Reply Forty-One

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Almost Autumn 2009

 

Sunggyu shifted his eyes between mine, emitting a gaze that caused my insides to churn unstoppably. The beam of light from the TV screen landed on one side of his face with gentle softness. The hair from his fringe effortlessly fell over his forehead, and it softened his features, making them look more youthful. I hadn't noticed it until I saw the ends of his fringe almost reaching his eyebrows, but before his mother appeared he definitely had his hair at the front brushed up over his forehead. A few hours ago, he had been definitely showing off his clear skin on the patch between eyebrows and hairline. Though, now his hair was covering most of its part.

 

 

He sighed slightly, and broke the silence. “Now that you actually ask me, I have no idea what to say.”

 

 

“That's okay, too,” I responded. “You don't have to say anything, if you don't want to.”

 

 

He nodded, as if he appreciated my patience, as if he had wanted those words to escape my lips all along. Then the corners of his lips quirked upwards, and he said, “Can I just start from last summer? When Woohyun and I found your letter?”

 

 

“Feel free to do so.”

 

 

“Okay, last summer, huh.” There was a nostalgic ring to his voice when he said that, and I couldn't help but feel slightly excluded from him. It wasn't the kind of excluded I had felt in the beginning of this year, though, when Woohyun's disinterest in the situation and Sunggyu's awkwardness had made me feel unwanted in the scene. I was just, yet again, simply jealous of the emotions that appeared in Sunggyu's eyes, or in his voice, when he heard the words last summer. Because those were emotions I didn't understand, emotions I couldn't know about, and that was what had caused this heavy feeling in my gut, like someone was filling my stomach with. The emotions belonged only to Sunggyu and his last summer, and I wasn't involved in all those memories, which was kinda a selfish thought because I had my own last summer and my own memories of that time.

 

 

He looked at the unchanging TV screen. “Everything was fine back then. My parents had a normal job like anyone else. They would come back from work late at night and I wouldn't be able to see them sometimes, but it didn't matter that much to me. I never felt neglected or uncared for. Quite the opposite, actually. They always tried to make me feel loved by asking me about my day. They would come to my room, and ask, 'Hey Sunggyu, did something great happen at school?' Which I am quite grateful for. Not everyone asks you about your day. And my parents don't ask that in the I Don't Really Care About The Answer kind of way. I know they love me. They show it subtly enough.

 

 

“Maybe you already know this, but my parents love lotteries and casinos and bars much more than other people do. Other kids' parents would rest on a Friday night, read a book, prepare for Saturday's work, enjoy a bath or spend some quality time with their children. But no, not my parents. Every Friday night, my mom would go to her friend's place and they would play Go-Stop or Mahjong,” he paused to look at me, “Have you ever heard of Mahjong?”

 

 

“A bit. Originates from China, right?”

 

 

“Right, and the rules are actually not that hard to learn, I've heard. We should play it sometime.”

 

 

I nodded, then he continued, “So the uncle on my father's side has this business. He buys antique things from elder people, then sells them for a higher price to people with hobbies of collecting them. I don't know much about his business. Actually I don't really want to know anything about it. But he seems to earn enough money from this thing he started. And my father worked for him since the beginning until, well, they had a fight. Everything was fine before. But then they had their differences regarding a few things and they stopped talking and my uncle fired my father or my father quit first and then, in winter, we had our CSAT test, but I was hardly able to concentrate in the tension at my place. I really tried working hard to get into SKY, but my father was so depressive at that time, I just couldn't focused on studying.”

 

 

“Wait, you wanted to get into one of the most prestigious universities?” I asked in disbelief. Sunggyu never gave me the impression of being that intelligent. I knew he was intelligent, but not to what extent. “What were your results?”

 

 

“475.”

 

 

“Wow.”

 

 

“Do I look that stupid to you?” he asked, amused.

 

 

And I responded with, “No, but you don't look that intelligent to me either.”

 

 

He smiled, and I told him to continue. “Then we thought we would lose him. My father, I mean. But we were wrong because he started going to casinos instead. And that so much more frequently. He started gambling with money that he didn't have, that he lent from relatives, friends or acquaintances, and at some point he gambled all that money away, lost all of them, and caused the debts to pile up. My mother was devastated when she saw him breaking down, so she ended up drowning her problems in gambling as well. Which is kind of a contradiction.” Sunggyu changed his position on the couch, flattened the wrinkles in the blanket that was covering our thighs, and looked at his hands. He inspected them like a detective carefully examining the murder's fingerprint, as if he didn't know whom those hands belonged to. He went on, “Don't get me wrong, though. My parents were still hard-working. They still tried their best to pay the bills and never asked me to work in order to help them out. That part-time job at Lotte Mart was completely decided by my own.

