Reply Thirty-Seven

August 2009

He looked a bit different, I noticed. His hair was slightly shorter, a shade darker. His eyes looked worn-out, maybe even dull and somber. The clothes he was wearing, a white tank top under a thin camouflage shirt matched with jeans and sneakers, didn't look like him at all. He looked good in them, I had to admit, but in a really uncomfortable and stranger-like way.

He had his slightly trembling hands placed on his lap, his gaze fixed on the ground. With his feet, he would push back the swing he was sitting on in the slightest way until he ceased all movements, and looked up at the night sky. There was a strange melancholy lingering in the air.

“Thank you for coming.”

I wrapped my hands around the chains, which suspended the swing, and let my hair fall over the sides of my face. In a natural way, I didn't feel like I wanted him to look at me. He probably wasn't, but the more I stared at him, the more I had the feeling he would stare back.

“How have you been?”

“Fine.”

“Have you eaten dinner already?”

“Yes.”

It was going to be a long night, I thought to myself. For some reasons, we both seemed hesitant with the things we truly wanted to say. For some reasons, we felt restricted by the events between us. In a hurtful way, we were like strangers who didn't know what to do with each other anymore. A really depressing feeling of being estranged with the people you used to care about, I couldn't help but dislike it.

“You know, I-”

August 2009; a day before

You stop being so cautious of what the other person is thinking of you when there are more important things to worry about, when real life problems take up all the amount of worries you would otherwise spend on awkwardness. Like in movies. Have you ever seen people staying awkward with each other when zombies are on their way to eat their brains, or when the world is going down? Obviously not. In the end, awkwardness only takes place because of people being too conscious of each other. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, in my opinion. But to some extent, it is.

And that was all I was thinking about when I found out about Sunggyu. The real Sunggyu, I mean. The one he truly was – from the first day I saw him with Woohyun during the football incident to the day we stopped being normal to each other. Of course, I would never be able to actually know the true Sunggyu, the one who spoke in this certain way, who moved in this certain manner, unless I experienced him, unless I actually talked to him for hours straight, taking notice of the smallest things. But Dongwoo as my information source was enough to nourish my curiosity of Who is Sunggyu.

He was your everyday guy whose parents didn't know how to take care of him, the type of guy who had to suffer his parents' shortcomings and addictions. He was someone you pitied once you found out about his family situation. Debts, gambling, warning letters, visits by neighbors or acquaintances. Sunggyu was someone whose life had never taken the right path.

But then again, I shouldn't be talking about family affairs that were none of my business, because, no matter how I (or in this case, Dongwoo) had experienced the situation or conversations, they really shouldn't be judged upon because they were perceived by a third person, a very vague spectator, and even if Sunggyu were to be the one who had told Dongwoo about his family situation, you couldn't possible come to a judgement just by experiencing one side of the story. Hearing the other side was close to impossible, in my case. So maybe I should just cease all judgements regarding this issue.

Nonetheless, I should at least say, Sunggyu's life was difficult. And if you looked at his parents, who were, according to Dongwoo, a little bit careless and messed up (in this situational sense), which could more or less mean nothing at all, you would understand why Sunggyu had more part-time jobs than a rich kid had phones. To quote my cousin, Sunggyu worked “a lot more than you would actually know”. Whether this was even possible or legal was beyond me.

So my take on Sunggyu: he was pitiful – in this compassionate kind of sense. You knew pity was just an extra that he didn't need, just like he never needed rain when he was outside, the absence of an umbrella in his hands, but you couldn't help but feel this emotion anyways. You knew it wouldn't help his situation either, but it filled your body and mind anyways, taking up the remaining space for possible solutions. In a sense, knowing about Sunggyu meant seeing him in a different light, thus treating him differently.

And that was exactly what I did when he emerged right after Dongwoo from the main doors of my house, his hair messily styled upwards, revealing his narrow forehead. He respectfully bowed to my family, the eyes of his smiling with his lips, as I noticed him wearing a gray plaid shirt for the first time. The right part of its hem was tugged into his jeans, placing attention on his black belt. I looked at my parents who were smiling contently, as if they were very much pleased by his manners.

“Our Sunggyu here visits us for the first time,” stated my father almost proudly, looking at my grandparents who were confused as to why we had a visitor. “He's Dongwoo and Hana's close friend.”

“Hello.” Sunggyu bowed to my grandparents again, flashing them his eye smile. “It's nice to meet you.”

My mom disappeared into the kitchen, saying she was going to bring some sweets to the living room, as my father started leading my grandparents back to their own chamber to rest. Dongwoo motioned for Sunggyu to sit down as he walked around the coffee table, towards my left side, and plopped down, his legs put in front of him. Watching him throwing his head back with his eyes closed, I decided to sit down, too, and Sunggyu followed after me, occupying the seat to my right.

