Chapter 1 : Unwanted Memories

Lee Jong Suk slid his numb hands into his trouser pockets as a shiver shuddered across his thin figure. The icy air whistled around his ears, causing his skin to tingle and sting beneath the layers of clothes he was snug into. He smiled against the warmth of his own breath that puffed in a soft frost against his muffler. It was March; they should be getting ready for the spring. But today people were huddling indoors for warmth; the streets in Bijeon-dong were barren except for an aging Hyundai car parked by a street light pole. But spring was beneath his feet, hibernating, and waiting for its moment to explode, just like the future that he didn’t know awaited ahead of him.

Every step he took left a fresh, crisp footprint in the snow, as if he was the only person to have ever been here. Snowflakes fell gently from the sky, tickling the end of his nose, tempting him to stick his tongue out and have a taste. The branches of the once pink cherry trees lining the sloped road now bowed with the heavy load of snow they were carrying, bending towards the streets. It made him think that if only they could shake themselves like a dog covered in water does; they would be free. Colours were brighter against the pure white blanket that spreads as far as the eye could see.

The airs smelled pure and fresh. Everything seemed quieter, almost muffled. There was a sense of serenity in the atmosphere. Nobody attempted to try and drive their cars as the roads were too treacherous in the unwelcomed snowfall that hastened since last night. However, that muffled quietness only lasted until he walked down to the road heading toward the school. Students were jumping about and running around in the slippery ice as boys confidently strut around aiming snowballs at anything that stood still for long enough. Students cowered and scattered as they tried to avoid the incoming missiles. Girls screamed and hid as they were bombarded with wave after wave of relentless snowballs. Jong Suk walked closer to the brick wall that ran along the road, dodging a snowball that accidently headed his way.

A headless snowman stood next to the bench at the end of the school playground and a girl attempted to fix the lost head, only to be sabotaged by a mischievous boy. Jong Suk heard her annoyed scream followed by a visible kick on the boy. The girl ran after him in a futile attempt to catch him.

“Hyung….Hyung!! Jong-Suk hyung!!” Jong Suk paused at the familiar voice. He didn’t need a second thought to figure out the owner of that voice since no other girl called him ‘hyung’. He turned around to see Kim Yoo Jin’s brown eyes glistening with joy, her soft brown hair bouncing with each step as she skidded toward him down the sloping road.  He felt a soft sting pierce across his chest when an unwanted image came across his mind. The girl reminded him of someone else, someone he didn’t want to think about now. He liked Yoo Jin’s soft brown hair; because that was the only difference that reminded him this little girl was different from that other person.  He shook away the unwanted thoughts and smiled at the little girl.

“Slow down, otherwise you will—”

“Hyung!!” her scream echoed into the cold air as she slithered across the frozen ice uncontrollably, hitting Jong-Suk with her whole body weight, throwing both of them flat on the icy ground.

“Ya! I told you to slow down!” Jong-Suk hissed, looking at the smiling face staring down on him.

“Sorry, Hyung!” she said, pulling her weight off Jong-Suk and steading herself on the ice. She extended her hand toward him

“Here,” she said.

He caught the helping hand and lifted his body, only to be thrown back onto the ice by the little girl.

“Ya!!!” he screamed at the girl making a mocking face in front of him. She stuck her tongue out and did a wiggly dance that almost plunged her onto the floor again. Once she was standing steady, she winked at Jong-Suk, pointing her finger at something up the road before running after another little girl that Jong-Suk assumed to be her friend. He shifted his gaze at the direction she had pointed to find a black-haired tall figure; he could get the gist of his features, but none of it stuck in Jong-Suk’s mind beyond the impression of astonishing beauty, just like the first day they had met years ago. His long hair wafted around him like black smoke, its tendrils curling and moving on their own volition. His scarf— or perhaps that was his hair too — shifted as if in an unfelt wind. An element of mystery lurked in his face, but it was a different one, not the cunning and deceitful type. Something else, something with an air of forbidden around him stirred underneath the gleam.

