson. Youngmi had something to discuss with her skating coach again so she left school early today too, and so Eunwoo and I were left alone. We slowly walked around the school’s yard, not wanting to go in because we’d have to be there for the rest of the day anyway.

As we passed the stairs leading to the school’s main gate, I heard cursing and shouting. Eunwoo seemed to hear it too, and against the expectations, it seemed like he got interested. Usually he always just walked away from situations, was it a fight or a quarrel. But now he was the one who started walking towards the sounds. It turned out Mikyung was doing her bad deeds once again. She and her clique had surrounded a lanky, tall boy into a corner and were clearly pestering him. I had never seen the boy before so he must’ve been new. He was looking down, not able to say anything or defend himself. This kind of situations usually didn’t have any effect on Eunwoo – me, anyhow, felt just as angry as any time I saw something like this. I was about to start screaming and cursing and break the clique to let the boy flee, but Eunwoo grabbed my wrist, held me back and walked towards the girls instead.

“What do you mean you don’t have any money?” I heard Mikyung asking the boy and poking the boy’s cheek continuously. The boy didn’t answer.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Eunwoo asked quietly, but loud enough for them to hear him. His straight face was enough to make Mikyung’s friend quiet down and back out from the situation. Mikyung turned around to stare at Eunwoo and after having a short staring battle with him, her eyes wandered to me and I got a glare from her. I just raised my eyebrows and nodded at Eunwoo as an order for Mikyung to look at him instead.

“I’m getting my lunch money”, she said and shrugged her shoulders.

“There’s a cafeteria with free food. Why are you stealing the money from a first grader?” Eunwoo asked, crossing his arms.

Mikyung snorted. “Why don’t you just mind you own busines? You’re just as bad as your cousin!”

I took a few steps and stood next to Eunwoo. “Exactly, there are two of us. And apparently only one of you. So why don’t you just go now?”

Mikyung glanced at her clique, who were all trying to sneak out of the situation, and she glared at them; she was probably going to shout at them afterwards for abandoning her. Then she stepped close to me and I actually thought, for a moment, that she’d spit on me. Instead, she leaned in to whisper something in my ear.

“You know I’ll kill you if you touch Bin, right?” she hissed.

I smiled. “You know I’ve wanted to do this since I came to this school, right?”

And then I did what Youngmi stopped me from doing the first day of school. I slapped her cheek as hard as I could. Either I was imagining or the sound of the slap echoed in the air for a while. I stepped back and glared at the girl who had frozen in her place, staring right in front of her with a shocked expression and a red cheek. Judging from the burning sensation in my hand, the slap had really hurt. Good. That’s what I wanted.

“Now, please leave innocent people alone”, I hissed back at her, and with a final glare walked down to the lanky boy who was staring at me with an expression just as shocked as Mikyung’s. I smiled at him and asked him to follow us. Then I turned back to Eunwoo, who was clearly trying to hold back his smile, and we walked away from Mikyung and her clique.

When we got far enough and reached the building’s main staircase, I collapsed onto the stairs.

“Did you see me?” I gasped. “Finally I could do that! Her expression was priceless!”

Eunwoo finally let out the laugh he had been holding in and sat next to me. “I’m proud of you, Minji. You held back from hitting her for so long.”

I glanced at the boy, who was still looking a bit alarmed and standing in front of us.

“What’s your name?” I asked, smiling at him.

“Yoon Sanha”, he introduced himself quietly.

“I’m Ryu Minji and this is my cousin, Cha Eunwoo. Are you new here?”

The boy nodded. “I transferred today.”

I tilted my head. “May I ask why did you transfer?”

“I was bullied”, he replied right away. I was surprised. Usually people who were bullied tried to hide the fact when going to a new school so that they’d avoid the same treatment in the new school. He was so open about it…

“I understand”, I nodded. “Do you know what? I’m being bullied too. But today I slapped my bully. I don’t think she’ll bully me or you anytime soon. She looked pretty shocked, didn’t she?”

Sanha stared at me with large eyes. “R- Really?”

I smiled at him. “Yes. You can join me and my friends on lunch breaks if you feel uncomfortable. I think each one of us has been bullied at some point but now we’re doing just fine.”

