Chapter 42 - Resentment

For a very long time I had been convinced that a broken heart was nothing more than an exaggeration. An exaggeration made by terribly sensitive girls. About terribly superficial stupid occurrences.

Isn’t it funny that I was now one of those 'terribly sensitive' girls myself?

I suppose it was.

It was insane how hollow I felt ever since I heard about what had happened between Daehyun and Yuna. For the past seven days I had tried to make sense of it all, but I learned soon enough that there was no actual sense to make. After all, there were too many questions.

Had his mind been set on Yuna all this time?

Had that kiss between them meant anything?

Had our kiss meant anything?

Had this always been a game for him?

Hadn’t he thought about me at all?

I would never get the answers to the questions. Heck, I would never allow Daehyun to answer them in the first place. I didn’t want to see or talk to him ever again. The past couple of days had progressed slowly. Not a moment went by in which I didn’t think about the kiss. I imagined it all the time. Every single detail. And all the while I would ask myself: why?

I was angry. I was sad. I was confused. But more importantly; I was broken.

I suppose that the signs had been there. Somewhere deep down a part of me always knew that things like this would happen. It’s exactly the reason why I kept denying the possibility of Daehyun liking me. It’s why I had been so afraid and so insecure about him in the first place. I never wanted to get hurt. And above all; I never wanted to be taken advantage of.

But now I was.

What killed me the most was how all of this made me think about a lot of ironic things. Things that made me pity myself even more. It was for example ironic that I had refused Jin’s feelings that eventful night, only to later find out that that exact same night, that exact same moment somewhere in Japan, Daehyun had done the opposite of what I had. He clearly hadn’t refused anyone’s feelings – except for maybe mine.

It was ironic how I had hurt Jin’s feelings about the same time Daehyun was technically hurting mine. I had long pondered over what it was that I had exactly done to deserve any of this, but I couldn’t come up with any logical answer.

‘’Aerin? Are you okay? You look distracted,’’ Kyoungjae said, his fingers snapping right in front of my face. I blinked and in turn snapped back to reality. A sad reality. A sad reality in which I couldn’t keep my thoughts on work. Instead, it was on that darned Jung Daehyun. Something I had vowed not do anymore.

I had taken the news of what happened between him and Yuna much worse than I had initially expected to take it. I didn’t understand what had caused this to happen and frankly I didn’t want to understand. All I knew was that Jung Daehyun and Choi Yuna had kissed in front of a big audience after both having lots to drink. After that, he had pulled her into the dorm’s bathroom which he immediately locked afterwards. What happened in there was basically unknown, but it wasn’t hard to guess though.

Not if you take their history into account.

Perhaps it didn’t make sense that I felt so betrayed by what had happened. Perhaps I didn’t have the right to act as if Daehyun had been unfaithful to me. Because technically we weren’t anything. We weren’t official. We hadn’t claimed each other in any way and he wasn’t mine just like I wasn’t his. But regardless of whether I truly was entitled to feel like I had been cheated on, I still couldn’t help but to feel that way.

‘’I’m fine,’’ I waved him off. I managed to lift the corners of my mouth ever so slightly. I could tell that Kyoungjae wasn’t buying my tough act. Fortunately for me he didn’t comment on it, because for some odd reason he sensed that I didn’t feel like talking today and smartly refrained from doing so himself.

It was only an hour later that all of it really got to me again. I was on a short break and still had two hours of my shift left to go. I sat motionless in Convenience’s small employees kitchen and stared mindlessly at my phone. And just in that moment the device vibrated against the table. The screen lit up and I could make up Jung Daehyun’s name. This was the third time he called. First he had send texts I vastly managed to ignore. The day after – on Friday – he had even called twice, but I had ignored that too. Today marked the third call in his attempts to contact me. Today also marked the sixth day I managed to completely shut him out.

Seeing his name on my phone made me all the more miserable and I felt myself mentally drain from all of this – yet again. I suppose that no one would ever understand how much I needed the comfort of being alone and it was exactly therefore that I had to talk to Kyoungjae again.

But the words spoken were not what he had expected me to say.

‘’Uh Kyoungjae, I’m not really feeling well. Um- could you manage the store alone, maybe?’’ I said after I came back from my break.

‘’Sure.’’

