Jeongsun

Jeongsun flipped through the book of poetry that Jongdae showed her extremely carefully. The pages of the moleskine notebook looked like they were threatening to fall out, despite both of them knowing that the leathered notebook was more than capable of holding the tattered pages together. 

Jongdae, as the girl had realised through the book that he kept so dearly with him all the time, had extremely neat handwriting. He penned his thoughts meticulously wherever he went; after a movie, watching a sunset, or even after a particularly uninteresting lesson in class. He said he couldn't hear very well, but it didn't stop him from imagining and thinking, and those thoughts and internal perceptions were all the more resounding and powerful without the distraction of actual sounds. 

How does the wind sound today? 

Jongdae gestured when he noticed that Jeongsun was struggling to keep the pages still from the wind as she read them closely. The two of them were lying flat on their bellies, poring through the pages of his poetry and having kimbaps for an afternoon getaway. A part of her really wanted to stay at home to help around with chores; her mother was going to work an extra shift that day so she didn't want her to come home to a messy house. Another part of her needed the perfect excuse to stay away from home, because she knew Bora and the girls had wanted to come by again. They'd made that clear after school the day before. She was all too happy to tell them that she was meeting a friend, and they almost looked scandalized to note that she had actual friend. 

A larger part of her knew that both Jongdae and her enjoyed each other's company, and that he didn't like to stay home. It was sad to hear that his parents didn't believe in implants even though they could afford it. He'd told her that his goal was to save up enough by college so that he could buy one on his own. He wanted to hear his poems composed into songs, or read aloud. She thought that was a beautiful dream, and she wished dearly that she had as much courage and bravery as Jongdae to voice his ideas and emotions. 

It's kind of like a fierce whistle. It feels fierce. But it's nice. 

She gestured back. He seemed to remember how a whistle sounded like, so he nodded with a contented smile before pointing her to his favourite poem. 

What would you want to say if you could talk again? Like your first words. 

Jongdae asked suddenly. He'd told her very frankly, what the first words he had wanted to hear if he were to get his first hearing aid; he wanted his parents to apologise. He didn't say what for, but she felt that she shouldn't probe further. He looked kind of hurt when he said that, and she could tell her friend had a lot of pride. Her heart clenched a little when she realised how stifled Jongdae must have felt at home. 

She caught his eyes momentarily when she was searching for an answer in her head; she was getting used to his gaze, but not quite. The wind and food was making her relax a little, but even Jongdae could feel that while she was eager to meet up, she was always tense. He'd told her once, sheepishly (or at least his expression looked that way), that she was a very shy girl. 

Shy. Not problematic. She liked that about Jongdae; he wasn't too quick to judge her. He didn't call her weird. He didn't call her a pushover. He just called her an extremely shy Jeongsun. 

Their little picnic and chitchat lasted for another few hours, when Jongdae finally decided that he had to head home after all and she had an appointment to attend. She left his question unanswered as they went on to talk about his poetry, why dogs were better than cats and played a round of Never Have I Ever, in which Jongdae revealed he had once gestured a rude word to a man before while smiling so the older male had thought he was greeting him. Meanwhile, she told him that she once eaten a whole box of chocopie in one seating. 

The question Jongdae left her with lingered in her mind all the way to her afternoon appointment, and a heavy feeling started building up again in her chest. She kind of knew what she wanted to say, if she regained her voice. She had rehearsed those words over and over again. Yet she was too timid to admit them to Jongdae. His goals were clear; he was brazen and unafraid. He was brave and confident. She didn't want him to think of her as more of a coward than she already was behaving around him.

There was only one person she would admit those words to. 

"The first thing I want to say, when I can finally speak, is to say no. I want to say no to my classmates in school. They just see my silence as my weakness, as something they can exploit. I'm really more than that. I want to let them know what I love too." 

Her own voice sounded foreign in her ears when she watched the replayed video tape. Her therapist, Dr. Lee, smiled gently at her. Or at least that was what she caught from the corner of her eye. 

"You're getting a lot better Jeongsun. You're actually looking directly at the camera when you speak," the therapist saidalmost too jovially. "Although you seem to be avoiding my gaze a little more than last time today. You managed a ten second eye contact and a full sentence last time, didn't you?" The lady scanned the records in her hands before turning to the teen again. Yet Jeongsun, trying hard as she might, couldn't bring herself to look at one of the only two people she could actually talk to. 

"I can't," she said, whispering to a particular spot on the white walls beside her. 

Her mother had been absolutely elated the last time when she went home to tell her the huge progress she'd made with her therapist. That she actually managed to say she had kimchi ramen for dinner after multiple sessions of psychological sessions, practice and interactions with her ever-patient therapist. She caught her mother tearing when washing the dishes in the kitchen that evening, and she could only imagine what this seemingly insignificant milestone meant to them. Her mother was now one step closer to relieving the financial burden of her therapy sess