LAST night’s train ride enabled Mei to breathe. Truly breathe. What happened with Charlie, and Jun’s interrogation on the ride to the station, . It hurt her mentally and drained her physically. Her parents, they were never as bad as she thought they were; yes, they were abusive. But they weren’t evil, they didn’t kill people, and they didn’t get involved with the political hierarchy of the world. The parents she remembers; the parents she grew up with: weren’t evil. Her mom grew garlic, and helped out at the local grocery store once in a while. Her father was a baseball coach for the community college nearby. Those were her parents—albeit abusive, but still her parents.

Jing Jing and Soon Young were waiting at the train station for her. Jing Jing was leaning her head on Soon Young’s shoulder, as they waited on one of those seriously disgusting benches in front of the rail. The minute she stepped out, she was greeted by the dusty darkness, and Jing Jing’s infamous bear hug. Soon Young only stayed a few feet in front of them, starring down at his brown shoes and running a hand through his blonde hair.

By the time they got back to the engaged pairs condo, Mei was even more exhausted then before—all she wanted to do was take a shower, eat some dinner then go to bed. But, of course, she had to deal with whatever the reason she came down to Jing Jing’s in the first place. Like, what the heck does she want? What does she need help with?

Apparently, Jing Jing thinks it’s time to come clean to Soon Young—about Mei that is. To tell him everything: Mei disappearance, and the stabbing in the school hallway, to what’s going on with Charlie Wang. She said that starting her marriage with Soon Young lying, is wrong. Soon Young has been and is her rock through everything. The best way Jing Jing could figure out how to tell him, is through Mei—because Mei knows everything about what’s happened, and what might happen. So, she’d be the best to explain.

Mei decided she didn’t want to do it until she had a good rest. Which is why, the day after getting on a train to make her way to Jing Jing, she’s sat at their dining room table starring across to the other end at Soon Young. He’s barely looking in her direction, keeping his eyes casted at the wooden table with his fingers etching along it.

“What is it you’d like to talk about?” Soon Young mumbles as he slowly glances up, and tries not to embarrass himself. Because once more he wants to impress Mei, and not get on her bad side because he knows how much Mei means to Jing Jing—and the other way around. Mei on the other hand, just wants to get the conversation over with so she doesn’t have to deal with it again.

She places both her hands on the table and leans forward. “Jing Jing, loves you—a lot. I hope you know this.” Mei begins, and watches as his face brightens and his cheeks turn a tinge of pink as he rustles hair once more in embarrassment. “But, there’s something she’d like for me to make clear, and I hope you’ll hear it to the end; and not get upset with her.” Soon Young face transforms from one of delight and slight awkwardness, to that of confusion.

“Go on.” He beckons in a small voice.

Mei leans back into her seat, and takes a deep breath. “Three years ago, before Jing Jing graduated school—I ran away. She, like everyone that I knew back then—including Jun—didn’t know where I went or what happened to me.” She waits for a second, mainly so that Soon Young can digest the information. And, he seems to take it okay. Nodding his head, biting the corner of his lip, running a hand through his hair, and shifting his gaze between Mei and the room where Jing Jing is waiting nervously.

“Many people assumed that I was either dead, or about to be. Obviously, they were and are wrong.” Soon Young nods his head repeatedly as he watches her both awe and mild confusion. “One of the reasons for leaving, has to do with an accident that happened four years ago.”

Soon Young watches as Mei tries to process the words about the events in her mind. “And?” He doesn’t even realize the word leaves his mouth, but it does, and it tells Mei that she needs to hurry up with whatever she’s going to say next.

“Jing Jing was stabbed, at our school, by a man who was subsequently involved with my father. Of course, neither of us knew the depth of that at the time—I’m not even sure if Jing Jing does now, I haven’t told her everything. But, I left China because of my parents and what happened to Jing Jing.”

Soon Young keeps quiet for a few seconds, processing it throughout his brain. As if that’ll make him comprehend anything. Sadly, without the bulk of the information—he can’t apprehend it at all. He bats his lashes a bit before looking up at Mei and smiling stiffly, “I’m not really understanding.”