 

 

“But one day I just had enough of everything. I couldn't keep on looking at my parents without a sense of embarrassment or disappointment. And when everything broke in me, and I just lost it, so I moved out.

 

 

“I told them about that, about my decision, and they felt so sorry for having ruined their son's life that they silently agreed. And even until now, the look in their eyes when I told them about moving out, it was the hardest part of leaving, I guess. They looked at me with so much guilt that it felt so wrong of me to do it. But my desire to lead a reassuring life without worries and stress was stronger. Stronger than the guilt. And when I moved out, I had to find all kinds of part-time jobs to keep my head above water. I ended up depending on myself. And as someone who left his parents in order to get away from their depressing life, I couldn't allow myself to ask for their support. Even if they had offered me their help, I wouldn't have accepted it. I just couldn't. And it was hard. Living alone, I mean. No one really asks you how hard it is, but it is hard. So maybe that's why I get along so well with Dongwoo. He genuinely cares.”

 

 

I smiled at that. “He is indeed one of a kind.”

 

 

“He's someone I'd like to introduce to my parents, if I were a girl.”

 

 

“Or someone you'd like to show the first snow or something.”

 

 

“Because he is so pure and innocent?” asked Sunggyu.

 

 

“Exactly,” I answered. Then, as if I had just remembered what our actual topic was, I said, “Please continue talking, if you want, I mean.”

 

 

He looked into my eyes, and smiled. “I actually hate talking about myself. And I don't mean this as an immediate response to your request, but I just generally prefer worrying about other people's affairs. The way you spend your time on finding solutions, on trying to help. But selflessness only gets you as far as your own problems outrun you in the race. And then you are back to point one and you have to start thinking of your own ways to escape the prison. Because, while you tried to open someone else's lock, you didn't notice you were in a cage all this while, as well. So in a way it's not even selflessness. It's more like pushing your nose into other people's business so you forget about your own.”

 

 

I wanted to say something to that, something along the lines of compliment and praise for his way of speaking with pictures, but then a noise resembling the sound of something heavy falling to the ground echoed from the back of the apartment, and I looked at Sunggyu and he looked back at me with the same horror, and then he told me to wait a second, and I nodded before he stood up and walked to his room.

 

 

He disappeared for maybe five minutes, and when he came back, he looked calm, almost tranquil. I asked him whether his mother was okay, and he told me she was. In fact, she just “threw something to the ground in her sleep.” An album or something. But her eyes were still tightly shut, her breathing as steady as ever.

 

 

“Do you want to drink something?” asked Sunggyu from his position behind the kitchen counter, as if having just remembered to be a good host. “Or are you hungry? You haven't eaten since we've met.”

 

 

“Nah, I'm okay,” I replied, glancing over the living room and spotting the darkened sky through the windows. And only then did it occur to me that I had never seen a clock in Sunggyu's apartment before. I asked, “By the way, what time is it?”

 

 

“7:26.”

 

 

I nodded, more to myself, when he returned to the couch with glasses of water in his hands. He offered me one of them, and I mouthed a Thanks in response, gladly accepting the drink. Sunggyu sat back down, his feet and calves under his bottom. We said nothing for a while.

 

 

Then I asked him, “What happened with you and your mother today? The fight, that is.”

 

 

“Ah, that,” he said, his eyes lighting up. “She came to apologize, actually. A few days ago, she appeared before my doors to ask for money and she usually doesn't do these kinds of things. Neither does my father do them, so I was surprised. And despite it being the first time, which should have calmed me down somehow, I got all mad at her for ruining my life even after I had moved out. But it wasn't even really about the money. I didn't care about it. I just hated the fact that she wanted to use it for gambling. So she came today to apologize and I told her that she didn't have to, and then she said she was sorry, both of them, for messing up my life, and my voice just unintentionally grew louder, and, without me knowing, I started to yell at her, and I told her to stop apologizing since it didn't matter to me anymore, and then at some point she started crying, and I felt so awful for causing her to break down, but my voice wouldn't decrease in volume, so I kind of kept on shouting at her to stop, and then somehow, in one way or another, she did, and then I walked out to find you sitting on the corridor.

 

 

“It's a really ridiculous thing,” he said, not letting any silence settle between us. “I mean, how you can never be that angry at your friends in that short amount of time, but how you can act so hatefully without a moment's pause when it comes to your parents. Why is that?”

 

 

I thought about it for a while. But I only came up with this answer: “I think we are too selfish in that sense. Like, how you immediately take someone for granted when they are continuously being nice to you, or like how you believe they will never turn their backs on you because they are the ones that love you the most. And yet, we can always say I love you to our lovers or our friends, but those three words would never escape our lips when it's about our parents. I think, our parents are so selfless that we feel like someone needs to be selfish in that relationship, as if it's okay to act like that.”

