"Kiss The Rain" by Yiruma. Please listen while you read. 

“I chose to buy a blue dress instead of white today. I don’t know why. Usually I prefer white”

Yong Hwa just finished taking a shower and found that text on his phone. It was 10 PM and he was considering to play more guitar or watch TV before sleeping. Contrary to what people believed about popular cool campus guys, sometimes it’s nice to just stay in and sleep before midnight.

He smiled and replied,

“Blue is nice. It’s my favorite color. What kind of dress?”

“Jeongmalyo, Oppa? It’s a fancy dress. Not something I’ll wear to the library or class. I just did what normal girls do, buying a dress just because it’s pretty, keke”

Yong Hwa lied down on his bed. Sometime two weeks ago, when Joo Hyeon made him ate cheese cakes, he had asked for her to call him “Oppa” instead of “Jung Yong Hwa-ssi”.

“Op…..pa. Don’t you think it sounds awkward?”

“Not at all. I think it sounds normal.”

Joo Hyeon looked at him for several seconds before nodding, “Algesseumnida. Oppa. No more Jung Yong Hwa-ssi.”

He had snickered inside then, for she was really cute, looking so thoughtful just because of a nickname.

Yes, he called her Joo Hyeon instead of Seo Hyeon. Because no one else called her Joo Hyeon except her parents and well, he wanted to be one of those special people that have the privilege. Friendly wise, of course.

And why the cheese cakes? He wouldn’t lie, he liked sweet things. But it was Joo Hyeon’s turn to treat. Like she said, “Jung Yong Hwa-ssi, you bought tea and lunch for me a week ago. Can I do that for you, too? Except I feel like eating cheese cakes now. You don’t happen to hate cakes, do you?”

He replied that he didn’t hate cakes at all, and especially wouldn’t mind to have a free lunch.

If he had to define what he had with Joo Hyeon, he’d say that it was “Friendship”. He had texted her randomly day by day, and she replied easily, like speaking her mind to a childhood friend.

It was needless to point that more often than not, he smiled when he felt his phone vibrated with a message from her, or that sometimes he lapsed from listening when they were face to face, and only looked at her face. How her eyes lived, her nose scrunched, and her lips moved……..so pleasantly.

It won’t break any laws to admit that your friend is pretty, right?

Yong Hwa decided he had enough guitar playing for the day. And the TV was boring anyway. Texting Joo Hyeon until she decided to sleep seemed more interesting.

*************************************

“What is Jung Yong Hwa for you?” Yoona had asked her one day as they sat shoulder to shoulder in their couch, watching Kim Soo Hyun playing Emperor.

“De? Yong Oppa? He’s a nice friend.”

“Yong…..Oppa?”

“Ne. Wae?”

“Nothing. Just…..you know, curious.”

Yoona dropped the subject and focused on TV again, or at least appeared to be so. This whole Jung Yong Hwa issue puzzled her. Seo Hyeon had never been close to guys before. Not as lovers, and even more so, not as friends.

She had heard that they met accidentally when his wallet chain was stuck on her skirt at the bus. He had been really kind and polite, Seo Hyeon said. And they just happened to bump into each other after that. Pure coincidences, people that just happened to click when they talked, and talking daily, just as friends.

Yoona would start feeling horrified thinking little Hyeonnie went out to lunch or to the mall with a random stranger. But Jung Yong Hwa was no random stranger. Like everyone who have enough social network, she knew that Yong Hwa used to be the resident playboy, until he suddenly just got bored with it all and remained single for two years.

Yoona also worked part time in the same hip clothes shop with Kang Min Hyuk, who happened to be a decent guy. Decent guys mixed among decent guy, right? So hopefully this Jung Yong Hwa was decent too. He had to be. If he played Joo Hyeon just for another conquest, she’d fry Yong Hwa with olive oil herself.

But Yoona was wise enough not to ask any more questions. If Seo Hyeon said he’s a friend, then that was that. So she didn’t comment at all when Seo Hyeon deliberately ignored the TV to have an online chat with this so called good guy.

