“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” 

- Albert Einstein

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Her eyes fixated on the clean, crisp canvas. Her fingers fidgeted with the small water colour brush making contact with a fluorescent, pacific blue. The pupils of her were slowly losing focus; it was hard to brainstorm ideas of a painting especially on a hot summer’s day. The lemonade beside her desk was the refreshment that was supplied free from the Arts building.

“Aigoo…” An exhale exited her lips.

It felt like the same routine she’d been doing was only boring her more and more. Everything that had been happening was unchanging. Waking up, doing volunteer hours, going grocery shopping, spending her free time painting or sketching, and then reading before bed. It’s like the routine was stapled to her forehead and nothing else could be written down on it.

Quickly wetting the blank canvas, her eyes closed, shut tight.

That’s when the brush tipped over her cold water can and her brush rolled on the ground, until it landed near the door of the room she was occupying. When she had rose from her seat and paced over to the door to retrieve her paint brush, she eyed a boy with dark eyes, slightly tousled hair, and full lips. He wisped right past her door; the breeze of him walking by had hit her cheeks fairly icily. In awe, her head whipped into the hallway to try to search for the boy, but he had disappeared out of sight, but…surprisingly, not out of her mind.

Once she had picked back up the brush, she sat down almost faintly smiling at the canvas. Her brush touched the liquid in the water can and she dipped it into a pale white, her imagination began roaming. Her memory wasn’t the best, she couldn’t remember small details as easily as many people around her, but somehow, she flawlessly was able to construct every bit of the boy. They had never met, but yet – she was about to distinct his exact features. His pure eyes, his round and soft nose, and his plump lips. All in all, almost perfection if only she had been painting his full face. She painted his side profile with patience. She knew if she had rushed it, the only thing that would cause her to do was become disappointed in herself.

“I have to get this right. I have to.” She kept reassuring herself that her masterpiece would be the best work of art she had ever painted.

The rough edges of the painting frustrated her to the maximum. Adding water to the tip of the brush, it softened the painting, making it look almost fragile and life-like now.

 She kept surprising herself. 

Asking infinite questions until her brain nearly cracked to pieces.

How did I remember his face so vividly?

While adding layers to the paint, she heard some music playing in the background. Without realization, she began swaying along to it, as if it was a song she had marinated into her mind a long time ago. The image of the side of his face didn’t fail to zoom-in and erase out of her head. To her, she felt like art was something more than just a pretty picture, it had meaning, it had life, and it had…something much livelier than just a flat surface or object of some sort.

Miyoung groaned as her head jerked over to her palette of colours.

The boy was about to cross pass her room again when he stopped midday, starring into the room. His eyes were locked on her, just gazing at the back of her head. He specifically picked out her features and pinpointed some things about her while the straw of his banana milk was still intact in his hands. But before he could look at her any farther, he noticed the painting she was working on. His eyes darted onto its surface and analyzed it before she could move another inch away from it. It was him.

Is she painting me?

He promised to be silent.

If he had spoken, she might’ve stopped painting.

Before taking another step, she moved aside to wash her peach tinted water colour brush.

His face became frozen, became still.

It was his face shape; he was so sure of it. He was positive that it was his face she was painting.

It can’t be me.

“It so accurate though,” he murmured whilst biting the tip of the straw.

Enchanted by her painting, he then looked back to where he came from and walked back to his original direction. He had told himself several times that he would walk by to see how she would have completed the painting after. He didn’t know whether if he was interested in seeing how spot on she would paint the painting, but nevertheless, his curiosity was flying in circles.

Heading back to his practice room, Taemin squeezed the empty carton of banana milk into one flat compartment and tossed it away into the waste bin before adjusting his sweater. He faintly smirked while looking back at his reflection and then waited for the music to restart. His body followed and picked up the rhythm quickly. His free-styling had always been the strongest point when it came to dancing. Not that he minded following choreography, he was the type to ‘go with the flow.’

