There I sat on a bench situated at the very side of the park. I had a full view of everything; I saw the musicians strumming away with their guitars and percussions, I saw the children playing by the swings, but most of all, I saw Zelo—one guy amidst his friends.

For quite some time, I’ve always looked forward to days like these where I’d sit on a bench with my baby blue teddy bear by my side as I listened to the soothing songs of Lim Kim, looking at Zelo from afar. The park gives me this kind of solace—the beauty of nature combined with the coexistence of different kinds of people who are here for exactly the same reasons: self-expression and living in ease. But unlike them, I am a wallflower; a mere observer. I had gotten used to that although those days, I’ve been questioning if I am but an irony in this park. If the purpose of this place is to coexist, why is it that I am rendering myself inexistent?

“Thinking deeply by yourself again, Ha Yi?”

Without me noticing it, Bom, my sister, had been sitting beside me for a while already. She grabbed my teddy bear and winked. “You’re so cute, sitting here, watching Zelo—“

My face flushed red. “Be quiet, sis,” I prompted. “People might hear you.”

She chuckled loudly. “There’s nothing to hide; they know, Hayi.”

To this, my face lit up instantly and my composure shattered for a few seconds. “What?!” I exclaimed, jammed my palms against the wooden park bench. “Did you tell on me?!”

“No, silly! It’s just that you make it so obvious that you’re looking at him,” she ruffled my hair briefly, “You guys already made a name for yourselves. TOP and I think of you two as a drama in reality. Sometimes, we bring popcorn just to watch you guys. No joke.”

I sighed, leaning casually against the bench, but my sister hit my head because she couldn’t contain her feels.

“Look! Look!” she pointed directly at Zelo. “He’s looking at you shy-cutely! Awwwww, how adorable!” She squeezed my cheeks. “Isn’t that adorable, Hayi?”

I pressed her hands away and hugged my bear to contain my bashfulness. “No, it’s not.”

She shook me vigorously. “Yes, it is!”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is,” a low voice added, it was TOP, my sister’s boyfriend A.K.A. Zelo’s older brother. “My bro’s pretty cool, but becomes a dork when I mention you to him.”

Once again, my face resembled a tomato. Exactly why do I always have to embarrass myself?

“I doubt that; you’re hallucinating things,” I said.

“No way,” he said and wrapped his arm around my sister’s. “I am 100% sure.”

“Anyways, we’re gonna chill and have a couple of drinks.” My sister gave me an encouraging wink and says, “Just go for it, Hayi! You’re dignified and pretty—a blossoming wallflower with a cute squishy face. He likes it, I believe it!”

With that, the couple went away, leaving me to once again get lost in music and deep contemplation. Many thoughts ran through my head, but the most prominent one was that of me being so-called “dignified and pretty.” For one, I never thought that I was pretty despite being conscious of my appearance. As a typical teenager, I have this trait of having a low self-esteem, especially when I am staring at my crush… which is, quiet admittedly, most of the time. I have also thought at some point that I am giving myself away too easily, but my eyes are stubborn enough to not resist Zelo’s carefree smile and freestyle rapping.

Still, I am probably merely just a fragment in his life; someone who can easily be forgotten and tossed away to the back of his head. That is what shames me, and that is what makes me hate my shyness. Always being stuck on this park bench, I keep wanting to at least take a step closer, but my body doesn’t follow and continuously glues itself into the chocolate-colored wood.

Time passed like that until I eventually fell asleep without me noticing it. By the time I woke up, it was already sunset. I slowly opened my eyes to see the rain pouring down in front of me although I am dry. The sweet sound of Lim Kim’s “Rain” answered it all. On the other end of the earphone’s cord is Zelo beside me—all drenched and freezing, holding up an umbrella with his head facing the ground, not yielding to any eye contact. My heart pounded through my chest, wishing to escape from all the fear, thrill, and nervousness that panged inside me. And when he finally glanced at me briefly, a surge of adrenaline rushed through my veins.

He noticed me looking at him and gave me a slight grin as droplets of rainwater dripped on his lips. “A-Are you al-right?”

I gripped my teddy bear tight. “Yes.”

“Th-that is good,” he said, trying to beat the loud sound of the rain.

A good ten seconds of awkward silence passed. And it was only after those ten seconds that I realized that his hands were getting very wobbly and that I should have been smart enough to share that umbrella with him and take him home. To that, I slapped myself in my thoughts.

