"Bastard."

I stumbled back, almost slapping myself in the face for not asking permission to sit. The seat across her, which I was about to occupy, might have been reserved for another already. But who could blame me? It was seven in the morning – too early to be up and awake on a Saturday – yet the public library was unusually packed. And if I was to concentrate on reviewing – which was my only purpose on coming here – I could only do so while sitting down.

"It took you nearly an hour to get me some coffee?" she exclaimed and looked up from where her head was slumped on the desk. Her eyes indicated that, clearly, I was not in the position to know what she was talking about. "You're not Sunmi."

"Mianhae," I said, pushing the chair back in its original position.

"No, get back here," she stated before I could possibly walk away.

My finger felt numb, stuck in between pages for too long after I used it to mark where I had left off. "Jinjja..." But I obliged anyway, and hurriedly sat in front of her. Once again, she had folded in on herself, her face flat on the open book she had been reading.

"So that means she took longer than an hour," she grumbled, mostly to herself, and raised her head before rubbing her eyes. "You know what," she began. "I gave her money to buy breakfast for the both of us since I don't quite remember the last time I ate. Not to mention," she yawned. Why was I listening to her again? "We were here since yesterday afternoon."

She must have said more, but I wasn't sure. I had long blocked her out, concentrating on my own work – all the while awashed in the delusion that the girl would leave me in peace. I could feel her eyes studying me, and to have a girl check you out wasn't that flattering as I had thought it would be. To have an unattractive girl stare at you was, at best, awkward, and somewhat a little offensive. But an attractive one, well...

I let my fingers travel the length of the spine of the paperback textbook. And now thanks to her, I began to grow conscious of my outward appearance. I sported a just-jumped-out-of-bed-and-went-straight-to-the-library look – faded jeans, a shirt that looked neither ironed nor washed, my reading glasses, and a bad case of bed head. But, remembering all these, I realized I came here to study and not to call for someone's attention – and this thought brought me back to concentrating.

Finally, when I decided that there might be something on my face, I looked up and saw her still blatantly staring. She didn't even flinch or look away. Or she might have been challenging me to a staring contest. "May I help you?" I asked at last. That, perhaps, did the trick, because the girl glanced away, shaking her head and smiling with the right corner of .

She toyed with the edges of the book she was reading, which was a thick volume of contemporary poetry. The title wasn't that interesting, but what do I expect from its author whose name I didn't even know how to pronounce? "What are you reading?" she asked, her voice innocent and sounding as if she hadn't just called me a bastard.

So I told her the title. "It's Donguibogam*," I said and her face fell a little, to which I almost laughed.

"Does it tell you how to cut people open?" she asked.

"No."

"Well..." She sighed, pondering deeply. "Does it feature a love story of some sort?"

I snorted. "It's nothing of that kind." And then it was my turn to interrogate. I took the open book from in front of her and flipped through several pages. The words didn't make sense, and I didn't bother to understand. Girl talk with Hyukjae, my roommate, required an all-nighter, although he was the one to do all the talking while I do all the listening. There was no drinking, of course. If I wanted to be doctor, I would have to walk my talk.

I ended up pushing the book back to her, just in time as her friend came running towards her. They conversed loudly, considering they were in a library. But no one seemed to notice. I turned my attention back to my textbook with the conclusion that we were on different levels. She may be the kind of girl who was endlessly fascinating and could be too in-your-face for some.

So for all intents and purposes, she, whatever her name is, wasn't my type.

Her friend tugged at her forearm relentlessly, to which she whined. "God, Sunmi, can you wait?" And she folded the page from where she left off and closed it. But before she stood up from her seat, however, she patted her jeans pocket for something. Her eyebrows furrowed, she turned to me. "Ya, do you have a pen?" And I shook my head no.

The girl turned to her friend. "Do you have a pen?" And Sunmi rolled her eyes while fumbling in her bag. Successful in finding one, she handed it to the girl. She grinned widely with all the delight of a child in Christmas morning, and began writing. It wouldn't have bothered me as much if she wrote on paper, like any other sane person would do. But she wrote on the table. On. The. Table.

When she finished scribbling, she found me gawking at her. That was when she stood up. "I'm a big believer in vandalism." And then she was gone. Looking around, nobody except me had seen her violate private property. But out of curiosity, I stood up and occupied her previous seat. There on the wooden surface, she had etched: Jung Jihyuk was here.

I mulled over this for a few minutes – tracing her handwriting with my fingers – just until I had decided that passing the board exams was ranked higher in my priority list than fussing over a girl who just called me a bastard. With this in mind, I had successfully reviewed for the exams in the hours that followed afterwards. Twice, in fact. But when I looked up and out the window, it surprised me to see that it was still bright outside.

I finished earlier than expected, but maybe some minutes of leisure time wouldn't hurt. And so I left the library and relished the street noise. It was refreshing to hear anything besides my own thoughts. I pulled my phone out and tapped it to display the time. 3:56. Before I could take another step, a voice behind me said:

"Bastard."