 

 

“You seem to get along with your parents, though,” said Sunggyu. “Are you affectionate towards them?”

 

 

“I do get along with my parents, but I just can't seem to express my feelings well.”

 

 

“I see.”

 

 

“You know,” I began, trying to sound as non-judgmentally as possible, “I hope you don't get this wrong, but I always thought you had a broken relationship with your parents.”

 

 

Sunggyu smiled reassuringly. “It's okay.” He placed his glass of water onto the coffee table, and said, “As for your statement, most people would think I hate my parents simply because they connect the fact about gambling with neglect. Which is like jumping into conclusions without further investigations.”

 

 

“Yeah, I'm sorry. I was one of those people.”

 

 

“No, don't apologize,” he said, and there was still a smile on his lips. He looked me in the eyes with so many different emotions that I got lost in them. Sunggyu continued, “Just then, when you held my hand, I felt much better because I knew I wasn't alone anymore. So thank you for that. Also for listening. I'm all okay now. Really. Thanks.”

 

 

I smiled at him, but looked away, because the direct contact of our eyes was something I wanted to prevent from happening. Despite our long and deep conversation, I was still shy. He was gazing at me, but I couldn't gaze back. And our knees were touching under the blanket, though this time I didn't move away. Then he cleared his throat in a small manner, and said, “Tell me about your story.”

 

 

“My story?” I repeated, dumbfounded. “But I don't have stories to tell. There's nothing you might not already know, I guess.”

 

 

“Tell me about your aunt, maybe, or about your relationship to your parents. There's always something to say.”

 

 

“Well, yeahㅡ”

 

 

“And if it's not something worth telling for you, then tell me about Woohyun.”

 

 

I stared at him with my mouth agape. “Huh?”

 

 

“Tell me about your first love who coincidentally happened to be my friend from high school,” was what he rephrased with nonchalance.

 

 

“You knew that!?”

 

 

“He did, too.”

 

 

“What?”

 

 

“Well,” said Sunggyu, tilting his head to the side, “he had an inkling, maybe. Sometimes he would nudge me and ask, 'Hey, do you also get the feeling that Hana might like me?' And then I would tell him that he was just flattering himself. So I don't think he truly knew.”

 

 

It took me a few seconds to fully process his words before I mumbled more to myself, “If he knew about it all along, then he probably never felt the same way.” Which was quite convenient to know since it did decrease the amount of regrets that had piled up throughout my past. It was almost like receiving a reply without actually confessing.

 

 

He said, “Woohyun is a complicated person. He changes his ideal types and things like that too frequently. One day he tells me he likes Hara, and then the next he tells me it's just infatuation. He swears to me that Hyuna is different, that he really likes her a lot, and then he gives up. I can't know whether he has ever liked you or not because he never told me. Someone like Woohyun might as well be hiding those secret feelings from his friend. With him, you never know.”

 

 

“Speaking of Hyuna,” I took up again, “what actually happened there?”

 

 

“He once worked at a café with her and they started texting a lot. He would always show me their conversations, and it did seem like she would become his next girlfriend. But then again she never really liked him back with the same pace. Woohyun would charge forward without looking back, but she approached things with a slower speed. In some ways, they never had the right timing, so he gave up. That guy always gives up too easily.”

 

 

“Not with Seungyeon, though.”

 

 

“Yeah, because she was his first love. With first loves, you're always patient.”

 

 

“Reminds me of your Piano Girl,” I blurted out.

 

 

“Piano Girl?” he repeated, his brows coming together. Then, as if someone had opened the closed door to his memories, he said, “Ah, Piano Girl.” Then he laughed. “You call her Piano Girl?”

 

 

“Don't change the subject!”

 

 

Sunggyu shook his head in amusement. “If you want to know about my love life, Hana, then I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I don't have a love life. Besides the fact, maybe, that someone recently confessed to me.”

 

 

Mind you, but I have to add a little side note here: in my whole life, I've never been as stupid as to not spot the subtle meanings in harmless remarks, to not read between the lines when a book of vagueness is thrown at me. At least, I am not always stupid. So when a few weeks ago, regarding my friendship with Howon, Sunggyu said, “When both of them are good-looking, and they get along, don't you think it's hard not to fall in love?” I only understood, “Hey, I subtly said you are good-looking. Did you notice?” Because many people wouldn't register the underlying meaning in his statement (normal people would just pay attention to the general message he wanted to convey), while someone like me would jump to the conclusion that he was implying that I (and maybe Howon, too) was, in his eyes, good-looking. As a matter of fact, this realization would, of course, change a lot between us. For reason 1) the guy I like thinks I am good-looking, and for reason 2) THE GUY I LIKE THINKS I AM GOOD-LOOKING. You get my point.

