Sica Unnie, I … want closure _{5 mins ago­}

Im Yoona was never the type to take initiative in relationships… not that she ever had been in one before. It’s always supposed to be the guy that takes the first move… shouldn’t he? Well that was what all the mounts of fanfiction she has buried herself in, drama she has plunged herself into and love songs she has listened repeatedly told her. In fact as she sits on her bed staring at her phone screen accompanied by only a pitying bedside lamp, she still cannot bring herself to believe that she had made this decision. Never since forever did she think she would make a move.

Guys – strong, charming/charismatic and confident. Well that’s what all those stereotypes say.  She knew the first moment she set her eyes on Shim Changmin he was all of those. Yes, ok, maybe she did deny them and find him just another stuck up, over confident, self obsessed and arrogant male but those traits soon diffused through.  They were supposed to be the one who takes the girl’s hand, the one who protects and cares, the one who musters up all his courage to take the leap of faith and expresses his feelings, maybe he has none. It’s an unwelcome thought but it has been flitting past her mind so regularly these days. 

And at this moment when she decides to revisit all the impressions left in her memory reel, she is unable to scrape a piece of evidence of it.  None, zero, nada.

She keeps a mental list of traits he has and the latest updates consisted of – denying, immature and isn’t read for a relationship. Yoona clenches her fist close to her chest, unable to mimick that wrench internally.

She never knew that the difference between what they saw, wanted, needed was that great. Wider than the pacific ocean? She never admitted that she wanted more…

Not really…

***

Laughter, Im Yoona loves it. In fact, she does it every day every moment of the day. She is known for it along with her unnie Taeyeon, the two that once start a fit of laughter, are unable to cease.

“It… hurts…” Yoona manages between her breaths. She clutches her stomach and leans towards the table. Taeyeon slaps Yoona on the arm while in hysteria. They both laugh harder, leaning back together, sometimes so hard no sound is produced. Then there are hiccups. They try to calm down taking deep breaths… inhale… exahale…inh…

“Laughing is like love… it hurts”   Hyoyeon comments. And off they go again. Igniting another cycle as if they were inhaling laughing gas.

“Hey Ju Hyun” Yuri calls from one end of the table to the other. “Who cooks the rice?”

“the rice cooker” Ju Hyun replies uncertainly (at her unnies condition).

Yoona never stopped in that moment to consider(create) a different meaning to the joke that Hyoeyon made.  She never traces back to why she likes laughing. But the reason was there. If she was bothered to actually search for it, she would realise that it is all because she wants to get that same feeling… that feeling he gives her. How easily he makes her smile, how easily he makes her laugh, how easily he makes her lose herself.

She is lost now. Hyoeyon unnie was right, but at the same time wrong. Love does hurt, but the pain is different from pain obtained from excessive laughter. The amplitude is so much… it is just… unbearable. Just like his closeness-distance. More distance than not she sighs.

***

 The fault was hers…

“Changmin Oppa” Krystal waves. Yoona feels him approaching their table from across the cafeteria. With Jessica’s wink and overly obvious clearing of , Krystal vacates the seat next to Yoona and moves to the other side of the table to join her sister. Yoona forces a smile ensuring that Jessica sees. She gets out of the chair just before he arrives and catches Sunny out of the corner of her eye.

“Unnie,” she points to her chair and heads over to join Krystal’s side as Sunny claims the seat cluelessly shooting curious looks at the Jung sisters. Her queries were answered with the voice greeting them.

“Hey guys” the towering Shim Changmin joins their side. Sunny immediately sits down at lightning speed. The height difference was just too great. Yoona feels his gaze on her but decides to ignore the urge to show her emotions. She spares a genuine (and fleeting) glance, an indifferent wave, and a nonchalant smile in his direction. No talk, and absolute distance = no teasing. She repeated that in her mind, completely denying the truth that their rumour was not something easily let go of.

“Yoona” Sooyoung uses her bony elbow to nudge Yoona on the arm “Hey look over there it’s Changmin, your prince” she winks down at her. Yoona pretends not to hear her and continues walking down the stone steps towards her next class. 

Peripheral vision is a gift she must thank the anatomy for. It is him a being in her chest is pounding uncontrollably. There’s that adrenaline in her legs, arms – well she was unsure what it was – they were just weak and warm.

But she takes the gratitude back as she immediately feels the regret when she turns the corner without looking towards that direction. He was with his friends, Kyuhyun and Onew, the other two continued walking. Changmin was left behind, stopping at an awkward position and trying to wave. But Yoona had decided to cruelly turn away. Distance = no teasing. She felt a pull, a tug and a dragging in her heart which left her dredging through the next week which they make no sort of contact.