He used his whole body when it came to dancing. Dancing was his life. He had never been drawn to anything, been attached to anything like it before. He only had ‘liked’ dancing at a young age and now, dancing is what has made him what he was.

He became more motivated.

He became more confident.

He became more independent.

Back to Miyoung’s art room, she was beginning his eyes now. She tried her best to shape them to their exact, distinct shape. During the process of her shaping his eyes, she heard footsteps approaching from behind. She hadn’t wanted to turn around, so she slapped on layers of paint without any sound made.

“Miyoung? What are you painting?”

The low voice made her seize from moving. She blinked once she realized who was in the room alongside of her. “Key?”

“The one and only, you know it.” He laughed while putting a heavy hand on her shoulder.

“Thank God, I thought it was someone else.”

Key angled his body towards her, with his hands on his hips. “Like who. Kai?”

“Don’t.” Her eyes glowered down at the painting and her arm nearly dropped by her side when his name was flying off of her oppa’s lips. She absolutely hated the sound of his name. Even the constant letter ‘k’ made her want to just pinch someone right in their throat. She knew Key meant well and didn’t have any intentions to harm her, much or less bother her. He wasn’t a heartless or mindless best friend to her; he just easily forgot her feelings.

“Kai’s back.” Key suddenly choked out without a warning.

She flinched and compressed her lips into a perfectly, fine, straight line. The paint brush almost snapped in half when she took a deep exhale. It wasn’t that she wanted to physically do something, that she mentally thought something, but it was because she didn’t know how to respond. “And?” The word was emphasized in an agitated manner.

All he could do was move a further back away from her, taking his steps nice and slow. “He wants to see you.”

“That does not specifically mean I want to encounter or want to be within a twenty mile radius of him.”

“You can’t keep avoiding him like this; you can’t just delete someone from your life, dongsaeng.”

She bit her lower lip, holding in the frustration growing beyond to compare. “Surely you know I’m capable of ignoring many things in my way.” Painting aggressively, the anger showed through her rough techniques. Loud and thick of the brush angered her. “Stupid boys.”

“Boys aren’t stupid.”

“No, they’re confusing and stupid.”

“Thank you for insulting the majority of my population.”

She scoffed with a sarcastic spin off. “Not like every person in the world has a brain the size of a watermelon.” Whooshing and switching brushes, she settled her soft brush to the edge of the desk.

“What are you painting?” He leaned closer, nearly falling into the canvas and knocking over art supplies.

Flatly, she spoke. “Inspiration.”

Examining the shapes she had already formed, his finger tapped his round chin. “Looks more like a person to me. A guy, perhaps?”

“Perhaps,” she simmered her voice, pushing back a lock of hair behind her ear.

Preparing himself, he flattened his bum onto a small stool and sat next to her, quietly looking from side to side occasionally while listening to his music. His head slowly bobbed from left to right, left to right, left to right. He felt the rhythm, swallowed the harmony, and hummed the melody from time to time. He slowly allowed his chin to rest on her back while she moved her delicate fingers, tightening her grip on the brush. “It’s going to be a masterpiece.”

The flow, the movement, the lights.

All hit him like thunder and lightning, combined and twirling as one.

His fingertips were eating up the air, his feet sailing across every corner.

Lee, Taemin would be by far the definition of perfection.

But that wasn’t what he thought of when he looked in the mirror. He had to have the lowest self esteem anyone would ever encounter when speaking to him. His positivity sure lustered, overpowered all his weakest points – but underneath all that happiness laid a dark, empty cave. He wasn’t the type of boy to just talk; he flustered and flunked whenever it came to a conversation starter. Whether it was dinner parties, family gathering, or first impressions – he wasn’t the type to be all hyped up and ready to talk.

The music nurtured him, painted over him while he took only a few steps to the other side of the room, moving to the sound of the music. Every beat, every step, every second was like he was in pure ecstasy.

He pushed his head aside to the wall when the music contracted, halted.

“Dancing, I see,” a dark haired boy scoffed, entering the empty dance room, “you’re really good, Taemin.”

