I didn’t realize it at the time, but Yonghwa began to distance himself from me after I told him about us leaving. Even now I can recall how much it bewildered me when he began to talk less. His playfulness around me seemed to vanish, as well. Suddenly, everything became awkward.

I felt like we had gone from inseparable friends to complete strangers. He started to hang out with the boys, and I started to hang out with the girls. In a blink of an eye, we didn’t stand between the great divide anymore. Like the others, we began to blend in—we started being mundane.

Sitting close to him suddenly felt so wrong, and he must’ve felt it, too, because he requested Sunggyu, our classmate, to swap seats with him. All I could do at that moment was to stare at Yonghwa as he sat down beside Mina, the campus heartthrob. Being the gentle soul that he was, Sunggyu scooted nearer to me. I looked at him.

“Did the two of you fight?” he asked.

I bit my lower lip, and rested the side of my head on my desk. “I don’t know, Gyu-yah. I don’t know…”

“I hope the two of you will get along soon,” he said. “You’re aware that Mina likes Yonghwa, aren’t you?”

I swallowed, and turned away from Sunggyu. I didn’t know why but at that time, something inside me began to clench up, and breathing suddenly became a hefty task. It was our Mathematics class when I decided to pass a note to Yonghwa.

To Yonghwa

Are you mad at me?
Why do you have to swap seats?
Mina has cooties!

I watched the paper land safely on Yonghwa’s desk. He looked back at me, and opened the paper quietly. I let out a sigh of relief upon seeing his crooked smile, but my face fell again when I noticed that he tried to hold it in. He took out his pencil and he began to write something. After a short while, the paper made its way back to me.

To Shin Hye

Mina is pretty
and nice. She has no cooties.
I’d rather stay here.

I pouted, and gave him a harsh glare. I turned to the paper again and started to scribble frantically.

To Yonghwa

Why?! This is not fair!
We’re best friends! Why do you keep
on ignoring me?

I passed the paper when the teacher wasn’t looking, and he looked at me seriously, as if he was about to scold me. He unfolded the paper and I watched his eyes trace my reply. He wrote something quickly and then the note was passed back to me again.

To Shin Hye

In the end, you’ll leave.
I have to get used to it
so I won’t be sad.

“What?” I muttered. I bit my lower lip and felt warm tears threatening to fall from my eyes. Yonghwa was looking at me, and I let out a scowl to show him that I wasn’t a cry-baby.

To Yonghwa

I will be sad, too!
You’re making things difficult.
Can’t we call it quits?

Yonghwa received my response, and my eyes widened when he did something  I never expected from him: he crumpled the paper into a ball, and he threw it in his bag. I bit my lower lip, and looked down on the floor in order to distract myself. Suddenly, Sunggyu let out a gasp, which sent the whole class to turn to him.

“Gyu-yah, what happened over there?” our teacher asked. “Weren’t you sitting beside Mina yesterday? Why are you there at the very back now?”

“T-Teacher…” Sunggyu stammered. “Shin Hye’s crying!”

“What?” our teacher let out. “Shin Hye-yah, what happened to you? Are you hurting somewhere?”

I slightly nodded. The teacher quickly approached me, and he kneeled down to meet me eye-to-eye. “Where are you hurting?”

I looked at our teacher while sniffing. I could feel my face burning, and my throat felt so dry. All I could do was make these uncontrollable, incoherent sobs. I swallowed the huge lump in my throat, and then pounded my chest with my fist twice. “It hurts here, teacher.”

“Try going to the infirmary,” he suggested. He quickly stood up, and he probed the room. “Yonghwa, where are you? Accompany Shin Hye.”

I glanced at Yonghwa, and from the looks of it, he didn’t want to go.

“It’s okay,” I mumbled forcibly. “I can go by my—”

I paused when Yonghwa stood up. “I’ll accompany her, sir.”

We both made our way outside, and Yonghwa paused in front of the vending machine. He inserted some loose change and he clicked on a button. I watched a bottle of water get pushed out and fall on the compartment. He grabbed it, and  handed the bottle to me. I stared at it for a moment, and carefully took it from him.

“Thanks,” I muttered.

“You should find new friends,” he said. “You’ll leave this place soon. You should get along with the girls in our class.”

I looked at him, and he smirked as he took out his handkerchief to wipe my face clean from my tears and snot.

“But you’re enough, Yonghwa,” I said.

“But to me, you’re not,” he returned. “How can you survive in London if you only depend on me, huh?”

I kept quiet. “Do you think I’m burdening you, then?”

“That’s not it,” he said. “But you have to stand alone sometimes.”

“You can do it, but I can’t,” I replied.