I blinked a couple of times before I actually progressed the meaning of the four lettered agreement to my request. I hadn’t expected him to agree so easily. I hadn’t exactly expected him to say that I couldn’t go home either, but still I wouldn’t have thought of him to let me go this easily. Not without tons of questions along the lines of are you really okay, or shouldn’t we call your dad first.

I suppose that somehow Kyoungjae simply understood that I wasn’t in the mood on that particular day. And I came to appreciate him a whole lot for that.

*

‘’Aerin!’’ I heard a voice I really didn’t feel like hearing call after me. I didn’t even need to turn my head in order to see who was calling; I knew perfectly well to which person that damned soothing voice belonged to.

I sped up my pace and pretended not to hear a thing. A heavy lump started to form in my throat the second time my name left his lips. His voice became louder at the third attempt to call my name – making it almost impossible to pretend that I hadn’t heard it in the first place. Still, I swore I wouldn’t look back at him. I didn’t want to see him. Yet strangely, a great part of me also wanted to turn around and hear what he possibly had to say.

‘’Aerin, wait a moment!’’ he called for the fourth time now. His tone held somewhat of a laugh and God in that moment it became obviously clear that he was being playful. Playful! I couldn’t believe this side of him given the circumstances we were in and I frantically shook my head in disbelieve, my steps becoming even firmer in an attempt to further distance myself from the cause of the constant wrenching of my heart that was Jung Daehyun.

It didn’t work though. At least, not for too long. Within seconds he had managed to catch up to me. I felt his slender fingers clench around my wrist before he turned me around so that I was now facing him directly. His expression didn’t seem the least bit guilty of anything; not the least bit guilty of the pain he had been causing me the past week, and for a split second I came to wonder whether he truly didn’t know why I hadn’t responded to any of his texts or calls or any of his attempts of communication. For a moment I wondered whether Daehyun had really no clue as to why I had completely shut him out for seven days straight.

‘’Aerin, Jesus, you walk really fast!’’ Daehyun told me with that sweet chuckle of his. I didn’t laugh along with him. I didn’t even pretend to smile. Instead, my expression was blank. Daehyun took notice of this for his vibrant chuckle slowly began to die down – his volume gradually becoming weak until it stopped being present altogether.

We allowed a brief moment of silence to loom over us. ‘’Hey, what’s wrong?’’ he brought up to say first, studying me with worry etched all over his beautiful face. The sight broke my heart even more. How someone could be so cruel was beyond me. He wasn’t supposed to look worried, because obviously he hadn’t cared. Not ever. It was him who did this in the first place.

I closed my eyes for a tiny bit, the darkness of my eyelids forcing me to think about how we had gotten to this scenario in the first place. Only two weeks ago everything had been fine for us. During the trip I had even honestly – and foolishly – convinced myself that confessing my feelings for Daehyun would resolve everything; that it would turn out for the best and that it would make me feel like the happiest girl alive. But now I wasn’t sure. Or better yet, now I knew that confessing held no meaning anymore. What he did scarred me too bad. He wronged me way too bad and I could never trust him again.

‘’Why are you looking at me like that? What’s wrong Aerin? Did something happen?‘’

‘’Oh no. Nothing happened,’’ I tried to shrug indifferently. All that could be heard was the sound of a scoff though.

‘’What? Then wh—’’

‘’I said that nothing happened!’’ I repeated, this time in a shaky voice. Initially, I didn’t want to speak a single word to him. I didn’t want to give him any idea that I knew what had happened. My pride wouldn’t allow me to have my heart broken and to have Daehyun know that he had been the cause of that. He had the power to either make or break me and I hated for him to know that. All I wanted was to sob quietly in my room until I got over it. Alone. I wanted to distance myself from him without a word. I just wanted Jung Daehyun gone. I wanted to go back to that time when I didn’t know him. When my heart wasn’t constantly aching and wondering. To that time I wasn’t constantly overthinking, analyzing and interpreting another person’s actions. I bit my lip and looked away, my vision randomly shifting to the bike stalls in an attempt to not to look at the guy I was unfortunately in love with.