************************************

Truthfully, Seo Hyeon didn’t think too much of Yong Hwa’s presence. The times she met him again at the patbingsoo place and the flea market shop were pleasant coincidences. When they started texting randomly, she just replied because it was worth to be replied, that’s all.

Honestly, Seo Hyeon might be a little arrogant. She got bored easily, with people. That was why she got not so many friends, but loved each one of them. She was very polite, but when a person, either a man or a woman, young or old, didn’t strike her as speaking in an interesting way, she pulled back. Not bothering to open up because well, she didn’t like the feeling of being forced for a long time, listening to needless things like nail paints or cars.

But Jung Yong Hwa was funny and interesting. He was not boring in the least. He didn’t mind to let a girl paid food for him, listened when he had to, and spoke of things that were worth to be listened to.

Sometimes, Seo Hyeon thought that books worth more than conversations. Jung Yong Hwa proved that wrong.

She didn’t find it inappropriate in the least to inform, “I want to have lunch in that Korean restaurant near the East Gate of Economics. If you want to, Oppa, let’s eat together. But only if you promise not to pay for me.”

He came when she was halfway through it. “I promise I won’t pay for your lunch but you must tell me what’s good here” grinning and putting his backpack and guitar on the chair beside him.

“So, how was your day?” he asked.

That was one of the thing she liked most about her good friend. Usually guys bored her because they drone on and on about themselves. Oppa was different. He liked to listen to her too.

She told him about classes, and Roman Empire and why she hated Brutus once and for all. In exchange, he told her about trying to fix this new melody to lyrics, and how he was dying for this new Fender Strat on display a few blocks away.

He didn’t mind going to random places too. Like pet shops –because she wanted to pat kittens—because he adored dogs and to a music shop where the owner knew her and let her played on the beautiful pianos for a song or two.

There was this white piano that she really wanted but cost a real fortune. She played piano as a hobby, like how she liked to read and wrote diaries, and maintained not to forget how to do it by joining the music club in university. Still, the moments she cherished most was the moments she played on this white piano, at least once a week.

The owner said he didn’t mind because the piano had to be played to keep it from getting out of tune.

She played that Yiruma song that she loved, “Kiss The Rain”, the melody flowing in the entire shop and it made her so unbelievably happy, wishing one day she could own this beautiful piano.

When she was done, Oppa looked strange, as if he couldn’t speak, and when she asked in a concerned tone, he said he was only feeling a little too full after lunch. She suggested they walked some more to help him digest the food, and bowed low to the piano owner, Yong Hwa close behind her.

Oppa made her days brighter. She wished he wouldn’t find a girlfriend too soon. It would be so dreary to stop talking and going to places with him.

***************************************

The next day, Yong Hwa came back to the music shop to ask the price of the white piano. She was right. It was very expensive. Not inhumanly, though. And not impossible either.

“I like “Leave Out All The Rest”, Oppa” she texted when he walked out of the shop.

He stopped walking at the sideway and replied. “You listened to Linkin Park? Awesome! I’m starting to like Yiruma too, because of you”.

“Jeongmalyo? Well, here’s a little test. What is your favorite song?”

He replied decisively, “”Love Me””, that’s the title of my favorite Yiruma song”.

******************************************

Lee Ji Eun, the talented, lovely, beautiful junior everyone was crazy about confessed that she liked him. It was one early evening after he came to his lecturer regarding his final performance and thesis, in front of the back garden of the campus where people still passed by. He was surprised. He never thought he still had it in him. Well, it was a little flattering and all, having the number one most popular junior in the campus harbored enough feelings for him to ask him to be her boyfriend.

He thought his days of being the coolest guy in the campus was over. Basically, he didn’t think that it mattered anymore. But what surprised him even more was how easy it was to say no to that girl. Nicely, of course, telling that he thought maybe they could be friends, and nothing more. He was grateful for her feelings, and wouldn’t be able to return it. He apologized, and hoped she would have a good evening ahead.