“You won’t,” he corrected.

I swallowed, and seeing that I couldn't say anything anymore, I opened the bottle of water he gave me. I took a tiny sip from it, and Yonghwa suddenly stopped walking. I sealed the bottle with the cap again and he looked back at me.

“Shin Hye, answer me,” he began in a coarse whisper. His voice wavered. “Why does it have to be you? Why do you have to leave?”

“I don’t know,” I replied solemnly. “I don’t want to leave, too.”

He sighed, and  nodded at me. “Your heart, does it really hurt?”

“It was hurting earlier,” I said. “But when you started talking to me, it stopped.”

Yonghwa flashed me that mischievous grin of his, and he fondly tousled my hair.

“We’ll be best friends forever, won’t we?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Even though we’re far apart?”

“Even though we’re far apart,” he reassured.

“Do you promise, Yonghwa?”

“I promise,” he replied, his grin not vanishing from his lips. “Then should we head back?”

I nodded. I looked at him carefully, and he stared back.

“We’re still best friends,” he said. “But let’s try to get along with our other classmates.”

I gave him a wistful stare, and smiled weakly. “Do you like Mina?”

Yonghwa was taken aback with the sudden confrontation, and with the way he blushed and turned away, I figured that my hunch was right. I couldn’t believe my eyes, to be honest. My Busan boy—the boy who walked with the four seasons present in him—actually liked someone.

Yonghwa was someone who beckoned the warm summer sunshine through his smile and crescent eyes; he smelled like the crisp winter and sometimes like the woody autumn; his voice reminded me of spring, where flowers bloom and cherry petals fall down unceasingly with such abundance.

My best friend actually admired someone. And that someone…wasn’t me.

I nodded to myself, grinning. “Yonghwa, I don’t feel well, after all. I’ll go and see the nurse. You can go back first,” I didn’t wait for his reply. I turned my back against him, and began to stride my way towards the infirmary.

The moment I slid the door open and saw the school nurse’s smiling face, I began to sob loudly. Her eyes widened, and she approached me, only to lock me in her warm embrace.

“Shin Hye-yah,” she soothingly said, as she smoothed down my hair. “What’s wrong?”

I wanted to explain, but I was sobbing so hard that all I could blurt out were these gibberish sounds. She shushed me and rocked me back and forth. Her sweet perfume calmed me down a bit, and when I was finally settled, she made me lay down on one of the beds. Instead of giving me medicine, she offered me a tray of cookies and milk.

I sat up straight upon seeing the treat and wiped my tears away.

“You’re sick, aren’t you?” she asked me gently.

“N-Not r-really…” I muttered. “W-Will I get p-punished?”

She placed the tray on the drawer near us and  sat down beside me. “You’re sick, Shin Hye,” she pushed. She pointed at my chest. “You’re hurting there, that’s why you’re crying.”

I looked at the nurse, and she smiled at me gently. I couldn’t do anything but hug her again. She hugged me back, and we stayed like that for a long while. I couldn't hold it in anymore so I told her about me leaving, and I told her about how unfair Yonghwa acted. She listened to me patiently, and after finishing the glass of milk and the bowl of cookies, she began to talk.

“I’m sure this hurts Yonghwa as much as this hurts you,” she said. “This might be Yonghwa’s way of protecting himself, Shin Hye-yah, so as his best friend, you should understand him.”

I nodded quietly.

“You’re tired,” she carried on. “You can sleep for now. I’ll wake you up when it’s time.”

<:>

I had a pretty deep sleep due to my incessant crying. I felt a lot better after resting, and with a smile on my face, I decided to go to our classroom to pick Yonghwa up. Much to my surprise, he wasn’t around anymore. Sunggyu told me that he left first, and if I hurried up, then I could still catch him downstairs. Heeding his advice, I quickly made my way to the school grounds but froze suddenly when I saw that Yonghwa wasn’t alone.

He was walking home with Mina.

At that moment, the thought of being excited for London crossed my mind.

<:>

My Mom was surprised to see me arrive home without Yonghwa tagging along.

“Where is he?” she casually asked.

I shrugged. “He’s with his girlfriend, I guess.”

Mom laughed at my bitter remark. “Girlfriend?” she repeated. “Yonghwa has a girlfriend already?”

I shrugged and at the same time let out a tiny sigh. “I’ll be in my room, Mom.”

I quickly went up the stairs and closed my bedroom door behind me. I said to myself that everything would be okay—that Yonghwa and I would hang out again. The very next day,  however, he still refused to swap seats with Sunggyu. He played with the guys and that left me to awkwardly talk with the girls in our class. I guess I couldn’t really connect with them. They were talking about these artists, clothes and girly toys that, up until that point, I didn’t really give a tick about. I ended up feeling miserable because the more I glanced at Yonghwa, the more I realized that unlike me, he belonged just about anywhere. He was, after all, the mood-setter of the group.

