8. Chocolate
I’m afraid
You’ll notice my feelings
So I started going to you but then stepped back
But at this rate
I think I’ll go crazy

Park Jaehyung

Sungjin, Dowoon, and I arrived in Japan when Jaehee was in her last year of Master’s. Her original group of friends have already graduated, so she was glad when her new neighbors are of the same nationality and will be studying in the same university as hers. She’s younger than me and Sungjin, but she’s technically our senior here, so we drop the formalities. Between her laughing at my jokes and poking fun at me, the deep conversations and the casual, random chats, and just having an amazing time whenever we’re together, we became good friends while I kept on collecting reasons for liking her.

After I got a congratulatory smack from Sungjin last night (he’ll probably describe is as ‘pat to my back’ but that man is hella strong and sometimes doesn’t know control), I wrote down a plan of sorts. I spent the next half day on inquiring regarding reservations, researching for apt places to go, and making an excel sheet to print so that I can impress her.

By 4 in the afternoon, I’m almost finished with my preparations, and I decide to make a stop by the supermarket to replenish the instant ramyeon stash for the apartment on the way to the pharmacy and the printing shop.

From the other side of the street, I see Jaehee running fast towards the mart’s entrance, and I jog to follow suit. She makes a beeline for the frozen foods section, and seems startled when I took the ice cream tub out for her. I have practically indirectly confessed to her when I redefined our day out as a date, but it seems that neither Jaehee nor I remembered this little fact.

While I revel in the level of comfort that our relationship has, it makes me kinda mad too. And thus, when she awkwardly bumped straight into me once we were outside, I mention the date to remind us both. It’s time to make her flustered about it too. I pat her head and power walk out of there, just like the night before.

I print out the card that I spent the afternoon laying-out, which includes a very official-looking invitation to tomorrow’s date, a summary of activities that reveals nothing except for timestamps and vague locations, and a reminder to bring a camera with her. Before going up to the apartment, I had Dowoon check if Jaehee was back home, and he confirms it. I walk to her front door, take a deep breath, and slip the invitation card under it, knock in the usual pattern that I do so that she knows it’s me, and run to the stairwell. From there, I send her a text: “You are cordially invited. See you tomorrow, m’lady. ;)” I hear her door close, and I receive a response from her: “Got the invitation, Sir. See you tomorrow. :)”

I wake up at 6 AM the next day, in time to see Jaehee leave the complex for her morning run. Sungjin arrives an hour later, talking to someone as he opened the door, “You’ll be fine, Jaehee-yah!” I give him a glass of water and inquire, “She’s nervous?” Sungjin just smirks, hands the glass to me, and says, “But not more than you, Jae. Go take a bath a fix up yourself already.”

At exactly 9 AM, I knock on her door with a Yakult in hand. She emerges in her dark pink knee-length dress, leggings, and lavender overcoat, a tote bag slung over her right shoulder. It’s not as if she has dressed differently for today, but I can’t help but smile at the fact that she is dressed for our date and has coincidentally matched my dark purple overcoat.

I was probably staring at her (again), because she’s now waving a hand in front of my face. “Is that for me?” she points her lips toward the Yakult, and grins. I hand her the drink and offer my elbow, “Shall we, m’lady?” She sips at the drink and looks from my face to my elbows back and forth a few times with furrowed eyebrows. I just respond with a smile. She rolls her eyes and smirks, and loops her arms into mine. “Let’s go, Jae.”

I reveal our first set of destinations to her while we were entering the train station, and she had to unlink our arms as she covers in elated joy. I ache at the loss of skinship but if it meant seeing her smile like that, it’s worth it, I guess. Jaehee has always wanted to go to Tokyo’s pet cafés, but they cost so much, she said that she’d rather spend the money on travelling. She’s mostly a cat person, calling on every cat she encounters and petting them when they allow her to. She loves animals in general, something that we share in common (though I am more of a dog person). So, I made reservations to a cat café for brunch, a dog café for dessert, and a rabbit café for afternoon coffee.