 

 

And when Sunggyu said, “Besides the fact, maybe, that someone recently confessed to me,” he was slightly, maybe subtly (but definitely) using means of fake oblivion (talking about me as if I wasn't there) to tease me with his nonchalant remark. Needless to say, teasing is almost equal to flirting, my friends.

 

 

His comment somehow made the air around us feel thicker, the silence that followed heavier, and I felt my cheeks heating up without my consent. I looked away, in fear eye contact might ruin the calm face I had put on. The spot where our knees were touching grew warmer, or maybe it was just me noticing the slightest changes in our silence. The palms of my hands felt sweaty around the glass of water, so I set the glass on the coffee table a few inches away from his. He was watching me all this while. I rubbed my hands, and he didn't refrain from observing my movements.

 

 

Then he inched a bit closer, and said my name in an almost whisper. And the thing is, you usually know when the other person wants to kiss you, when they want to press their lips against yours, because they give off this certain feeling, because their gaze tell you exactly that. The look in their eyes have their intentions written on them, so it is definitely not a wrong thing to believe that the eyes are the windows to our souls.

 

 

Sunggyu said, “It's not polite to just kiss you without saying anything beforehand, so I'll say it now.” A smile spread across his lips as he looked me in the eyes. “I like you, somehow. No, just I like you. Without the somehow. I am certain I like you. And if you wanted to know when I knew I did, I wouldn't be able to give you a definite answer. I can only tell you that the incident of Woohyun kicking the ball to the bleachers, from where you were watching us, during middle school was the first time I noticed you. Before that, I wasn't even aware of your existence. Not to mention of the feelings I would develop a few years after that. I guess, I did find you slightly attractive back then. The infatuation kind of attractive. Not anything serious or long-lasting. But then we met again at the ice parlor last summer, and I found your letter andㅡ”

 

 

“Wait, you found the letter?” I interrupted.

 

 

“Yeah, I found the letter, but Woohyun was the one who picked it up and approached you.”

 

 

“Okay, continue...”

 

 

He nodded. “So when I saw you at that ice parlor, I just thought, 'Hey, isn't that the girl from middle school? The one who lost consciousness because of Woohyun's flying ball?' I asked him after you guys left, but he said he didn't remember. And after that encounter I tried to look at your face more. I tried to find out whether I indeed thought you were attractive, but came to the conclusion that you were just another girl who happened to fit my ideal type criteria. Nothing more than that. And besides, I knew you liked Woohyun anyways, so I didn't care to question my feelings anymore. Until Chuseok. That was when I seriously wondered whether I was just curious about you because you liked Woohyun or whether because I was starting to like you that I grew curious. Then at some point you stop keeping track of these things, and without your slightest knowledge you realize you somehow like this person. And then the somehow disappears, and it's only like. And after a while you just know you like her. You don't need a reason or an answer for that. It's just I like you. No because. No since. No but. No somehow.”

 

 

“When I confessed,” I said, leaning away from him, my back against the armrest, “you said you knew. How did you know?”

 

 

“I just knew,” he answered, and I tried hard not to smile at that. “It's not necessarily because you are obvious with your feelings. It's just that I was always more attentive and observant regarding you.”

 

 

“But then you rejected me.”

 

 

“No, I didn't. It was more like a temporary answer to your confession. Maybe a cruel one at that.”

 

 

“I didn't mind,” I said.

 

 

“It's just that the idea of dating doesn't necessarily appeal to me.”

 

 

“Neither do I fancy that.”

 

 

He smiled with one corner of his lips, and rested his arm on the back of the couch, his hand placed next to my shoulder. “So we are not together now?”

 

 

I shrugged.

 

 

“It doesn't matter anyways.”

 

 

Then he leaned in, tilted his head slightly, and kissed me. Closing my eyes, I realized that you can only truly enjoy the simple pleasure of being kissed by the one you like to the fullest when your primary sense perception is switched off. Only then can you really experience the person with all your other senses. The smell of their hair. The sound of their breathing. The taste of their lips. Their soft hands. And then, when you notice all these things, you fall in love even more and that with the greatest feeling of fulfillment.

 

 

With his lips still on mine, he smiled, and then he pulled back to gaze at me. Out of pure embarrassment (and shyness), I turned away, and covered my reddened face with my hands. He laughed at that, and inched even closer so that only my bended knees were serving as a wall separating our bodies from each other.

 

 

“Are you shy now?” he asked, with an amused tone in his voice.

 

 

“I am not.”