Entering the university cafeteria at 12pm was not a smart idea. This is not when you are with a few of your sisters trying to find a vacant table (not many left). Sooyoung was leading ahead of course, complaining since 5 minutes into their education lecture. Jessica, Taeyeon and Yuri followed shikshin. Just as she Yoona was about to catch up to the girls who were heading directly towards a vacant couch, her soul leaves for a moment. She felt it clearly. It was not Hyoyeon linking arms with her, but the feeling of a presence heading by. She knew it was him. And it was (thanks to her peripheral vision once again) he floats by towards his table with fish and chips on his tray. For the first time, it was not the food (that she noticed first)despite it being both their favourite subjects. But she opts not to say anything knowing that she was treading in dangerous waters – i.e. the unnies potential piranha attacks. ‘someone else will notice’ she decides.  

And indeed a moment later, Taeyeon and Jessica turn around arm in arm and point in a hustle

“hey look, it’s Changmin” Yoona’s stomach does a little somersault thing at his name and zones out before she hears the other names.

“Oh and Minho and Donghae”

When they join, Yoona lags behind, buying as much time as she can so she is allocated at the end of the table. Luckily she got what she wanted. The unnies hadn’t made any prior arrangements. She sighs but she is unsure whether it is of relief or disappointment. She is unable to confirm whether he even registered her (attempted) greeting. It is added to the list of events. Those events that somehow indirectly caused the wet patch on her pillow every night before she drifts off into a better reality.

***

One is not a number that can contain the memories that she replays before bedtime every night. People get bedtime stories whether with or without morals. This was Yoona’s version. It was her own reminder and message to herself.  It tortures her by extracting all the regret, for having not done it differently; the pain, that it was not real and; the reality that she is unable to change. This is all after a round of (depressing) ballad music and angsty fanfiction. She believes that angst is closer to reality than just adding artificial sweetener to every event that occurs in daily life.

 Yoona and Hyoyeon are mucking around with stationary in Tiffany’s (VERY) pink pencil case while the owner is questioning Changmin. But as Yoona is toying with the Rilakkuma pen and poking Sunny with it, her mind and soul is in the conversation opposite.

“Changmin, what about your girlfriend?” Tiffany brings up too obviously. Yoona knows he hates this topic, it’s sensitive and she dreads it as much as him at this moment. But there is a bigger part of her that is dying to listen more.

“I don’t have one” Yoona feels that sinkhole in her heart. No matter how true it is and how much that truth and reality Yoona acknowledges and imprints in her mind, it is completely different when it comes out of his mouth just like that. Why disappointment when she knew it was nothing? She wanted to know why. And it still bothers her till this day.

Tiffany lowers her voice

“Then what about” Yoona sees Tiffany quirking her head towards her direction.

“We’re just friends” the words sound heavy. At least it weighs down in her heart.  she knew that. she really did. ‘we’re just friends’ she tells Taeyeon and Jessica whom of course dismissed her (poor) attempt to lie. They were right though, she found it hard to even convince herself.

“Really?” Tiffany continues to probe “Don’t believe you”

“yeah, we just talk”

“a lot” Tiffany corrects.

“Yeah we just talk… a lot” and Yoona knew it was her cue to leave. He need not know the amount of tears she had lost.

Yoona and most of her sisters search the entire high school grounds to find their broken friend. It is Tiffany’s first heartbreak and with the inexperience of the girls, they are unable to come up with a better strategy to comfort their sister despite knowing that all words were useless.

Yoona is disappointed in herself when she notices Shim Changmin before the sobbing Tiffany beside him.

Their worry is deepened when the school bell rings and Tiffany has only seemingly recovered from the sobbing. As they leave, yoona approaches Changmin,

“What happened?” she bites her lip and turns to the direction their friend had left

“They broke up” he sighs. Yoona’s fury towards Tiffany’s ex begins to simmer. But she is distracted by her own emotions. Especially what he says next

“That’s why you don’t do this stuff” you mean you, Shim Changmin. She knew exactly what she was referring to, but the arrow directly hits her heart. He continues

“You get hurt, and…” Yoona moves realising her sisters were hanging around. She heads off with a brief ‘see you’ she is too dampened, but still notices the way Taeyeon and Seohyun are covering their mouths as if to hide their own delight at something. it always happens, even now. She turns around

“I was thinking she spotted Tiffany so easily because….” Taeyeon begins

“I know unnie, of course she’ll see him first” Yoona has lost the fight in her to say much back.

“Tiffany is in need of help that’s why I found her.” She had even avoided mentioning his name. She fails to decipher whether she wants to cry or find the piece of scum and punch him. But she decides it’s the former since she is energy deprived.

He concluded it’s impossible and that he does not want to be in this type of relationship. So why is she still hanging on?