While me? I felt that I belonged with him.

<:>

Several weeks already passed by and the silent war between Yonghwa and I still brewed. Our visas finally arrived one day and I asked my Mom if I could stop going to school altogether. She agreed. It was autumn, then, and to kill some time, I decided to float paper boats by the river—the very same one where Yonghwa and I met a few years ago.

The river became stagnant at that time so I had to push the boats away with a stick I found lying on the ground somewhere. The leaves that were green last summer became crimson and whenever the wind blew, a storm of red would shroud the area. The fallen leaves floated about aimlessly on the river, together with my paper boats. The gentle sunlight tickled my back and it felt nice.

“Push!” I huffed, as I poked the paper boat with the stick I held. Playing alone wasn’t that lonely. I did do this for the first seven years of my life, after all. I looked around, and my eyes widened when a red paper boat slowly made its way towards me. I pulled it nearer with my stick and took it out from the water. After a short while of inspection, I began to unfold it. I smoothed it down on the ground and blinked with disbelief when I saw that the short letter was written by Yonghwa.

“To the girl who stopped going to school,” I read aloud. “Stop floating paper boats and cheer for me in the upcoming soccer competition this weekend. I need you. Love, Busan boy.”

I smirked, and suddenly feeling a sense of hope, I threw my stick away and with the soggy letter in my hand, I ran for our house. My Mom was in the living room, then, reading something. I stopped short and I looked up at her.

“Oh, Shin Hye-yah, you’re home,” she said.

“Yeah,” I replied. “Mom, can I—”

“We’re going to London,” she cut in.

“I know that already,” I said, forcing out a smile.

“This weekend,” she finished off.

My eyes widened, and my heart began to race. “Mom, I can’t. I have to cheer for Yonghwa. He’s a part of the soccer team.”

She sat down in front of me, and she gave me this gentle, motherly look. “I’m sorry, Shin Hye, but you can’t.”

Warm tears started to emerge from my eyes, and I began to tremble. I sniffed, and I began to rub my eyes. “Why do we have to move to London, anyway?”

I gently broke away from my mother’s grasp, and like before, the only place I could turn to was Yonghwa’s house. I didn’t have to break into his room since he was waiting for me in their porch. He was grinning when he saw me.

“So, did your Mom say yes?” he asked expectantly.

I looked at him, and choked out a smile. “I can’t go, Yonghwa.”

His face fell. “Why not? Is that why you’re crying?”

I nodded. “We’re going to London this weekend.”

Yonghwa didn’t reply. He clenched his hands into tight balls of fists, and with a tiny grunt, he quickly turned around and he entered their house. I heard him lock the door, and from outside, I traced his steps. I looked at his window the exact moment he closed it.

“I’m sorry…” I muttered, before heading back to my house.

<:>

We had to leave on a Friday night, and all I could leave on Yonghwa’s doorstep was a piece of paper. Since that day, I never caught a glimpse of him. His parents did their part in persuading him to talk to me, but they were unsuccessful. In the end, I had to leave Korea without even saying a formal goodbye to my best friend.

<:>

To Yonghwa

Even if I’m not
in the soccer tournament,
my heart cheers for you.

Please don’t forget me
and our precious memories.
Yonghwa, don’t you dare!

I could never fit
in seventeen syllables
just how nice you are.

You are the best friend
I always wanted to have.
I’m glad I met you.

We will meet again.
I swear we will so hold on
and don’t forget me.

I shouldn’t say this
but I think the four seasons
are present in you.

Your smile, like summer,
brightens up the entire room—
your crescent eyes, too!

Your voice is like spring,
reminding me of flowers
and cherry blossoms.

You sometimes smell like
winter or even autumn.
I will miss those scents.

Most of all, Yonghwa,
I will miss you…and I hope…
you will miss me, too.

"Many will say they are loyal friends, but who can find one who is truly reliable?"
- Proverbs 20:6 (NLT)

loveternallyou lol thanks ^^ you're the one who gave me the idea, after all ^^!

JustBee whoa, I'm touched ;A; thanks for the encouragement :D Though I know I have so many shortcomings, I'm happy because somehow, I was able to perk up your interest ^^

mylchris Thank you ^^ and praise God for giving me the wisdom to carry on writing ^^

laz_15 here's an update ^^ *sigh* I'll get around Seoul Underground soon ^^;; I just have to finish some things. Thanks for supporting that FF, as well ^^