<1>

Thanks for showing me around. I’ll be departing in 15 minutes. See you soon.

Jiyong scoffs softly, his hand still trembles holding the cellphone. He is looking at the word ‘See you soon’ and wonders if she really meant it. Ten seconds pass and he still cannot decide if he should click the button to call her. What is the use of calling her right now, when she might turn off the phone already.

He is standing in front of her place, at 7 o’clock in the morning (the earliest time he has ever woken up). Something was telling his mind yesterday that she would disappear after last night, that she would run away from him. And something was telling his mind to wake up early (even though he didn’t get any sleep at all) and come here waiting for her because he would miss her. And he really did. And he wonders why did he let all of this happen in a blink of his eyes? It feels like… he finally decided to chase after her while she started to run away.

Jiyong looked down on his shadow, now it’s only one, not two like days before. He hates this, he hates the fact that he begins to wish that he could see two, his shadow beside someone shorter than him, with her small shoulder shaking softly. Jiyong slowly moves away, thinking that should he just forget everything happening several days before. May it be just a dream before he starts to believe that it is not.

No matter how hard she tries to sleep, she cannot. Jieun looks at her phone with the screen popping up another ticket notice at 10. She wonders if he did come to look for her in the morning, or maybe when she sent that text, he might be still sleeping. Jieun wraps her legs with her thin arms around, she misses the warmth of his shirt. And that night, the warmth he gave her in the lips.

Jieun closes her eyes, tries to sleep again. But it’s no use. Maybe no matter how hard she’s trying to run away, she can’t. The plane twists around, but it’s nothing compared to her mind. She wants to run away from herself and her sickening heart.

(Jieun wonders if he knew, on the day at the sea that she had drawn a tiny little heart on the sand too.)

<2>

“How was Jeju?” Inna pats her head when Jieun passes out on the sofa.

She’s thinking if she had enjoyed it or not. The sea, the winds,… the smell of salty water, the smell of daisies, the smell of coffee (?!),… the smell of dry leaves,… the coldness, the warmth of the jacket,… the taste of tea (?!),… the scent in his room (?!), and… the taste of his lips (?!). Jieun shakes her head, this is not the right thing for her to remember. She supposes she should remember something else. But… was she spending all her time with him there?

Jieun covers her face with her small hands, that Inna wonders if something must have been going on. Instead, Inna just pulls her over for a hug. She looks fragile as she always is, so Inna thinks maybe this time she should instead be the one who helps Jieun.

“What happened Jing?”

“Jeju… is beautiful.” Jieun sniffs and closes her eyes. “It’s so beautiful that it feels like a dream to me, Inna.”

Inna looks at her as if she’s at her right mind. Because Jieun looks so happy talking about it, but this ain’t feel right at all. Something in her voice sounds broken too.

“Well, it’s not a dream Jing.”

“Sometimes I wish it was a dream. But sometimes, I don’t.”

“Why?”

Jieun suddenly pauses. That was not completely what she meant to say. It was part of her unconscious mind. So she does want that to be a dream, but she also does want that to be real. Because, him.

“Just…”

He looks at the clock. She must be home now. Or else, she might be meeting her friends right now. Or else, she might returns to work immediately. Or, she’s with someone that he doesn’t even know (or is supposed to know.)

Wait no, why does he have to know that? And why does he care, if she’s somewhere or doing something. They’re not related, and they’re nothing.

But he knows now he does care. But now, things get back to normal, the way he wanted it to be. He could have days to rest, alone. He could have things to do, alone. But now, why do alone sounds scary for him, why did she come to his world, mess it up and leave after all. He hates that. But he doesn’t hate her.

He misses her.

The cigarette burns soullessly between his fingers, and the dark of the room covers him up. Jiyong walks to the balcony and lays his heavy arms on the bar, checking if he could see any star tonight in the sky.

Jeju has always been like that, cold and rude to him with no stars and sweetness. The smoke from his little “killer” on his hand dully puffs like a cry baby who never stops crying, just as how his feelings are streaming over the place that he couldn’t stop.