While her initial reaction is excitement, she suddenly shifts to worry. “But you’re allergic to dogs, Jae.”

“Jaehee, I already took anti-histamine meds. I got a bunch here in my bag as well. I also bought a mask in case it got me sneezing for the rest of the day. It won’t kill me, I’ll be fine. Okay?”

She hesitates a bit, and then nods, “Okay, if you say so.”

The train ride and walk to the cat café took almost an hour and a half, because Jaehee has already brought out her camera and has started to take photos. “You made me bring this so we can also do a photo walk, right?” She’s smiling so widely, and I take that as her appreciative response for knowing her so well. Spring is itching to arrive, the Sakura blossoms will be blooming in a few days.

In all these, my eyes are trained on her, walking a few steps behind her as she takes macro photos of the buds, the tree foliage, of me. At one point, I take out my camera and take a few shots of her. She catches me doing so and smiles for the camera, and we do this cliché thing where I'm taking a photo of her taking a photo of me.

At the cat café, we order brunch and have the random depths of conversation as we usually do. When she finished her food, she’s off chasing the cats and petting them, and for the rest of the hour, I ended up watching her run around. I whip my phone out to capture these moments, and she sometimes even poses with the cats. She’s such a dork.

Jaehee returns to our table, her black leggings covered in cat hair. She asks for my phone to check the photos. Beaming at the pictures, she suddenly pouts and looks at me. “Hey! Were you taking a video?”

Ah, I got caught. “This will definitely go into my vlog, you know.” I shrug and take the phone away from her before she deletes it.

She playfully scoffs, “You’re vlogging our date? I can’t believe you, Park Jaehyung. Youtube fame is eating you alive.”

“Ha! You said date!” I pump my fist in victory.

“I said what I said.” It was her turn to shrug, and she stands up and walks to the ladies’ room.

Lee Jaehee

We don’t order dessert at the cat café because apparently, we’ll be having it in the dog café. Nevertheless, we order sandwiches with our cake sampler slices, because the 40-minute walk towards here practically digested the pastas we had at the previous place. It took long because we were doing a photo walk again, the imminent arrival of spring brings forth a lot of interesting sights to see.

Quite different to the cat café, we were surrounded by trained dogs who sat by our side and didn’t beg for food while we ate. We petted them to our heart’s content, and after our table was cleared, Jae had a bunch of dogs on his lap. I bring out my camera and take snaps of him looking elated at being able to hug and smother these creatures without his allergies taking over. He told me once that he genuinely wanted a dog, and that he tried having one, but he had to give it away to a relative because the meds only worked temporarily.

Park Jaehyung’s laugh is infectious, and watching him with the dogs makes me swell with happiness. At one point, Jae yells at me through the lens, “Jaehee-yah, put down the damn camera and just play with them!” And I do as I’m told.

By the café’s doors, we were lint-rolling away the dog fur from our dark-colored clothes. Jae stands by the cashier and pays for our bill, and I have my arms crossed over my chest. When he turns around, he raises an eyebrow at my posture, “What’s the problem, Jaehee-yah?”

“Do you really plan to pay for everything today?”

He squints his eyes at me and regards my facial expression. “That is a trick question. There is only one correct answer and that should be a ‘no’, right?”

“Send me today’s total and I’ll pay you for the half, okay?”

“I understand, m’lady. But please stop using that tone? I’m scared.” He makes an exaggerated scared face, and I laugh in response.

For the rabbit café, we take a short train ride and a shorter walk. A quaint café with little balls of white fluff in the most random of places, Jae and I arrive during their sleeping time, and very few were active. Jae orders a tall coffee while I have my second dessert – a parfait. He’s taking photos of the rabbits sleeping in the table next to ours, and I’m watching him as I always do when he shoots – with artistic admiration.

