It took me an entire year to realize what the strange, unintentional, underlying skips of my heartbeats and unrecognized feelings truly meant. Of course, I was passive in realizing things, and so wasn’t I the most receptive person out there, in fact I was quite stubborn in admitting things, I took too long to think things through and make resolute decisions, maybe that was the exact reason why I was slow in moving ahead in my life.

Only after I did realize that I had developed feelings for my batch-mate, I thought how much of a gullible person I was. I mean, back in high-school, I was never interested in other people, girls and boys alike; I had my own matters to deal with, like winning bets and reading mangas and all, or I’d be hanging around with my friends in the streets, watching the people pass by. I enjoyed spending a care-free life, unbounded by anything that could be of the means of causing trouble which also included unnecessary relationships with others. I preferred to keep people at arm’s length, I was probably afraid to grow too close to people around me; having my mother as the closest person to me, I learned my lesson; therefore I was afraid to be attached to the others; I was afraid to feel vulnerable, powerless and dependent; I was afraid to be weak. In fact, I wasn’t in the position to be weak, my entire life was at the very edge, one push would get me tumbling down into an emotional roller coaster, and this very thought kept me away from people, having them around at a fair distance.

So that had me way beyond the point of falling in love.

So I never knew what falling in love really was like.

Okay, now I wish you wouldn’t understand me in some other strange way. It wasn’t like I was completely unemotional or anything, like I didn’t feel anything towards the opposite gender, hell! I had my hormones running, I did! The thing is, I avoided it at all costs. In simpler words, I avoided the simplest mistake of sentimental breakdown called love.

Things changed once I graduated high school and gradually entered the general society. I remember my appa saying once that high-school graduation was a major turning point in once life, and that was, indeed, the truth. High school graduation brought a drastic change in my life, and I stopped being the nonchalant, happy-go-lucky person that I used to be back in high school. I grew up, and I allowed my heart on lose to settle in anywhere of it likeness, and…

Ah, well, I never even imagined that my heart really asked for an overly handsome, clean-freak, healthy eater.

Trust me, Myung Soo was darn skinny for his age, and at times I took hours of my free time to sit in a corner and wonder what on earth happened to all the food he gobbled like a dog who had starved a lifetime. And eventually, why I even liked him?

But then again, there’s this saying, right? Healthy eater is a happy-?

“Yah! Isn’t that enough already?” I complained, hopelessly watching as Myung Soo nonchalantly munched on a bread roll as though he had all the time in the world. “That’s 12 thousand worth of my money you idiot!”

“Is that so…” he said thoughtfully, wiping his hands before he dug into his second helping of pie. “Then that’s a month’s worth of photocopies for you”

“Aish! This rascal!”

And what made it even worse was that he didn’t even respond when I hit him on his head. The truth is, Myung Soo was so calm peaceful and behaved when it came to eating, sleeping and even during lectures which was a horridly spiteful experience which I had to live through practically every single minute I spent in his company. It was not that it’s a bad thing or anything, thinking it through, it’s something of a man that so young to be well appreciated, the gentlemanly mannerisms; but, well, here’s the deal; I was the complete opposite of Kim Myung Soo, and he was my first love.

It scared me even!  When there wasn’t a single crumb of left out food on the table and a single bubble of water on the wood; it was as though he had just taken the seat after a round of customary cleaning while I live the table as though I had harvested the food right then and there.

And he did that out of common courtesy.  So much to have fallen in love with an OCD extremity.

“By the way” He began, once he had finished with the pie (Keeping the utensils in right order, a gulp of water, followed by wiping his lips and hands), “I’m playing hooky”

“Oh really?” I asked, befuddled that he actually decided to skip the next two hours of the lectures. “Why would that be?”

“Hyung just got back from the states this morning, so-,”

“Oh! You want to hang out with him-,”

“-So I’ve got to clean the place, he’s messed up the entire apartment!”

But of course.  

“But Myung if he just got back-?” I began to ask out of curiosity; I mean, Myung Soo was with me the entire morning, how on earth would he know if it was messed up or not…?

“Oh I know it’s entirely out of place” He said and smiled in return. “Sixth sense”

…of a clean-freak. Dear god spare my life.

