Woo Bin limps across the hallway, brushing the sprinkles of rain off his blazer. His injured knee shoots waves of pain through his whole leg with each step he takes, and his busted lip isn’t much of a comfort either. But he likes the way each cut in his body aches; it reminds him that he is still alive. He tries to focus on how badly his leg hurts, on whether or not getting into that fight last evening worsened the stab on his knee.

He feels something trickle down his leg and soak into his sock. A small blood stain is creeping through the black fabric of his school trouser. It isn’t much. Not something anyone else would notice. He ignores it and slides the back door open into the classroom; a light breeze sweeps past him, rustling through his hair. The classroom is empty except for a girl sitting at the very front seat, right in front of the teacher’s desk. She stares at him as if some unusual creature has crawled into her class. Woo Bin glares at her—not that he intended to, just his normal stare is a glare in other’s eyes since he has naturally sharp and intense eyes with sharp facial features to add on top—he sees the girl flinch. She jerks back to the front and focus on whatever that is on her desk. He sighs and shuffles toward his seat at the very end of the class, right by the window. Am I too early? He wonders as he dumps his bag on his desk.

A shiver tingles through his body when a sudden breeze breaks in from the open window; it carries the smell of fresh rain along with an uncannily familiar fragrance. It makes his stomach lurch. He jerks up to shut the open pane of glass and catches the pink petal landed on the windowsill. His gaze naturally wonders beyond the window and grasp the source of that nauseating fragrance—a fully blossomed cherry tree just outside their classroom; a pang wrenches at his heart just by the sight of it. He picks up the cherry petal and holds it on his palm. Its softness cools into his skin; it tingles through his palm, down his arm and pierce into his heart, thousand times sharper than a knife.

Woo Bin doesn’t know why his throat hurt. He can’t understand the way his eyes are prickling all of a sudden. It’s just a cherry petal!

He crushes the petal in his fist and throws the crumbles out of the window and slams it shut, stopping that horrible smell from wrenching his heart any further, before slumping onto his seat.

“Good Morning!!” the unusually cheerful voice belongs to Park Shin Hye, the girl Woo Bin hates the most, because she doesn’t flinch at his glares and she doesn’t stay away from him like the other’s do.

He ignores her and leans against the desk, facing at the window and squeeze shut his eyes. He hears her stumble across the class, steps getting closer to him. Then she flops onto the empty seat next to him.

“Woo Bin-ah…” she shakes him; but there is no response.

“Woo Bin-ah…” she shakes him again, this time with much force. He snaps his eyes and glares at her; instead of retreating, the girl flashes a smile at him.

“At least you are looking at me now” she says, reaching her hand to shuffle his hair. He slaps her hand away and closes his eyes again.

“Woo Bin-ah…what is wrong with your face?” she tries to touch the bruises on his face, but she fails when his broad hand stops her from reaching any closer. She withdraws her hand back to her lap.

“Did you get into a fight again?” she doesn’t seem surprised anymore. She can’t remember the last time she saw him without a cut on his face. “You still can’t let it go? Are you still thinking about—”

“Ya, Shin Hye-ah!”

Shin Hye jumps to the loud cry coming from the front of her classroom; a familiar figure with long blond hair and thick makeup covering the smooth pale skin pops out of the crowd. The girl runs toward Shin-Hye with a big gleam in her face. Shin-Hye sighs and turns around, ignoring the cheerful girl running toward her. She looks at Woo Bin again.

“Why are you always like this? It’s been five years alre—”

“Ya!!” the girl, finally reaches her and huffs for air as she grabs on to Shin-Hye’s arm. “Why on earth would you ignore me when I was clearly calling you?”

“Oh, you were calling me?” she says, pulling in a dumbfound look, “sorry, didn’t hear you.”

“Don’t lie! You clearly saw m—”

“So? What did you want?”

The girl circles her arm around Shin-Hye’s and let out a gentle chuckle like a shy girl on her first date.

“You are creeping me out,” Shin-Hye says, escaping from the entangled arms. “Stop smiling like that and tell me what you wanted to say and leave.”

She giggles once again and cups her hands on her blushing cheeks, then turns to Shin-Hye with a bright gleam. “Today….” she says. “We have a transfer student!” she let her hand fall off the cheeks and grabs on to Shin-Hye once again. She pulls Shin-Hye out of the seat and drags her toward the back door.

