Eight:

My breath was hitched and clothes sticky by the sweat covering my entire body by the sunset. I envied his energy as Baekhyun was still gleaming and ready to throw twenty more pitches. He grinned seeing my pathetic condition and told me to take a five-minute break. I shook my head and gripped the bat tighter, blinking my eyes a few times to regain focus. He laughed and sat down instead of me.

“Rest is just as important.” He said and sighed. “You’ve certainly got out of shape…but it’s not so bad. You’re doing amazing.” He commented and I dropped the bat to my side.

“Amazing is not enough.” I shook my head lifelessly and trailed off to sit next to him. “You know…there’s this girl…” I twisted my fingers around the hem of my shirt. “Everyone says she plays so well…so well that she’ll definitely be the power hitter.”

He shifted closer to me and squeezed my shoulders. “Hey…what are you nervous about? You’re a great player too.”

“I don’t know…I don’t think I have it in me anymore.” I continued to stare at the marigolds of our lawn that Dad had planted on my birthday and rested my head on his shoulder.

“You’re breaking my heart now.” he said with a pout in his meeky voice and I let out a chuckle. “You were the MVP in the middle school team. Don’t you remember how the coach used to fight our Korean teacher to let you off for practice because he said you already know enough of the language?”

I laughed. That was indeed a sweet memory. The coach in middle school loved me so dearly for my batting as I made our team win four times in a single year. “But this is high school…”

“Excuses~” he teased, “that girl may be good at this…but you’re you. You have to focus on your own potential.” He took my restless hands and interlaced them with his own. “Who’s the most intelligent person you know?”

I cackled and looked up at him. This was his best way of cheering me up. “You are, Professor Baekhyun.”

“And according to the Professor, you’ll do very well in the tests.” He brushed his non-existent moustache and I nodded with a grin, some weight lifting off my chest. He kissed the top of my head and then scorned. “Alright, enough rest. Get up.”

I continued to laugh till I was back at my place and this time I played with a positive outlook. Or atleast tried to. We practiced all night till the streetlights were shut off.

The next morning, Baekhyun walked with me till the main gate to school and excused he had to meet his friends for something about today’s class quiz. I felt something was weird about his reason but let him go nonetheless. I spotted Jihyo at the lockers, ticking off something on a list while two girls from the club stood next to her discussing some matter and she was clearly not paying any attention whatsoever. I wondered where Sana would be…I hadn’t seen her since a day and she didn’t text me again either. Perhaps because I never replied but…I liked to think she had been too busy.

As I was strolling ahead in my thoughts I felt someone walk next to me and turned with a big grin, expecting Chaeyoung, but the grin dissolved into a weak smile when I saw Momo raise her eyebrows at me and smirk.

“Are you always this happy to see someone?” she asked and my cheeks were heating up.

“Hi.” I shook my head and replied instead. It sounded so low and shy and I disliked how it came out.

“Hey. Cool hairstyle.” She commented and I unconsciously touched my hair and remembered I hadn’t made any hairstyle at all; I had just brushed and let them down. I then felt like an idiot and heard her chuckle. “You’re really adorable.”

I blinked rapidly and she seemed to enjoy my speechlessness. But I tried again,

“Umm…that day…” I began, hoping she didn’t remember it, but her smile said she did.

“Yeah…that day…” she nodded, her smile turning dangerous. “Do you enjoy peeping on two girls trying to make out?”

I started coughing and had to tap my chest to regain my breathing. “Uh…haha…ha…” I gulped after the awkward laugh. “No, no…it wasn’t like that. There’s a misunderstanding. I had lost my way…and accidently ended up there at that moment.” My cheeks were probably a deep shade of red.

“Lost the way. Nice excuse.” She nodded again in a teasing manner and squished both of my cheeks. “Too damn cute. You’re sure so different than the rest.” She said it rather as a loud mental note and thought to herself for a few seconds. “Well, see you later, peeper~” she laughed and finally walked away from me.

My heart beat was doubled in rate and legs losing their power. Was the Momo magic beginning to work on me? Was she doing this on purpose? Does this mean I’m cheating on First Kiss?

“Crowd incoming. Move on, airhead.” Chaeyoung joined me shortly, catching my attention back, connecting our arms and making me move forward. “Why do you look so petrified?”

“Please try to come earlier.” I shook my head and gulped again while she laughed doubtfully and replied with okay.

“Tzuyu’s turn next to this!” Mr. Changmin yelled with a clap as Lisa finished her pitching audition. She jumped and high-fived Jisoo as if she knew she’ll be selected in the team. I felt my guts churning and wished I had the same amount of shining confidence.

She walked ahead to the bleachers where the ones who had finished auditions were to wait. The rest of us stood in a line along the outer path and Mr. Changmin called out a random name to be in stand-by while he was evaluating the current player. Right now Mina pitched and I was in awe of her flexibility. Her appearance was like that of a gentle ballerina and seeing her pitch so well for baseball instead always caught me off-guard.

Mr. Changmin muttered a low good and scribbled something on his notepad. “Dahyun’s turn next.”

My heart skipped a few beats. Tzuyu strolled to her position with the bat he handed her and I had to stand-by in the center of the distance between her and the waiting line. I realized my teeth were stammering which I tried to stop by clutching my jaws tightly.

