HONGBIN

Afternoon had rapidly arrived and I was sitting on the couch inside the practice room waiting for Cha Soojin to arrive, I was hoping she would show up because I really didn’t want to delay things anymore. It was bad enough having been teamed up with her for a project, and as much as I disliked the thought of having to spend time with her; I knew it was necessary or else the project would go downhill and I wasn’t having that.

I was trying to come up with a choreography in my mind but then again, I wasn’t even sure what song we were going to pick and if we were going to be okay with the selection to begin with; knowing that we both had communication troubles between each other, it wasn’t crazy to believe that we were going to clash even in choosing the song for our performance.

I brought my hands to my face and buried it in them, feeling frustrated at the whole situation. And at times I wished that maybe just maybe, that we hadn’t started off on the wrong foot because it does get exhausting to be arguing all the time. I still disliked her a lot, especially after hearing her badmouthing me I just had some sort of ‘allergy’ when it came to her. Surely she was talented, but a procrastinator, kinda pretty, but obnoxious and loud, looks like a lady yet has a sharp way of directing her words. She was an odd combination yet at least wasn’t after me, like half the classroom.

The rays from the sunset were slowly making their way inside the practice room and I noticed that the time for our practice was getting closer. The practice room was slowly transforming into an orange toned place, yes the sun was setting.

Suddenly, I heard the doorknob click much to my surprise—I thought she had already forgotten about the practice, I lifted my gaze and looked towards the door being opened, but it wasn’t the person I was waiting for.

“Waiting for someone hyung?” standing by the doorframe was a friend and hoobae of mine, Han Sanghyuk, he had just recently enrolled to this college and we quickly became friends, he was two semesters behind me due to him having just started college. Furthermore, we had been able to become friends due to him frequenting the store where I work part-time.

“Maybe” I replied to him as I kind of glared at the ground, I had actually believed that it could have been that Cha Soojin but no, she seemed to have decided to simply ignore the fact that we had to practice and come up with a routine worthy of being the best for our presentation. Yet I didn’t want to give away that much information even if Hyuk was my friend.

When I replied to him, he had a surprised look on his face and proceeded to walk inside the practice room “Oh are you going on a date or something?” he inquired.

I scoffed and I was sure that at that very moment I was making a really offended gesture, I frowned at the mention of the word “date”. Seriously, date? With her? No way.

“Why making that face?” he asked, visibly curious as he sat down next to me. "Why" he asked, perhaps because I just didn’t want to be related to her in any way. The combination of the words “Cha Soojin” and “date” didn’t sound nice at all in my mind.

“It isn’t a date, not when it is when someone like her!” I protested rapidly.

“Oh” Crap, I think he figured it out by the look he was giving me, that look of sudden realization when your eyes open wide, “Her?! You mean Cha Soojin-sunbaenim from your class? That’s the girl you dislike tons, right?” he narrowed it down magnificently, ‘the girl I dislike tons’ indeed.

“Yes that’s the one” I nodded and groaned just at the thought of currently being waiting for her like an idiot that was just dumped on a, for the lack of a better word, ‘date’.

“Why are you waiting for her though?” Hyuk asked.

“Long story short, she is my dance partner for a presentation we have before midterms, and now we have to dance together” I began explaining, but moment I started, there was something in me that didn’t make me want to stop. I wanted to rant and rant to my heart’s content and let out my frustration somehow, to let it be voiced “But—this girl thinks all it takes is innate talent and not constant training, it gets to me”

She had always been like that in the time that I unluckily knew her, she thought of herself as being talented enough and that only that would take her far. It is her attitude that got to me, it reminded me badly about an audition I had once had, it reminded of that person badly.

“I mean have you seen her? She shows up late to class, doesn’t practice as much as I do for example—and have you seen her dark circles under her eyes?”

“Hyung…” I blinked the moment and fell silent for some seconds to let him speak.

“I barely know Cha Soojin-sunbaenim other than “that prodigy girl” from second year in the dance faculty” he stated, right, he had the luck of not “actually” crossing paths or exchanging words with her. I wish I had had that luck.

“Right, you’re just on your first semester… sorry I forgot for a while” I said, but I couldn’t help myself but to keep on ranting and judging everything about her “But I mean from what you have seen from her, don’t you think she is annoying?” I asked, hoping that by just looking at her he had been able to gather enough information to come to the same conclusion as me.

“Um…”

“She boasts around like she is the best, and is always ‘don’t touch me don’t touch me’ to everyone that gets close to her,” by this point, Hyuk was looking at me as though I had lost it “Have you seen the way she dresses when she practices? She dresses like she is on the gym or something! With leggings and short tops and the like, out of place, a show off”

“Hyung” Hyuk interrupted but I could see he was trying to hold on his laughter, I frowned at that, and stopped talking for some seconds, fact that I regretted when I heard him speaking again, “Are you obsessed with that girl or something?” he asked me.

“I’m not!” I shouted, my eyes opening wide at that mention of me just being thinking about her all the time.

“She sounds a hella lot like you” Hyuk teased.

“Don’t dare say that” I responded. A lot like me? There was no way that we were alike, I couldn’t see it. I found no similarities between the both of us, I tried to think of a single time in which we could have something in common but nothing, nothing came to mind other than having that dislike towards each other in common.