He always has too many girls on his bed, and each time is another one. That’s… never right from the start, but he’s been ignoring for so long that he finally supposes it’s not wrong. But he knows it’s so wrong, to let himself be ed up like that. Funny that he’s the one ing those ladies, but it actually is him who got ed up. It has been him, from the start.

But now, he wants nobody. But at the same time, he doesn’t want to be alone. He hates this feeling, the feeling that in between he doesn’t want to be alone because it kills him but he also hates the fact that he’s supposed to be alone but now he doesn’t want to.

Sometimes, he thinks of her. No, whenever he has that champagne, looking at the seat where she sat, talking about her past loves and starting to mumble until he kissed her. And that kiss was never remembered, but would also never forgotten. Just sometimes, he thinks of her, of them, of what they had, of the waves, the winds, the daisies and how small her shoulder is.

<3>

When he heard her name randomly in between the sounds of autumn leaves falling, he thought he was crazy. And he curses himself for making himself a fool that still thinks about her. But when her name is called again, his ears become to focus and his eyes become to strike. He turns to the side to see her standing there again, with her long hair and her fair skin wearing a cap. She looks the same, with her basic fashion style that he disgusted before. And her smile looks just like what he saw the last time six months ago.

So when their eyes finally rejoined, her smile is supposed to fade but did not. And, Jiyong felt a cramp in his heart, as if she had already deleted everything, and him. And when she did that ing-frustrated-and-annoyed ninety-degree bow again, his hands suddenly clench a fist.

“Jiyong? Hello. You’re coming to work today?” Inna waves at him, but all he could see is the person next to her.

“Yeah noona. Hello.” Jiyong makes a quick bow and returns his eyes to the other person.

“Ah this is Jieun, I mean IU. You guys know each other, right?”

He wanted to say ‘no’ because yes, they never know each other, and he didn’t even want to know her, he wishes he wouldn’t know her. Because, she keeps the same smile, the smile that he supposes it’s so different from the smile that he saw last time, but it doesn’t change in her face either.

“Hello, sunbaenim.”

He could feel the burn of his stomach, the burn of his head when she speaks out those words. Jiyong supposes that he has nothing to do with this, even to say hello back to her, or just ignores the hell out of this and leaves. But, his heart aches because he supposes that they had something, but it was nothing. So he thought they were something, but they were ing nothing. So, he was wrong, he was so wrong about thinking of them, ing wrong that he began to wish, wish that it was right. This was not what he wanted, and this is never something he wants. But, at the same time, he wants more than this. He wants something between them, between the girl standing in front of him with that smile and himself, the person he no longer puts his faith in.

Jiyong had given a chance to himself, but when he didn’t even use his chance yet, it already expired.

“Um.” Jiyong bows slightly before moving away. “I gotta go.”

Jieun put her clenched fist behind her backs, and her expression tires her of. She needs to bear with it until he disappears, and then she would promise herself not to ever meet him again. Because, this is wrong, so wrong that her heart begins to feel everything again. She has missed him, so much, that she has started working like an emotionless doll. She has faked everything on her face so that she could begin to turn those fake emotions into real ones. She has been doing so good, so so good that she felt proud about that until now. Until this moment that she doesn’t even know if it should be a happy or a tragic moment, because she has missed him, and she has wanted to see him again, and she has wanted to know whether he was doing alright; but also she knew that she should also move on and forget about everything, about them.

But he looks good, he always looks good, and Jieun finds herself guilty when she feels a pain on her chest when he’s doing fine. He must be doing fine, he will. And she should be happy for him, and cheer for him. So Jieun knows that she should try to at least, do what she should do (and not what she wants to do.)