“Where are you dragging me?” she shouts. The girl pauses at the door, still clutching on to Shin-Hye.

“What are you? Some kind of unearthly creature?” she asks.

“No, I am a healthy young high school girl, a fine creature FROM the Earth!”

“Then you should get excited like one!” she says and rushes out of the class, pulling Shin-Hye behind her. The girl hurries down the hallway, making her way out of the building. She turns left, following the footpath behind the building that lead the shortest way to the teachers’ office. Shin Hye follows after her.

“What’s there to be excited about a transfer student? We get a lot every year you know”

 “Yeah, but not from England!”

“England?”

“Yeah, and he was a former student at your middle school I believe. Perhaps you know him, his name is Lee—Oh!!!” she screams pointing at the corridor in front of the teachers’ office. “Look! It’s him!!”

Shin-Hye darts her eyes at the boy her friend is pointing at; she stops dead. Fear floods her at the sight of the familiar face. She feels a cold shudder hit her at the core and run down her spine like a fine stalactite dragged through her bare skin. What is he doing here?

***

Woo Bin is thankful to whoever it was that dragged Shin-Hye out of this class.

He sees Shin-Hye return to the class after the first bell has rung and goes straight to her seat. That is unusual of her, Woo Bin thinks, but he is glad that she has stopped bothering him. She sits quietly throughout the lessons.

Halfway through the first lesson, the soft whisper of the spring drizzle has hastened into beads that slant against the window. It drums against the glass in a blurred sound of one long whir. It rains-pours-buckets, on and on and on. It feels like one long wet weekend, and the students stand miserably in the hallways as they complain about the sudden downpour that took away their chance of playing out in the field. Woo Bin carries on with his sleep; he knows it always rained in April but this time it feels as if it is raining on him personally, just like his heart is refusing to let go of the pain. It rains through the next two lessons and then the bell rings announcing the lunch break.

Woo Bin gradually lifts his head, bows down as the teacher leave. He watches Shin-Hye walk out of the class room without a word.  Did something happen to her? Woo Bin thinks, getting up from his seat; his knee jolts with pain and he accidently hits his chair—it crashes on the floor and all the screams and laughs halt at the loud thud. Perhaps he stood up too fast, he thinks as he pulls the chair back up.

He can hear the students whispering.

What are they saying? He has a feeling that they are talking about him, and he is pretty sure that he knew what they are saying, too.

He is the one without any friends. No. He is the one who ruined his friend’s life.

Their whispers remind him of the rustling of cherry petals. Woo Bin has always hated the sound. He fights the urge to punch those who are whispering, to stop the river of noises that flow out of their mouths. But he can’t.  

The sound engulfs him. Threatens to overwhelm him.

He wants to get out of here. He limps out of the classroom as fast as his injured leg allows him to.  

He dash across the hallway and turns right, hitting someone accidently. The person he had bumped on to topples on the floor.

“Sorry, I didn—” Woo Bin’s eyes widen. His heart freezes at the sight of the familiar face looking up at him. The memories from the spring five years ago floods over him.

Trees lining along the road were full of cherry blossoms; the pink petals were falling just like snow. He was only twelve years old then.

“Ya, Jong Sukie…hurry up, will you,” he yelled at his friend who was falling behind.

“Stop running!” Jong Suk shouted back, stopping half way and huffing for air. Woo Bin stood by the crossway, giggling at his weak friend. Jong Suk never liked running around, because he was out of breath very easily and Woo Bin liked teasing him for that. Perhaps it was because of his thin pale figure, but somehow a lot of boys liked picking on Jong Suk. They would call him a girly and they would pinch the boy, poke him and bite him. Woo Bin hated it when those boys touched his friend and so he would punch anyone that dared to touch Jong Suk. Somehow it became to a point where Jong Suk was called Woo Bin’s princess. He didn’t dislike the sound of it; in fact he liked the fact that people knew who Jong Suk belonged to. He was happy when Jong Suk tailed behind him where ever he went, until that day.

Woo Bin ran across the crosswalk and paused in the middle, waiting for his friend to catch up. He heard Jong Suk scream his name and the next thing he knew was someone pushing him so hard that he was plunged onto the ground.

A screech defended his ears and he saw a car hit a light pole by the road. The clean petal on the road floated in a river of blood and his Jong Sukie was silently sleeping in that pool of petals.