“Hey Jae?” I call his attention to ask him a question. He turns to me and places his camera on the table, “Yes, Jaehee-yah?” He takes a long sip of his coffee.

“Jae, since when did you have bad eyesight?”

“Since I was a teen, I guess?”
“How bad is it?”

Jae removes his spectacles. "Without it, I can't see you clearly anymore." He moves his face closer, up until to middle of table. "Now, you're a little bit clearer." He then stands up, bends down his back a bit until his face is a about five inches away from mine. "I can see you very clearly now, Jaehee." He's not smiling, and he's staring straight into my eyes. I blink too many times in a row. He then smiles, pinches my cheek for a second, and returns to his seat. "Just kidding, I had lasik surgery a few years ago. I really don't need to wear glasses anymore but I feel more confident in them." Still a bit flustered, all I manage is an, "Oh."

He smirks, and says, "Glad to know that I have some sort of effect on the great Lee Jaehee." I think I'm blushing, and he just laughs.

We leave the rabbit café at around 3 in the afternoon, and when Jae reveals that the next location is just 10 minutes away – Yoyogi Park, I stare at him in confusion. “Why there?”

We start walking, and he replies, “Well, it’s a great place to do another photo walk session.” I nod in agreement.

He then adds, “I remembered you telling me a story about travelling solo to Tokyo for the first time, when you rode a bike here in Yoyogi Park, and that it was something you weren’t able to do again once you came back as a student because you’re not a tourist anymore. And that you wanted to go with someone who wouldn't mock you for it.”

I’m quiet for a few moments, because all I can say in response is, “You remembered that, Jae?”

“It didn’t make sense as to why you can’t just go and do it, but I figured I could be that one person who will never mock you for anything, much less a bike ride in a park.”

I’m immensely touched that he remembered this, when I forgot about it already. I realize that this guy could sweep me off my feet if only I didn’t have my romance blinders on. That Park Jaehyung is a catch, and yet I am not sure about how I feel about all of these. In true Jaehee fashion, I throw these thoughts under my ‘to-deal-with-later’ rug, and mutter a quiet thank you.

“We’re not even there yet, and you’re thanking me already. Save it for until the end of today, okay?” He lifts his camera and points it at me, and I smile widely for him.

Park Jaehyung

Jaehee has planned literally every single trip we made since September, and she genuinely enjoys the process. I once spent a Saturday afternoon watching her do research, make calls, and create a spreadsheet of a budget and itinerary for a weekend trip for four. In between her infinite eye rolls at my uselessness and my pretending to play a game on my phone, I probably stared at her too much.

“Jae, if you have time to idle around, please suggest some activities that the boys would like to do?”

“Jaehee-yah, we’ll love whatever we end up doing, so you can decide on your own. Makes the process easier, right?”

A throw pillow lands on my head, and I lift my eyes from my phone to see her typing away on her laptop and shaking her head in disappointment. She’s smiling though, and when she looks back at me and mouths, “What?”, I just shrug.

And thus, when I volunteered to plan for this whole date, I wanted it to be extra special. A day filled with things she likes, and the things she loves to do. Cats, food, photography, and parks (hopefully a Park Jaehyung as well, but we’ll work on that).

The look on her face when I mentioned about the reason for Yoyogi Park was priceless. Jaehee’s facial expressions are often transparent; and I can read the amount of gratitude she has that I remembered these details. All these efforts are always worth it if she smiles like that, at me.

We continue our photo walk inside the park, and we get lost a few times while trying to find where the damn cycling course is. When we get to it, I let Jaehee ride first, telling her that I’ll take photos of her and walk around for a while. She passes by me several times, and after 15 minutes, I rent one too and we were off racing against each other in no time.

“You’re in a dress. And yet. You pedal. So fast.” I am struggling for air as I remove myself from the bicycle and sit beside her in a bench, the imaginary finish line we’ve set.