I felt a warm feeling spread in my heart as Sanha’s lips slowly turned into a smile. “That sounds nice.”

“You’re on the first grade, right?” Eunwoo asked him, and as he nodded, continued, “I think your lesson is starting soon.”

Sanha glanced at the clock and his eyes widening, he hurried down the stairs, disappearing into a hallway. I smiled after him and then turned to look at Eunwoo, who stared after the young boy.

“Why did you interfere?” I asked. “You usually ignore these kind of things.”

“He reminds me of Minhyuk”, Eunwoo replied. “That scared look in his eyes and the way he’s looking down all the time. He’s just like Minhyuk before he started spending time with us.”

I smiled at him. My cousin’s stone heart had been melted. I fluffed his hair just to receive an annoyed glance from him. I laughed at him and got up. Our lesson would start soon as well. As we walked back to our classroom, I thought about our group. Eunwoo had been bullied because of his grades and the fact he had to repeat a whole year of studying. I had been a total outcast for 5 years and was still bullied in this school. Minhyuk had been bullied and made into a scared little puppy. Youngmi had no friends and even though she hadn’t been bullied, everybody avoided her. And now Sanha, another bullied, scared puppy. It almost seemed like I was the type of person to befriend every single person who I found pitiful or relatable. But I was happy with this group of friends. At least I knew everybody really liked and appreciated me.

After the lessons for the day ended, Youngmi and I decided to go shopping since she didn’t have an academy to attend today. We took a bus to Hongdae and headed to our favourite café to eat some bingsu. We ate and chatted just as usual when I felt my phone vibrate and checked it. Another message from Bin.

You didn’t reply. Did you change the bandages? Breaking your arms does sound tempting to me.

I couldn’t hold back a chuckle. Why did our interactions always include someone getting hurt? I had changed the bandages – I had gotten the gauze off already and just replaced the old bandages with new, smaller ones. The cuts on my arms were already almost healed. But it was true I hadn’t replied to his message. I wrote him a quick reply, saying I did indeed take care of my cuts.

“Who are you texting?” Youngmi asked.

“Bin”, I said.

“What? Moon Bin?” Youngmi burst out, eyes enlarged. “When did you guys exchange numbers?”

I sighed. “We didn’t, actually. Do you remember the time Bin had my phone? I guess he got my number and saved his to my phone back then.”

Youngmi shook her head. “I think the troublemaker has a crush on you.”

“What?” I think my voice came out higher than it was supposed to, and I blushed. “No way, I don’t think he does.”

“Wait a minute… are you blushing?” Youngmi frowned at me playfully. “Don’t tell me you feel the same!”

My eyes widened and I felt the red colour spreading. “What are you talking about…”

She laughed at me but then her expression toned down and she looked a little bit puzzled. “What are we going to do about Minhyuk…”

I raised my eyes from my feet. “What do you mean?”

“You really don’t have eyes, Minji”, Youngmi sighed. “It’s obvious he likes you. You should’ve heard his voice when Eunwoo called him and said you got left behind at the mountains. I’m pretty sure he didn’t sleep that night.”

I frowned and sighed. We had hugged twice the day after that. Now that I thought about it, even the way he had brushed my hair off my face to see the bruise on my forehead had been very gentle. I felt crappy about not realizing earlier. I needed to talk with Minhyuk as soon as possible.

“Anyway, my skating practice starts at 7pm, we have some time before that”, Youngmi said. “Let’s go!”

After two full hours of shopping for new clothes and accessories, we parted ways and I decided to just take a bus and go back home. I had a lot of homework to do! And so I walked to the nearest bus stop and waited for a few minutes. Just as I hopped onto the bus, I saw a familiar figure running to the bus stop and getting into the bus behind me. I conquered the back seat with my shopping bags – all two of them – and looked as Bin walked towards me even though the whole bus was pretty empty.

“May I sit next to you?” he asked with a playful twinkle in his eyes.

“I guess so”, I sighed.

“You guess?” he smirked and sat next to me.