“Then, I think maybe Jing Jing should explain it.” Mei stands up from the table, the ends of the wooden chair scratching against the bamboo floor. With the blonde boy sitting at the large glass dining room table; Mei makes her way to Jing Jing, who’s still hiding out in that room. She’s spinning around in a plushy purple desk chair, with her legs pulled to her chest and her hair covering her face. “I think you should explain the rest, I said the basics.”

The brunette glances up at the blonde with nervousness gracing her face. “Is he mad?” Mei shakes her head and crosses her arms over her chest.

“No, he just wants to understand.” Jing Jing takes a deep breath as she pulls her legs even tighter to her chest. Now, if Soon Young is confused, Mei is even more so. She’s never quite understood relationships before. All she really knew were what her parents showed her: and that’s not really a good example. “I’m not sure why you wanted me to tell him in the first place. I guess you were afraid. But, Jing Jing, he loves you—and he’ll understand why you kept it from him, and why you lied. He’s not going to be angry, when there’s nothing to be angry about. Instead, he’ll be glad. Glad that you told him the truth before getting married. So, go and tell him.”

“Everything?”

“Everything.”

Needless to say, Jing Jing told Soon Young everything: from Mei having been abused, to the attack at school, even to the recent appearance of Charlie. And, like Mei thought, Soon Young wasn’t even close to angry. He couldn’t be, not when Jing Jing is crying through every sentence, and her lie was a way to protect herself. She wasn’t doing it to spite him, or to hurt him in any way. The rest of the night consisted with Soon Young trying to comfort Jing Jing, and Mei keeping her distance. The last thing she wanted was for Jing Jing to cry even more when she sees her, so she stayed in the guest bedroom; alone, and ultimately lonely.

It’s times like these when she begins to realize how much she loves living with Ming Hao and Jun. There’s never a dull moment with them, not to mention that they’re there for her when she needs it. They’re there when she wakes up, and they’re there when she goes to sleep. Though, her loneliness doesn’t come full fledge until she gets a call—around eight o’clock—from none other than Jun.

“What’s up?” She asks as she takes a seat on her bed and pulls her knees to her chest. She tries to swipe away her cold hair—having just taken a shower a few minutes earlier—from her forehead, but it doesn’t really work out and only makes her fingers a bit colder than before, and wet.

She hears rustling on the other side of the phone, as if he’s walking around and the phone is pressed toward his side. Finally, after a few dwindling seconds of waiting for him to say something back, he does. “Mei?” His voice comes out smooth, but hoarse, he probably has a sore throat; so she thinks.

“Yeah?” She replies as she leans her head on the top of her knees.

She hears him sigh, a long boisterous sigh, before saying the words that she wanted to say to him but was too afraid to. “I miss you.” She’s not to shocked by the fact, because if she’s missing him then it’s more than likely that he misses her. But it does keep her quiet and unmoving from her position. “I-I miss you already Mei, and it’s only been a day. I’m scared about when you leave for good.” So is she. She’s been dreading it to the point it keeps her up at night. She’s afraid she’ll hurt Jing Jing again, and now—now she’ll be hurting Jun too. Maybe even Ming Hao, and that truly . “You said we’d talk about this…”

“I don’t think now’s a good time.” She manages to say. “Can’t we talk about this tomorrow, when I get back?” Once more she hears him sigh, and by now she realizes that he’s probably just gotten home from either studying too late at the library, or going out to dinner with Ming Hao.

“I, yeah, I guess so.” He mumbles back to her; running a hand through his hair, and sounding moderately sad about it all. “What time do I need to be at the station?” He asks and she relies all the information about the train ride, that she knew off the top of her head. As the conversation comes to an end—at least that’s what Jun thinks—Mei says something that makes him grin ear to ear.

“Jun?”

“Yeah.”

“I miss you too.”

O c t o b e r  7

2 0 1 5

S e o u l,  S o u t h  K o r e a

JUN’S at the train station early, sitting on the bench, running his hand through his raggedy hair, and uneasiness running through his system. After last night’s phone call, he began to think about it like crazy. Mei misses him? Mei misses him as much as he misses her—and that seems like a step in the right direction. Because, if she misses him then there’s a good chance that she might stay and not leave. At least, he hopes.

