The door opened and my face lit up.

“Right on time, Jaejoongie!” he beamed, looking at his watch. “Are you sure you packed everything you need?”

“Yah,” I said, incapable of hiding the sadness in my trembling voice. I spent about three hours that morning packing, checking and rechecking to see if I had forgotten or missed anything important. After all, I had to pack everything that I brought from home.

“I see,” he raised his eyebrows. “Anyways, we should be heading off. Customs control is a pain sometimes.”

I smiled and skipped to his side, holding onto the inside of his elbow. ‘You might never be mine, Yunho,’ I thought, ‘But I could always pretend that you are—just until I leave.’

“Are you feeling well today?” Yunho asked. “Is your fever completely gone?”

I nodded. It was half true, at least. My fever was at his last breath but it was a fighter, still struggling for life and determined to continue lingering in my system. Because of that, I still had not regained all of my potential strength. “I feel fine.”

Yunho pursed his lips and kept walking. “Did you manage to practice a little bit this morning?”

I squeezed his sleeve. “About two hours.”

“How did it go?”

I did not want to tell him that my strength deteriorated so much that I could barely maneuver my fingers around the keyboard anymore, much less grasp the difficult chords in the pieces I selected for the competition; I couldn’t even play a simple C major scale, for crying out loud. Not only that, after a week without any practicing, I had forgotten almost half the notes written on the score. It went terribly.

“It went alright,” I lied partially. “I could still play, at least. It was not as bad as I expected.”

“That’s good.”

‘No, it’s not,’ I thought.

“Well, I’ll take you to my car and we’ll talk about our plan.”

“Sounds good,” I murmured as I pressed my head lightly against Yunho’s shoulder.

We went to the downstairs parking lot and I was met with the bitter smell of gasoline and petroleum. Though it smelled like crap, I decided just to be grateful that I was able to smell at all. “Which car is yours?”

Yunho took out his keys and pressed a button. A white car at the back beeped and its lights flashed bright red. “That one.”

I giggled and started jogging towards it, feeling the artificial wind blowing my long bangs to the side. ‘Note to self: trim your hair.’ Either way, it felt good to be acting like a real kid again, and a wide smile made its way onto my face as I bounced towards the car in a child-like fashion.

Then I was grabbed backwards just before a car sped by out of no where.

My heart skipped a beat when I realized that Yunho was protectively embracing me from behind. I didn’t hear him breathing.

“Be careful, Jaejoongie,” he urged. “Or else I’ll have a heart attack because of you.”

I gulped and nodded feverishly.

Yunho tightly held my hand in his and I shivered at the force that was almost crushing my fingers. “The world has a bothersome habit of creating accidents, especially those that harm the innocent.” He brought me closer to him and took a wary step forward, eyes suspicious and ears totally alert. Yunho reminded me of a mother deer scanning an open meadow for hunters [A/N: Bambi], and I could not help but feel only gratitude for him.

The car clicked and the doors were unlocked. I admired the shiny almost-silver gleam the vehicle had, and felt my eyes fill with homesick tears when I remembered that my father had the exact same car.

“Get in, Jaejoongie,” Yunho opened the car door for me. I slipped in quickly.

I watched as Yunho walked around the front of his car and sat in the driver’s seat, openly admiring his poise. Even as I became emotionally closer to my professor, his regal aura never left him and I always felt as if I was speaking to the king of Korea himself.

“Ready to go?” he said as he pushed the key into the ignition.

I jolted when the engine finally started. “Yah, ready as I’ll ever be.”

And so, he maneuvered his car out of the tight parking space and drove out of the dark parking lot into the quiet lonely streets. I took a quick look in the rearview mirror and watched as the conservatory became smaller and smaller until it finally disappeared out of sight when Yunho turned a corner. I should have rejoiced, but I didn’t. In spite of everything, I only smiled sadly as I knew that I would never be returning. It was the right choice for me, I knew, but leaving something as romantically grand as a conservatory student status was never meant to be easy. Come to think of it, nothing is ever easy. Especially when I would be leaving something as precious as Yunho.

“Okay, so our flight leaves in about four and a half hours,” Yunho started babbling. “It will take only two minutes or so to drive to the airport, and hopefully we will be able to get through Customs without too much of a hassle. From there, we’ll board the plane when the time comes.”

I nodded like a good student.

“Our plane tickets are situated together,” he continued in his deep voice. “I was lucky enough to purchase the window seat for you.”

Flushing, I sincerely smiled up at him. “Thank you. That was very thoughtful.”

Yunho’s eyes softened as he glanced at me. “Do you know what Oscar Wilde said?”

“I’m sure he said a lot of things,” I giggled.

My professor laughed. “Well, this one stands out to me. He said: ‘I have simple tastes. I am always satisfied with the best.’”

“Well,” I barked with a roll of my eyes, “He also said, ‘When I die, I don’t want to go to heaven; none of my friends are there.’”

Yunho laughed again. “My point was that you should be satisfied with only the best. You deserve it nonetheless.”

“What did I ever do to deserve anything?” I asked, coming off more cynically than I intended.

My professor smiled wearily. “You are just not aware of some things in life, Jaejoongie. You will be when you are older, though.”

“When I am a large bird?” I raised an eyebrow.

“Jaejoongie, you can be a large bird physically but still retain your inner little bird,” Yunho explained solemnly. “It requires some understanding which requires some maturity which requires some time which requires some patience.”

I took some time to process what he just said into my brain and then nodded.

“Okay, we’ve arrived.”

I looked out the window to see the airport sign, and hopped out of Yunho’s car to help load the luggage. I brought a luggage cart and watched as Yunho placed each baggage one by one onto it in quiet efficiency.

“Bring these inside and start checking in,” he ordered. “I’m going to park the car.”