To be honest, I did feel a little bit troubled. Especially after the chat I had with Youngmi. I didn’t know what exactly our relationship was. I didn’t know if he liked me. For God’s sake, I didn’t even know if I liked him! And now that Youngmi had told me about Minhyuk, I felt a little bit pressured. I sighed and just stared in front of me. I struggled to keep my eyes open – I guess the easy waking up in the morning was paying itself back this way; I felt tired so early. I rested my head against the bus’s cool window and closed my eyes. My intention wasn’t to fall asleep, but somehow I did anyway.

When I woke up, magically my head wasn’t resting against the cool window anymore. Somehow I had managed to turn my head the other way and place my head against Bin’s shoulder. I realized the situation but was too embarrassed to even open my eyes. How would I act? Just get up normally and ignore what had happened? Apologize? Laugh it off? I just really didn’t know, so I just kept my eyes closed. I tried to calculate the time and wondered where we were. I had to open my eyes and see if I wanted to get off the bus at the right stop!

I tried to part my eyes just slightly to glance out of the window, but I got caught the second I started.

“I know you’re awake”, Bin said with a soft voice.

My eyes opened and I looked up at him. He stared back at me and I backed away quickly realizing how close our faces were. I scratched my head, and I knew how embarrassed I must’ve looked. I stared out of the window, trying to calm my heart that had started to beat faster than before. I still had good ten minutes left before I could get out of the bus. I tried to sigh as quietly as I could.

“You’re embarrassed, aren’t you?” Bin asked.

“No”, I replied quickly.

He chuckled. “Right, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about. We did sleep in the same bed… I guess this was nothing compared to that, right? Yet you still are embarrassed and clearly nervous.”

I had to momentarily close my eyes because my heartbeat felt like it would kill me. I turned to look at him. “I’m not.”

“You always deny things”, he said, smirking at me. “You said the same thing that night.”

Why did he have to remind me of that right now? The butterflies in my stomach seemed to go crazy and I had to take a deep breath. I was sure he knew how I felt, and he must’ve enjoyed making me like that as he just kept staring at me with an amused expression. I tried to ignore him and rested my head against the window again. The coolness seemed to calm me down a little bit.

“I heard you slapped Mikyung today”, he said.

“I did”, I admitted.

“Good. It was about the time someone did that”, he said. “Did you hit hard?”

I couldn’t hold back a small smile. “There was an echo.”

“I hope she leaves you alone from now on”, he said quietly.

I smiled at myself. I had been so proud of myself earlier, but now I just felt a little bit embarrassed.

“Do you know what she said just before I slapped her?” I asked, not even realising the words came out of my mouth. “She said she’d kill me if I’d touch you.”

I have no idea where the sudden braveness came from. Wherever it came from, it disappeared the moment I closed my mouth and I wanted to kill myself. Why in the world did I have to say that? I didn’t have the courage to glance at Bin, who was silent, but I could sense him staring at me. I felt super relieved as the bus stopped at my stop right then, and I grabbed my bags and rushed out without looking back.

As I walked away from the bus stop I happened to glance at the bus, and could see Bin staring at me through the window. I couldn’t read his expression, but his eyes had this intense look in them that made my stomach twist and turn. I looked away quickly and hurried home.

The moment I stepped into our apartment, I could sense something was wrong. The way Eunwoo’s shoes had been thrown here and there, and how it was so silent in the apartment. I quickly got my shoes off and walked around the apartment, looking into the kitchen, the living room, into Eunwoo’s room and finally into aunt’s room. I gasped as I opened the door.

Aunt was lying on the bed, apparently sleeping as her eyes were closed and her breathing was slow but deep. The bruises on her body had increased and now I could clearly see blood on the corner of . Eunwoo was sitting on the bed next to his mother and wiping her face with a wet towel. I took a step into the room and Eunwoo finally noticed me.

“I found her lying on the floor unconscious”, he whispered. “I was about to call the ambulance but she came into and told me not to. I don’t know what I should do.”

Eunwoo’s eyes clearly had tears forming in them and that alone made my heart skip a beat. What was going on? I dropped my bags and got my phone. Youngmi’s parents were both doctors. If aunt didn’t want to go to the hospital, we needed a doctor to come here.

“Youngmi!” I burst out the moment Youngmi picked up the call. “Can you contact your mom or dad?”

“Yeah”, she said. “What, do you need a doctor?”

“We need a doctor at our place. This is an emergency!”