“Seems like I have no choice then” I said, pulling out my purse to pay the bill. “I’d hang out with Howon or something”

“Okay. But you have to get the laundry first”

“Laundry?” I asked, confused. “What laundry?”

“The laundry you promised to wash”

“The…laundry I promised to wash?”

“In exchange of the photocopies”

I groaned, cursing his extreme ability to remember any and every point of life.

The truth is, I envied the people who didn’t force themselves to forget what hurt them the most, for those were the kind of people who were brave, resolute and who fearlessly faced every challenge with a smile on his face; they knew what being hurt truly was like, for the past and all the pains that they’ve been through would hurt them on and on, and that only would make him stronger. This very thought would always make me feel so small, as though I was a tiniest tree trying to rise in a field of banyans, as though the reality was weakening me even more. Because I was so afraid to let my past hurt me anymore.

Maybe that was the reason why I liked him, Kim Myung Soo, because he wasn’t afraid to be hurt by his past, as though every scar which would deepen by every second he spent recalling it was giving him a remedy to stand strong.

And this, he did with such nonchalance, as though he was sharing a nice conversation with an old-friend while taking a stroll in the park. Maybe that is what which made him Kim Myung Soo.

“You know…” He said, diligently placing his dirty laundry which he had neatly folded, into a laundry bag while I sat immobile on the edge of his bed, urging him to continue. “I owe my entire life to him, to Hyung I mean…he’s like a parent I’ve never had, and that’s exactly why I let him off even if he turned the house into a pig sty”

Pigsty wasn’t the word for it, I tell you, and I was still suffering the aftershock of seeing Myung Soo not fainting on the very spot after seeing the state of the condominium. Well, love is a strange thing, and for Myung Soo it won over his ridiculous infatuation.

He went on while I silently watched his doing.

“Besides, he’s putting up with me, which is a miracle because the last thing one can expect from him is tolerance. He’s not like me; a pampered kid, he is. But not I. Maybe he’s pitying me for it, but I wouldn’t care…” He looked up at me and smiled. “I don’t mind being pitied, you know. That’s just an emotion that one would have towards another, and if he did pity me, then I probably deserved it, maybe that’s why he’s putting up with me, no matter how difficult it could get…”

He sighed and unfolded a T-shirt which seemed to not to have been folded to his liking and began to fold it again. “All through that, he treats me like his very own dongsaeng, to which I’m thankful over my life. It hurts, to know that they don’t really feel special about you, it really hurts….” An awkward chuckle. “Maybe that’s how things are right? The people whom you wished would love you the most, they forget you, and then a complete stranger would hold you close to his heart, like you’re some really nice cake or something which he refuse to share with others…”

I widened my eyes in befuddlement. “What do you mean?”

“What do you mean what do you mean?”

I analyzed his words before asking; “I thought he was your hyung?”

He chuckled, stood up and pulled up the mouth of the laundry bag before skillfully tying it into a knot. “You really are forgetful, aren’t you?”

“Eh?”

He sighed and looked down at me with a smile. “I told you the other day, remember? We aren’t related at all…”

With that he dragged the bag out of his bedroom and I followed suit.

“You did? Really? I don’t remember…”

He took a deep breath and turned around once we had reached the hallway. There were beads of silvery sweat glistening on his forehead and right up above his nose, his eyes focused into mine as though it was life threatening to witness the mess that his hyung had deliberately performed in their house.

“Eunji, you should really stop doing that”

“Doing What?” I asked, confused.

“Overlooking things. He’s not my Hyung, Hyung…I told you; he was my tutor…”

Realization hit me as the vague memory of one of our previous conversations came to the surface. “Ah….that…But I wasn’t overlooking things!” I said in defense. “It just…slipped my mind”

With his thumb and fore finger, Myung Soo picked up something which seemed to be a blatantly torn plastic rain-coat and laid it aside. “Eunji, you know why I tell you these things?”

“Err…no?”

“Because girls understand people’s feelings, and you’re the only one I can openly speak to with no hard feelings involved…”

I stayed silent then, unable to respond; and there in the deepest depth of my heart, there was a strange little girl bawling her heart out. Oh, so you will only see me as a friend…

Who am I kidding even?