“Where will we meet?” I asked, a little bit afraid of not having Yunho by my side.

“I’ll find you,” he smirked before jumping into his car and driving off.

I sighed, watching as Yunho drove his car off towards the parking lot. ‘Guess I have to trust him,’ I thought. Slowly pushing the heavy cart through the sliding doors into the cool airport, I took out my plane ticket and lined up accordingly. I gulped as agoraphobia started kicking in. ‘So many people! Yoochun might be one of them!’ Only the thought made me quiver in fear. Then it hit me: ‘Oh ! I don’t have Yunho’s passport!’ The queue moved quickly, and eventually I was one away from being first in line. ‘Oh crap!’ I swore in my mind.

When the person in front of me left, I gulped as I made my way towards the lady behind the counter, handing her my travel document. “H-Hi,” I stuttered. “I’m going to Belgium.”

“As stated on your airplane ticket,” the lady laughed. “Where in Belgium, may I ask?”

“B-Brussels?”

“Until when?”

“Three weeks,” I replied.

“Are you the only one or is a guardian coming with you?” the lady’s eyes seemed to narrow as she looked at the right side of my passport (my age).

I swallowed the lump in my throat but then felt a hand on my shoulder.

“I’m his guardian.”

I looked behind me and breathed out a sigh of relief.

“Oh okay! Please fill this out and check in your baggage.”

While Yunho started signing through all of the papers, I carefully wrote down the contact information for our larger suitcases and a tall lean man took them for me. I straightened my back and grinned for no particular reason; from the corner of my eye, I noticed that Yunho was smiling as well.

“Have a nice flight!”

“Thank you,” we both bowed slightly.

We made our way to our specified gate number (Gate 6A), and sat down on the hard metal chairs. I placed my backpack carefully onto the ground and slumped into my seat.

“Do you think you are ready for the competition?” Yunho asked absentmindedly.

I nodded though I felt nothing of the sort. “It won’t get any better.”

“How would you react if you did not make it past first round?”

I scratched my head. I sincerely wanted to play my best on stage and to impress Yunho one last time before heading home, and I sincerely wanted to be able to bring glory to my family; yet, whether or not I make it past first round did not matter to me anymore. If anything, I would have been quite glad to have been swiped off from second round since it would give me the excuse to return home sooner even if it meant leaving Yunho. “I would be very sad,” I finally replied. “But life goes on, doesn’t it?”

Yunho looked at me and smiled brightly. “Good answer.” His eyes suddenly became melancholy. “Jaejoongie, let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, there was a talented young girl who was the best at everything, whether it be academics, arts, community work, or even athletics. She received top marks in every class she ever had and was even accepted into the Harvard Medical School with a full scholarship. Six months before graduation, however, she died after jumping off of the tallest building on campus. She specialized in Physics and spent days calculating which building would be best for a suicide venue, even going so far as to figure out how she would fall and what force it would have on her once she hit the ground.”

I frowned and opened my mouth to speak.

“Let me finish,” my professor cut me off gently. “There was another girl who was the talented girl’s classmate. She was not exactly lazy, but her marks were never above average, and she even received a final mark of zero on many of her courses. She just barely made it into the worst university in town, and was laughed upon by many of her past classmates. She had no scholarship either so all her money went to her tuition and living expenses, while none were spent on food or clothing. Unable to endure such disgrace, she decided to head towards the beach in hopes of walking into the water to drown herself. Before her feet even touched the water, however, she fainted from lack of nutrition. A middle-class man found her by the shore and took care of her until she was strong again. Although her grades never improved, they married and she led a simple life as a housewife and ballroom dancer instructor.”

My eyebrows knitted together. ‘Where was this going?’

“Now, Jaejoongie, who would you think is more successful in life? The talented girl or the not-so-talented one?”

I blinked several times in deep pondering. “The not-so-talented one,” I replied confidently. “To be more successful in life, the number one factor is ‘to live’. The talented girl failed in that sense, while the not-so-talented one succeeded.”

Yunho nodded. “Yes, but the not-so-talented girl also tried to kill herself.”

“Well, she was very lucky that she was dumb enough not to even MAKE it into the water! I mean, come on!”

My professor smiled. “There is no need to be crude, but yes, that’s my point. You succeed in life if you have bad days but still stand up to face them eventually. The talented girl had everything set in her seemingly perfect life but she still committed suicide for no reason. The not-so-talented girl had every reason to kill herself—her parents were ashamed of her, her classmates mocked her, etc.—and yet she was fortunate to have gotten up to face her realities, though with much difficulty. That was why I was happy when you said that life goes on.”

I punched my professor lightly on his shoulder. “You think I would commit suicide?!”

“A few weeks ago, probably,” Yunho laughed, “But that is not what I meant. The fact that life goes on is the secret to life itself.”

“Life goes on?” I raised my eyebrows. “THAT’S life’s secret?”

Yunho chuckled. “Based on my own experience. It might be different for you once you gain enough insight. Just remember to stand up after you fall no matter how hard it is, and realize that life will go on despite everything—so you’d might as well continue life merrily, right? That, my boy, is the key to a happy life.”

‘And that is why,’ I closed my eyes at the thought, ‘I will be treasuring the last few weeks I have with you, Yunho. That itself will give me happiness.’

“Flight 6A, please start boarding,” the flight attendant finally announced.

“Better go!” Yunho said brightly as he stood up and stretched.

I followed suit and took my natural place by his side. I looked up at him and smiled.

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YAY I updated.
Notice all of the symbolism and foreshadowing in this chapter.
I'll be updating every Saturday at 7:00 a.m. from now on. If I don't, please spam my email [email protected] ;)

Thank you, readers, for all your support and encouragement!