Chapter 4 – Girls’ Talk

HER

A few days later, just after finishing my third period class, I saw Do-Hee rush into the classroom like a tornado, running towards her friends with a smile so big it threatened to split her face in two. “I got it! I got it!” she was screaming, and the other two started jumping up and down excitedly.

“Do-Hee… aren’t you supposed to come see me first when you’re late?” I asked in my best strict-teacher voice.

“Oh, but miss, you don’t understand!” she turned to me and babbled excitedly, “We just got approved to go to EXO’s fan signing next week!!” and they squealed some more.

The words she’d just uttered made absolutely no sense to me. I told her that she still needed to go to the teacher’s office and get a late notice before she could come and return to class. She knew the rules. She sulked a little but obeyed, and I was left with the other two to explain to me what was going on.

“Don’t you know EXO, miss?” asked Reika.

Of course I knew the name. Even if I had been just a normal person, with no interest in k-pop, there was no way to be teaching in an all-girls junior high school and not know the name of the most popular boyband of the moment. But actually, I knew quite a bit about EXO, for much more different reasons…

“Of course I know them, but what do they have to do with Do-Hee being almost 3 hours late?”

The two girls shared a guilty look.

“They’re having an event next week… where you can meet them and get their autograph” Mi-ran explained, slowly, as if I was completely clueless, which made me want to laugh.

“…but you had to register for it at exactly 10am. And those things sell-out in minutes!” squeaked Reika, looking up at me with her big brown eyes, “oh please don’t be too mad at Do-Hee, teacher!”

I smiled. I remembered being just like them when I was their age. I looked at my watch and it was already 11:40. I needed to hurry up downstairs and grab my things before the next class started, so I wished them luck and took my leave.

*

Since it was such beautiful weather, I decided to take my lunch outside. Our school, being a rather affluent private school, had really nice grounds and a “green terrace” to the left of the main gym, where several tables and benches had been set up amidst various vegetation. It was a lovely spot and of course lots of girls loved to sit there during their breaks; which meant that there was hardly ever any place for me to sit.

“Miss C! Come sit with us!”

It was Do-Hee who had shouted, and I looked up to see her waving at me, smiling with cute dimples, so I thought ‘why not?’

Even though it wasn’t even 2 hours later, the topic of their fan-event tickets seemed to have been forgotten at the moment, because Do-Hee and Reika were both busy teasing Mi-ran for having a crush on a boy. The tall girl – who was usually the most collected of the three – was blushing furiously, her nose buried into her carton of banana-milk. I chuckled.

“Miss, do you have a boyfriend?” Do-Hee asked me, tactless as usual.

“No, I don’t”

“Eeeeehhhh…. But you’re so pretty!” exclaimed Reika, in hilarious disbelief.

“Well, one doesn’t automatically go with the other, you know!” I replied, tapping her on the nose.

“But you’ve been in love before, right? Tell us, tell us!” Do-Hee piped up.

I looked from one to the other and squirmed inwardly. Of course I had been in love before, but thinking about it was still rather painful, even though it had ended 5 years ago and I had been the one doing the ending. I’d dated other guys since then, but when people asked me about love, the only person that ever came to mind was Min Seok. My feelings for him had never really quite gone away, and the truth is, I had never wanted to break up with him. Even at that time, it had been the hardest decision that I’d ever made. And I’d spent so many nights regretting it… but now, when I saw what he had become, I knew that I had made the right choice.

I looked at their young, eager faces and it warmed my heart, so I decided I might as well tell them something.

“Yes, I have…”

“Ooooh!!” they cooed in unison.

“When?”

“Was he handsome?”

“What’s his name?”

They attacked me with questions all at once.

“It was in high school, and his name was Min Seok and we dated for 3 years. He wasn’t really handsome… more like, cute? But he was the best-looking guy in the world to me.” I laughed, “I loved him a lot.”

The girls squealed and of course, one of them asked “Why did you break up?”

“I left to go study in England…” I told them. It wasn’t exactly a lie.

“Aww… that’s too bad” Reika shook her head sadly.

They would probably have gone on interrogating me for quite a bit longer, but we were all interrupted when we heard a scream coming from the terrace entrance. I turned in time to see an older girl face-plant down the stairs. Since I was the only teacher around, I rushed over to the small crowd that was already gathering around her. She’d scraped her knees and looked like she might’ve sprained her ankle, but all in all, looked better for wear than I expected. Ordering one of the bystanders to carry her things, I put her arm around my shoulders and helped bring the injured girl to the nurse’s office.

DO-HEE

The accident had shocked everyone on the terrace, but once it seemed like that girl was gonna be ok, everyone returned to their seat and continued chatting. There wasn’t that much time left to the lunch break anyways.

“Ah! Miss Cheon forgot her bag!” exclaimed Reika, suddenly. I peered over the table and saw that indeed, there was a slumpy beige eco-bag there that didn’t belong to any of us.

“We should bring it back to her” said Mi-ran.

I agreed, but I wasn’t done eating so I said, “After I finish this.”  

“You don’t need to eat more though!” Reika smirked at me, so I threw some food at her.

“kyaah!” she squealed and jumped back, “omg, look what you did!”

The bag had fallen and its contents had spilled on the ground. She gave me a dirty look and bent down to put the things back in.

“Hey what’s this?” She stood up with the bag, holding a small piece of paper in her hand. I scurried over and peaked over her shoulder at the photograph she was holding. Mi-ran did the same on the other side. It was a picture of our teacher, when she was a lot younger, with her arms around a smiling boy.

 “Oooh, do you think this is the ex-boyfriend?” asked Reika, and we all peered a little closer, giggling.

“Doesn’t he look kinda familiar to you?” I asked. I felt like I’d seen his face before, but I just couldn’t remember when.

“I don’t really think we should be going through the teacher’s stuff though…” Mi-ran said after a while; even though she’d seemed just as giddy as the rest of us when we first found it… but she was right.

So we put the picture back and gathered our things before heading to the teachers’ room. Miss Cheon was still in the nurse’s office with that girl though, so we gave her bag to another teacher who said he’d give it to her. And then, on the way back to our classroom, it suddenly hit me.

 “Omg! Min Seok!” I stopped walking and the other two looked at me like I was crazy.

“What?” asked Mi-ran.

“That’s Xiumin’s name!!” I said, hoping they would catch on.

“Yeah, so?” added Reika.

“Miss Cheon! That guy in her picture!!!” I waved my hands in circles looking at them expectantly; waiting for them to get them and then…

“Miss Cheon’s long lost love is Xiumin from EXO!?!!!!”