Him

Fortunately Kim Sem had given us a five minute break after her insane dance lesson in which everybody was attempting to gain feeling in their legs.

“Eunhyuk-ah,” Shindong called as he flopped on the floor beside me. “Where’s Donghae?”

“I don’t know,” I shrugged as I wiped away the beads of sweats running down my sideburns. “Probably wagging class to eat some newly discovered treats.”

“Naw, someone missing their boyfriend?” He giggled in a girly manner and for irritating me, I decided to kick him on the side, feeling satisfied that he had received pain.

“But Eunhyuk, I think I saw your boyfriend with Hyoyeon before.” Sungmin joined as he threw the towel over his shoulder.

“For the last time, he is not my boy—wait, you said he was with Hyoyeon?”

“Yeah,” He nodded and gave me a water bottle. “They were walking out of the school together while I was running late.”

“That’s weird …” I mumbled to myself, not realising that Shindong had heard.

“Don’t worry Hyukkie,” He said as he pulled himself off from the ground to pat me on the back. “Your boyfriend’s not cheating on you.”

I pushed his hand away and started gulping down the water, crushing the bottle as I did so that there was not a single drop left and exhaled a deep breath out when I had drunk it all.

The only reason Donghae would be together with Hyoyeon outside of school would be to introduce her to some ‘life-changing’ muffins or something along that.

No other reason Eunhyuk, just keep thinking that.

Her

“This is it, huh?” I clarified as I looked at house.

“Yepp,” Donghae replied, reaffirming the address on his phone. “This is the place.”

Taking an inhalation of breath and realising it, I clenched my fists together. “Well, let’s do this then.”

“Yeah, good luck dear!” He spoke quickly and began trailing away but I managed to catch him by the ear, pinching him hard as I held onto it.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“Well, I was going to hide in the bushes while you do your work but you’re kind of hurting me now!” He complained, trying to slap my hand away.

“Why would you do that?” I questioned and released him. “I can’t do this by myself.”

After rubbing his reddening ear, he folded his arms together in a cross and pouted like his usual child-like behaviour.

“Hyuk’s dad doesn’t really like Hyorin and I because he thinks that we were bad influences for him.”

“Which is why this is the best time to reconcile with him!” I suggested and locked my arm around his so that he won’t escape. “You have to be with me!”

“Why? You’re the one that has the DVD—“

“—Now you have it,” I interjected by tucking it into his arms. “And besides, wouldn’t it be weird if I were to just rock up at the door and say: ‘Hey, my name’s Hyoyeon, Eunhyuk’s sworn enemy, and I’m here to present you with this, please take it!’”

“Well me being here doesn’t really reduce that weirdness any further!”

As he tried to push the DVD back to me, I attempted to give it back and as a result, we were in a hot-potato fight where the DVD was stuck as the poor potato stuck in our chaotic environment.

“Donghae?”

A sudden woman’s call had stopped our fight and when we had turned to see her identity, even with one glance, one very wide-eyed glance, her appearance was exactly like Monkey-boy, although much prettier.

“Hello Mrs. Lee,” Donghae greeted and bowed in an exact ninety-degree angle as I followed his action immediately.

She took slow but gentle steps towards us as she raised her eyebrow in both confusion and surprise by our presence.

“Ah right! This is Hyoyeon,” Donghae introduced while she scanned me up and down. “She’s also Eunhyuk’s friend.”

I tried to hide my cringe at the thought of me being friends with a monkey but Donghae nudged me several times so that I’d go along with it.

She nodded her head lightly and responded with a small smile, as if she were anticipating yet afraid of what was to come from us.

“So, what brings you two here?” She asked. “It couldn’t be that something is wrong with Hyuk?”

“No! Of course not! It’s just …”

“T-This!” I stuttered as I showed her the DVD. “Um, please take this and watch it tonight, Mrs. Lee.”

She tilted her head to the side and only analyzed the object in my hands.

“This is …?”

I pulled her hand up to take it out of mine, unintentionally being disrespectful and tightly held onto both her hands.

“Please watch this Mrs. Lee,” I stared at her directly in the eye. “It won’t take much of your time, and I promise that it’s worth the time. If you love your son—no.” I paused and smiled at her. “Because you love your son, you will watch this.”

When I had removed my hands from her, she remained silent and continued observing at the DVD, then glimpsing back at me again.

“I don’t think—“

“—Not only you Mrs. Lee,” I stated. “You and your husband must both watch this. It’s very important. I apologize for the disturbance so we’ll be leaving now.”

Not forgetting to bow a farewell, Donghae had followed in sequence and we had left.

As we walked off, Donghae whispered to me, “What if she won’t watch it?”

“She has to,” I retorted. “Because I can tell that she’s a mother who loves her son very dearly.”

