“Myungsoo-yah! Myungsoo-yah!” upon hearing his name was being called, a boy under a big tree lifted his body to search for the voice’s owner between the thousands of baby breaths.

                There, he thought for himself as he formed a small smile in on his lips; he managed to find her long black hair between the white colors.

                He watched the younger girl ran towards him in until she stopped a few centimeters in front of one from hundreds baby breaths’ line. A huge grin was the first thing he saw from her, then after looking how she dressed today, he lifted his hand to cover his lips which were forming the same huge grin as her.

                “What do you think?” she posed with her hand on her waist, showing off the new dress she wore today.

                “You never told me that you are going back to school,” he said as he chuckled upon seeing her tacky poses.

                “It’s sudden news for me too. Mom just told me yesterday. She said that I’ll be able to attend the school on Monday. But I was so excited and I can’t wait to wear these uniforms, so I end up wearing these today.” The boy who listened to the girl watched her pale checks reddening in excitement as she told him her new story.

                “So what do you think?” she said as she gave him her last pose. The boy lifted his hand under his chin and looked at her like he was rating her.

                “You look beautiful, Su Ji.”

…

                “So how’s your first day of school?” Myungsoo asked to Su Ji who lay beside him, both were looking at the clear skies without clouds, some of the sunlight hit their face after it slipped between the leaves of the big three a few centimeters away above their head.

                “It was awesome!” she almost shouted. Su Ji fixed her position, using her elbow for support, facing Myungsoo beside her.

                “Everyone was so kind and funny. Some teachers were scary though, they got mad for no reason and loved to pick those who didn’t even raise their hand, but some were nice and I actually listen to them without getting any sleepy.

                I made friends with the girls and they said I have beautiful hair. They also said that the boys were looking at me because they thought I was beautiful,” Su Ji was cut by Myungsoo who was suddenly turned his face around to glare at her, but after the shock and Myungsoo seemed to get his sense back, he told Su Ji to continue her story.

                “Overall, it was cool. It was really fun to be in the same place with many people for a long period. It was also fun when we ate together at the break time, showing our food and exchanging it with others.

                But seriously, the math was really really hard! What Teacher Cho taught me this entire time is nothing compares that dreadful math. Those teachers never really taught me anything, they kept saying that too much study will hurt me. And now, I feel like an idiot,”

                Listening to Su Ji was like having an adventure. It was the excitement when we first entered the nature, then her high tone was like when we were climbing a mountain, then feeling the calm as we backed down to the river, then surprise like when we witnessing a waterfall, and the adrenaline when we reached the cliff, and the end was the blue feeling we got when we left the nature.

                But in the end, everything was beautiful, and that was the number one similarity on listening to Su Ji and having an adventure for Myungsoo.

                “No, you are not. I know you are a smart one,” he said to her, not just wanting to erase the frown she had on her face but also sharing the fact about her that she may not realize.

                “How can you say that I am a smart one?” she said, not wanting to get fluttered by something which probably was nothing but a mere lie.

                “Because I’m also a one of the smart ones,” Myungsoo said confidently with a huge grin. He was to to tell her that her critical mind was just one of the visible proofs that showed her intelligence, and of course he couldn’t let her know that all this time Teacher Cho would tell him everything about her every time he came to his family restaurant.

                  Myungsoo liked Teacher Cho. The man, who was Su Ji’s private teacher for this past year, also happened to be a regular customer of Myungsoo’s family restaurant. Every Friday night, Teacher Cho would order dishes for two people; for himself and for Myungsoo. He would ask Myungsoo to have dinner with him and then he would tell Myungsoo his stories. It would begin with his experiments, or the people he met in the library as he was a librarian during the day, but in the end, they would end up in Su Ji.

                  Teacher Cho would tell Myungsoo about this one particular girl that loved to read. He would show him the girl’s neat handwriting and her ordered notes. He said the girl was his trigger for reading more books for the girl knowledge was surpassing him. Teacher Cho also told Myungsoo how he wanted to tell her more about the world, if only her physic was as strong as her determination.

                  And Myungsoo would tell Teacher Cho about what he thought about the girl. Mister Cho liked to hear about what Myungsoo thought about the girl. One of his favorite sentences from Myungsoo was when Myungsoo told him that Su Ji was born weak, but she lived as strong.

“You are so full of yourself,” Su Ji hissed upon hearing Myungsoo last sentence, and Myungsoo could only chuckle. No he thought inwardly, I am so full of you, Su Ji.

                “After bragging that much, you absolutely need to help me with my studies! I think I will have so many things to ask,” she demanded. The boy nodded in agreement even though he doubted the girl’s last sentence.

…

                “So first, you need to calculate this, and you use this method for the next step, then you can finally use the formula to solve it,” Myungsoo explained as he pointed the ordered numbers and letters on the paper. The girl beside him turned her body around and rolled on the green grass under them as soon as he finished his sentence.

                “I can’t believe that you are actually a smart one,” she said while rolling in whining voice. Myungsoo smirked in proud not because he was indeed smart, but because at least, he could see the irritated expression from the defeated girl.

                It had been a month after Su Ji got back to school. She still had the same energy as her first time going back there. In time like this, Su Ji would read her textbook along with Myungsoo and both would share each other knowledge about the subject. Su Ji adapted quite well, everyday she would tell Myungsoo her friends that had been nice to her, and even sometimes, someone would annoy her, in the end of the day, Su Ji would tell Myungsoo that she was glad to have such many friends.

                The only thing that irritated Su Ji more than anything was math. She even called math as ‘unidentified outer space language’. For her, math was not about solving problems, it was more like crying in process. She hated how in math she always stuck with x and y.

                But Myungsoo loved math, at least he did for the last month. He loved it that in math, he would stuck with Su Ji. And the x and y became nothing but a way to make them closer for him.

                “Do you love study, Myungsoo?” Su Ji stopped rolling and faced the sky above her with stretched arms.

                “Honestly.., no,” he told her. He closed her math book and moved beside her to lie, letting the warm sunlight end on his face while he inhaled the fresh scent of baby breaths.

                “Why?” she asked to the boy beside her, now looking at him with her black pearl eyes.

                “Because I don’t fancy words and numbers.”

                “What do you fancy then?”

                Myungsoo turned his head to Su Ji and found her eyes were still looking at him in the way they had always been. He found his own reflection there and thought inwardly, that was just one of the things he fancied in life.

                I fancy you, he said right while he was in the apple of her eyes, inwardly of course.

                He turned his head back to the sky and captured the view with his black lenses of eyes. “I fancy image,” he answered with the same smile he had for Su Ji.

                “What do you do with them?” Su Ji asked, curious after hearing a new thing about her two-years-best friend.

                “I draw,” Myungsoo said, almost obviously proud.

                “I never see you draw,” Su Ji recalled. Myungsoo gave a bitter smile of agreement.

                “Drawing is an expensive and for some—a profligate, thing to do you know,” Myungsoo said lightly as he thought about all the heavy stuff that separated him and drawing. Su Ji knew Myungsoo was actually beckoning his family and their economic condition. Su Ji understood.

                “What do you draw?” she continued.

                “Anything,”

                “Draw me then,”

                “Can I?” A question, beckoning the infinite gap between the two, slipped from Myungsoo’s lips between the excitements he felt.

                “Why can’t you?” Su Ji, unaware of the substance that built the inability asked.

                “I mean, I’ll try,” Myungsoo fixed. Even if he had told her that he drew ‘anything’, he refused to draw the ignored realization for Su Ji to see.

                “Tomorrow?”

                “Tomorrow, then.”

                The next day, she didn’t show up.

@_byharu