“Oh…”

“So, yeah…by being forgetful, you might even lose someone’s trust” He said and moved the apparently heavy laundry bag towards me. “And don’t let it happen…losing someone’s trust is like, well…like losing your apartment key. Once you lost it, you’d lose the entry to his heart....” He let out a reluctant sigh and smiled.  “Here you go! Once again, Hand-washed, extra comfort”

“Myung Soo, I…” I began, in order to say something controversy to his argument, conversely, however, my mind did otherwise, deciding against it to concentrate on the problem now in hand. “Uh…are we going then?”

He shook his head. “I don’t want to drive again”

“Eh?”

“You heard me, you have to walk yourself home…”

I covered my face with both my hands, sulking in utter bewilderment. “Good gracious Myung Soo! Do you really expect me to take that…?” I pointed at the massive white laundry bag which proudly stood on its glory by his feet as though it was a pound of pure gold. “…That…in the bus?”

“Why not? You have done it before…”

I was rendered speechless. No, I feigned myself speechless, because I knew Kim Myung Soo all too well, and arguing with him about such irrational mundane matters would always have the same reaction of deaf elephants who were being entertained by an entire orchestral performance.

And I would still ask myself, did I still like him?

Myung Soo lived with his Hyung in a sophisticated little condominium in downtown Seoul which stood three bus stops away from mine; in fact, it was an insane ride back towards the way we came which also sadly indicated that I had come passing my place only to visit Myung Soo and take the laundry all the way back for three bus stops now by bus, while previously, well, Myung Soo drove his way home.

You know, something I learned from this entire falling in love hoo-ha is that once we had fallen in love, we accept every single flaw of this significant other very dearly with all your heart; which exactly was the case with me. The thing is, my love for Kim Myung Soo was perceptibly unreciprocated, I doubt it even if he saw me as something more than the girl whom he can speak to and share his lunch with while he was a lot more than he considered himself to be for me.  That’s the think about first loves, you see; I am no love guru, but this truth, I had learned the hard way. No first love is reciprocated.

In fact, love is like some sort of a challenge, where there are win or lose stakes.

There are no rules, no scores, no tactics or guidelines; the only thing which mattered was making the right choice; the best choice will lead you to a clear cut win while the wrong one leads you to endless hurt. Falling in love is being thrown into a massive hall where there is an endless selection of doors; we can open any one of them and walk in at our own likeness, whether it looks spacious inside or comfortable; the matter lies within the choice, where the probability of being hurt or otherwise is predetermined by our fate.

 And then the first love, well…there’s something about one’s very first love. The very first love is like an experiment, as though god is setting us pure souls through a trial of hope and illusions where the sheer reality lied far beyond us. I don’t know whether I’m making sense even, with this counterarguments, but the bottom line is, my friend. Never trust your first love to be your one and only love. The possibility is, it’s just sheer a mind-boggling illusion.

But then again, we’re all young and free souls despite how frail our hearts are. And so we take up the adventure of chasing after our first love.

The laundry bag was as heavy as a bag of dried king coconuts that I could hardly move on my spot where I stood in the middle of the street, trying to flag a taxi, deciding against the idea of taking the bus. There must be rules against people taking over-weighed baggage on board of public transport, right?

But then again, people didn’t take a week’s worth of dirty laundry across the streets on the public buses under regular basis, which made the situation even worse.

The best option, as of now, seemed to me to take a taxi and head home. The truth is, I had done it before, taking the laundry in the bus, I mean; numerous times. And each and every time had I humiliated myself to the extreme owing to the blatant hideousness of the entire idea; I mean, who would be dumb enough to take someone else’s dirty laundry home? Yes, I obviously was but the intention truly mattered, and in my case, well, it was purely out of love.

But that didn’t mean that this humiliation shouldn’t come to a stern termination.

After almost ten minutes or so of waiting, I happened to catch a glimpse of an approaching taxi in my peripheral view; by which I immediately came to prepare myself by dragging the bag and myself to the edge of the pavement, waiting for the car to come by.

And it did. I raised my hand in order to flag it, which obediently followed to my liking and parked at the edge of the pavement. I opened the front door and poked my head in.

“Uh, Ahjussie!” I began, taking in his appearance and the hint of greying hair. “Would you mind to open the trunk?”