“Are you alright?” Woo Bin is pulled back from his memories by the gentle voice. “I’m sorry,” the boy says giving him a foreign smile that doesn’t belong to him.

“I should have watched where I was going,” he bows and steps away. A familiar scent trails past Woo Bin, an overwhelming grief knotting his stomach and pulling at his heart. Pins and needles run up the back of his neck and a lump in his throat threatens to choke him. Panic takes over. Though the boy no longer seemed like the Jong Suk he knew, his scent still hasn’t changed. He feels a stabbing pain behind his eyes. Jong Sukie… my Jong Sukie…doesn’t know me…? A tear trickles down his cheek. His arms and legs are paralyzed. The flow of time stops. The air grows thin, and he has trouble breathing. He loses all connections with the people and things around him. His hammering heart swallows him whole and the trailing off that boy’s steps clicks loud and clear in his ears.

“…n-ah! Woo Bin-ah!” someone is calling. The muffled voice seems to reach him from the depth of a cave. It finally dawns to him that he is hearing his own name. “What is wrong? Are you alright?” the voice sounds closer now.

He tilts his head to see Shin-Hye standing next to him, clutching on his arm.

“You…saw him?” she asks, her eyes full of…worry and pain. Woo Bin nods.

“But…Jong Sukie…why is he pretending to not know me?” his voice cracks as he speaks, a choke escaping his throat.

“Woo Bin-ah…” she pulls him into a hug. “He is not pretending Woo Bin-ah…” she says, stoking his back as she tries to calm him down.

“He no longer has any memory. He has forgotten everything Woo Bin-ah…”

***

It has been two weeks since Jong Suk transferred to this knew school. Apparently he has lived in this neighbourhood before—or so his parents say. But he can’t remember a thing. It feels as if he didn’t exist before, the life he has lived feels like only five years rather than the seventeen years he has been living for.

A lot of students stare at him as he walks past class 2-1. But there is one person that attracts his attention; a tall boy with dark hair and very sharp eyes. For some reason Jong Suk feels a familiar scent from that boy—perhaps it wasn’t a scent, but something, something very familiar like he knows that person, something that he only feels from that person. But he doesn’t know that boy; there are no memories of that boy. Perhaps he is someone I knew from the past? He wonders today, too, as he walks past class 2-1. The boy stares at him as usual and he can see a thin veil of redness in that boy’s eyes. I must be imagining things…he says to himself and walks into his class next door.

If he knows me why doesn’t he talk to me? He is busy with his usual thoughts throughout the lesson. He thinks about that sharp eyed boy until the lunch bell rings. Then he darts out of the class. He has been watch that strange boy since the first day he bumped onto him at the hallway and Jong Suk knows that he will be leaving to the rooftop right after the bell.

He spots the tall boy moving through the crowd quite easily. Jong Suk follows after him. He has decided to talk with that boy today.

He sees the boy limps up the staircase heading to the rooftop. Did he injure his leg? He watches as the boy walks to the closed door; there is a rusted metal lock hanging uselessly on the handle, keeping the chains in place but just barely. If anyone is brave enough, they can easily push it open and slide into the roof.  The dark haired boy clutches on to the rusted hinges and gives it a good push. The door squeals against the tiled floor, opening a small gap, just enough for him to squeeze through.

Jong Suk follows after him and enters the roof top.

“Ah…!!” he takes in a deep breath once he is standing on the open space beyond those forbidden doors. A light breeze ripples through his clothes and rustles past his hair. The air feels fresh and cool and it calms his lungs. The day is warm and sun shines brightly on him. This is the perfect quiet place to spend the lunch break Jong Suk thinks as he follows the tall boy who has disappeared behind the store room to the right end of the roof.

The tall guy collapses against the wall; he squint his eyes and stretches one sneakered foot, running his hand gingerly up and down his calf, rubbing carefully.

Is he hurt badly?  

“Hey” Jong Suk says walking closer to the boy.

Woo Bin looks ups to see the familiar face. He looks alarmed. Woo Bin doesn’t want to talk with him. He wants to focus on the way that the wound on his knee feels. He wants to make it feel even worse by stretching it with his hand. That way the images of those cherry petals floating in a pool of blood will momentarily disappear.

“Are you alright?” Jong Suk asks sitting next to Woo Bin. He looks at the patch of blood stained onto Woo Bin’s trouser around his knee cap.

