Chapter 38 - Take the heat

‘’No that’s okay,‘’ I kindly shrugged off Jin’s silent request as I made a dodging movement. It was already nice enough of him to offer me – and Soojin – a ride to the airport; I figured that carrying my own luggage was the least I could do for him in return. A droplet of salty sweat dripped from my forehead as I determinedly – and with much struggle – walked in the direction of his car. The slightly worn-out handle of my luggage cut merciless in the sweaty flesh of my hands and I momentarily cursed the hot weather under my breath; carrying heavy luggage was one thing, carrying heavy luggage with clammy weather was another.

Jin caught up with my snail speed within seconds, his hand reaching out for the heavy weight I was attempting to carry. ‘’Aerin, it is okay. Let me get this for you.’’ Not knowing how else to protest, I sheepishly watched as Jin grabbed the heavy luggage from my hands. He wasn’t struggling nearly as much as I had done just now, but that didn’t mean that carrying the suitcase wasn’t hard on him either way. I muttered a soft thanks - one I doubt he had heard - and watched him open his trunk to store my stuff in there.

For a moment I stood in a daze, allowing my brain to fully comprehend that we were finally having our beloved end-of-the-year trip. The hard sound of Jin’s trunk slamming shut quickly snapped me back to earth however, as well as Soojin’s call: ‘’Aerin!’’ her voice sounded from inside the car. I walked up to the window to be greeted with the sight of an ever chirpy Soojin, wearing sunglasses as she rolled the window down. ‘’It’s finally happening!’’ she continued to sound excited.  

‘’Yeah, tell me about it,’’ I laughed as I watched her take her sunglasses off.

‘’Do you need any he—‘’

‘’Your suitcase is in the trunk. Whenever you’re done, we’re good to go!’’ Jin’s sudden presence next to me unintentionally interrupted Soojin’s sentence. She didn’t seem to mind, for she simply nodded before she went back to sitting straight in her spot. Slightly clearing my throat, I intended to turn to Jin so that I could properly thank him for his help. My lips parted in order to voice something out, but the sound of my door abruptly swinging open immediately caused my attention to shift. I watched as my mother hurriedly walked up to our direction, a medium sized box apparent in her hand.

‘’Thank you so much for giving Aerin a ride to the airport, Kim Seokjin. Public transportation is so problematic with big bags of luggage and I couldn’t take her myself,’’ my mother let out her sincere gratitude with a relieved smile.

‘’It is not a problem Mrs. Park. I’m happy to help out,’’ Jin smiled politely in return.

At that my mother nodded before she turned towards me. Affection shimmered in her eye as she handed over the box – not even elaborating on what was in there – and, pulled me into a bear hug: ‘’Have a save flight, Rin. And if you can, let me know if you have arrived safely. I love you, have fun.’’ Her voice tickled against my hair, causing a chuckle to escape my throat.

I couldn’t help but to grin widely at her words. They made me realize that I was actually leaving Korea’s familiar soil for the next upcoming five days. I couldn’t help but to be excited with that prospect. I hugged her tighter. ‘’I will, mom. I love you too.’’

The little road trip to the airport was peaceful. A generic pop song was playing on the radio and Soojin cheerfully sang along as her vision absent-mindedly followed the things along the road. Jin was driving intently, but on the same time eagerly small talking with his friend he had picked up after me. As I watched the two of them interact, I realized that I had never really talked to Jung Hoseok before – except for the few times we had talked about strategic plans whenever we would be teamed up during PE. I hadn’t even known he and Jin were friends, even though it had been quite obvious in retrospect.

‘’Okay so… honestly speaking… who do you guys think is going to hook up on this trip?’’ Soojin suddenly spoke excitedly as she shifted a bit in her seat. I shook my head playfully at her question, all the while absent-mindedly scrolling through my conversations on KakaoTalk. The only active chat was the group chat with Jea and Chaerin. They were vocal about their excitement regarding their trip to Japan and for a moment I came to envy them; not particularly because I was separated from them, but mainly because they were together with Daehyun. The reminder of the male made my thumb hover over the most recent conversation with him. I contemplated whether I should say something to him. Anything. But then my attention shifted to a defensive Soojin.