 

 

He took my hands and pulled them down to reveal my face. Then he pushed my knees apart, as though he had noticed they were a nuisance to him and his next intention, leaned forward, and cupped my cheeks, but before he could do anything, I said, “Your mother is sleeping next-door.”

 

 

“Oh, you're right,” he responded, drawing slightly back and causing our bodies to share some (much needed) distance. His eyes scanned my face for certain emotions, so it seemed, but I was putting a lot of efforts on looking calm and preventing him from noticing a change of expression. Since, in reality, something in my gut was doing somersaults without my approval, my heart was beating crazily like it had nothing better to do (a really embarrassing statement, if I think about it now), and my chest felt like bursting. Though, I am not Son Hana if I can't conceal these phenomena.

 

 

“You're right,” he repeated, nodding to himself like a teacher appreciating his straight-to-the-point explanation of a complicated topic at school, and then he stopped several seconds later, and started smirking mischievously. “On the other handㅡ”he said, decreasing the distance between us, his eyes not leaving mine, then almost held me in his arms, and kissed me again. But this time for real.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A week later, Eunji knew about it. An hour after that, I told Howon (who was already informed by the second person involved in it, which I am still quite bitter about). Two weeks and a half passed by and Sungyeol found out. (Apparently, because my face beamed with happiness, and I became prettier through that, which of course logically explains why he found out.) Dongwoo heard the story when he was video-chatting with the second person involved (another thing I'm quite bitter about). At around the 24th day mark (I wasn't counting), I decided to tell my mother.

 

 

She was doing the laundry in the living room when I said, “Mom, I have to confess something.”

 

 

And she, the very definition of a nice mother, asked judgmentally, “What have you been up to again?”

 

 

“Nothing that demands the rise of your anger,” I answered. “It's just something I want to admit because that's what nice daughters do.”

 

 

“Don't beat around the bush.”

 

 

I took a deep breath, and tried hard not to tell her too much, because some things are better off without letting your parents know about them. “I am currently dating someone.”

 

 

“Whom?”

 

 

“Someone you know.”

 

 

“Who is it?”

 

 

“Sunggyu,” I said finally.

 

 

She stayed silent for a while, looked at the laundry, and moved not a single inch. Her expression was hardly readable, making it impossible for me to find out what she was really thinking. Not that my mother would ever have anything against me dating someone. But the simple idea of her daughter going on dates, calling someone at night, texting, and even kissing them was probably not necessarily her greatest desire as a mother. And when several seconds passed by without any of us speaking up, I decided to break the silence, but my mother beat me to it. She said, “If it's Sunggyu, then I'm fine with it.”

 

 

“Really?” I asked, not quite sure about her statement.

 

 

“Sunggyu is a fine man. I like him. He is polite and smiles really beautifully.”

 

 

“And it's really okay?”

 

 

She looked at me from the corner of her eyes. “How old are you again?”

 

 

“18.”

 

 

“Some girls even younger than you already date and wear make-up. I am just glad as a mother that you've told me honestly.”

 

 

I smiled and hugged her by wrapping one arm around her shoulders, pressing her cheek against mine. She just lightly patted my back as if she didn't really care that I was showing her my affection right now. Then I wanted to kiss her cheek, an act to prove that maybe in our relationship I wasn't so selfish after all, but my father suddenly entered the living room, and sat down on the couch next to me. I pulled back from my mom and turned to him.

 

 

“So it's Sunggyu, huh?” was the first thing he said after gaining my attention. He sat leaning forward, his elbows placed on his knees, his gaze fixed on the ground. There didn't seem to be disappointment in his voice, so I silently heaved a relieved sigh. “Like your mother said, if it's Sunggyu, then it's fine by me.”

 

 

I approached my father, smiled at him, and embraced him with my arms, not thinking of anything else besides him. It was like that: the urge to shower them with my love increased the more they accepted my relationship with Sunggyu. I realized, you only notice how much you owe them when they do things to your favor. When they agree to buy you the newest car. When they allow you to stay out until over midnight. When they give in to permitting you the trip that you've always wanted. When they accept the person you can always say I love you to. And maybe that's the problem, or maybe it's a step forward. Either ways, I was hugging my dad, simultaneously wishing I could do that more often, wishing I could be more affectionate and grateful towards my parents, and then there was this proud smile on his lips when I pulled back. In my view, that should be reason enough for me to change my ways and become a better daughter.

 

 

Still smiling, he looked at me, before turning all serious, then asking, “But you haven't kissed yet, right?”