She gulps water but is just breathing normally. “Jae, you should run with me and Sungjin some time.” I shake my head in response, and focus on getting my breathing back to normal.

She offers me her bottled water. “Once you’re okay, let’s just ride leisurely, okay?” I nod aggressively and down the rest of the water.

We spent the rest of the rental hour as promised, taking in the simplicity of the moment and the scenery. By the time we were done, the sun was setting. We simultaneously looked at each other, and we say something at the same time, “golden hour.”

We make our way towards the park’s exit that nearest to our station, with an unspoken agreement to let each other be as we take one last photo walk of the day. I mostly take photos of her, of the landscape, of people, of dogs. And then of her, again, and again, as if an invisible thread pulls my camera lens to wherever she was.

When we arrive at the train station, it’s properly night time already. “Jaehee-yah, we’ll have dinner somewhere familiar; will that be alright?”

She nods. “It’s your itinerary, I’ll just follow you, Jae.”

Park Sungjin

According to Jae’s excel file of schedule, they should be arriving by now. Dowoon and I have finished cooking, and are lounging by the balcony to get a premiere view of how their first date are progressing so far.

“Hyung, do you think Jaehyung-hyung’s grand gestures today will still go over noona’s head?”

“Haven’t you been listening when I told you that Jae made it clear to her that today’s a date?”

“I was, but look at a that.” He nods towards the two figures walking down our street, laughing and animatedly talking to each other. “They look like the same old friends to me.”

“They do enjoy each other’s company, eh? Oh well, the night’s literally young. Let’s go Dowoon-ah, let’s help Jaehyung get his girl.”

Yesterday, I watched in amusement as Jae run around the apartment since arriving after my morning run. Despite being the smart guy on a scholarship studying his multimedia arts master’s degree in Japan, Jae has never put as much effort into his academics. He does read a lot in his free time, but to be fair, he also games a lot; so, I honestly think that he’s just really smart. By lunch, he’s finished making phone calls, and after eating, Dowoon and I have been somehow roped into his plans for his date with Jaehee. We oblige with his requests (of course, with some sort of payment that we’ll cash in later), helping him secure a permit, shop for materials, and set-up a location.

Jae arrived just before dinner, and finalizes everything before camping in his shared room with Dowoon. At around 11 PM, I heard the maknae shout at the eldest: “Ah hyung! Let me sleep! Stop practicing already! We’re gonna get complaints from the neighbors again!” I jumped out of my bed and walked to their door, which I opened a fraction to pop in my head and told Jae, “Try to sleep already Jae, you’re gonna be great tomorrow. For now, just get some beauty sleep, okay?”  His pursed smile tells me he probably will have a hard time getting sleep, but he finally laid down on his bed. I turn off their lights, and before the door closed, I heard Jae say, “Thank you for all the help, Sungjin-ah.”

Dowoon played the look-out to make sure that we leave the apartment in time to walk one floor behind Jae and Jaehee. When they arrive at our apartment building’s semi-open rooftop, Jae leaves the door half open so we can be in the floor landing’s shadows.
From my position, I see Jaehee looking confused. “Is this legal?”

Jae responds with an, “I thought you trust me?” He pouts, and she just chuckles. Jae switches on the lights and watches her face light up in surprise and awe. Jaehee looks up at Jae and smiles, “Okay, no more questions, I swear. It’s beautiful up here, when did you set this up?” A blanket was set up under a low, utensils-filled table, with throw pillows for cushion and a portable heater positioned to each seat’s right side. Overhead, warm led lightbulbs hung to illuminate their small dining space.

Jaehee returns to admiring the set-up, and Jae watches her with the softest smile that he only ever does for her. She once again looks up at him, catching his gaze for a few seconds. She then shifts her eyes forward and does an awkward cough, and says, “So, are we having food delivered here?”