‘’What?! Abroad trips are practically a recipe for new couples! Don’t act you like you guys don’t know it!’’ she argued upon taking notice of the narrowed eyed looks she got from both Hoseok and Jin. Soojin was right however. Trips such as these were indeed an occasion in which ‘love’ often blossomed – for at least those five days. It was almost as if this infatuation was a social expectation.

‘’Alright, you are quite right about that,’’ Hoseok admitted with an amused laugh. Playing along he added: ‘’so who is hooking up this week?’’

There fell a silence, except for the sound of humming coming from Soojin who was clearly thinking hard about the question. I didn’t even bother to think about it; I didn’t even care for such things – at all.

‘’I think I’m going to hook up with Aerin,’’ Jin commented unexpectedly, a soft sheepish chuckle leaving his throat. The comment was followed by another brief silence and for a moment I didn’t know whether he was joking or not, but I laughed his comment off nonetheless – not really sure what else there was for me to do.

‘’You would want that, wouldn’t you?’’ I heard Soojin tease as I shifted my attention to my phone, not sure where else to look in all the awkwardness that I suddenly felt. The moment I unlocked my screen, I felt the little machine vibrate in my hand and my heart skipped a beat and instantly forgot about the awkwardness of just now when I noticed who had made the machine go off like that in the first place.

Daehyun: Have a safe flight Rinnie

I could feel my cheeks turn slightly red as I stared at the message for what felt like minutes. My heart was beating fast as I unconsciously pressed the device to my chest. Ironically close to my heart.

He texted me.

He was thinking about me – at least enough to wish me a safe flight. The action made my heart flutter and my fingers eagerly brushed over my smartphone’s screen in an attempt to reply. I had long shut out my surroundings and was instead completely fixated on the 4,99 inched touchscreen.

Aerin: You too, DaeDae

Daehyun: Lol

Daehyun: Don’t have too much fun without me

Aerin: You know I couldn’t :’)

With a fluttered heart I pressed send, once again feeling astounded by the fact that Jung Daehyun could always make my day - and mood - even better than I thought was possible.

Hours later, I felt even more astounded by the fact that one irrelevant person, whose opinion shouldn’t have mattered, was able to make my good mood shift completely once we were on the plane. Rolling my eyes in annoyance for the nth time, I tried to come up with multiple ways to ignore Lee Suji’s obvious gossiping – about literally everyone. I tried to close my eyes and take a nap, I tried to deeply concentrate on the magazines that were available and I even tried to rise above Suji’s clear voice by talking to an absent-minded Soojin – whom was intently listening to what Suji was saying to begin with. But none of those methods seemed to be working. I didn’t know why, of all people, Suji was assigned to sit in the seats in front of mine, but somehow it had happened and I let out a soft groan as I realized that it was probably the universe testing my patience – and good mood.

Suji decided to speak maliciously about another classmates of us and without really intending to do so, I let the most annoyed and loud sigh escape my lips in response. It was something I shouldn’t have done despite my huge dislike towards the person seated in front of me. Suji knew that the sigh had to do with the things she had said. Turning her head around, she specifically searched for my eyes. Once they had found mine she gave me the most undermining look anyone has ever given me; almost as if she was trying to tell me that I should have never dared to sigh like I had just done. In that moment I knew that things were going to get ugly between us – again.

‘’How ing cocky that girl has become,’’ I heard her, not so subtly, whisper to Lee Hana whom was sitting next to her. I couldn’t hear Hana’s response, but then I quickly figured that she probably hadn’t responded in the first place. Unlike Suji, Hana wasn’t the type to be mean in front of your face. She was the type to do it behind your back. I didn’t know whether that was better than Suji’s usual tactics were, but for now it definitely felt better at the least.

‘’You know some people are convinced that Jin has a thing for Aerin,’’ Suji feigned to whisper to Hana – again.