The corners of his mouth brightened, “Kai! What are you doing here?”

“Thought I’d stop by. Besides, it’s not like every day I get to see my best friend. I’ve been gone for too long, haven’t I?” The younger boy warmly walked up to him. The way he paced looked so fragile, so innocent. Not like the sly fox he used to be. “Seems like you’ve been busy while I was gone.”

Taemin looked around the room. “It became…my home.”

“I knew I could only trust you with my favourite hiding spot.” Seeing his best friend after his disappearance for three and a half years felt like they had reunited after a long rainstorm. He couldn’t tell Tae Min how much he had missed him; his shyness covered it up decently well. Looking around the room, some water bottles and Taemin’s absolute, prized possession – orange Nike duffle bag. “What were you dancing to?”

The honey coloured hair boy peered upwards, “Just a song I’ve finished composing. How’d it sound?”

“Sounds like your style. Nothing really has changed, huh?”

“Nothing, nothing at all.” Even the goals, the motivations, and his smile – it was all there, had never left.

“Looks like you even got brighter, hyung!” Kai put his hand on his best friend’s fitted shoulder, his hand seemingly small once it placed at its rightful spot.

Hugging her knees, the warmth of the room embraced her, holding her into one bided body. Pieces of her hair got caught in the front of her face, causing mismatched hair, but all she could do now was stare at the painting, the masterpiece, the utter beauty that laid, appeared in front of her eyes. She had completed the painting at approximately 3:11am. People would’ve thought she was crazy for staying up so late, but she couldn’t just leave it there. It was haunting her if she hadn’t completed it all in one go. Once she would start something, her gimmick was to always effectively execute it.

“Thank you…whoever you are,” she mumbled while her lips crushed on the centre of her knees. She was referring to the boy whom she had only caught a mere glance at, but if it weren’t for his being, his occurrence, the painting wouldn’t have even existed.

She felt safe, she felt like everything was okay. She didn’t want this to end, she wanted to smile…just to smile.

Immersing into her soft comforter, her eyes lit up when her phone lighted up from the corners of her eyes. Her right hand stretched, reached for it, and then she pressed the speaker against her ear. “Yoboseyo?”

“Miyoung, ah.”

Kai.

It was Kai.

She could recognize his voice from a mile away. Even if he had decided to send him email, she knew him all too well. His everything, his being, his persona – she knew it all too much. It was like he was an open book and she was a parrot, just repeating and memorizing his every action, his every word.

Biting on her lower lip, she had urged herself to restrain from remembering everything, everything of their past.

Another one of her mottos?

Don’t let your past make you bitter, let it make you better.

“Do you know what time it is?” Stammering, the annoyance level she was on was beyond what she had gone through for the past few years.

His low chuckle and words didn’t fail to shake her. “Well, didn’t you always paint until this time every time you were in the midst of buzzing around, you busy bee? I thought that…I’d tell you I’m back…I missed you, Miyoung. It’s…been so long since I’ve last seen you. Last spoken to you. You haven’t…changed that much have you?”

She held in all the tension, she had to push down all the strings that were attached to her and swallow all of the madness that was running in her mind. His sincerity was the last thing on the face of the Earth that she would ever feel for. “I’ve changed.” Stinging the words through her teeth, she hadn’t known why she answered him when all she had wished for was for one of them end and kill off the conversation.

He smiled on the other line. “Thought so,” he lowly put. “I missed you.”

She snickered silently. “Yes, you keep thinking that.”

“Thinking? I truly did miss you, Miyoung, ah.”

“Please, just stop. I really don’t…want to go through this again, Jongin. I've made so many mistakes already. Not this time, no.”

“Jongin? Whatever happened to us talking informally?”

Miyoung laughed bitterly. “Us? What us?” She smiled through the growing tears in her eyes. “I don’t think…I knew you, after what had happened,” the weakening heart of hers was breaking apart again. It was tearing apart, all the strings attached were snapping.