I don’t know why but I didn’t like that Tzuyu got to perform before me. Something about this sequence felt like a bad omen. And I was right. As soon as Mr. Changmin shot the balls through the toy blaster, she effortlessly hit three continuous balls in one go that landed far out of the diamond. I saw everyone gasp and soon the thunders of applause followed.

“Hmm…amazing Tzuyu. You’ve improved.” That was the first time he praised someone today as Tzuyu handed him the bat back with a grin of victory spread across her cheeks. “Yeri’s turn next.”

Their eyes stared at me and then I realized I hadn’t moved to the auditioning point. It felt like my legs were frozen over. I somehow managed to walk over to Mr. Changmin at the pace of a snail and reluctantly took the bat from him. The bat Tzuyu had held earlier. It still radiated her warmth.

“Good luck.” He smiled seeing me so nervous but I felt even weaker. A good sort of luck is exactly what I don’t seem to have.

The sun was dull because of the clouds that day and it particularly didn’t help as my bones were getting chiller. I gulped and gripped the bat tightly like I had practiced yesterday but suddenly all of it felt erased from my memory. The practice, the warm-up, the little cheers Baekhyun did for me. Not even his gleaming face telling me I can wing it.

All my head was occupied with was the last three fantastic hits Tzuyu managed to do and how I can never outdo that. Never.

“Are you ready?” Mr. Changmin asked before lifting his blaster and I nodded clumsily.

We had only three turns to showcase our talent. At the first I swung the bat before the ball was in reach. In the second I swung a second later and the ball had hit in the left knee. I heard disappointed and pitying awws from both sides. I hated it. I hated everything.

My eyes trailed Mr. Changmin’s confused face to Tzuyu sitting care freely up on the bleachers, talking to Jihyo in her focus. I hated this more. I was a mess right now and Tzuyu wasn’t even bothered, so why was I being so affected by her? I my bottom lip and lifted the bat, nodding to imply I’m ready.

But when he lifted the blaster again the same image ran through my mind and a voice said that it’s pointless – I can’t achieve anything much good with this last turn. It’s a gone hope. My heart fell in the void that was my lack of self confidence and it seemed like it would never stop falling now.

So when the ball was shot in my direction I dropped the bat to my side and let it hit me again on my waist. Chaeyoung’s faint cheer died midway and I barely lifted my face to see Mr. Changmin looking angry and disheartened. There I go disappointing people again.

I stared at the very annoying green shade of the grass field as I walked past the waiting line members towards the bleachers. I didn’t have the sort of stamina to take in anymore faces showing pity towards me because I know it…I know it more than anyone else that I had my golden chance and I lost it. I began to realize this really wasn’t middle school and I’m not meant for this anymore. Maybe I never was.

I recognized Sana’s shoes decorated with a butterfly made of red glitter. She reached her hand out as I walked closer and lazily dragged her fingers over my wrist. I withdrew my hand and dug my face lower to hide the tears that had begun to roll down my burning cheeks.

I had told you, Baekhyun. Amazing isn’t enough. Nothing about me is enough.

I didn’t sleep well that night. I cried till three pm and stared at my dark walls for the rest of the time. I received a few texts; Chaeyoung messaged me that I shouldn’t worry about today and that she’ll be absent tomorrow due to work and one surprise text from Mr. Siwon reminding me of dinner the day after tomorrow. At around dawn I got a text from Sana that was actually just the picture of those ragdolls I had seen earlier. I don’t know why she sent me that and what it was supposed to mean so I simply put my phone to silence and began crying again.

I put some concealer to hide my dark circles from Baekhyun and tried to maintain a happy voice as he asked me about yesterday’s test. I simply lied that I did well and that the results are not out yet. He seemed to fall for it and it hurt to fool him like that. He had never asked for anything in return for all the love he spilled on me and yet I couldn’t even manage to get on the team for him. I really was just a useless addition to his life, wasn’t I?

It was lonely that day without Chaeyoung being by my side and telling me all her unique jokes to lift my mood. I began to realize the impact of Chaeyoung’s petite presence in my life as I sat on our usual spot at the canteen and ordered a large beef burger that was her favorite. The chattering around me was the only interesting thing happening so far as I heard people talk about scandalous hook ups and the difficulty of the maths quiz.

“Good day, good looking.” Sana’s voice interrupted and I looked to my side to see her settle in Chaeyoung’s place with her tray clustered with an extra large burger, fries, fruit salad, two chocolate muffins, a large size coke and the regular glass of water.

“What did you just call me?” I raised a brow and she shrugged innocently.

“I said it’s a good day.” She took a bite of five fries at once and I stared at her lips. “Sitting all by yourself on good days isn’t nice for development.”

“What kind of development? And who said that?” I didn’t want her to leave. I kind of liked her sitting with me right now even though she’s annoying as hell.

“Development of…growth cells. Some kind of neurons.” She shrugged again. “It’s from a survey.”

“You’re lying…” I narrowed my eyes at her and she took a bite of the burger larger than her capacity to chew. I tried to hold the laugh that was bubbling inside my throat at that. “Growth cells and nerve cells are very different things.”

“Sana’s surveys are never wrong. And besides, they might be different but neither of them works in your case. Hence I’m givin