I rolled my eyes. Her loud voice notified that she was speaking just loud enough for me to hear anything she was about to say – about me. I couldn’t be surprised. Lee Suji always did this on purpose; she was mentioning me so blatantly because she genuinely wanted to hurt my feelings on purpose. It was now obvious that my sigh of earlier, together with the little fall-out between us of just recently had struck a nerve. Soojin had noticed this much too, but didn’t dare to say anything. Instead she squirmed uncomfortably in her seat, glancing over me apologetically.  

‘’How so?’’ Hana asked timidly, surprising me with the fact that she actually dared to become a bit more vocal. Hana personality wasn’t as foul as Suji’s, but I suppose that she could come incredibly close to it sometimes.

‘’I have no idea,’’ Suji shrugged casually. ‘’But I sure as hell don’t get it if it were to be true. I mean, Jin must be a freaking if he were to like an average not to mention boring girl like her. Especially since he can get so much better.’’

Suji made extra sure to empathize on certain words she used and though I knew that her opinion barely was supposed to mean anything, I still somehow took her words to heart. My hands unconsciously trailed down to grip my jeans in frustration while I allowed her words to sink in even further. Not being good enough for Jin was something I didn’t even care much about, but for her to empathize on how boring and average I was hurt somehow. I pressed my lips together, all the while telling myself that I shouldn’t care about her words. For a moment it worked as I felt myself grow less tense, but then she did the unforgivable and steered her obvious gossip towards another direction. One that was bound to hurt me.

‘’I don’t get what the suppose obsession with her is anyway. I mean Jin perhaps, alright fine that much I could try to understand. But Jung Daehyun bringing her to class and all? What would he actually want with her? Talking about lowering your standards. How could you go from showing interest in Choi Yuna to having some sort of interest in Park Aerin? Where is the logic in that?’’

She actually had the nerve to say my full name, out loud, while she knew that I was being able to hear her. My breathing became unsteady for a moment and anger and sadness raged through my entire mind as I made up all possible things I could retort. I noticed Soojin eyeing me with this look that was supposed to tell me that I shouldn’t listen to what she was saying; that I should let it go. But as everyone already knows; that was easier said than done. Lee Suji had just spoken the word and thoughts that had been unconsciously gnawing on me ever since I developed feelings for Daehyun. In a twisted way I even felt the same way as Suji did. Having someone who didn’t even know about us say it out loud, hurt more than I had ever imagined it could; and it sure as hell made me more insecure about Daehyun’s intentions as well.

I intensely came to hate Lee Suji in that moment. It took me all my willpower not to yank her hair over her seat as well as to ignore the harsh statements she tried to provoke me with. Breathing out, I decided not to give her the satisfaction of any reply – something I was sure she had wanted. Instead I (un)comfortably slumped down in my seat, trying to make her believe that I was unbothered.

And for the rest of this flight, day and even the remaining five days of this entire trip I vowed to ignore the petty existence that was Lee Suji.

‘’Honestly… does anyone of you… dislike Lee Suji as much as I do?’’ Soojin’s voice carefully sounded about the one girl I had tried to ignore for the past three days of this exhausting yet thrilling trip.

I turned from my side to my back as I let out a sigh. The sound had much to do with the mention of Suji; the girl who had tried to get on my nerves with every possible change she got. An even greater part of that sound however had to do with me feeling extremely hot beneath a surprisingly thin blanket. I hadn’t been able to sleep because of the heat and I figured that I wasn’t the only one feeling as hot. Our entire little dorm was awake. A circumstance that wasn’t desired given that it was close to 04:00 AM – while we had to get up early the next morning. Up until this day Singapore had been constantly hot; with the countries average of 31 degrees I had tried my hardest not to dry out ever since the first day. One would have thought that being here for the third night would, at least, make one accustomed to it. That wasn’t the case for me however.

‘’Nobody truly likes Lee Suji, not even her suppose friends,’’ Kang Maeri commented dryly, her remark causing chuckles to escape from both Soojin and me. In contrast, Seo Joohyun kept quiet. The absence of any response from her wasn’t surprising since she usually didn’t like engaging in (negative) gossiping about others – I had always thought that I was much like her in that aspect. Then I figured that it was either her lack of interest for the conversations about others that caused her to be quiet, or her being sound asleep already. I couldn’t tell since the room was pitch black.

‘’Joohyun are you awake?’’

