006

Somehow, when my phone didn’t ring, it seemed even more noisily present than if it was constantly buzzing. As each day went by, it became more evident that he didn’t mean to call. I fought so much against the desire to just text him again, tell him that I was just joking, that I’d take everything that had been said back, so that, he would text me again like nothing had happened, and everything would be back to what it should be.

Days passed. I waited, breathless, praying that footsteps would come and someone would call up, “Yumi, someone named Baekhyun is calling for you.”  It sounded so pathetic, that even I cringed everytime I thought of the idea. It was just all too absurd, but I always found myself, praying and wishing, for that absurd thing to happen.

I went back home. When I was washing my face in the bathroom, I left the door open just a little so I could hear its ring over the noise of the water from the faucet. And as the end of the week drew nearer, each ring or beep made that lump in my throat harder and heavier. I couldn’t even eat and sleep properly. I would always get my toes curled, and my mother would constantly chastise me for being annoying just because I would always sigh and sigh from daylight to midnight.

The days of the sem break were filled with monotonous sameness. At first, I tried to make myself feel glad that I was awake and that the morning was beautiful. I tried doing some things that could make me forget about Baekhyun. I would drown myself reading classic novels, with which the words were too lofty and deep that there came a time that it didn’t even make sense to me. But I didn’t stop doing it, just for the sake of forgetting Baekhyun.

It was almost second semester and I hadn’t heard a single word from him, didn’t he tell me not to forget to update him? Was I supposed to be the only one updating? Was I supposed to say to him that he should not forget to update me too? What if he forgot all about me? Or worst, what if he thought I was weird because I told him I liked him?

The last night of the sem break came and here I was, lying on my bed, back in our dormitory. I thought and thought so long that every thought in my head turned into a little prayer. The longing seemed to all other ideas from my head, all the energy that had been left in my body, until the whole darkness of the room was keeping time to the words that beat and beat in my head.

Through the window, the night breezes came with the smell of something lilac and my prayers went on and on, ends linked to beginnings in an endless chain, till my thoughts were a steady chant of “Let him call, let him call!” I kept saying it, again and again, even after I shut my eyes.

I woke up to realize that this was the morning where I got to see him again, it was our enrollment day. I looked at my phone and my hands trembled when I saw that I had one unread message.

HEY!!! So excited to see you! Come early so we could still have some time to enjoy our last days of freedom! –Yuri

I smiled; what if I saw him today? Would he ask me how my vacation went? Would I answer him with, “I waited for your message?” Would he tell me that his phone was snatched and for some acceptable reason, he didn’t get to memorize my number?

Would I tell him that it was okay? That I’d been busy enough not to be able to notice? What if he asked me about the message he received that day when I told him I liked him? Would I just pretend that it was nothing, or it was just a wrong sent message, or would I just let myself die out of shame because of that?

My mind was filled with empty thoughts of how I was going to face him, of little things that could’ve happened if ever I came across his path. I became anxious as I watched the hands of the clock passed by every number. I felt dizzy and at the same time, overwhelmed with all the feelings forming at the pit of my stomach.

In my head were mini movies on how I’d react for some possible things that he could ask me, and I couldn’t help but smile every time I think of the possibility that he was just waiting to talk to me in person and tell me that he liked me too.

His thoughts occupied me and made my temper a whole lot longer while I was busy waiting in line for the enrollment. I was all registered and just waiting for my turn to pay my fee, ready for the next sem, when I noticed that I hadn’t seen him yet.

I looked everywhere for him, but there was no sign until finally, I received a text message from him.

“I just finished registering and they said that our block is already full. I was transferred to another block.”

I almost dropped my phone. We were not classmates and I could pretty much tell you that nothing really happened that semester period.

Once in a while, I would go out of our classroom to take a look at his, I caught a glimpse of him every now and then but I was too weak to even smile. What he did to me was so unbearable that I couldn’t even look at him in the eye. I was hurt. And I was wishing that somehow, he felt that too.

My mind told me that all that had happened in the previous semester was completely lost and gone with the wind. But when he texted me one night asking me how I was, I knew that I was only fooling myself.

Call me crazy, but from then on, I realized that everything he did; everything that he did wrong and everything that he would do, would always be okay. I had given him the power to hurt me. I surrendered to that, and that was okay.

We became close again though we hadn’t had the chance to talk face-to-face. There were times when he would say that he needed tutoring in English and we’d both go to the library or the students’ lodging area and there I would tutor him.

Oftentimes, he would text me and ask me if he could photocopy my notes in Psychology where we had the same professors. I’d give it to him and in those times, he would ask me if I could accompany him and I would.

There was one time when he asked me if I could join him research something for public speaking and I did, he made a speech about friendship and I made something about love.

All the little things we did together became my only thought at night, and little by little, I found myself remembering everything that happened ever since I met him.

I wanted so badly to cry with this strange emotion that I was feeling. Not big, loud sobs, but just sit by myself without making any noise and just let the tears trickle slowly and silently without me, having to stop them.

I tried to force my mind back, back to the time before I knew Baekhyun, but it kept popping with little memories on the way and I could not get past of my 19th birthday. Pictures kept flashing in my mind till I was sick with unhappiness and confusion and my heart felt sore and bruised.

And then I finally surrendered.

I still loved him.

I decided to update in a bulk and the updates started from Chapter 002! Just so you won't be confuse. Tomorrow is the start of my school days but updates will be consistent, I think? I hope so!

Wish me well for the start of a new term in school! I'm so excited because it's a new term, but people will be the same, so...

Haha. Love lots. :)

- deni-sky