Abruptly panicking, I said, “I’m so sorry!” I then awkwardly held the umbrella tight and lowered his hand—touching his cold skin for the first time. “Here, let me hold this and I’ll take you home—“

But suddenly, he wrapped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me in against his body. I held his cold hand in return. The song had repeated, and our hearts throbbed fast to Lim Kim’s humming. His body was ice cold, and his hand was shaking—reminding me more of my guilt.

Am I taking this too fast? I thought to myself.

“Am I taking this too fast?” asked Zelo, still looking on the ground. A droplet of water plunged down from his nose and went splashing to the ground as he let out a slight grin on his perfectly cold red face.

I briefly nodded in which he pulled away. I pulled him back in.

“But I don’t want you to be cold, and… I want you to be here… beside me,” I admitted. “For quite some time now, actually. I am sick too; I am sick of watching.”

I couldn’t believe those words came out of my mouth.

He smiled. “I reciprocate the feeling.”

My heart exploded. My grip on his hand tightened; his hold on my shoulder followed.

“You’re very warm,” he said, his husky voice sending chills through my ear right down to the tip of my toes.

“Y-yes, of course. Because you covered me, and I thank you for that.”

He shook his head and began to turn red once again. “No, I mean, you. You’re a really warmhearted person. Pulling you close like this…” He bit his lip. “Pulling you close like this… makes me feel at ease despite the cold.”

After having said that, he shivered intensely. Exactly, how long had I been sleeping? But none of that mattered; I had to cut this blissful moment short—I had to bring him home.

“Hey, it’s not safe for us here,” I said. “You’re probably sick by now.”

“It’s fine—“

“No it’s not,” I interrupted, surprised by myself. “Health first, okay?”

He willingly nodded and got up with me. “I understand.”

The way back to his house took quite some time. For sure, he was sick what with his heavy footsteps that rendered him slow and weak. At some point, I ended up lifting half of his weight back to the house and when his mother answered the door, well, let’s just say she wasn’t so pleased as she was proud of him to be with me. Still, she was nice enough to let me in and take care of him while he was away although I knew that she was testing me if I was capable enough to be his… you know what.

---

An hour had passed. He was lying on his bed on his belly, his right cheek was flat against the pillow as he looked at me with that sickly little face.

“I feel guilty,” I said, playing with my fingers. “If I hadn’t fallen asleep—“

“If you hadn’t fallen asleep,” he said huskily, “I wouldn’t have had the courage to go up to you. Being sick is nothing knowing that I finally came face to face with you, spoke to you, and felt your embrace…” He shifted his head to bury it into the pillow, embarrassed of what he had just said. “You know?” said he in a blurred out tone.

I smiled so hard, curled up her fists into balls and silently fisted the air from his comment—he couldn’t see it anyway.

“We were both timid all this time,” I said. “Thank you for making the first move, Ze…lo.”

He lifted his head and chuckled a chuckle that I would never forget—a soft, airy chuckle that lit up my senses. “Is my name that hard to pronounce?”

“It feels surreal to say it in front of you.”

“You’ll get used to it, Ha…yi,” he said, realizing that he too had the same predicament. “Or rather, we’ll get used to it.”

I smiled at him widely and sat beside him on his bed. I had no idea why I did that; I just felt like it. Slowly, he got up, held my hand with his warm hand. I leaned on his shoulder and felt his breath against my hair. We sang a nice duet together as we watched the rain splash against the window, creating a blurred view of the outside world.

He placed his hands on my shoulders. “Hayi.”

“Wha?—“

Before I could even completely ask, he wrapped his arms around my chest and rested his cheek by my ear and said, “Maybe you know this by now…maybe you don’t.” He stopped briefly the continued shakily, “But I just want it to be obvious and legit.” I felt him tense up from nervousness. He then whispered, “I like you, Hayi.”

My eyes grew big as my body weakened; I had never thought that the time will come that he’d say that.

“I—I reciprocate the feeling,” I softly said and held the arms that were intertwined over my collar bones and closed my eyes, feeling his heart beat fast.

I found it so surreal how things progressed. How my crush had become something more in such a short period of time. It was only hours ago that I was simply an observer, but by then, I was in his warm embrace. It was innocent, yet intimate—it was the kind of feeling that you wish to replay over and over. The words he had said, all of his actions, both of our hesitances and bashful moments—they were priceless. They were irreplaceable.

In this particular one shot, I tried to experiement with the tenses so I apologize if anything bothered you in regards to that. Still, I hope that I was able to portray that kind of feeling when two shy people who like each other meet and that the spark moments were sparky enough. 

Thank you for requesting~! :D