I looked at him, noticing how he had pretty distinct sideburns that made me want to rub my hands against it, just to feel the scratchy stubble, as I asked him, “Did Dongwoo force you to come?”

The corners of his lips started tugging upwards, his eyes twinkling with the slightest spark. He looked back at me, a moment of silence accompanying his gaze, before averting his eyes towards my mom who was coming from the kitchen to place a plate of cookies on the table, leaving us as sudden as she had appeared.

“He told me it would be a good idea to meet my in-laws,” he said. To which, my heart skipped a beat before he went on, “Pretend Dongwoo were actually your brother so I actually make sense.”

I smiled knowingly, adding my two cents to his story. “Congrats to marrying Dongwoo, then.”

The said guy, who was busy choosing a cookie from the plate, finally looked at us, his eyebrows knitting together in a slight manner. Dongwoo then picked the one with the chocolate on top, stuffing it into his mouth before asking, “Wha ah u talkin abou?”

“Talk after you finished eating,” scolded Sunggyu gently, a smile on his lips.

The thing is, when people start talking, you obviously look at them as an act of respect, if you want, unless someone else is more interesting to watch. But since I already knew Dongwoo and the image of him difficultly munching on something, I ended up making short eye contact with Sunggyu, in which he actually caught me staring at him, as I was watching his long and straight eyelashes fall before his eyes. I looked away the moment I noticed we were staring at each other too much.

“It's the first time I'm hearing Sunggyu-hyung is my husband,” said Dongwoo, wiping the corners of his mouth clean with the back of his hand, after he had finished off his cookie.

“That's because you were too busy cheating on me with this girl.”

“Girl?” I repeated, staring at my cousin with my eyebrows furrowed.

Dongwoo returned my confusion with a sheepish smile, not before giving Sunggyu a meaningful look. “Um,” he began, his voice fading in a small instant, his laugh following the awkward silence.

“Why are you hesitating?” Sunggyu asked. “You should tell her.”

“But that's the kind of talk you don't usually have with people of the opposite gender,” retorted Dongwoo, uncertain.

“She's family. Just tell her.”

I was looking back and forth between the two of them, my head whipping from side to side. At first, glancing at Dongwoo's hesitation, then admiring Sunggyu's mature way of speaking to him. It seemed more like a movie to me, a conversation cropped from a script. In the movie I was watching, Dongwoo would be the type of guy who was being persuaded to do something, a shy boy who would barely speak out for himself, and Sunggyu would be the persuasive kind of person, the one who would push the kids towards their limits, force them into doing the impossible, because that was just how he would show his affection.

“Okay,” Dongwoo began, nodding his head as if he had to confirm the decision with himself twice, “I'll tell you, Hana.”

“Tell me,” I repeated.

“So... there's a girl,” he said, glancing at Sunggyu, then back at me. “She's from here.”

“You mean Seoul?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, go on.”

Dongwoo moved closer to the coffee table, resting his forearms on it while looking at me. “I met her at Woohyun's birthday party earlier this year.”

There was a short moment in which I didn't know what to feel or to think because I was simply reminded by the regretful feelings of that day and the difficult emotions I had to overcome. The thing is, once you remember one event, you will be reminded of the other events that led to that thing, or the happenings that were caused by it. Remembering one thing will mean you will remember the others, too. And that was what triggered my mixed feelings, in the first place.

My cousin looked at me worriedly, as if he knew what I was thinking about, what I was feeling, before I nodded to him, showing I was fine with him mentioning my first love. He nodded back, clearing his throat before continuing, “She comes from the States. I mean, she's living with her sister here in Seoul right now, and she was born here, too, but she moved to America when she was three, I think. So now she is living here because she's finished her studies abroad. And wow, Hana, she is so pretty. But not only that, she is also really nice and easy to get along with. And her voice is so much better than Sunggyu-hyung's.”

I snickered at that, glancing at the said guy who was scoffing.

“We exchanged numbers because we got along so well, and when I went back to my hometown, we started texting each other.”

I smiled. “Ah, so our Dong-aegi is slowly becoming aware of girls, huh.”

“About time too,” added Sunggyu.

In that moment, I realized, nothing in this world could compare with the genuine happiness you felt for the joy of others. Not the extra chicken at your favorite fast food restaurant or the money coincidentally found in the pockets of your jeans. Of course, those were little things that made your day a bit brighter and happier, your dull Mondays a bit more colorful, but what truly felt satisfying to me was the happiness of the people I cherished. I realized, the warmth you felt in your heart, after finding out about your loved ones' happiness, was so much more beautiful, so much better. In Dongwoo's case, it was like experiencing my first love all over again – just without the heartbreaks or regrets.

