Yewon

There’s always that one guy who gets a hold of you. Not like your brother or even father who gets you in a headlock kind of hold. Or the little kid you’re babysitting who attaches himself to your leg like a koala kind of hold.

I’m talking about a life changing thing. The “can’t sleep, can’t eat properly, can’t do homeworks, can’t stop giggling, because you can’t forget about his smile” kind of hold. The kind of hold when you were listening and dancing to your favourite K-pop song with your best friend.

The very same hold when you were reading romantic novels or fluffy fanfics about your idols, and you hope and pray that it will happen to you. And then it happen to you, and you go completely and totally insane and lose your entire grip on reality or any sense on how things used to be before he walked in to your life and ruined everything.

Love’s super sneaky like that. It creeps up the second you turn around the mirror and look at your reflection, admiring how beautiful you are (or maybe not).The same thing about how you gossip with your friend about the mean girls at school, or maybe when you didn’t expect to be the antagonist in the play although you wanted to be the protagonist.

Then suddenly, you just woke up one morning and realize The Truth: that some boy—a boy you’ve known for your whole life who you never even dreamed would be actual boyfriend-material; a boy you never thought was cute; a boy who’s kind of dork and wore the same old hoodie all the time—is suddenly all you can think of.

But the problem is, there is absolutely nothing fun about falling in love. Mostly it just makes you feel sick and crazy and anxious and nervous all the time remembering that it may end soon and probably ruined your life. And then it does.

Yes, he smells amazing. And yes, you melt whenever he texts you good nights, good mornings, I love yous, all the time. And yes, when he dances your world just stopped for a while and just admire that beautiful creature in front of you. When he kisses you your brain shuts off and all you can feel is his lips and nothing else matters. And yes, he tells you that you’re beautiful, and suddenly you are.

The whole love thing is a huge mess and a giant nightmare that is about to explore into your face and doesn’t have any idea what you’ve gotten yourself into. Love is no game. People jump off the bridge and even sell of their possessions and live somewhere just to forget about their love.

I know. Because it happened to me. I did not mean that I left home and be far far far far far away from him. The way I went is much worse. I died because of a broken heart. No, I didn’t kill myself. No, I didn’t go on a hunger strike.  I didn’t catch pneumonia just because I cried and suffered in the rain. No urban myths or legends here just my heart literally broke in half.

I know it’s really ridiculous and unbelievable but that’s the truth. I didn’t know that someone could die with that at all. Even if most people blame my sudden death because I was once diagnosed with a heart disease, the koku haku disease ( a disease where in you have a limited heart beats and might die any time) since I was born but cured when I reach high school.

But, I lived well. I was very energetic and quite boyish. I was even picked as my school’s varsity swimming team when I was in my middle school and up until now, I am a member.

But, it doesn’t matter anymore.
Still in the end, my heart broke anyway.

My name is Kang Yewon, not the actress or the member of a girl group named, Oh my girl. Just a normal teenage girl who lives at a normal town here in Seoul. I have a brother whose name is Kang Younghyun, my brother who likes to rap and play his bass guitar.

I had a perfect family: My Mom, Dad, my older bro, and our precious dog Mogu.
I also had a perfect group of friends: Minhyun, Hyunjin, and Shiah (my closest friend).
And my perfect boyfriend: the dancer, the class’ vice president, the one and only, Kim Jongin.

Before I died, I had everything and more.
I was happy.

But all of that changed on the night of December 18, 2017—the night I felt a terrible pain in my chest and collapsed across the dinner table from Younghyun.
Just like that. It’s game over. It was the end of a life.
My life.

In the first few hours after my death I guess I ignored the times, the years of running and swimming and biking down the mini hills here in our village at practically illegal speeds had finally caught up with me. My heart must have been weaker than everyone had thought. There must have been something really, really wrong with me after all. Something even my mom couldn’t have predicted, as she was a cardiologist.

After a couple of days, neighbors, friends, classmates have been visiting our home and sending their condolences to our family.
Maybe, now that I am gone my older brother is devastated. Because he would probably be the one now who will pick up Mogu’s waste.

Oh, I missed my brother!
Younghyun and I have been bestfriend since we were a kid, are age is quite close enough that’s why we can relate to each other. We are also the normal siblings who were also fighting over a childish thing and even now that I’m 18 and he is 19.

My memorial service was rough and short. And the hardest part of it is that seeing my brother, my older brother who didn’t even shed a single tear. I know that he was supposed to be strong for my mom and dad but I’m quite sad that he didn’t even mourn for me.

The whole school came, even the school’s Principal Mrs. Choi, who sat next to my mom. I’ve noticed that my dad was wearing the neck tie I gave to him. A grayish neck tie with a little black stripes on it. His face was hard, tired, I could tell from the dark shadow under his eyes that he hadn’t slept in days. He was sitting next my mom, with his right arm wrapped around her. He held on tight, like he was afraid to let go. Like mom might crumble into pieces.
Or that he would.