“Why are you here?” Woo Bin tries to make his voice sound colder as possible. But his throat is burning in a knot and it only makes his voice shake.

“I saw you heading this way; I wanted to talk to you.”

Woo Bin feels a tingle run through his body at Jong Suk’s voice. Those words sound very closer to his heart. But he can’t let them shake him; Jong Suk doesn’t know you…this isn’t your Jong Suk he reminds himself.

“What did you want to say?” Woo Bin asks, without looking at the boy sitting beside him.

“I was worried about you,” Jong Suk says. “You seemed to be in pain. Is your leg okay?”

Woo Bin can no longer focus on the hurt in his knee, because his heart starts to ache with much deeper, much stronger pain now. Why are you worrying about me? Why are you asking me these stupid questions when you don’t even remember me?

“You…do you know me?”

Woo Bin jolts at the sudden question thrown at him. He jerks his head and focuses his widened eyes on Jong Suk. He can’t think about anything to say. His mind seems to have gone blank.

Woo Bin finally managed to part his lips slightly, “You…” he mutters. “Don’t really…remember me?” his voice is muffled with the tears that are filling in his eyes.

“So you really know me…huh?” Jong Suk says, smiling sadly at Woo Bin. “Sorry…I don’t have any memory before my accident,” then he looks at Woo Bin, “Perhaps you know it too. Apparently I was involved in an accident when I was in middle school. I have lost my memories after that. But since I first saw you that day when I bumped on to you at the hallway, for some reason…I felt like I knew you.”

Woo Bin wants to turn around and cradle this boy into his chest, but he cannot find the strength to move his body.  But do I even have the right to do touch him? His memories are gone because of me…it is my fault that he no longer remembers me…

“I am sorry that I don’t remember you,” he says smiling pitifully.

Even as he smiles, Woo Bin can see the regret in his eyes. Regret for the memories he has lost, the past he no longer lives, the sorrow for the twelve years that doesn’t exist in him anymore. It’s all my fault that he looks like this…I know that very well…I know that he became like this because of me…but…still…why can’t I stop this urge to hug him? Why can’t I let him go…let him live a life without the person who ruined him…I don’t want to…someday his memories might return and he might regret coming back to me. But still…until such a day arrives, I’m going to hold onto you…tightly…very tightly Jong Sukie…

Woo Bin grabs the boy by his shoulders and hurls him into his chest. He wraps his arms tightly around Jong Suk’s waist and breathes in that familiar scent so close to him.  

Woo Bin’s voice seems to be caught in his throat as he struggles to form the words. Somehow he manages to utter.

“I missed you….”

Woo Bin feels Jong Suk’s hands slid onto his back, returning his hug as he moves closer into his warmth.

“I think…I missed you too…a lot,” Jong Suk’s whispers tickles into Woo Bin’s ears. “Because right now, I feel very happy…happier than I have ever been in the past five year I have spent…my heart feels warmer,” his lips stretch against Woo Bin’s collarbone as a smile tugs at his face.

Woo Bin loosens his arms and moves back, just far enough to look into Jong Suk’s eyes. He bites his lip lightly and carefully caresses Jong Suk’s cheek with his thumb. He can feel the heat rising under the care of his thumb as Jong Suk’s cheeks reddens lightly. He smiles.

Jong Suk feels Woo Bin’s hand slide down his back and pulls him closer to Woo Bin’s face. The warmth of his breath wafts against Jong Suk’s face, sending a shudder through his whole self. He doesn’t dislike it for some reason.

Woo Bin reaches up, closing the few centimetres left between them; until their breaths are beating on each other’s lips, their lips almost brushing but not really touching. They stays like that, so close that their eyes are closed, so close that they hear each other’s heart drumming in their cages following the same rhythm, so close that they feel the heat on their lips hovering over one another; because in that moment, neither of them moved. Neither of them breathed. They just…existed together. The tension melts away. And Woo Bin’s lips softly brush against Jong Suk’s, almost like a feather—soft and distant—not close enough, but it tickles through Jong Suk’s chest, all the way down to his knees.

Jong Suk jolted at the sudden invasion. He did not expect such a physical contact from Woo Bin and he certainly didn’t know how to react. Somehow it feels right. His heart begins to beat faster and louder. And he wraps his arms around Woo Bin’s shoulders, pulling him closer.