I look at Dowoon and we take that as our cue, and we emerge from the door with food in our hands. Jaehee looks surprised at our appearance, mouths “Why are you here?” at me, and then looks at Jae for an explanation.

Jae gets the plates from Dowoon’s hands and places it on the table, saying, “I’ve commissioned my roommates to be the chef, I figured you’d want homemade Korean cooking.” I follow suit, while Dowoon runs back to get the rest of the side dishes.

Jaehee walks to the table, then turns to me, “I can’t believe he made you and Dowoon do this.”

“Our services are not cheap, so enjoy the night, okay?” I gesture for her to sit down and Jae puts an additional coat around her shoulders, while I point at the extra blanket just in case it’s still too cold. Dowoon arrives with the rest of the food, and sets it up while Jae fumbles for his camera and sets it up on a tripod. We take photos of the whole crew and then of just the two of them. Worried about the food’s warmth, I usher a hesitant Dowoon out of the door (“But hyung, I want to witness this as a highly invested audience member!”) and leave them alone.

Park Jaehyung

I didn’t expect that we’d be starving by the time we arrived, but thankfully, Dowoon and Sungjin cooked a lot. Despite the night’s cold weather, the portable heaters provided enough warmth. We eat in comfortable silence, and every now and then Jaehee grimaces or chuckles at something that happened during the day, and we’ll laugh about it together.

When we finish our meal, I stand up and get something from the shadows, and I see the anticipation in Jaehee’s face when she sees the guitar in my hand. “We’re gonna end today on a jamming session?”

I sit again in front of her and make sure my guitar’s in tune (even though I rechecked it multiple times last night and even asked Sungjin to check again today). “Not quite.” I smile at her and she has a curious brow raised.

I perform a song* I’ve written; it’s practically a love letter announcing that I like her. Knowing Jaehee, though, I will have to be more direct. And sure enough, after she claps and gushes about how beautiful the song was, I don’t see her recognizing the song to be about her, for her. “That was amazing, Park Jaehyung! Are you gonna send that to record labels? Park Bogum could totally rock that song!”

“Why thank you for being an immediate fan girl, Ms. Lee.” I force a smile. “I think JYP Entertainment can give this song to that awesome band they have. I’ll think about your suggestion.”

She stands up and walks toward the rooftop’s ledge, and stares at the night sky. I leave my guitar and stand beside her, looking at her while her eyes are somewhere else. It feels like this happens too often. She suddenly grows quiet, and looks at me. "Thank you for today, Jae. I had fun. It's always easy when it's you.”

My instant crush on Lee Jaehee has evolved as the days went by since knowing her, and while I have convinced myself that I am content with being just her friend, I have unconsciously made efforts toward this moment. When she said those words, something inside me snaps. I sigh, and I look straight into her eyes. She holds it longer than she usually does, and before she breaks the eye contact, I tell her everything.

“I don't want to be just a comfortable presence to you. I want to make your heart flutter the way you make me do. You're the kindest, smartest, most beautiful, most amazing person I've ever met. And I like you so much, Lee Jaehee. More than a friend, I like you. Mostly, I just wanted you to know. I didn't want to expect anything in return. But if you could give me a chance, that's all I ask.”

If anyone guessed the song Jae "wrote", let me know. ;)

I Like You (좋아합니다)

In life, there aren’t many days
When things go your way
There are more days when it didn’t go my way
Will today be another one of those days?
I am pretty worried

After I tell you these words
I’m not sure if we can go back
To smiling like we are now
But I have to

I Like you
I tried holding it back
But I can’t anymore

Now I can tell you
I want to love
You

Your eyes are shaking
It’s shaking up my heart

After this moment
I’m not sure if we can go back
To being natural
But I have to

I Like you
I tried holding it back
But I can’t anymore

Now I can tell you
I want to love

I’ve thought of you like this
But if you don’t feel the same

You just need to tell me
“I’m sorry” and
I’ll be fine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daoMYJv8i0c