It was quite ironic how we even got here, because at this point I failed to remember how all of this messiness started in the first place. How we started. Without actually intending to do so, my eyes settled on his and I noticed him looking at me in a manner that other would define as hopeless. It was weird that at the exact same time his eyes still managed to keep their original fierceness too. As if he was looking right through my soul, determinedly searching for something. It was a look that made me feel more self-conscious than it had ever done. Everything was different now. We were different now. And as I allowed that fact to sink in, I couldn’t help to think about how severely afraid I was, and always had been, of this particular confrontation. I didn’t want to tell him how upset I was with him. The coward within me didn’t want that honesty between us, because if I were admitting my feelings out loud that meant that I would become vulnerable and the chances of me hurting in that state were surely greater. Ultimately the truth was probably going to be more painful than it was ever going to set me free. However the not-so-cowardly part of me did want this honesty; because if everything would be all said and done I could, possibly, end his chapter in my life and move past all of this. Past all of those insecurities bottling up inside of me – because of him. Past all the hatred and immature jealousy I felt towards this one person who didn’t deserve one bit of it – because of him. Past me not really recognizing myself anymore, which was more or less the worst. I managed to trail my eyes away from his. With that, my eyes fixated on the bike stalls yet again. That’s when it hit me; that’s when I did remember how all of this had started.

It had started with that goddamn bike.

Daehyun’s voice made me snap away from the sudden hate I had grown on my bike. ‘’Then why are you acting like this? I don’t un—‘’

''Really? Are you honestly that ing stupid Daehyun?!'' The words didn't come out like I had intented them to. They had gone, or flown, our without them being filtered and I suppose that he was genuinely astounded by my sudden use of tone and swearwords. Believe me, I was too.

‘’What. Aerin I don’t know what you’re tal—‘’

‘’Stop this!’’

‘’Stop wh—‘’

‘’Stop acting like you don’t know what’s wrong! Why do you even pretend to care?’’

‘’Seriously Aerin, I’m not follow—‘’

‘’What the hell do you want from me Daehyun?’’ I hissed on the verge of tears. I didn’t care about the possibility of people hearing us – but to my luck, the square was nearly empty of students anyway. I didn’t care that I was suddenly yelling like an idiot. At this moment nothing mattered but my frustration and sadness for the boy in front of me.

‘’I want you… I- I want you to tell me why you’re so upset,’’ he nearly stuttered taken aback, blinking excessively.

‘’Do you really want to know why I’m so upset? Are you really that clueless?’’ I paused for a bit, not really sure how much I actually wanted to tell him. I didn’t want to explain myself. I didn’t want to let him know how much he had hurt me. I just wanted to erase him. Quietly. But despite not wanting to share anything at all, the words still came out in a mixture of anger, sarcasm and desperation nonetheless. It was as if there was no possible stop to it anyway. ‘’It’s because you broke my heart into millions of tiny freaking pieces!’’

Daehyun’s gaze averted to the ground in shame and perhaps guilt once I actually let out how much he had broken me and although the sight made a small part of me want to stop the rant so that I could hug and kiss him in comfort, I still felt the great need to let everything off my chest. Instead of doing this calmly like I initially intended, I couldn’t help but to grow angrier the more I thought about what had happened. This in turn resulted in the way I continued to speak, or rather scream at him: ‘’You have been playing me all along and I- I can’t believe I even allowed you to do that! I can’t… I can’t believe that I liked you and sincerely believed you liked me too.’’

The moments those words left my lips, Daehyun tilted his head and stared me right in the eye – in somewhat of a surprise. That’s when I hated the fact that I had indirectly confessed to him. I noticed his lips part to voice something out but in all the anger I didn’t let him, instead I went on accusingly: ‘’all you really thought about was getting it on with Yuna and you know what? You can make out with her during trips to Japan – or anywhere – all you want. Do whatever you please, but just… just leave me out of it. Exclude me from your ed up games and just leave me the hell alone! I don’t want to see you anymore.’’

There was a painful heavy-loaded silence after that little speech of mine. It was that type of silence that felt like an eternity, even though it lasted a mere three seconds in reality. Three seconds in which Daehyun came to realize that the make out session between him and Yuna was the cause that had driven me to this state. His face twitched and his lips parted but nothing came out at first.

‘’I- Aerin let me explain.’’ The words came out clumsily and for a split second it seemed like he had hit rock bottom. In that split second I almost felt sorry for seeing him like that in the first place, but then I reminded myself that it was me who was hurt by him. Not the other way around.

‘’Daehyun, you don’t have to explain. Believe me, I understand perfectly well.’’

‘’No Aerin, please, I do have to explain!’’