Mother

After having encountered with Donghae and the girl’s unexpected appearance at my house, I entered the kitchen and dropped my handbag onto the sofa while still holding the DVD in my hands, unable to forget the girl’s determination in wanting me to view it as her eyes held contact with mine, gripping my hands as she did so.

It can’t be those movies where a woman with long black hair covering her face comes out of the television and tries to kill me right?

Nevertheless, my curiosity sparked my interests and I had already pressed play only to have my immediate descry when the screen had revealed itself titled, ‘Lee Eunhyuk, a beautiful son.’

The video began with Eunhyuk looking at the camera with his cute confused face as he cocked his eyebrow.

“Why do you keep texting?” He asks.

“Because I have a lot of friends,” It sounded like Donghae’s voice. “Just keep dancing and don’t mind me.”

He then shrugged off his suspicion and continued dancing. In the following scenes all included some of his dancing and some of them even included the girl I had seen before, Hyoyeon, was it?

However what seemed to more intriguing was Hyuk’s facial expression. Piercing his eyes at the mirror as he maintained some dance steps, huffing and puffing out breath in an attempt to fight against his exhaustion. Even so, he was enjoying it all.

“Tell me oppa,” A female voice spoke through the audio of the video, while images of Hyorin and Eunhyuk were playing. I’m guessing it was Hyorin’s voice. “Why do you want to become a choreographer?”

Haven’t I told you this already?” My son skeptically asked.

“Maybe, but I can’t remember.”

 “Because I love dancing.”

I suddenly felt an ache in my heart—a pain that I’ve made towards my son.

“Why don’t you just listen to your father Hyuk-ah?” I asked while sitting beside him on his bed. “He wants you to do well in life and not waste your life somewhere else.”

“Why don’t you understand mom?!” He argued. “I’m not going to waste my life, because I’d be doing something I love! Why should I spend the rest of my life doing something I hate?!”

Now that I think about it, he’s grown up so much these past two years. From that childish, stubborn face that I always saw—how he always stomped angrily as he stormed off to his room, he pouted if he didn’t get things his own way, he folded his arms together and gave me a silent treatment to solve problems—but now, he’s changed. He cut his hair short, and dyed it to a dark blonde color as opposed to his black messy hair in the past. He’s grown taller, and looks like there are some muscles at the biceps.

The one big difference is though, are his increase in smiles. Throughout the video, he was smiling and laughing with his friends—playfully using violence at times and his gummy grin after a completion of a dance—as if to say that he won a game.

“What do you think of Eunhyuk?”

“Eunhyuk oppa?” The young girl replied as she looked at the camera. “He’s the best in the school!”

“Eunhyuk sunbaenim helps people when needed and you can learn a lot from him.”

“Eunhyuk is more than the most popular guy in school, he’s the most generous as well.”

“Eunhyuk oppa! I love you!”

The video then went towards Hyorin.

“Eunhyuk oppa has always been there for me since high school.” She spoke. “He’s the greatest person I’ve met in my life and without him, I wouldn’t know what to do. I’m glad for his existence.”

“Hyuk-ah!” It was now Donghae’s turn. “What I like about Eunhyuk … hmm … he’s my best friend, and because he’s my best friend, he treats me like a brother vice-versa. I’ve known him for a long time, and no one can ever replace such a wonderful person.”

I felt my eyes stinging, from trying to hold back the tears.

“Hello Eunhyuk’s mother,” Oh! It was the girl from before. “Lee Eunhyuk is now 23 years old and aims to be a choreographer in the future. He has such good friends and enjoys dancing a lot. He works hard to the point where he fainted, but don’t worry, he’s well now. Do you know why? Because he doesn’t give up.”

And the resistance had failed now as water drops instinctively fell from my eyes, running down my cheeks.

“And because he doesn’t give up, I hope you won’t give up on him either.” She continued. “Everyone wants to thank you for giving birth to him and his life is important in everyone else’s. That’s why, I hope you can attend the Seoul Youth Competition on Friday from 1PM-6PM. I promise that you’ll be able to gain a lot from coming. Something that you’ve lost for two years now.”

After her speech, there left a few more selca pictures of him and his friends.

“I know that you don’t really like to talk about this oppa,” Hyorin’s audio was speaking. “But what’re you going to do about your parents? Do you plan to not contact them ever again?”

“I think it’s best that way, even though I actually miss them.”

“You miss them?”

“Of course,” He responded immediately. “Even though they disagree about my future, it doesn’t stop me from loving them … but whether they love me too, I don’t really know about that.”

I stopped the video and couldn’t take it anymore. A massive pain had struck my heart as I felt past mistakes that ran through my head. The tears that escaped from my eyes never ended and my eyes were starting to swell from the sadness. My small hiccups were louder as I dropped to the ground from my couch.

I do love you, Eunhyuk,

a/n: Please look at the next chapter for a full author’s note as this will be a double update!