Mei arrives thirty minutes after he gets there. She’s dressed in an old pair of grey sweatpants, one of her old white shirts, raggedy old black converse and her hair’s tied into a pony tail. She looks like she could fall over and never wake up; exhaustion fills every part of her face. At her arrival, Jun stands up and walks over to her, taking her backpack and throwing it over his shoulder before grabbing her suitcase and holding it with his right hand. “How did it go?”

Mei shrugs her shoulders and places her hands into the pockets of her sweats. “Fine.” The two walk stiffly next to each other, as they make their way down the concrete path—through the bustling citizens—and to his truck. They kept rather silent, only ever saying something when a person would accidentally walk into them. Other than that, the two rarely conversed. At one point Jun has to grab onto Mei’s hand to pull her out of the way of a mob of fieldtrip going middle schoolers who practically trampled over everyone in the surrounding area. Mei was way too exhausted to even realize they were there, so it’s a saving grace that Jun had pulled her out of the way in time.

The car ride wasn’t any better. Once getting in, and placing Mei’s two bags in the cab part of the truck, they got on their way and once more kept quiet. Ironically, all the two wanted to do was talk. Though that didn’t seem to happen. Jun kept focus on the busy road, and Mei kept her gaze out the side of the window. Neither of them dared to look at each other.

By the time they got to the apartment, both of them were—beyond belief—more so annoyed with each other than anything else. Mei wanted Jun to start the conversation, and Jun wanted Mei to start the conversation. Neither of them did that. Rather, they walked up the stairs to the third floor—elevator is still not working, despite regular complaints about it—and entered the apartment moments later; after the two could find their respected keys, Jun finding his first.

Ming Hao walks into the kitchen, around the time the two enter, his face plastered with the want to sleep and his batman onesie is wrinkled from rolling around in his sleep. He stares hard at Mei as he walks out of the kitchen and after he spots her entering the apartment; he points directly at her with his index finger, “You, go make the coffee.” The youngest of the three has subsequently come to enjoy and actually like the taste of Mei’s coffee, and now can only have hers. Yesterday was a mess when Jun made it—it was bitter, and all he wanted to do was throw up on the older. He’s never been so aggravated more so than yesterday, to the point that all he did was scowl at everybody who dared to talk to him; including Jun, especially Jun.

“Aren’t you going to say hi?” Jun asks as he places Mei’s bags on the floor next to the banister. His eyes follow Mei as she walks around the both of them, and goes straight to the coffee machine.

Ming Hao rolls his eyes as he puts his gaze back on Mei, “Hi, I see your back from your trip. I’m not sure if I’m happy about that, but whatever; I come last in this household anyways.” He turns back toward Jun with a look of boredom—his eyes slanted down, his head tilted, and his mouth in a slant. “Happy?” Jun rolls his eyes at the younger in annoyance. He now thinks that the younger will most likely never be nice. Not when he’s like this, always rude in a childish way of his.

“I’ll be back.” She murmurs as she grabs her bags, slides them over her shoulders, and walks down the hallway to her room. Once there, she places her bags in front of the closet—not daring to put anything around, though it’s not like she has before—and goes toward the window. She pushes the window and bars covering it open, and slides outside. Like her usual early mornings, she takes a seat on the edge of the fire escape and brings her knees to her chest.

Though most of her worry these past two days, has been more on Jing Jing’s troubles with Soon Young and then the whole aspect of staying thanks to her ever growing attachment with Jun and Ming Hao—she’s still worrying about Charlie. What he said, everything he did to get to her, his ongoing investigation. She still hasn’t talked to anyone about it (not even Jing Jing who practically knows everything about her) and it’s scaring her. She’s worried she might explode if she keeps it all in. But she’s scared that if she tells someone like Jun or Jing Jing, they may agree with Charlie and want her to give up her parents to put them in jail. But, what about her opinion? She’s not positive that her parents are totally awful.