“What pleasant news,” I remarked, letting a satisfying sigh escape my lips.

“Yeah, falling in love must be so nice.”

“But I'm not falling in love,” mumbled Dongwoo innocently, staring at his own arms on the coffee table.

Watching him, with the confusion written across his face and his oblivious expression, strangely filled my heart with bittersweet feelings. I was undeniably doubting his words. Whatever he would tell you about this girl was probably only true to him. Only he would see the truth in it. But I decided not to say anything regarding this matter. I figured, letting him find out by himself was better than taking away the surprise of realizing one's own feelings. He should do that at his own pace. Just like how I had experienced Woohyun as my first love, from the moment I saw him at the football field during middle school as he was kicking the ball at my face to the moment I had started realizing my affection to him. I had hurt a lot along the way, but I still wouldn't have wanted anyone to spoil the ending.

“But, hyung,” began Dongwoo, tilting his head slightly to the side, “didn't you tell me your first love was during middle school?”

Sunggyu scoffed. “That was ages ago.”

“First love is first love,” I insisted, and he smiled in return.

There were a lot of things I truly found depressing in Summer 2009, a lot of things that made my soul feel weighed down and lost. But then, there were a few moments I truly felt happy, moments that made me the person I am today. Summer 2009 had its up and downs. One moment I would smile and laugh at the most ridiculous things, I would jump in joy and dance to my favorite songs, and the next I would feel sad and start crying. Summer 2009 was just that fickle. Though, that one time I had spent with Dongwoo and Sunggyu rather belonged to the good and pleasant memories, to the great moments that are still held close to my heart. Summer 2009 marked the time things started shifting to a surprising direction.

And it also marked the time the name Awkward Turtles had finally lost its burdensome meaning.

August 2009; that day

If I had to present the changing relationship with my aunt in a diagram, it would look like this:

loving, caring (1991 – primary school) → hateful (primary school – 2008) → back to loving (2008 – now) → ?

Hatred obviously wasn't something I was currently feeling towards my dear aunt. Though, it wasn't exactly love either. Indifference would be the wrong answer, too, since I did care about her health and happiness, considering the fact that I, the younger one, had actually tried to teach her a lesson. Her well-being was something I truly wished for, but her stubbornness made it so much harder for me to persevere this attitude. At some point, every human being would start giving up. Just like how I had given up on Woohyun, a result that happened naturally.

So to put the cards on the table: my aunt was in love with a dude I couldn't really measure up, and because of her certain belief that he was the one, she moved in to him. And that boyfriend of hers, a bit too skinny for a man, was also the dude who would say harsh things to people whenever he was drunk. Her friends, those guys I had met at the welcoming party a few months ago, were obviously bad influence to my aunt, and I had no idea why she would always take their sides when I told her the truth. To put it bluntly, she was more immature than I was.

So whenever I saw her at home, because she still had things to pack and move to her boyfriend's apartment, my temper would rise, and I would get unnecessarily angry. That was just the result that would take place whenever you mixed Me with My Aunt. It wasn't pleasant, my friends. It sincerely wasn't.

She was in the bathroom on the second floor, looking for her remaining make-up and skin care products, as I stood near the door frame, silently watching her. Her hair had already grown to her chest, a different color every time she would be seen by me. I also noticed how she was wearing false eyelashes with thick mascara on top and lip tint on her lips. Something on the skin of her upper arm slightly revealed itself when the short sleeves of her tshirt started moving upwards. It took me ages to realize what it actually was.

“You have a tattoo!?” I shrieked, irritated. It was the outline of a winged heart.

My aunt quickly pulled the tshirt down, covering what had already been seen. “Don't be so loud.”

“What loud?” I asked, not awaiting an answer. “Since when do you like tattoos?”

“Ever since I was a brat during middle school.”

“Oh God.” I rolled my eyes, leaning against the door frame with my back. “I can't believe it.”

“You don't have to, Hana.”

I pressed my lips together, shaking my head in a disappointed manner. To prevent misunderstandings, the problem here wasn't the tattoo. I didn't really care whether she wanted to draw something permanently on her skin or not, whether she would pierce her ears as well or whatsoever, but what really irked me was the change in her. The discharge from hospital was like her license to start acting like a rebellious teenager again. I just hated the change in her. And I hated everything that made her become an unrecognizable person to me.

“You really need to stop,” I told her. “You really freaking need to stop.”

“You don't understand this. You are too young.”

“You're right. I'm the young one here. But why are you taking the immature role right now?”

She said nothing at that. After a pause, she continued looking for her remaining stuff. My patience for her slowly started sinking until I told myself that she was a grown up lady, and she should do whatever the hell she wanted to do. I told myself it was okay for her to get tattoos, to smoke and to drink, to date good and bad people, to move in with the one she loved, to act like a teen or to go to bars. I told myself to stop caring because she obviously didn't care enough to listen to me.