‘’Wide awake,’’ sounded Joohyun’s reply to Soojin.

‘’God, this is so awful. How am I going to get up tomorrow?’’ Maeri then cried desperately. She the small lamp near the bunk bed she shared with Joohyun and slightly illuminated our dusty and moreover cheap room. I could see her sit up, ruffling her hair in despair before she lay down again, allowing the nth sigh to escape her lips.

‘’Well, at least you have half an hour extra. I have breakfast duty.’’

My ears perked up at the mention of the breakfast duty I had shamelessly forgotten about. Slightly relieved that Soojin mentioned this awful morning routine I reminded her that I had duty too before I allowed my hands to roam underneath my pillow until they ultimately came in contact with the cool cover case of my phone. The thumb of my right hand skillfully brushed over my illuminating screen, setting an alarm, while my other hand worked to wipe the newly formed sweat from my forehead. I puffed out another breath of annoyance as the device reminded me that I had about three hours left to sleep. Wonderful.  I found it unfair that only a handful of students - including me - had gotten the task of preparing breakfast. The odds were never in my favor.

‘’Well, the two of you at least have each other,’’ Joohyun chuckled sheepishly. I appreciated her attempt of making the breakfast duty sound more pleasant than it in reality was, but that was just it; the routine - as well as getting up earlier - was awful and no amount of words could possibly reduce this.

I didn’t say anything. Instead, I allowed a single leg to rest on top of my blanket; one of my semi-effective methods to cool down. A yawn escaped my lips and the dorm soon engulfed itself in a silence that held on for a good couple of minutes.

‘’I really can’t sleep guys,’’ Maeri broke the silence with an annoyed huff. I caught her tired expression due to the light of the lamp near her face, which reminded me how stupid it was that she hadn’t turned it off already.

‘’Me too. Let’s talk about whatever, perhaps it’ll tire us enough to finally fall asleep,’’ The idea, or rather solution to our sleeping problem was a typically a suggestion coming from Kwon Soojin. After all, she was a chatterbox who loved to talk.

The first night of our trip she had mostly kept to herself in our dorm. Normally I would have found that unusual given her urge to talk a lot, but then I quickly figured that it made sense given her incident with Suji. Ever since she had crossed her, she had distanced herself from our classmates as well. Soojin had quickly grown accustomed to Maeri and Joohyun however. Now it was even safe to say that we had all become cozier with each other. We hung out a lot during our free time and I honestly wouldn’t have expected things to turn out any differently since Kang Maeri and Seo Joohyun were genuinely nice girls – which was the reason I picked them to share a dorm with in the first place.

‘’You’ve gotten close with Hoseok,’’ Maeri stated first. My eyebrow naturally lifted itself in somewhat of a fascination as I came to think of how funny it was that the topic always managed to shift itself towards the topic of boys – and love. Moreover, I found it amusing that Maeri was such a curious soul. She had been like that during Chaerin’s sleepover in regards to Yuna too and now she was acting like it again. It was ironic how much I had hated that big ball of curiosity of hers when it concerned Yuna and Daehyun, while it was now something I came to enjoy because I, too, had noticed a sudden blossoming friendship between Hoseok and Soojin. Whenever she wouldn’t be with us, she was with him.

I deliberately hadn’t touched upon the topic of their suspicious friendship for I concluded that I wouldn’t have liked it if Soojin had done that to me if the roles had been reversed; and so I figured that it was only fair to treat her with the same respect. Maeri bringing it up like this changed matters however. Now, I didn’t see any harm in finding out what the exact deal between the two of them was. It wasn’t like I could fall asleep anyway.

‘’Yeah… he is nice to me. But we’re just friends,’’ Soojin paused for a brief moment, and then hesitatingly added: “’I doubt he sees me in that way. He is just nice.’’

‘’No guy is that nice,’’ Maeri told matter-of-factly.