 

 

And I could only repeat in my head: some things are truly better off without letting your parents know about them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I sat next to Sungyeol in the bus, whom I had picked up at Eunji's family store, which was almost around my corner, when he truthfully told me what he thought about me dating Sunggyu. For reasons unknown to me, he came upon the idea that it was okay for him to talk about businesses that weren't his, and for reasons unknown to him, I listened. He was wearing a tshirt with a V-necked cut under a pastel-colored cardigan. His chino pants were slightly rolled up at its cuffs and his sneakers looked almost beyond repair, the color white barely recognizable.

 

 

He said, “I always thought you would like Myungsoo, to be honest. And not the genius from high school.”

 

 

I had to suppress the laughter coming from my throat when he called Sunggyu a genius. “Things don't always go the way you want them to.”

 

 

“Meaning you wanted to like Myungsoo?”

 

 

“No, not really,” I answered, albeit wondering whether my statement actually bore any truth.

 

 

“But it's a pity, you know,” he said, not really looking at me. “I don't know Kim Sunggyu personally, but I've heard good things about him in the past, so you dating him isn't exactly the pity I'm talking about. It's more, like, I don't know, maybe the fact that there is no future between you and Myungsoo.” He gave the whole conversation a short pause, before nodding. “Yeah, that's what I'm trying to say. It's a pity that there is no future between you two.”

 

 

“But it's not my fault,” I insisted. “I've tried contacting him a lot of times, but he never answered.”

 

 

“Okay, let's make a deal. You try calling him one last time, in my presence, and when he doesn't answer, I will stop bothering you about it.”

 

 

“Okay, deal.”

 

 

“Deal.”

 

 

I nervously took out my phone, searched for his name in my contacts, and tapped on his number, bringing the phone to my ear. When the ringback tone began resonating, I glanced at Sungyeol's expectant face, and wondered just what I would say if Myungsoo actually picked up, although the chances of that happening was quite slim. If someone refuses to answer the several times you have contacted them in the past, they most obviously won't answer now. So, of course, wondering about what to say to him was a wrong move on my part. And maybe a waste of time. Because Myungsoo didn't pick up. And he most obviously wouldn't in the future.

 

 

“I will see it as him having lost all his chances,” said Sungyeol after I had stuffed my phone back into my bag.

 

 

“It doesn't matter, anyways. We can't go back to our past selves.”

 

 

“But there's regret, isn't it?”

 

 

I nodded, chuckling at nothing in particular. “A little bit.”

 

 

“You've tried everything possible in your situation, though. You shouldn't feel regretful.”

 

 

“Yeah, maybe.”

 

 

We exited when the bus arrived in Myeongdong and the many retail stores displayed themselves in front of us with the beauty that they harbored. Sungyeol changed the topic skillfully by talking about his usual stories, and I couldn't help feeling slightly grateful towards him. Despite him being sometimes a bit too oblivious to the things around him, he did know when to make someone feel comfortable in his presence, and how. So when he started talking about his little brother, whom I had not met yet, I felt the greatest desire to set him up with Eunji, and not simply because I wanted someone like Sungyeol to stay in my circle of friends, but because I wanted someone like him to experience his own happiness. This is obviously my story, and he is obviously just a supporting character in it. But, like everyone else, he has a story on his own, and in his story he's the hero who will get the girl at the end. And all I wished for at that precise moment, while he was talking about his little brother, was for him to arrive at the chapter where he would get the girl he always wanted.

 

 

We walked past the popular shops in Myeongdong, squeezing past young people, turned into corners, and arrived at a residential area of the division. Standing in front of the particular apartment complex, I turned to Sungyeol, and asked, “Will you be all right?”

 

 

“Why wouldn't I be?”

 

 

“Because you don't really know Howon or Sunggyu. And it's your first time really talking to them.”

 

 

He gave me a smug smile. “I am Lee Sungyeol. I get along with everyone on the spot. No need to worry about me.”

 

 

I shook my head in amusement, and led him by walking at the front. He followed a few inches behind me, the sound of his steps clearly sounding more nervous than I was used to. I stepped into the elevator, and he did the same. We arrived at Sunggyu's floor quite quickly, and when I walked towards the respective apartment door, I heard Sungyeol mumble to himself, “Eunji used to fancy Howon.” Which was quite amusing to me.

 

 

When we stood in front of the apartment, I rang twice, and after a few seconds Sunggyu opened the door. He looked at me with this special smile that people only show their special someones, and I smiled back with the same amount of specialness. Then he told us to come in, and we did, and when we entered his living room, I spotted Howon and Sunggyu's mother sitting next to each other on the couch, previously engaged in a conversation before we interrupted them by our appearance. And then I wondered whether I was going to be all right.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sungyeol really knew how to talk with people well, how to make himself comfortable in people's presence. When he had said he could get along with strangers on the spot, he really meant it with no hidden lie or sarcasm. In fact, he almost immediately befriended everyone, as if it were second nature to him. Granted, at first, he did seem awkward and shy and maybe not so Sungyeol-ish, but after ten minutes (and a joke of him) he settled into the atmosphere with ease. A really admirable trait, in my opinion.