"I have a name, thank you for asking," I said, but didn't budge.

Jihyuk remained behind me. "You could be named whatever name but I would still call you a bastard for all I care."

"And I'm a bastard because...?"

"You're standing in the middle of the street, idiot," she finally said.

And I was. Standing in the middle of the street, I mean. I walked to the nearest bench and sat. She ended up beside me. "So now it's idiot, huh?"

"Nope. Still a bastard."

And then we laughed. "It's a good thing you remembered me from a while ago," she said. "Because I'm actually...I'm...you know...I'm very..." Jihyuk scratched her head. "I'm, uh, very..." And then she snapped her fingers. "Forgetful! Yes, I'm very forgetful."

I grabbed her chin and brushed her hair behind her left ear. She looked startled, but my only intention was to pull the pen out – the one she had used to vandalize in the library – from where it was tucked behind her ear. "So you've forgotten to return this too?" I asked.

Jihyuk snatched it from my hands. "Yes," she admitted, and pocketed the pen before standing up. As she walked away, I got my revenge by similarly checking her out, eyeing the places where her body eased from one place to another. And I realized how there was no book in human existence that talks about a woman's curves. If I tried, I thought, I would write a book with a single page containing a picture of her. The Science of Curves by Dr. Lee Donghae.

I was snapped out of my thoughts after she nudged me with her foot. "Well, are you coming or not?" And she looked up at the cloudy sky. "It will rain."

I followed her.

I did not think: She might be a con-artist and will probably lead me to an alley before mugging me.

I did not think: I barely know her.

I did not think: I should probably get home.

I did not think: The dark sky was a premonition that I had stumbled across a bad person.

I followed her, our footsteps eventually matching. She was silent on the way to wherever. "So what, you're a big believer in vandalism but a nonbeliever in proper introductions?" I asked, pacing beside her. She looked at me, chuckled, and nodded. And that was that.

I didn't even know where we were headed, but I kept walking anyway. Thunders erupted once in a while, with occasional lightning striking across the sky. After a while, we were in front of the intersection, waiting for the traffic lights to turn red so we could cross the street. She turned to me. "Is that book important to you?" she asked.

Although I didn't know what that was for, I nodded. Before I could protest, she has already grabbed the book from my hands and tucked it under her shirt, so now there was a rectangular bulge on her stomach. "Tell me something more," Jihyuk said. "Do you like running?"

Then I felt a raindrop on my arm. And then another one. And another one. And it was then that I had realized what she meant. By then, it was already pouring hard. "Ya, answer quickly!" she exclaimed, laughing. "Palli!"

Instead of responding, I grabbed her by her forearm and dragged her to the nearest shelter we could find – which was beside a convenience store. Drying her wet hands on her soaked clothes – which was practically useless – she handed me my book afterwards. And now it smelled faintly of her.

We entered the convenience store while intentionally making the floor slippery with rainwater from our clothes. The cold air from the vents hit me first hand, but ironically enough, Jihyuk walked over to the coolers and bought an entire tub of ice cream for the both of us. I added the 'for the both of us' because I believed she could have eaten the whole thing by herself, but instead she asked for two spoons.

We sat by the window and watched the rain and the people passing by. I couldn't have possibly imagined that watching people from the inside was as entertaining as Jihyuk had made it out to be. In different voices and accents, she had dubbed people's conversations impressively. And I figured she might have done this a lot before.

When the dubbing ran out, she ate more, leaving me to fill the empty air with usual small talk. "Jung Jihyuk," I said and dug into the ice cream with my spoon. "Isn't that a boy's name?"

"Always comes up." She sighed and shook her head in disbelief. "My dad was so convinced that my mother's child was a boy. When I came out, they realized I was a girl but he was like, 'Gender is not dictated by the name' or whatever. End of story."

And I shoved a spoonful of cookies and cream in my mouth. Then, silently and almost sadly, "Don't you really want to know what my name is?" I asked.

"No," she said, and that put me in place. We ate in silence until she finally gave up. "Fine, what's your name?"

I did a small celebratory dance – which was flailing my arms wildly in the air – and she joined in. And we both danced to the ballad song blaring through the speakers of the store. We looked at each other through the faint reflection on the glass windows, then we laughed. "Lee Donghae," I said finally.

"Your parents love fishing or something?"

 "No," I replied. "We lived near the sea before," I explained briefly, to which she just nodded.

Out of nowhere, she held her hand out. "Jung Jihyuk. Boy's name."

I faced her, only to see her grinning. "Lee Donghae," I said and shook her hand. "Parents loved fishing...or something."

And then we continued eating. She especially avoided the cookies in the ice cream, but then ended up eating the cookies anyway. Jung Jihyuk, from what I could tell in our relationship so far, was unpredictable so much as she was indecisive. By the time the entire tub was empty, the rain had finally ceased.

I pushed the door open, letting her exit first. "I'm still the bastard, aren't I?"

She laughed and nodded, exiting the store.

***

*Donguibogam = “The Principles and Practice of Eastern Medicine”