‘’You sound like Chaerin,’’ I instantly came to think about my best friend once her name had slipped of my tongue. I wondered how both she and Jea were doing. The cheap motel we were staying in had no Wi-fi unless you paid for it and our teachers wouldn’t allow us to since they didn’t want students to be engrossed in their phone too much. This resulted in us only having internet in certain public places where it was provided for free. Initially, I hadn’t cared too much about the fact that my phone was pretty useless in this country; I had only brought it along as a morning alarm and camera in the first place. Now I did found it quite unfortunate however. I made a mental note to ask Soojin to come along to the McDonalds - a place that most of the time offered free Wi-fi - with me whenever the circumstance would present itself.

‘’That’s because I got the quote from her.’’

‘’Of course, that much I should have known.’’

Maeri chuckled along with me. ‘’But seriously… I think he has this little thing for you,’’ she continued to sound convinced, ‘’I mean, he continuously seeks you out. If that isn’t a sign, I don’t know what else is.’’

‘’You think everyone has a thing for everyone though,’’ I countered playfully, simultaneously recalling that one time she told me that Jin supposedly had a thing for me – which was ridiculous.

‘’Even I think he does though,’’ Joohyun suddenly decided to speak – surprising everyone in the progress. ‘’If a guy acts particularly nice towards you during a trip like this one… it means something.’’

‘’It sounds like someone is speaking from experience!’’ Maeri chuckled as she shifted from one position into the other one. I chuckled along and retracted the one leg I had swung over the blanket earlier, only to switch it with the other long limb.

‘’Perhaps I am.’’  

Minutes proceeded to pass with Joohyun openly talking about the short fling she had with Kang Yonghwa, a guy we had shared PE with before he transferred to another school because he had to move away. I listened to her story with much surprise for I hadn’t known of Joohyun’s involvement with Yonghwa – at all. That I had no clue wasn’t really surprising, but even Maeri and Soojin hadn’t known about it. According to Joohyun nobody had, except for the two of them.

I found it funny that Seo Joohyun and Kang Yonghwa had been romantically involved. Joohyun had always struck me as quiet girl. She was perhaps more than average looking but one wouldn’t necessarily see this since she didn’t doll up. Yonghwa however always emitted the complete opposite persona. He had been fairly popular because he definitely invested in the way he looked. Also, Joohyun was mainly into books - and herself - while Yonghwa was very focused on sports – and therefore didn’t involve with girls all too much. But that was just how the both of them struck me and I needed to remind myself that that’s only the perceived part of a person. Definitely not all there is to them – as had turned out now.

‘’You have been awfully quiet on this subject Aerin,’’ Maeri commented once Joohyun had enclosed her story. ‘’Don’t you pretend that you don’t have anything going on with someone.’’

Normally, I wouldn’t have particularly liked how the imaginary topic-ball was suddenly tossed to me. As a matter of fact, in most cases I would have hated it. It was therefore surprising that the following words slipping from my mouth were anything but dismissive: ‘’actually,’’ I began softly, in somewhat of hesitation, ‘’there is someone I happen to like.’’

The confession had left my lips before I could truly consider the weight of them. On any normal day - or night - I wouldn’t have felt like sharing a personal romantic story of mine. First of all, because I was rarely romantically involved with anyone in the first place and secondly because those stories just felt very personal. I don’t know what it was that night that made me speak about myself. Perhaps it was the friendly ambiance. Perhaps it was because even a girl like Seo Joohyun was entrusting her story to us. I don’t know, but I couldn’t take the words back anyway.

‘’Who is it?’’ Surprisingly it was Joohyun who raised that question first. Although it was completely dark on her part of the room, I could still form a clear image of the expression on her face; gentle as always, yet her brows raised only a slight bit.

I laughed sheepishly before I took a deep breath and began to formulate a story I wasn’t even sure how to formulate in the first place: ‘’I won’t tell who it is, but I do have someone I like as of now.’’

‘’Okay fine, don’t tell us who it is, but what’s he like?’’ Maeri couldn’t help but to pry.

‘’What he’s like?’’ I repeated as I came to think about Daehyun, ‘’Appearance-wise? Or personality wise?’’

‘’Both,’’ Soojin joined in.