Kai was trying his hardest to get on her good side, but that was unlikely the case. “Miyoung…can…I see you tomorrow?”

Swallowing the painful shots, her voice cracked. “N-no.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to see you.”

“Please…stop denying this, stop denying how much you have missed me. How much you have yearned for me. Stop kidding yourself, Miyoung. I know you better than anyone else. You don’t give up on things you care about. You didn’t ever have a doubt about me. You’ve always loved me, deep down. Even when everything had hit rock bottom for us.”

His words crawled under her skin. She just wanted to hide, to be anywhere but where he was. She had never wanted to see him ever again. She hated him, she hated him so much she couldn’t even have enough words to describe the feelings that kept bottling up every time his name was mentioned or his voice echoed on the insides of her head.

One minute she was on cloud nine and the next she was running for her life.

What was this?

Why?

She wanted to know why it had to be this way.

Everything he said, everything he meant, it was all lies.

Kai was a sweet talker.

He was a flirt.

He was her boyfriend.

He was her everything.

He was the apple of her eye.

Was.

He didn’t amuse her one bit.

His fake sympathy and trickeries were things she adapted to.

His love for her was like the four seasons, always changing, and never the same.

Gripping tightly onto the phone, the tendency of wanting to throw it, whip it across her bedroom walls were what she was deciding between or handling the situation with the calmest yet hurtful direction.

“You know me better than anyone else? Know me? If you know me so well tell me how I feel right now. Tell me how I feel about you. Tell me how I felt when I found out you had been dating someone else while telling me all those ‘I love you’s.’ Let me know how I am. Because apparently I don’t know myself, I was losing myself. No, Kai. No, I wasn’t.  I never lost myself. I was never losing myself in the first place, I was losing you. I was losing your love for me. I was losing the you I used to love. You became a stranger to me, Kai. And you still are. I’ve never had a doubt about you?” She paused, holding back all the tears. She wanted…she wanted to just scream, to cry until it was all over, but she couldn’t. “All I had were doubts, all I had were fears. Every day, every second. I had so many doubts, Kai. I had too many to even keep up with. I had so many, you just…you just didn’t know. You just were so full of yourself. You couldn’t see anything past you. You could never love me as much as I had loved you. You loved yourself more than anyone else. You couldn’t see me in your eyes. I was merely a shadow, behind you and slowly fading away.” She didn’t want to cry, she didn’t want to show her weakness, she didn’t want him to hear her painfully breaking apart, shearing away. “I don’t know even why…why there was an ‘us.’ I don’t know why I had to keep telling myself I wasn’t going to lose you when I never had you, Kai. I honestly didn’t realize how stupid I was. How stupid I was for falling for someone like you. You never loved me, you ever tried to. You never loved me. Not even once. Even when you said it, it didn’t feel sincere. It just felt like you had to say it…because I was your girlfriend.”

“Miyoung–

“Please…don’t ever call me again. I…don’t want to speak to you.”

“Miyoung, ah! Please stop saying all of this! It’s ridiculous how–

She painfully cut in. “How I fell for you? How you thought you knew me? How you say you love me when you don’t mean it at all?”

Kai’s voice was breaking; he couldn’t properly process everything she was saying. All he knew was that he wanted her back, more than ever. “Mi…Miyoung.”

“I’m sorry,” she paused to whimper and let her tears spill over her cold arms. “I don’t talk to strangers,” and with that she pushed the end button on her cell phone and shut off her lamp, crying herself to sleep under her covers.

Pushing herself back against the safest place possible, her bed – she held herself, she had to hold herself.

The loneliness was slowly killing her.

She swallowed hard and spoke in a soft whisper, “Everything will be okay. Everything will be okay. Tomorrow will be better. I know it will be.” But even saying those things…she felt so doubtful, she felt the lies behind it all.

--
 

[ 18. 04. 12. ]

Calendar > Friday, May 18th, 2012

Tick Tock > 10:05 PM

Infatuation > Almost (Cover) by Jessica of SNSD

Emotion > “╥﹏╥”