She loves her parents, like any child would. She knows how messed up they are, especially with how she was treated. But growing up, all she ever knew was that if you were going to respect and love someone you start with your parents. It’s ingrained in her brain, and her blood. She can’t and won’t let that go. So, she needs time—to digest it all and decide later about whether or not she wants to go along with Charlie and convict her parents. For now, she’ll be where she is, and she’ll act like the biggest problem she has is seeing Jing Jing’s parents at her wedding. For now, Charlie never met her, and she never learned the news of her parents. Just for now. After the wedding, after she’s had time to digest it: she’ll talk to someone.

“Hey.” Mei glances over her shoulder to see Jun holding two cups of coffee. She grabs the yellow cup before allowing room for him to climb out and sit next to her. “So, how’s Jing Jing and Soon Young?” He places his cup down next to him and watches as she slightly shifts away from him; like she always does.

She ends up shrugging her shoulders as she places her arms around her legs, and her head a top her knees. “Better than she was, and—I guess—Soon Young-sshi is fine too.” She flicks her eyes toward him and takes a deep breath. “She wanted me to tell him everything about what happened. My parents, the stabbing, and the stuff with Charlie.”

Jun curtly nods his head as he keeps his eyes on her, “What did happen with Charlie?” He waits for her to answer; obviously, she doesn’t. Instead she flips her head to the other side and lays it back on her knees. Just by that action he knows she doesn’t want to talk about it. She never wants to talk about it. “He dropped this off the other day. Slipped it under the door when I wasn’t looking.” He holds out a silver card with black Chinese lettering on it, almost immediately Mei snatches it when she sees it. “It’s his address, why’s he giving you his address? What’s going on Mei?”

She reads what’s on there, ‘If you want to talk more, here’s my address: 8704 Cheongdam-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, Korea. Drop in whenever, keys’ buried in the fake plant on the left.’ She reads it over and over again. What the hell does he want from her? This card isn’t just about ‘talking whenever’ this is something else. She can feel it. Why is he still in Korea? Why hasn’t he left yet? Why not go back to China since she didn’t answer? Why is he still here?

“Are you guys making out in there?”

Mei and Jun glance over their shoulders to see Ming Hao walking into her room with a hand covering his eyes, and the other directly in front of him trying to feel for something. “What do you want?” Jun asks as he crawls back into her room, to the idiot still with his hand covering his face, and still wearing his ridiculous batman onesie. He finally, after a few seconds, takes his hand off his face and stares at Jun with a small smile. Mei watches in slight discomfort; one reason being that they’re in her room, and another reason being that Ming Hao is smiling and she’s never really seen him smile (only when watching some stupid anime he likes).

“Can you make breakfast? I’m hungry.” He whines with that smile still on his face. Jun, despite wanting to talk to Mei about what the hell is going on with Charlie, he nods his head and heads to the kitchen with Ming Hao following behind. Thus leaving Mei alone to think. She lets the card flip between her fingers, letting it graze against her skin as she tries to really think about what ‘Charlie’ must want. He must want to talk to her, that’s why he left his card.

There’s more to the story.

Thus there’s more for her to learn, when she doesn’t really want to learn anymore. “Mei.” Ming Hao stands in the doorway, now fully changed into a pair of denim jeans, a dark blue sweater, and white tennis shoes. Completely changed from what he was dressed in before. “We’re out of eggs, so we’re going out for breakfast. Let’s go.” Mei nods her head, grabbing her red coat from off her bed, and follows after Ming Hao and Jun; to the red truck. Unfortunately, there are no seatbelts in the cab of the truck and there’s not a lot of seat room—so, the three end up sitting together in the front. The arm rest—usually plastered down since it’s broke when Ming Hao threw a bag full of tools on it—got pulled up, and Ming Hao took that as his spot; using the semi-dirty seat belt to keep himself in place. Meanwhile Jun kept his place in the driver’s seat, while Mei sat on the other side of Ming Hao, keeping her body pressed up against the side of the car door.

“We should get pizza.” Ming Hao murmurs as he plays with the dials to both the air conditioning and the radio.