As I was starting to go away, leaving the scene that depressed me so much, that poked holes into my soul, I heard my aunt lastly say, “You don't know how it is to not have lived properly at my age. Staying in the hospital for such a long time...”

I wanted to tell her how stupid it was to believe you would live properly when you drank an uncountable amount of alcohol, visited bars almost everyday, and ruined your body for the sake of living properly. I wanted to yell at her for truly believing such things. But in the end, I decided to give up. At some point, I was just at my limit.

In the late afternoon, I had found the courage to actually text Myungsoo, in order to make up with him, to rewrite my incomprehensible future. Don't ask me what had happened prior to my decision because I sincerely didn't know. I was just lying in my bed, thinking about my aunt and her words, thinking about Sunggyu and wondering whether he ever had the chance to live his youth properly because he had been forced to grow up in his parents' stead, thinking about other people, until Myungsoo's face popped into my mind, and I thought to myself I should finally text him. I told myself it was time for me to stop kicking the can down the road because I couldn't keep on delaying important matters to a later day. I feared things would never change if I didn't act more confrontative and courageous.

I wrote:

Hey Myungsoo, can we stop avoiding each other?

After a long stare at the words, I sighed, pressed the send button, and put the device onto my nightstand, hoping he would reply soon. I grabbed for a magazine, and started reading whatever was in it. The SHINee members' faces appeared at one of the pages, their amazing visuals depicted in black and white colors. For some weird reasons, I found Taemin in that photoshoot really attractive, especially his full lips and his messy hair. The emotions in his gaze stirred something in me as I suddenly pulled the laptop at the end of my bed onto my lap, and started typing their group name into the search bar.

I wasted a few hours on watching videos, eating dinner, going back to my room, downloading and listening to their songs, saving their images, until I probably had more of SHINee in my laptop than I had of Big Bang. Looking at the clock on the wall, which displayed 6:56pm, I grabbed my phone, and hopefully pressed on the home button. No new messages.

In a strange way, I felt like Myungsoo had received and read my message, but he didn't and wouldn't answer me because his silence might actually be the answer already. I felt like this wasn't going to be a repetition of New Year where he had just forgotten to reply because his life was so messed up and busy. This time, I felt like he was cruelly avoiding me because that was how the things between us would end up, in his perception. I felt like he had given up on us already, like he couldn't see any traces of friendship left between us. At which point, I almost started crying because I obviously was still holding onto the thought that things were going to be alright one day. I still hadn't given up on him yet; my heart was still aching for his presence in my life. And as I was thinking about all these problems and worries and regrets, my phone suddenly started ringing, causing my heart to stop for a moment.

It was a message.

From Howon.

When you have so many words to say to each other, so many things to sort out, you won't know where to start, and end up saying nothing at all. That was exactly how I felt after Howon had texted me to meet him at the playground in my neighborhood in order to talk things out. Neither the darkened sky nor the cold wind could prevent me from going. It was just that the possibility of not going wasn't even presented as a choice. Even if I didn't know what to say, even if I ended up hitting him because he had been such a bastard, I would still go. The urge to meet the one who used to be my closest friend was just so much stronger than my resentment towards him. Howon, I figured, was someone I would always favor over any other guy in my life.

Under the night sky, with the faded stars looking down at us, we ended up sitting on the swings, half a meter of distance separating them, as the most overwhelming silence that ever occurred in our friendship fell between us. In a way, it was more like I was sitting next to a stranger than next to my best friend.

“You know,” he began as I looked at him, “I-” He stopped short. A brief wind rushed past us, filling the pause after his hesitation. “Hana,” he tried again, my name effortlessly rolling off his tongue, “can't you stop making me feel like I'm the worst?” He looked back at me. “I mean, the way we are acting right now... it's not like us at all.”

I shook my head, casting my gaze at the ground. “We aren't the same anymore.”

“We've drifted apart.”

The more I listened to his voice, the more I yearned for our past memories. When yesterday I had been reminded of Woohyun's birthday party, it had taken me to the time where Howon had rushed to see me because he knew how lonely I must have felt. I remembered the white shirt he was wearing with the gray pattern adorning his getup. I remembered his messy styled hair and his jeans. I remembered the flick on my forehead because I was pretending to have fallen asleep. I remembered his worried expression when he noticed I had cried. Howon was someone I never wanted to loose, but maybe I had lost him already to the time that had estranged us.

“I've promised to be honest with you,” he said. “I believe, honesty is the only way to fix our broken friendship. I think we can sort out all the problems and unanswered questions when we are honest with our words, with our feelings. I really believe honesty is the important key to a long lasting friendship.”

I looked at him, and he looked back.

“So I'll be honest with you now.”