 

 

We were all sitting in the living room, talking about things that were okay to talk about in front of a parent, and Sunggyu did not share any physical contact with me (besides, maybe, our legs touching since we were seated next to each other), which was something I could only silently thank him for. Just like it was impossible for me to admit to my father that I had already kissed Sunggyu, it was also better to keep our boyfriend-girlfriend interactions to a minimum. As much as I wanted him to wrap his arm around me or for him to hold my hands, I would only feel awkward and uncomfortable in his mother's presence. And it also seemed impolite to openly display our feelings and affections when other people were around. From experience I knew, it would only make others squirm in their seats.

 

 

Sunggyu's mother was a good-hearted woman, I felt. Maybe she wasn't as strong as my own mother, who wouldn't even shed a single tear when dogs die in movies, but it didn't matter because her sensitivity was her charm. I had heard her cry before, and it did seem genuine and from her heart. It wasn't just show to make men weak. (Those people really exist.) She truly meant it. And by the look she gave me, I found out she was aware of me dating her son. But she wasn't looking at me with a superior attitude or judging eyes, though. Quite the opposite, actually. She looked at me as if my background or my looks or my wealth or whatever mattered to people nowadays hadn't even once crossed her thoughts, as if it had never occurred to her to perceive me with those things in mind. And maybe it was because I was looking at her the same way, or maybe because she was just that good-hearted. But the more she flashed a genuine smile towards me, the more I saw Sunggyu in her.

 

 

In the silence that followed after one of Sungyeol's amazing stories, she spoke up in her soft voice. “You guys came for a round of Mahjong, didn't you?”

 

 

“Yes, madam, we did,” said Sungyeol, much to our amusement.

 

 

She smiled genuinely back, and turned to Sunggyu. “Give me the suitcase, please.”

 

 

We all knelt down around the coffee table, each of us occupying one of its sides, while Sunggyu's mother prepared the game for us by opening the suitcase, slamming the tiles, that I had only seen on photos, face down onto the wooden top of the table, and by shuffling them with both of her hands, simultaneously explaining the rules. Sungyeol joined her without hesitation, using his fingers to get a general impression of the weight and the cold and smooth surface of the tiles. We all listened to her intently. She moved her lips in this certain manner that it was impossible to look away from them. When she spoke, she did this with full conviction and elegance. Although I didn't understand anything of what she was telling us, and, glancing at Howon and Sungyeol, they didn't seem to either, it was still pleasant to listen to her soothing voice.

 

 

For the sake of demonstration, Sunggyu's mother played the first round whereas I had decided to stay out of the game. At first, it seemed like Howon was leading, but that was obviously just an illusion, or maybe a deception on his part. Just as everyone was thinking Busan guy had actually understood the game, she placed her last tile to the middle, and won. A maybe not so unpredictable outcome. In the second round, I joined them, and she herself sat behind to watch us. She was seated right between Sunggyu and me, so whenever I didn't know which tile to place, she would subtly help me, causing the others to groan in envy. A result that I really, really liked. And she would keep silent most of the time – she didn't speak much anyways – but her presence would still be sensed by the person sitting next to her, and it wasn't the kind of sensation that was unpleasant. And sometimes she would whisper something to Sunggyu, and he would nod or smile in response, and no one would know what they were talking about. It wasn't necessarily because those words weren't intended for us to hear in the first place, but because her voice was just that soft and quiet that it was close to impossible to listen in, especially when Sungyeol started singing out of the blue. That was probably reason One why I lost the game. (Side note: Sunggyu won.)

 

 

I found out about reason Two when Sunggyu's mother had decided to leave us, to go to bed because she was tired, and when there was no one else around me anymore who would subtly give me hints to succeed in winning this game. In the true sense of the word, I at Mahjong. I eventually understood the rules in the course of that evening, but the magic of winning kept staying in the dark, too far for me to reach, too hard to obtain.

 

 

Sunggyu won two games in the row until Sungyeol and Howon joined forces and started cheating their way through. Basically, they would exchange tiles secretly, when Sunggyu wasn't looking, and tell him to bring drinks so they could see his set of tiles. And then they would help each other win the game, going as far as secretly pocketing joker tiles (which could be replaced by any number) during the shuffling before each round. As expected, those cheaters won. Then, at some point, Sunggyu noticed, or more like, he had finally decided to do something, so he started cheating, too, and I couldn't let the male breed dominate the only woman in the circle, so I, as well, cheated, and then we all resorted to cheating, and no one really cared about the results anymore, about winning or losing, about the hours ticking by, about night falling over us, because we were all laughing with tears in our eyes, holding our stomachs with much difficulty, trying to make sounds that weren't even close to laughing, but it was impossible. By the time we finally stopped, Sunggyu looked at me, a smile lingering on his lips, and I wanted to be close to him, so much closer than our arms were touching, and I wasn't really talking about physical closeness.