“Hyung, in all honesty I believe you are obsessed with her” Hyuk stated matter of factly, this made me believe I must have let out too much info since I ranted endlessly.

“I…”

“It’s not like it is wrong having a huge crush on someone, y’know” He teased me as he patted me on the back, I gasped while feeling sorta annoyed, not at Hyuk but at the mention of me possibly having a crush that I had no idea of. Crush? On her? No way.

“It’s not like that! I just can’t let her be better than me—I need to keep my grades up or else I’m screwed” I explained “I can’t let her grades be better than mine” And of course I couldn’t, in any class to be quite honest, especially not in the dance ones.

“You have it tough” Hyuk made himself comfortable on the couch as he crossed his arms over his chest. He knew what I was going through so he understood my situation and how it would affect me even more if my grades dropped. Being 2nd place isn’t so bad but she had the best grades out of the two of us, perhaps “that innate talent” she had was something the teachers liked other than dedication.

“See, it’s not like I have a thing for her, I just…” I began, I was about to explain again but then I remembered why I disliked her that much and I couldn’t help myself,“I mean who would like a girl that calls you lunatic, flat out talks crap about you not being special at all when she doesn’t even know you that much!”

“Hyung”

“Yeah tell me”

He placed a hand on my shoulder and looked directly into my eyes, “I don’t think you really hate her that much, even though you are always whining about her everything”

“It’s not like I only talk about her” I bit my bottom lip at that mention, me being always whining, I sighed “and like I have told you, I can’t let someone like her take that scholarship from me”

“It must be tough hyung, since you have to work part time and keep your grades up everywhere so your half scholarship isn’t taken away” it was exactly that, and he knew, yet he was teasing me like there was no tomorrow.

“Precisely, being disowned by your parents is not something someone like her would understand…” I had been kicked out of my house the moment I had decided to enroll on an Arts University and to go for the dancing major on top of it. My parents had always wanted for me to go for something more common or for something that could help with their company, economics, marketing, business management—but not dancing. They kicked me out when I showed them my registration papers, cutting all forms of monetary support with that. They only gave me one week to leave the house and find a place to go to, find a job and just live on some money that they had left on my bank account. Of course someone like her wouldn’t understand that. Having no support at all from your parents in comparison to the other students at college that were always bragging how they were going back to their parents houses. At this point, being the son of a well-off family wasn’t something good.

“I can’t either to be honest…” Hyuk said, I didn’t reply to him, his parents supported him enough, I didn’t know what business they had or anything but I knew they were supporting their son enough so much that he could afford many of the things at the store I worked at.

Time kept passing by and I just didn’t want to look at the clock myself or else I felt that I would be even angrier.

“What time is it already?” I asked Hyuk, he glanced at the wall and checked the time.

“6.30 PM” he answered.

“Told you that girl is irresponsible as hell” I said while feeling frustrated at the situation, “I’m screwed if I fail that project, my grades will drop and it will all be her fault”

“You sure she was okay with practicing today? Did you both get to decide that?”

“UGH” Of course not, she was shouting at me the day before, calling out to me from the practice room while I had told her that we had to have this meeting yes or yes and there was no backing out of it “No…not really” but in reality she hadn’t agreed to do it. She in fact had said she wasn’t able to make it.

I walked across the room looking all bothered, I saw Hyuk rising from the couch and walking past me,

“Probably wait a little more, since you are so eager to practice” a pat on the back before he rushed towards the door.

“Hey you!”

“Sorry gotta bounce! I’ll talk to you later hyung” he said and made his way out of the practice room.

“Hey I’m not eager…” I was saying,“…to dance with Cha Soojin… drat, he’s gone” however he hadn’t stay to listen to me at all. I sighed in total defeat. I figured that I should just wait for a longer while for her and that maybe just maybe, she would actually show up.

Time passed and it was already 8.00 pm, I was mad and resentful, she had actually left me waiting there for 2 hours. My phone suddenly started vibrating and blinking, when I picked it up I could see Hyuk’s name on it so I answered the call.

“She didn’t come” I said to him while sighing, he could tell that I was really fed up with the situation, “Yeah I’m going back to my flat, I’m annoyed” I ended the call and picked up my things to just go back to my place, I couldn’t stay a single minute more inside that practice room.

----

Saturday had arrived and we had classes again, I was there early. Feeling annoyed since the day before, I didn’t want to see her after she had just blatantly ignored me and had gone about her way without any sort of consideration. Then again I was troubled since she had indeed told me that she was not going to be there. But to my bad luck I spotted her when she had arrived at the classroom, I saw her by the door and she was walking inside the place. I fixed my eyes on her, kinda glaring judgingly, moment we had eye contact when she noticed I was looking at her she jumped a bit in surprise and seemed to hesitate approaching me, yet she had to, after all, her seat was behind mine in this class.

“Oh hello there” I said moment she walked past me, she put her bag on top of the desk and took some steps back.

“Good morning…” she said, in a faint tone, I could see that her dark circles were bigger than usual and her expression looked a bit worn out, like she hadn’t slept at all “I...” she was saying but anger got the better of me and made me speak faster than I should have.

“Why didn’t you come to practice yesterday? I thought it was better to get this over with as fast as possible”

Her eyes opened wide, like that had immediately woken her up “Look if I could have, I would have come!” she raised her voice this time and frowned  “I told you it wasn’t possible for me to come every night like you wanted me to!”

“Yo