****

She wonders why, still. Despite those many events that there is still that yearning for that possibility. Following logic, she should be able to come to the same conclusion. But emotions is a more complicated, having no completely accurate explanation. It does not follow the basic principles.

So she has decided. Decided that this is what she wants. She is determined to do it. She believes that she must do it, and will be able to. How hard can it be?

She waits for the day where her practical is cancelled for the week – corresponding with the time she met him on the way to university the first week when she had no practicals either. She plans and calculates the same time, train and carriage.

She would just begin a normal conversation and since she wants it to be beautiful like those dramas, fanfiction and songs tell, she even has a rehearsed version of what she wants to say. It’s easy to recite it over and over again in case she would fail knowing what she is like. It has to be perfect, like the project they did together felt like. It was the only speech presentation she had succeeded in getting a decent mark (and even being top of class).Practice made perfect therefore she did not see why it would not work.  

‘Shim Changmin, we’re friends right?’ she recites in her head

 ‘don’t worry, I don’t like you anymore so… you don’t have that burden” she sighs without realising it. “Took me long enough” she shrugs with a weak smile into the distance while sitting on the bench at the train station.

And she will end it with “We’re still friends right?” and make a promise.  

“I will definitely be able to do it this time!” she says to herself

She hears a train approach, and closes her favourite drama novel ready to board the train. But checking her watch and realising that she was early and it will probably be on the next train, she steps on and immediately returns back to her spot on the station bench. She declined the original idea of getting off at the next stop if he was not on this train. Im Yoona believed in fate, so she would delegate the decision to it.

However, waiting another fifteen minutes until the next train, she is unable to hide her deflated expression when she realises that he was not present. The regret of not boarding the earlier train did not help either. Her train journey was just contemplation filled. As she reaches her transit station to change trains, she calls Sunny.

“Unnie, I’m going to be late for Chemistry lecture, all because I did not want to board an old train and waited for the new train… now the next train comes in ten minutes meaning I will be quite late” she speaks in a tangle, like how she feels right now. What she said was partly true, just an insignificant reason though.  

“Oh, do you see Changmin at the station?” Yoona does not even bother to check her surroundings and confirms “No”

“Oh, when my train stopped at the station, I saw him and he could have got on but he didn’t so I don’t know what happened. Why would you wait for a later train when there is a train in front of you that can take you to your destination right?”

“My express train leaves in a minute” Changmin says while looking at his phone as they leave their first train after their late afternoon class.  Yoona widens her eyes and pushes him faster down the stairs.

“Go go go, you can still make it!” she is determined.

“meh” he sighs “I can take the all stops train, I’ll be lonely anyway”

“Exactly! You’ll be lonely when I get off at the third stop. So there’s no difference” Yoona reasons.

He merely shrugs when they reach the top of the platform, and the train is still there. Yoona pushes the urge to smile back down.

He just hates being unaccompanied, that’s all. She tells herself.

hey, do you want to be my partner? _{sent less than 1 minute ago}Yoona’s pulse skips a beat.

^ for speech presentation >.>_{sent less than 1 minute ago}she is surprised at his invitation since he has a friend in the same class. Unlike her,(she narrows her eyes at the thought) Sunny abandoned her (the subject) just before they were handed the notification. So she needs a partner. However, she knew her own skill

But, I always failed my speeches…

It’s alright=) just need to practise many times.

…OK :L

Jessica and Yoona are having a ‘you first’ competition on who will join the rest of the group on the seats on the train.

“If you go down first, I’ll go down”

“no, I’ll go down if you go down” Yoona smiled

The rest were all seated happily and beckoning them, however the ignorant two were still going on and on and….

“YOONA!” they here footsteps stumble onto the train just before the doors close.

Jessica was still into the game and immediately told the guy to join the rest before them. But the fact that Yoona’s name was called first despite her back was facing the door which he entered had not gone unnoticed to the now ‘Go have a seat first’ Yoona arguing to her unnie.

“Why don’t you both go together?” he makes a move to drag Yoona’s bag.

“No”

And their persistence makes another attempter to admit defeat. In the end Jessica and yoona remained standing for their trip. Jessica being oblivious to what was clogging her friend’s mind and Yoona wondering whether she had just been imagining things.

“Right Yoona?” Sunny was asking through the phone line. Her friend might have lost connection. “Yoona?”

“neh?” still trying to absorb the fact that many memories flooded to her mind at what Sunny had said. The possibilities…

“So you didn’t see him?”

“No Unnie, It is not meant to be” Yoona jokes as she sighs and stares up at the sky. If someone would just write the word ‘failure’ in the sky, she would feel better. If only it was that easy. If only she caught that earlier train. Could he have seen me and waited for me? She wonders. If only… she was able to get closure.