 

 

Later that night, when Hoya and Sungyeol started playing video games, and Sunggyu wasn't in the mood to join them, and neither was I, we decided to walk out to the apartment's balcony to gaze into neighboring verandas. Sunggyu had told me that his neighbor, who lived in the building in front of us, liked crafting and recycling, making old stuff look new and giving it a vintage touch. His job was apparently being an artist, according to Sunggyu, although the latter didn't really know so sure himself. The distance prevented him from judging accurately. The closed windows, the shut curtains, the blank walls – it was impossible to look into people's hearts by just watching from afar. But just like Eunji and I love attaching stories to people passing by an ice parlor's windows, Sunggyu liked wondering about his neighbor's life.

 

 

“He might be a romantic guy. Someone who reads a lot of romance books maybe,” said Sunggyu, as we sat down next to each other, leaning against the windows to the balcony, our eyes set on his neighbor's veranda. The whole square ground there was covered with grass, fake or real one, I couldn't really pinpoint. A comfortable-looking swing, where up to five people could sit, with cushioned seating stood right in front of the entrance to the apartment, a small, wooden desk next to it. If you were to trace the veranda with oblivious eyes, you would still notice a bookshelf standing there in the middle of it. And at its immediate end, there were two white square pillars with an arch connecting them from above, at each side ivy entangling the construction. Normally verandas would have some kind of fence around its outline, to separate itself from the surrounding, but this one was only bordered at two sides, and where the pillars stood, you could just walk out without any hindrance, without opening a fence, or without having to step over it. The left side of the veranda was built against a bricked wall, which was probably shoulder-high. A fence resembling those from basketball courts separated the property at the other side from the neighbors, and instead of looking bleak and maybe out of place, with the light bulbs attached, it displayed the same beauty that the stars emit in the night sky. I took a closer look and spotted little, white, unmoving spots on the fence, and when I asked Sunggyu, he said, “Polaroids.”

 

 

“Polaroids?”

 

 

“I once saw him taking shots of the neighborhood.”

 

 

“And then he just puts them up there?” I asked, astounded.

 

 

“Yeah, maybe it's his hobby.”

 

 

“Or maybe he is a stalker, and he always stalks his neighbors, looks into their places when the curtains are drawn back, takes photos of them, and wonders about their lives, just like you do.”

 

 

He laughed, putting his arm around me. “That's a possibility, too.”

 

 

Then he pulled me closer, much closer than we already were, and I inhaled his scent, which was a mix of shampoo and body lotion, before I asked him, “What actually happened between you and Woohyun? You guys used to be best friends.”

 

 

“I wouldn't necessarily say best friends,” was his immediate response. “We were close, but not as close as that.”

 

 

“And then you guys just stopped being close?”

 

 

He shrugged slightly. “I don't know. There is not a real reason for us drifting apart. I could try as much as I want, and I would only find made-up excuses. Woohyun and I never had the kind of friendship that would last after graduation. We became estranged, you could say. We were just high school friends.”

 

 

I nodded slowly, and looked at him. He looked back with the same gaze, and then he kissed my cheeks, and whispered something into my ear, and his eyes wouldn't leave mine the whole time, and then he kissed me again, on my lips, and it felt so great that I momentarily forgot what the world looked like before I met Sunggyu, before I even knew about his existence. At that precise moment, it was like our feelings had no boundaries, like no one had put obstacles in the way, like there was only Sunggyu and me walking down a lonely path, a path that didn't seem so lonely with him by my side. In the world where only Sunggyu and I existed, there weren't butterflies flying about, undiscovered flowers spread across the willows, or bright stars shining alongside the moon. There weren't such things to distract us. In the world where only we existed, there was just this veranda with the bricked wall, the fence from the basketball court and those two white square pillars with the arch above. And we would silently sit on the cushioned swing, side by side, and look at the Polaroid pictures and the light bulbs would replace the stars. And maybe we would kiss, or maybe we would just hold hands. And then, when boredom got the better of us, when the scenery of the fake apartment buildings around us and the fake grass on the ground started to sicken us, we would go back to the real world, and we would love each other despite the polluted city, the honking of cars, the hypocritical society or the flaws in people. No one really has to be perfect to love someone or to be loved. And we were definitely not perfect.