Jun looks away from the road for maybe two seconds, to look at Ming Hao with a grimace, and a hint of anger. “You said you wanted breakfast; besides, who has pizza at seven in the morning?” Ming Hao shrugs his shoulders and moves away from the buttons of the car, to cross his arms.

“I also said I wanted to watch Tokyo Ghoul last night, but then watched Soul Eater instead; and regretted it because I’ve seen it so many damn times and it made me angry.” He pouts; Jun only manages to side-eye him while Mei tries to not say anything stupid like ‘what’s Tokyo Ghoul and Soul Eater?’ Because she’s never heard of them.

When the traffic causes them to come to a complete stop (because traffic all throughout Seoul, ) Jun shifts his body to stare at Ming Hao and glare. “Is that why you came out and shot me with your nerf gun?”

“No,” Ming Hao begins while scrunching his face up in annoyance and once again reaching out to mess with the stereo and air conditioning. “I shot you because you were watching Gag Concert without me, and your laugh is so ing annoying.” He says it in that stupid ‘duh’ voice that it almost causes Jun to reach over and slap him upside the head.

“Then why did you shoot me the second time?” He practically shouts.

The younger rolls his eyes as he shifts body toward Jun—his back touching Mei’s shoulder causing her to be slightly awkward as she tries to shift away from him (it doesn’t work). “I shot you the second time because you were drinking hot chocolate and didn’t make any for me; when you know it’s my favorite drink.”

“There was some left in the pot!” Jun shouts back.

Ming Hao scoffs, “But you ate all the marshmallows!”

“There were barely any left in the pantry because you drink so much of that and pile them on top like it’s whip cream!” The older shouts back; but the younger shoots his finger towards Jun accusingly like he said something wrong. Yet, for a fact, Mei can confirm the above statement—because besides drinking coffee in the morning, Ming Hao drinks hot chocolate.

“It makes me feel like I’m eating a cloud.”

“That’s stupid!”

“You’re stupid!”

The bickering doesn’t stop until finally Jun pulls the car into the parking lot of one of those hole-in-the-wall pizza joints, as Ming Hao continues to huff and puff with his arms crossed. “Marshmallows are the soul of my being.” He whispers as he kicks Jun in the back in order to push him out of the car, and for him to get out. Jun sighs and watches as Ming Hao grudgingly makes his way into the pizza joint with the other two following.

Jun should’ve realized it then: as he was too busy trying to talk to Ming Hao about how it wasn’t fair that he laughed so loud when the second shot got him straight between the eyes and it took him a good five minutes to pull the stupid thing off; meanwhile, Mei was flipping the card between her fingers again, gazing at the address before comparing it to the address of the pizza joint. The pizza joint being approximately half a mile away from Charlie’s apartment; so she ran. Because, as much as she doesn’t want to learn whatever there’s left to learn, she has too.

Her feet didn’t stop hitting the pavement, or crushing the leave beneath her feet until she found herself in front of a bright white apartment complex with the same address as the one on the silver card. She contemplates it for a few seconds. Is it truly a good idea to waltz into a dunces’ apartment and ask for an explanation of what the hell he wants? Maybe she should just retreat and never speak of Charlie again.

In the end, she makes it inside the building when someone leaves, and she shakily walks up the dark carpeted stairs until reaching the eighth floor. In front of the red door, there’s two potted plants on each side of it. Fake plants that resemble a Fiddle Tree that are sat in white pots. Maybe, she should knock; though he did say that she should just grab the key, as if it’s her own apartment. So, she crouches down in front of the left plant—like the card directs—and digs her hand into the pot, pulling out the silver key and dusting it off.

She doesn’t think about it anymore and opens the door, stepping inside quickly and shutting the door behind her. She’s places her hands and forehead against it, letting out a deep breath. She glances down at her pocket to see it flashing, meaning someone is either calling or texting her—most likely calling, and its most likely Jun.