‘’He… he has a nice face,’’ I began sheepishly as I started to visualize his handsome features. I didn’t truly know why I was in love with Daehyun, so trying to formulate it wasn’t as easy. Still, I attempted to give a pretty clear yet not too obvious description nonetheless. ‘’His eyes, nose and especially lips are… nice and um… he is that type of guy people like to be in the presence of. Therefore he knows and gets along with a lot of people and—’’

‘’Are you implying that he’s popular?’’

‘’I guess that a lot of people know him, yeah.’’

‘’Is he from our school?’’ Maeri proposed her third question.

‘’Yes.’’

‘’Our year?’’

‘’Yeah…’’

‘’Okay so elaborate, what is it you like about him?’’

Silence hung in the air once the question was raised. I knew my feelings pretty well, but now that I had to describe them out loud it was as if I knew nothing about those feelings and why I felt like that in the first place. ’’I- I don’t know actually. He is… he makes me feel this kind of way I can’t easily explain. But it’s a feeling I like.’’ I wasn’t sure whether I was making any sense. Neither of the girls had commented on my vague description however and I decided to take that as a good sign. ‘’He is on my mind constantly; because everything somehow reminds me of him, even small little things that got little to do with him. When he interacts with me I feel… ecstatic. Even if our conversations aren’t really about anything I still love it when he talks to me. When he shows that he has been thinking about me, I feel somewhat special,’’ I caught myself smiling like an idiot as I thought about all the things that made Daehyun, Jung Daehyun and why I liked him so much for it. Without even noticing that I was talking a lot I continued to ramble like a love struck idiot, almost like I was speaking to myself rather than to my classmates: ‘’He’s really complex and I can never figure him out, but I kind of like that about him. Most of the time it frustrates me; he frustrates me. Sometimes he can say really unthoughtful things and at first I thought that that was so characteristic of him because at times he can come off as a good looking , but he is so much more than that. He is funny and helpful, but also considerate and so sweet at times. I- I don’t know how to explain it, but all those little things about him make me like him.’’

Several squeals were heard, resulting in an extremely wide smile on my part. Only after I had spoken my thoughts about Daehyun out loud, did I realize how much in love with him I truly was. Suddenly I came to find it so stupid that I hadn’t said any of this to Daehyun in the first place. Instead, we had been playing games with each other, not realizing that - if he were to feel the same way about me - we were both losing. For a moment I considered what I truly wanted and what it required me to do if I were to make it happen and as if a switch had been turned I considered that I should for a fact confess my feelings to Daehyun. Sure, there was a chance that he wouldn’t return them, that he would tell me that he doesn’t want to become serious just like he had done to Yuna, but if I didn’t take that chance I would never know any of that in the first place. I didn’t know why the answer was so simple and had been there all along, still I was so reluctant to grab it.

‘’It’s Jin, isn’t it?!’’ Maeri harshly popped the peaceful bubble I was in. Raising my eyebrows in the highest way possible, I shifted so that I could catch a glimpse of Maeri’s slightly illuminated face. Her eyes were closed and at first glance one couldn’t even tell that she was awake. I was surprised that Maeri guessed that it was Jin I had been talking about. Jin. I had tried hard not to spill too much, because I didn’t really want them to figure out whom I had been referring too. Still, Jin as the the guess was unexpected.

‘’Why would you think that?’’ I asked, genuinely curious what it was that caused Jin to be brought up every time.

‘’He does fit the description,’’ Joohyun chimed in, her tone indicating that was on the verge of falling asleep, ‘’and… and he brought you to the airport. That sure strikes me as considerate.’’

‘’He brought Soojin and Hoseok too,’’ I protested weakly.

‘’Only because you asked if I could come along,’’ Soojin proved herself to be of little help with a very soft mutter. I suspected that she was already well on her way to dreamland too.

‘’But still, ‘’ I protested with a loud yawn. I had wanted to disagree firmly, but the sudden drowsiness that overtook me wouldn’t allow me to do so.

The room grew familiarly silent - like it was supposed to be given the ungodly hour we were now in - and I soon felt my eyelids becoming extremely heavy. I snuggled deeper into my pillow, shutting out everything, while I once again came to think about Jung Daehyun; the person who was always able to infiltrate my mind right before drifting to sleep.

A small smile crept up my face.

And despite the heat, I finally fell asleep. 

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