“Trunk?” He asked, as though to make sure if he heard right and cleared his throat.  “Well, it can’t be opened, I apologize”

I groaned in frustration, deciding to not to think too much about Myung Soo and his overly-handsome face which I would have considered to taint with my fist. “Fine. How if I take it o-?”

“Taxi!” A faintly breathless voice of a man yelled over from somewhere in the street, followed by an impatient series of the sound of rubber soles hitting the concrete. “Taxi!”

I looked up to see any other taxi in sight, but I was wrong, he was apparently calling out to the taxi that I had flagged first. But of course, I never had any hopes on flagging a taxi to be that easy. Seoul truly had left good impressions on me after I had moved in from Cheonju-do, and flagging taxis around where I lived was one of that.

The sound of running feet grew closer, and when it seemed to have approached closer, it stopped. I straightened up, smoothing my shirt, preparing myself to lunge at whoever it was who came running over here as though it was a life threatening emergency to take a taxi. Apparently the person who had had his entire life on the guillotine that he rushed for a taxi was, well, was a charming young man who had seemingly gone out on a jog. He was charming, alright, (Although not as charming as Myung Soo) but that wouldn’t give me any reason to let him take the taxi, I mean, I flagged it first.

“Taxi…” he breathed out, inhaling heavily with silvery droplets of sweat glittering under the sun on his unbelievably creamy white skin, his straightened golden brown thick and damp with perspiration stuck at every direction, as he remained, bent down, his hands clasping on his kneecaps; the very sight of this person, I tell you, reminded me very much of my father after his morning jog. He didn’t obviously seem fit enough for his age.

He then looked up at me, as I stood waiting for him to realize that the taxi was, in fact, taken, which he most obviously did. He breathed out to me. “Are…you…in a hurry?”

I gestured at the laundry bad remaining on the pavement still standing at its glory. “Do I seem otherwise?”

“Ah, Yes…but if you could…”

I held up my hand. “Sorry, Ahjussie, I too am a busy woman, can’t you hold up a bit?”

His stare was intense, mouth agape as though he was observing an insane invention. “Eh?”

I decided to ignore him and began to pull up the bag, forcing it into the rear seat, but the driver suddenly reached out and stopped me as though I was performing a crime; before the driver himself leaned over and rolled down the front passenger seat window. He eyed the intruder with a curious light before he turned back to me. “Miss, are you in a hurry?”

I widened my eyes and looked back at the intruder. Was he, by any chance, provoking him?

I returned to the driver. “Uh, yes?”

He glanced at the third person once more before looking back at me. “Which way are you headed to?”

I gave him a curious glance and mentioned my destination. He nodded in response before turning to the latter, throwing at him the same question. In a breathless whisper he muttered where he was going which was apparently on the very same way as I were headed to. The driver smiled then, as though he was offered his favorite kind of a smoothie or something and turned to me. “Miss, do you mind if I take this hire and come back? Or shall I call another-,”

“Wait” I said, furiously holding up my hand. “What did he do just now? I flagged you first! Why would you take his hire and leave me on the road when I had flagged you all before he came about hopping over like a dying rabbit!”

“Miss-“

“For goodness sake!” I bellowed, forgetting it entirely that I was before two complete strangers.  “You know what? This is the basis of how the country is going about now! We all need equal rights! And that also comes down to people flagging taxis, which have to be based on who and who comes first, not otherwise!”

“Eh?”

I took a deep breath, calming down my anger. “I flagged…the cab first”

The two strangers, however, stared at me flabbergasted, completely taken aback by my outburst. The third stranger had come closer now, and was blatantly examining me before letting out a reluctant sigh, his eyes landing on the bag by my feet.

“I’m in a hurry” He said.

“And I have all the time in the world!” I shot back. “Life is too short you know”

“But please…”

I rolled my eyes. “Well no if you go provoking people…”

His eyes widened in surprise. “I….did no-,”

The driver pressed his honk, putting our bickering into utter silence. “You know what? I’ll take you both at once. Get in”

And yes, believe me; for the first time in my life, I, Jung Eunji who had never shared nothing so much as a cookie with a stranger was now riding the taxi with an unbelievably charming young alien as though it was the most natural thing on earth.

Ah well, these were the moments where you really really regretted to have fallen in love.

Done! Hope you like it.