I couldn’t help but watch mom, in particular. The way she’d locked her eyes on the flower arrangement and my picture that was in the middle of it.  The way her skin seemed cracked, like the sadness of me being gone had worked its way into her pores. The barely-there scent of her rosewater perfume lingering in the space between us.

Mom.

I glanced out over the crowd, thinking how surreal it felt to be sitting in front of so many people. Noticing all the details and wondering why so many of them had barely bothered to say hi to me when I was alive. But here they are anyway.

I remembered that this was not the first memorial service I attended to. I remember my old friend, Yeji who died a few years ago. She might be a few years older than me but we enjoyed each other’s presence and became friends. But soon our lives drifted apart as we had little misunderstanding that affects our relationship with each other. It used to make me sad, remembering all the fun and memories we’d had together in the past. But I guess the truth is, sometimes friends come in and out of our lives like clothes—in one season and out the next.

Like girlfriends, right Jongin?

I remember the morning I’d heard about the news about Yeji. Our team’s coach had called us for our daily 6am practice and I was the first one to warm-up. A few of my teammates were whispering like crazy about something over by the locker room door, so I swam across the pool and jumped out to see what was up. I could still feel the adrenaline pumping through me as I pulled off my diving cap and began to towel off.

“Hey Sunbin, what’s going on?” I whispered. “Did something happen?” I asked with a my eyebrows raised.
“There was a fire last night,” she said. “A girl in senior year was killed. “
It can’t be Yeji right… I paused, the towel dropping through my hands.
“Who? Who died?”
She put her hand on my shoulder as the other girls looked on us. “Your old friend, I think. Yang Yeji.”

I can still recall the feeling in my stomach as the words left Sunbin’s mouth. Can still remember the clammy cool of the water droplets as they roll back down my back like tears.

My old friend.
Yang Yeji.

We’d all come to her memorial service as a family. Who’d have thought, just a couple of years later, we’d be sitting here again—this time for me?

Then came the part where people got up to share all of their memories with me. My science teacher, Mr. Lee, talked about the time when I almost caught the chemistry lab into fire with the wrong choice of chemicals that were put in the tube. My co-teammate Sunbin also spoke about our memories, our same interest in music (she even sang a few lines of our favourite song Day6’s “Pouring”) ,my obsession over Baskin Robbins’ banana nut fudge ice cream, and how much the team will miss me.

I will also miss you.

The thing is all of the stories were funny. All of the memories were sweet. For a second, it was kind of easy to forget that this was a memorial service. I didn’t feel like anyone had died. It wasn’t morbid, depressing or creepy. It was actually kind of fun, hearing how much everyone liked me. I remembering feeling silly that I’d been worried about it; for thinking it was going to be hard to watch. But the mood was light. Like some sort of a celebration or a party.

And this time, I was the star.

Then Minhyun, Hyunjin, and Shiah got up from their seats. I watched them walk to the stage, hand in hand. They all look so young, so alive.
Pretty, petite, and dark-haired Minhyun, wearing the moon necklace I gave to her. Hyunjin’s brownish hair pulled back from her face, her eyes was puffy from crying. And lastly Shiah, was a total mess I think if I were alive I would probably about being a zombie with that look. She is holding a daisy on her right hand.

My favourite flower.

It was crazy to see the three of them up there together without me, like the  earth was turned the other way around. They didn’t know that I was just sitting on the stage, watching, just a few feet away. Wishing that I could tell them everything would be fine, even if I wasn’t so sure. But the dead can’t talk, after all.

They glanced at each other and took a deep breaths. Then Shiah began to sing. Her voice was lonely. Beautiful.

That was our favourite song..

It’s just a passing downpour it’s how I feel.
After I met you, I haven’t lost the happy memories to the rain.
When the rain stops let’s meet again and we will smile again and be together.

She wavered for a split second on together, and soon the other two catch up and sing as well. They were linking arms and holding each other tightly, not letting go. Their heartbroken harmony echoing against the totally silent room.

Oh god.

I looked around and see my mom begun to cry, her body shaking. Dad, trying to be strong. Tears spilling down on his face anyway. Younghyun’s eyes were blank and just staring straight ahead. With that few lines of the song, the entire room had fallen apart. Neighbors, close friends, close relatives, teachers, and school mates. All of them are crying. Crying for me.

Then I saw him. His dark messy hair, his dark brown eyes locked firmly on the white marble floor. The black jacket I used to snuggled into so many times. His perfect lips, the I used to kiss every day for years. Kim Jongin has snuck into the back of the room like a ghost. But he wasn’t the ghost.

I was.
That’s when I lost it.