As he walked away, he thought of what Joo Hyeon would comment on this. Would she tease that he was so popular, desired by juniors and asked whether he was sincere or just trying to be cool?

****************************************

Before Yong Hwa could report the interesting occurrence in his life that night, he froze on his bed reading her text.

“Someone came up at the library today and said that he liked me. It was so out of the blue and unexpected”.

Yong Hwa read the two sentences ten times before he realized he was not breathing. Forcing himself, he replied quickly,

“Aigoo. Uri Joohyeonnie is getting popular. Who’s the brave guy?”

“His name is Lee Teuk. He said he’s in Creative Music. Do you know him?”

The bastard. Why did he ever thought that Lee Teuk like reading? Of course not! He’s after the librarian after all!

He wanted to degrade the guy in her eyes. But decided against it.

“He’s okay. Normal. Not a bad guy. So? What did he say? Love at first sight?”

“He said he liked me for a while now. Has wondered how he should approach me, and finally just asked me out like that.”

He made a lot of typo to reply that and spent some time to erase and retype.

“And? What did you say? Are you falling for that handsome guy too? When will you start your romantic date?”

“I said we can be friends.”

Goosebumps and dread filled him and he had a vivid image of strangling Lee Teuk to death as he texted,

“How predictable.”

“He wanted to take me to eat seafood tomorrow night. Do you think I should go?”

If he’s a heart machine, he would make faint graphics of ups and downs now.

“What do you want, Joo Hyeon? What do you think of him?”

“I don’t know…..I need some time to think about it. How about you, Oppa? You haven’t told me about your day.”

“Coincidentally, the same thing happened to me today. A pretty junior who can write songs, plays piano and guitar told me she liked me and asked to be my girlfriend.”

Her reply came thirty seconds letter. Not a minute later. If it was a minute later, he could believe that she was having an upset shock.

“Wow! This sounds like straight out from a romance novel. What did you say to her?”

Yong Hwa paced in his room and finally decided not to play cool and be honest.

“I said "no, thank you"”

“What? Why? She sounds perfect!”

If he’s a heart machine, the graphic would make fainter sounds now.

“I don’t know. Maybe she’s not my type. Enough about me. What about you? I admit I’m curious. Will you or will you not go for that date?”

“I think I will. It won’t hurt to know new people once in a while.”

Yong Hwa almost dropped his phone. Lucky Lee Teuk. Jerk! I wish he died tonight.

He made clapping emoticons and typed, “Now that’s unpredictable. But brave. Maybe you have fallen in love with his pretty face.”

“Well…….he was rather good looking. But it’s not that. I spent thirty minutes talking with him today, and he didn’t bore me.”

Yong Hwa glanced angrily to his mirror. Am I ugly, then? Am I boring?

“Okay. Uri Seo Joo Hyeon. Always more than shallow ideas.”

“Exactly. I guess dinner tomorrow will be alright. I finally got the chance to wear that fancy blue dress”.

He slammed his phone to the table, reading her last sentence. The fancy blue dress. Perfect. Joo Hyeon, Lee Teuk, seafood, dinner.

“I hope you’ll have a great time. Tell me all about it afterwards. By the way, Joo Hyeon, which restaurant?”

She replied and said she would sleep early, she didn’t want to appear with black bags under her eyes, afraid Lee Teuk would think she was too excited.

If he was the heart machine, he would be making long, one note beep right now.

******************************************

Author’s Note :

2 July 2012

There you go. Sorry for the short update. Gotta work soon.

One more part before this ends, I guess. Thank you for the comments, I’m happy you like this story too. Some said I get the idea from A Gentleman’s Dignity. But I’ve never watched it, and actually, this was based from a personal experience. My dress was caught on a guy’s bag’s zipper one day. That was where the idea came from. 

Please tell me what you think about this one too, okay?

*********************************************

25 March 2019

Sorry for not updating my Yongseo fics in a long time. This is a little treat. I hope you like it. Have a great week!