I attempted to walk away as my tears were threatening to fall. He had seen me cry because of him once and I had no intention of giving him that pleasure twice. I’ve never felt so ty before and all I wanted to do was to get away from him. I knew very well that he wouldn’t let me so easily though, and although I stepped away from him – setting my impossible plan in motion already – I still found out how right I was the moment he took hold of me. I tried to shrug him off but his grip was rather firm and therefore I simply couldn’t.

‘’Let go of me!’’ I yelled. At first he wouldn’t budge. He kept calling my name in that sweet voice of his, his grip becoming even more firm. ‘’Daehyun, you’re hurting me!’’

There it was. The great tears I couldn’t hold in anymore dramatically fell down my face and eventually dripped on the pavement beneath us. It was ironic how the statement that caused him to immediately let go of me referred more to the mental pain of his actions than it did to the physical hold on my arm. He let go of me in shock and stared at me with a dumbstruck look on his face. He was thrown off guard, not to mention completely speechless. It was an expression I had never really seen on him before. It was obvious that he hadn’t expected things to turn out like this when he had first called after me. It made me realize that if I hadn’t found out about what happened, he would have never told me about it on his own accord either. He would have continued to flirt with me for God knows what reasons while it was so painfully obvious that this thing between him and Yuna wasn’t over. They were never going to be over. The realization was driving me sick to my stomach.

‘’Aerin it’s really not what you think. It’s a misunderstanding! Please, you have to let me explain!‘’ he tried to console me once again.

I didn’t want to hear it. I was mad and I had enough. I attempted to walk away again but Daehyun kept on my tail and soon he held on the same speed as I did while he tried to explain himself: ‘’We were drunk and she kissed me first and… and it was a stupid accident! It didn’t mean anything to me! I hardly remember anything from that night.’’

This made me stop in my tracks. I was struck with astonishment as his words sunk in and repeated themselves in my thick head. He called it an accident. A freaking accident. At that moment I became even more infuriated than I already was.

‘’An accident?’’ I don’t believe I have ever scoffed as loudly as I did back then. ‘’What does that even mean Daehyun? That you accidently stumbled back into ? Because last time I checked, that is what you can call an accident! Tell me… how could you possibly accidently make out with her when the two of you have been doing each other for who knows how long!’’ Daehyun countenance changed into something else when he learned that I knew about his past history with Yuna. I couldn’t tell what that expression exactly was and frankly, at that moment, I didn’t even care. He had no right to look so surprised. Everyone knew about them.

I let out a bitter laugh. ‘’What? You didn’t think I would find out that the two of you have had lovely baby-making encounters once in a while? How stupid do you actually think I am?’’

‘’Aerin I know what it looks like, but it’s not what you think. You have to listen to me.’’ It came out as a mere soft plea. I blinked a couple of times and took notice of how incredibly small Daehyun looked in this moment.

‘’I don’t have to do anything for you,’’ I paused for a moment and took another deep breath in which I almost cried again. ‘’I think… I think I already know enough. Frankly, I don’t need to hear any more of your lies. I can’t believe you even have the nerve…’’ I let out a choked laugh, ‘…to call this an accident. You are a liar Jung Daehyun, and I don’t want to see you again. Pretend that you don’t know me and leave me alone. It shouldn’t be too hard for you. Plenty of pretty fishes in the sea for you.’’ Honestly I didn’t for a fact know if he was lying. I accused him of doing that because I was angry and I wanted to hurt him with my words just like he would have managed to hurt me if the roles were to be reversed. But I wasn’t nearly as satisfied with the expression that followed on his part.

After all, I had expected to see more hurt etched on his face. I had expected him to beg me to let him explain; to beg me to forgive him. But none of that happened in the following minutes. The moment I accused him of being a liar his expression noticeably changed.

And he became angry.

‘’So I’m the liar? I’m the one leading people on?’’ he scoffed just as loud as I had done. ‘’You got to be ing kidding me! I know that what happened was wrong, but you have to trust me when I tell you that I never intended for that to happen! I would never in my life do something to deliberately hurt you! But yeah Park Aerin who freaking knows everything, Park Aerin who has everything figured out in that wonderful thick skull of hers doesn’t need an explanation! And now you act like I have hurt your feelings so bad while it is obviously clear that you don’t even have feelings for me in the first place!’’

‘’Excuse me?’’ I let out in disbelieve.