He approached Jong-Suk, his hands deep in the pockets of his school blazer. The same dark brown eyes that curved and widened to the outer side at the edge as Yoo Jin’s looked down on him with a smirk tugging at the edge of his mouth. He pulled out his big hand buried into his navy blazer and held it toward Jong-Suk, tugging his head as a way of telling Jong-Suk to hold on.

Jong-Suk tilted his head back to get a clearer view of the face above him. The moment he looked into those sharp brown eyes that had fallen on him, Jong-Suk felt a shiver run down his neck; they looked nothing like the little girl’s playful eyes, though they were siblings. These eyes were a deep trap that entangled Jong-Suk in an eternal knot, the eyes he wanted to erase from his memory if possible.  Jong-Suk snapped his gaze on to the floor; he wished he’d had a little more time to prepare for this encounter before running onto him like this on the street in this embarrassing situation. He could feel his straight brown hair puffing in all directions, as if it wanted to escape this place.

“What are you doing? Are you planning to sit there all day?” Kim Woo Bin said smiling at Jong-Suk.

“I….I wasn’t,” Jong-Suk stammered. He jolted onto his feet, refusing to take the helping hand that was extended to him. Jong-Suk jerked to the sudden pain shooting across his abdomen, clutching tightly onto his stomach.

“Ya, are you alright?” Woo Bin swiftly held onto the stumbling Jong-Suk’s arm, steading him. Hee directed his big hand onto the spot Jong-Suk was clutching at.

“I—It’s nothing,” Jong-Suk said, slapping away the broad hand approaching him. His voice sounded loud and nervous even in the too noisy street. Jong-Suk brushed off the ice coating his school clothes.

“Aigoo…how clumsy can you be?” Woo Bin said with a slight lifting at the corner of his mouth conveying…mockery.

Jong-Suk gave him a stern gaze and started stepping carefully toward the school.

“By the way, where is your sister?”

Jong-Suk felt his heart freeze at the sudden question. A sudden rush of memories from the winter break flashed across his mind;

After his freshman year at high school ended in last February, he decided to give a visit to his aunt that lives in Jowon-dong during his first week of school holiday. He was on his way back home when he suddenly paused at the sight of a familiar figure. His twin sister, Lee Jin-Ah (or as boys has nicknamed, Han Gwang-High’s Nana) was swaying on the playground swing next to their apartment complex, looking exotic in a vintage smoking jacket and a pair of black skinny jeans.  Whenever they sat together, people would always be surprised by their similarities. One especially intriguing aspect was that they even had the same beauty make right by their eye; while Jong-Suk had it by his right eye, she had it by her left, almost as if they were mirror images. Although they were similar to such astonishing extend, he never quite felt like they were twins, because…well they were just too different.

Jin-Ah’s brows were thin pencil lines that arced beautifully, her eyes a glittering chocolate with long lashes that suited her compared to his pale grey eyes that no one else in his family had. Her pale porcelain skin with a tint of redness at the cheeks was firm and attractive than his face that was like the moon, pale and somehow wavering according to his friends.

Jin-Ah suddenly jolted onto her feet and stood tilted up on her toes with arms slightly extended to her sides, as if ready to take wing at the slightest sound. It's impossible not to think of a bird when he looked at her. Then a slow smile stretched across her face, her eyes were reduced to chinks and her cheeks gleamed under the street lamp as they stretched further though he thought the skin would rip apart if she kept smiling for any longer. Jong-Suk followed the direction she was grinning at and found a very familiar tall and broad shouldered boy standing few meters down the road. Jong-Suk watched in silence as his twin sister darted across the playground and gripped him as she buried her face on his chest. A sudden jolt of pain bolted through Jong-Suk’s body and his visage started to haze. He had not hoped to see his best friend with his sister in such a way. And there was something else, something that wrenched his heart at the sight of them cuddled up so closely and so dearly. Jong-Suk had spun around and rushed down the road into their apartment.

“What are you thinking so deeply about?”  Woo Bin’s voice pulled him back from his memories.

“Huh? Oh…nothing. She left home before me,” Jong-Suk said, tugging his muffler further up until it covered his face, leaving just a small slit for his eyes to warily peak out from.

“Oh…” Woo Bin swung his arm over Jong-Suk’s thin shoulders and walked through the school gates.

***