<4>

Jieun covers her hands around her arms again, because it’s almost that time of the year again, the time of shiny stars and ringing bells, the time of insolent winds crashing her face violently. Inna should be granted “The Silly Girl of the Year” because she always forgets things, and now Jieun has to stand in front of the building to wait for her (because Jieun doesn’t want to go inside that building and meet him). The coldness makes Jieun shiver her small shoulder, and in a second Jieun suddenly thinks of the warmth of the jacket she had worn in that cold day in Jeju. A second later, a jacket is wrapped around her when she startles; a hand touches her shoulder.

“Why you’re here alone? Where is Inna noona?”

Jiyong doesn’t look at her, instead he returns to a far distance after wrapping his jacket around her with his hands inside his pocket again. Jieun never wants this to happen, but again, the warmth of his jacket makes she start to want this to happen.

“She forgot something so I’m waiting for her.”

“You should go inside to wait.”

“I’m good.”

“Liar.”

Jieun turns to look at him, when the breeze is flowing in between their distance. Their eyes meet again, and sparkles. Jieun wishes she could smile like the way she always smiles to him, but her heart aches because looking at him with this distance even feels so far away for her, to even reach him.

“How… are you doing?” Jieun stops looking at him.

“Just so so. You?”

“I’m… good.”

Jiyong suddenly coughs in a laugh. He feels ridiculous, even if she pulls out a lie to answer him, he still feels like a fool. She must be fine, and she wants to be fine, but in fact he was not. Even now he met her, Jiyong felt worse despite that he had always wanted to see her again. Like finally, he has known the truth, that they were indeed nothing. And he had hoped that they were, so when he entered the building for ten minutes thinking if he should hold onto her; and after that, he came outside again. Because he had hoped that they were something.

“Sunbaenim?”

Jiyong gasps to hold his anger, because he never likes her ‘sunbaenim’ at the first place.

“You really forgot everything, didn’t you?”

Jieun doesn’t dare to look at him, because she’s afraid that she will let all of her feelings out if she looks into his eyes.

“So it’s only me.” Jiyong still laughs like an idiot. “Sorry.”

“Sunbaenim… you should forget everything too.” Her voice is shaking. “Let’s just think of it as a dream. A beautiful dream. And a dream shouldn’t be remembered. Because if you keep trying to remember it, you will never go back to reality. Let it be a dream, and we need to move on from that dream. Because it’s just a dream, not a reality.”

“Was it that easy…?”

Jiyong pauses, because… the winds keep blowing in between them, and sliding through his heart.

“Was it that easy for you to forget such a beautiful dream?”

“No, it wasn’t. It was never easy. But sometimes you just have to forget it, because it’s no use trying to remember it. Because it’s not a reality.”

“Why do you try to forget it if you don’t want to? And why do you think it’s a dream and not a reality?”

“Sunbaenim.” Jieun holds back her tears. “Do you still believe it could be a reality?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Then sorry, I don’t. Dream is only a dream. It never came true.”

“Liar.”

“Why do you care?”

Jiyong wants to hug her, because she looks just the same like she looked six months ago besides him, with that small shoulder and trembling tiny hands. She looks just like what he has missed, has been longing for, has been dreaming about. And now there she is, making that face in front of him, making him want to protect her and embrace her.

“Because you’re always cold, and look so small, and fragile, and I…”

“Sunbaenim. Stop it.”

“Stop what?”

“Everything.”

“I told you not to call me sunbaenim.”

“Why can’t I?”

“Cause…”

When Inna comes at the right moment, that Jieun wishes it was the wrong moment so that she could look into his eyes and somehow know what he is thinking right now, because she never wants to hurt him by saying those words. But she chooses not to care anymore. Jieun removes his jacket and again, bows (that makes him hopelessly irritate through the winds) and moves her feet toward the car leaving Inna in confuse. And, Jiyong just silently bows to Inna and leaves.

Cause it hurts.

When their backs turn to each other, that night is the coldest night, with heavy snow pouring from the sky. It looks like tears which are frozen from the cold, rude and dead silence of the words.

That night, they never sleep. They are busy thinking of the last thing they had. Was it those painful words she said, or was it the beautiful memories that he hoped it would last forever in Jeju?