‘’You can point fingers at me all you want, but if we are talking about playing games you have to take a good look at yourself and admit that you’ve been the only vivid player in this so-called game between us. Ever since the beginning! So don’t blame me for messing up once while you have been acting messed up from the very start of this!’’

‘’I- wha- so you’re saying that this is my fault?!’’

‘’No this mess today is my fault! , I know messed up Aerin and I’m fully ing aware of that, but don’t pretend like you are an angel who got her feelings hurt, because you have hurt my ty feelings more than I can even count!’’

My mouth dropped open in astonishment and I couldn’t even come up with coherent sentences to defend myself. ‘’I- what are you talking ab—‘’

‘’Do you know how much I tried getting to you? Every ing time I texted you in the span of God knows how many months I subtly tried to break through that thick concrete shell of yours, but you would never allow me to come too close. I have ing tried Aerin. I did, but I’m so tired of it. You on the contrary haven’t sought after me at all. I always needed to start a conversation with you, because if I wouldn’t, we wouldn’t even communicate in the first place! You never even texted me once! Not once!’’ I wanted to interrupt him to defend myself because I did text him once, but Daehyun wouldn’t even let me as he went on without seize: ‘’Oh no, never mind you did. You did once, only because I so kindly asked you to let me know whether Jongup’s birthday present had arrived to your place – which for the record, was a freaking excuse to talk to you! You want to talk about games Aerin? How about you count that one time you completely ignored my existence that one day at Himchan’s after I had done everything in my power to help you find your precious phone the day prior! Do you enjoy kissing people only to act as if they’re dead the next time you see them?!’’ he paused for a moment to collect himself and stepped incredibly close to me. Looking angry and disappointed. ’’You can act as if what happened between Yuna and me is the cause of your distrust towards me, but the ing truth is that you always intended to keep me out. You always surrounded yourself with walls I couldn’t possibly climb over no matter what I did. You always acted indifferent towards me. You’re the ing ice princess and now you claim that you’ve liked me and I’m the only one at fault? If you did like me you wouldn’t have acted like you did for so long. Your actions spoke for their self. Loud and clear and I’m sick and tired of your hard to get games. Didn’t I mean anything to you? Do I look like a ing joke to you?’’

You were never a joke to me, I wanted to tell him. How he could even assume that made me furious beyond words. How dare he say that I was the one playing games? How did he even dare to pin this entire thing on me? At that point I had no clue what to feel. I was so angry. So angry and sad at the same time. I bit my lip and tried to calm myself, but the truth was that his words were hurting me more than I could ever loudly admit to anyone.

‘’You know what,’’ I brought out to say after glaring at Daehyun for what felt like hours, ‘’you are right. This is all my fault. I’m the bad man and you… you did nothing that caused me to be like that in the first place! You—‘’

‘’ Aerin you aren’t listening to me! That’s not what I’m trying to say! I’m saying we are both at fault so don’t pre—‘’

‘’That’s exactly what you’re saying! You’re implying that I’m the one at fault!’’

‘’I don—‘’

‘’You know what, it doesn’t matter what you’re saying! I don’t ing care!’’ I snarled, ‘’don’t you get it? It doesn’t matter anymore! I’m just as done with you as you are with me! It’s obvious! I don’t want to talk to you anymore. Ever.’’ I turned away from him and this time he didn’t even try to stop me.

And that hurt.

I was angry at him, yes, and he was just as angry with me, but still I secretly hoped that he would try harder to stop me – try harder to get to me. That’s when I could’ve come to realize that Daehyun was perhaps partly right and that I, somewhere subconsciously, did see our relationship as some sort of game in which I expected Daehyun to constantly seek me out. Only, at that moment I was so angry with him that I didn’t even care. All I cared for were Daehyun’s faults. He was the villain. He broke me. It didn’t for one second occur to me that I had some part in all of this too. I didn’t care for his feelings I had possibly hurt. I had always only cared for my own.

While walking away, I muttered something along the lines of: I hope you have a nice life with Yuna, only to further hurt him. He didn’t retort to it and a part of me hated that.

I wiped a tear with the back of my hand and held my head high as I walked away. My pride was protectively held in my left hand while my heart and feelings in my right hand were ruthlessly dropped on the dirty concrete of the school’s square.

And as of this day, I’m still not sure whether allowing my pride to win that particular battle was the ultimate victory. 

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