Part 5 ⧫ Ascertain

as·cer·tain

/ˌasərˈtān/

verb

Find (something) out for certain; make sure of.

_______

To say I couldn’t concentrate the remainder of the weekend was a huge understatement.

No matter how much I wanted to stop myself from doing so, I couldn’t help but go back and think about what Baekhyun had said before he departed. Those two short, simple sentences -- the impact they had on me was unimaginable.

They died. In a car crash.

I was pretty sure I wasn’t able to wipe the look on his face when he had said that out of my mind anytime soon. It was so full of raw pain, of anger, of sorrow that I simply couldn’t shake the image out of my mind. It was a look I knew full well, something I had seen in the mirror daily for at least months, before the pain had faded to a dull ache that was never quite gone. A battle wound that opened or throbbed harder when it was winter -- the pain went and left, though never to the point where it was completely gone.

Not to mention it was too hard for my brain to fathom. I had lost my parents to a car crash -- had Byun Baekhyun really had too? Was it possibly wrong for all the judging I had done of his actions -- climbing that wall, living life like it was all a huge joke -- was there really a reason behind this? What exactly had happened to him? Was it his parents’ supposed death that played the largest role behind his behaviour, his actions? What, what was his standpoint?

“… I’m actually not sure,” I muttered into the phone. Fresh air normally helped clear my mind, along with talking to Jihyun. But apparently fresh air and Jihyun didn’t mix, because talking to her was currently muddling up my mind quite a bit more. Her continuous demands and questions about Baekhyun wasn’t really helping with my thinking. To think of it, the easiest way for me to get all my questions answered was probably by asking Baekhyun himself, but that wasn’t on my to-do list. Facing him sounded a little (or maybe a lot) scary, especially when the last time I saw him his eyes had been burning and he’d looked ready to either strangle me or start crying. I wasn’t sure I prefered any of those. Seen the latter, didn’t want to experience the first.

“Well, I don’t think one would lie about their parents dying,” Jihyun stated a matter-of-factly. “I mean, that’s not something to really joke around about. He wouldn’t be that depressed about it if it was just some joke.”

“Yeah, but…” I kicked a rock absentmindedly, watching it skid across the sidewalk and into one of the fountains, disappearing from sight. Boramae Park was one of my favourite places to visit -- the park’s greenery was amazing in the summer, the autumn leaves were a wonder and in the winter, covered in white, it was just as beautiful as it’s neighboring seasons. “It’s not that I don’t want to believe him. He’s just so… different from me and all it’s hard to believe the same thing happened to both of us. I’ve had so many…bad impressions, I guess, of him that I can't really compute with that.”

“What, you mean he’s not scared of everything?” I could picture Jihyun snickering at the other side. There was one problem with her: I was never sure what she would take seriously and what she wouldn’t. The fact that I was extremely careful with just about everything was supposedly one of the things that Jihyun took as a joke.

Another pebble skidded. “No, like seriously. I’ve seen him at school; he’s confident, he’s not really scared of anything, he’s like super social. He seems… so carefree and happy, you know? Apart from Friday when I found him half drowned on my front step, it was like he… doesn’t care.”

Her tone of voice had changed; I could even tell through the phone with the crappy reception. “So? You wouldn’t look super depressed at first sight, just an overly shy girl, maybe. But he can’t be one hundred percent happy all the time, can he?”

“Well… no. His face kinda just contorts in annoyance whenever he sees me.”

A pause, probably from silent laughter. “Apart from that? Your face isn’t that ugly, by the way.”

“Well, I told you about Friday. He seemed all depressed and crying and all, but he was drunk and all. He started spacing out after his friend had mentioned his brother — Baekbeom, I think he’s called? — though he completely snapped at me when I asked him about his parents. I don't think that was fake, but still—”

“Gosh, Iseul.” I could sense the why are you so stupid? tone literally leaking through my end of the phone. “Put it together. Remember, he said something about November sixth the day “they left him,” right? How his friend said that he had “done it last year too”? His parents died that day. It was sorta like…a ed up anniversary of some sort. Remember the first three years after your parents died?”

I flinched at that, but Jihyun obviously couldn't see me. “Y-yeah.”

“You were a wreck. Naturally, the guy’s still grieving — who knows how many years it’s been?”

I nodded slowly, before the thought hit me yet again that Jihyun couldn't see any of my movements. I resorted to mumbling a muffled, “Yeah, I guess so,” into the phone.

The sun was beginning to dip towards the horizon, so I turned back to get back to the bus stop, so hopefully I’d beat the night home. Past experiences had proven to me that staying out late and after the sun had set either resulted in me getting lost or crashing into Byun Baekhyun, and I wasn’t sure if I had the courage to face either, especially the latter. Tomorrow was Monday. I was debating whether or not if I really wanted to go to school, but it was something I couldn’t wait for yet dreaded. I wasn’t sure about Baekhyun, but I wasn’t about to let that whole incident go unscathed and undetected. Maybe it wasn’t right to probe into other’s private lives, but it wasn’t that wrong to be dying for answers. Besides, I needed courage to face that guy. It wouldn’t work if I used all my courage trying to brave the night home.

“Geez, Iseul,” Jihyun continued. “You’re the one who’s seen or heard all this or at least been there when it happened. How come I can make sense of everything better than you can?”

A cold wind gusted along, making me shudder and hug my coat closer to myself. The last of the leaves on the trees shuddered, some spiralling towards the ground, others still determinedly clinging to the branches. In the back of my mind, I wondered how long it would be before they fell down like their brothers and sisters. “Let’s say you’re gifted with the ability to make sense of things better than Han Iseul.”

She snorted. “Han Idiot.”

“I’m going to stop telling you my problems.”

There was a pause on the other end, and I could only conclude that Jihyun was laughing at me. I could picture her silently laughing, almost choking, and almost hear her next words.

“Exactly what you said last time,” Jihyun said smugly. “When you had a crush on that Minho guy—”

“Please don’t bring that up.”

“—and you kept on talking about him.”

“That was, like, five years ago!”

“Mmhm. More like two.”

“It was only a small cru–”

My words died in my throat when I spotted the surprisingly now-familiar figure standing alone under the meek shelter of the bus stop, which was my current destination. His presence would've gone unnoticed even, if it weren't for the coat he was wearing. Hands stuffed in pockets of a long overcoat that I only saw just yesterday morning, an inhumanly tall frame.

“Iseul? Don’t tell me you got run over by a car. Or even better, a truck–”

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