“Knew you’d come at some point.” Mei stiffens at the deep voice as she slowly looks over her shoulder. There, walking to a large grey couch, is Charlie with a bowl of cereal in hand. “Come in and sit.” With his free hand he pats an empty part of the couch while simultaneously placing his feet on the coffee table. “I’m a little surprised, I thought maybe you’d come earlier.”

Mei’s lip curls as she takes a step further inside the nice apartment. Despite just coming from China, the apartment the older man is staying in, is actually nice. The kitchen has granite counter tops, and a huge island directly in the middle of it all. The dining room has a large table with six chairs that sits directly in front the family room. The family room has two large sectional sofas, with a flat screen TV sitting in front of it, and a balcony two the right of it. Directly to the left of it is a pair of stairs that leads to the looming loft above the couches. It’s obvious that the loft is where the bedroom is, most likely.

“Will you stop standing there?” He sneers before shoveling some food into his mouth. Mei complies and takes a seat on the other couch on the furthest spot away from him and closer to the TV. “So, how are y—”

“Cut the crap.”

Charlie’s eyes widen as he lets out a slight chuckle. He’s surprised Mei can be so short and snappy. She wasn’t like that the other day when she let him walk all over her. What changed? “Cut what crap?” Her eyes narrow on him as she flings his card onto the coffee table, nearing his legs, and crosses her arms right after. Charlie glances down at the card before letting his eyes flicker back to her. “So…”

“What more is there to the story? That’s why you left the card, right? There’s more to the story. So, cut the crap and tell me.” She waits for a second, to see if he responds, though he only stares at her with a glint of humor in his eyes. Is he amused by her anger? Or maybe because she’s finally done with his ? Whatever it is, she’s pissed at his nonexistent answer.

A small smile form’s in the corner of his lips as he places his cereal on the table and straitens up. “I’m surprised, just from that note you’ve figured out there’s more to the story?” Mei scoffs and let’s herself roll her eyes.

“Just because I didn’t finish my schooling, doesn’t mean I’m a lesser person than you.” If Charlie is ‘smart’ than he needs to get that stupid observation out of his mind, that kids who don’t finish their schooling are automatic ‘dullards’. “Now, let’s skip this small talk and get straight to the point.”

“Alright, fine by me.” Charlie opens his mouth to continue to talk when he’s cut off by the sound of intense knocking on the door, and sudden yells of her name. “Well, looks like someone wants to see you.” He glances at the door before turning back toward Mei with a laugh. “Should I get it, or you?” Mei stands up and heads to the door, maneuvering around Charlie and the coffee table. By the time she reaches the door, she could hear both Jun’s and Ming Hao’s voice—surprisingly, they both came.

Slowly, she opens the door and watches as Jun barges in; he pulls her close to him, breathing in and out harshly and repeatedly. Ming Hao walks in a second after, pushing past them and to Charlie, who’s now starring at the three of them as he leans up against the couch with a smirk. Before Mei can separate from Jun and tell Ming Hao to stop, the youngest boy lands a er punch on the elder’s jaw.

“Tell me what the hell is going on, now!” Ming Hao shouts as he twists away from a sore Charlie, to face Mei who is now pushing Jun away from her. It doesn’t take a fool to notice the blatant anger in Ming Hao’s eyes, and the sudden rush of adrenaline leaving his body. The youngers eyes flicker toward Jun as he points an accusing finger toward him. “How the hell did you know she’d be here, and why were you here? And why the hell is this jerk here, when you said you’d never talk to him to the point you were physically incapable of being near him!”

Charlie clicks his tongue as he centers himself a few feet away from Ming Hao, “Should I tell them or you? Or, maybe we should tell everyone from the beginning; because, I’m assuming you haven’t said anything to them based on this ones,” He juts his thumb toward Ming Hao. “reaction. And if that’s true, then this is going to be one wild ride.” As Mei is standing there, flickering her eyes between Ming Hao, Charlie, and Jun. Only one thing is running through her mind:

Run.

And as much as she thinks it would be a great thing to do, run away from this situation and never look back. She won’t, so she doesn’t. In the end it wouldn’t matter, because she’s sure Jun will always find her. Maybe even Ming Hao, and now, possibly, Charlie.

Crap.