QUESTIONS.

LU HAN.

She said it. She was a machine.

No flesh, no blood, no heart.

I froze while I walked to my apartment.

With trembling hands I opened the door.

I slowly took off my shoes and went to my room.

I could remember how she sat there, freezing, shaking.

She was dripping wet, her hair falling messily into her face.

Her eyes looking at me, innocent, hopeless.

“Sahee.” Her name felt unreal in my mouth.

The night was restless.

I was tired and exhausted, but I couldn't sleep.

There was too much in my head.

Her. Sahee.

I had kissed her. I had loved her.

But she was a machine.

I got up in the middle of the night and walked over to my desk.

There were a couple of pictures pinned onto the wall.

Photos of us, we took long ago. In autumn.

When she started to live at my house.

When we watched our first movies together.

When we spent our first time together.

When I started to fall for her.

“What does 'love' mean to you?” Mr Do asked.

I lifted my head from my paper like the other surprised students.

We were actually speaking about the book we just read.

“Haha, I shocked you guys, right? There is a survey made by
senior students and that's why I should ask you this question.
Also, please write your answer on this sheet.”

The guy in front of me, Baekhyun, handed me a blank piece of paper.

Everybody around me began writing their answers and thoughts down,

but I just kept staring at the paper.

“Lu Han, don't forget to write your answer,” Teacher Do reminded me.

I nodded absently and tightened my grip around my pen.

“Love is...” I muttered,

“when you can't live without this special, precious person.”

Suddenly neatly written lines filled the paper, bit by bit.

I couldn't stop my thoughts. Sahee. Sahee. Sahee.

“Teacher Do? Can I have another piece of paper, please?”

He looked at me, his eyes widened, but gave me another one.

Love. Love is this very special feeling.

It makes you feel happy, to the happiest person on earth.

Love can also disappoint you. In many ways.

The person you love can suddenly change.

This person, the one you always appreciated, loved, cared about,

can change completely, from head to toe.

You may be shocked and you'll also think that something in your heart changed too.

You'll think that you don't love this person anymore. You'll look for reasons why.

Everything will get different, it will change.

But isn't it that you just didn't want to admit your own feelings?

That you still love this person? Your heart is still longing for that person.

You love this person, no matter how much they've changed.

You just can't let them go.

Because if you let them go,

you'll lose everything.

Hearts cannot change that easily.

Love is a strong bond that can't be teared.

No matter how hard you try.

I handed my two papers to Teacher Do and packed my things.

The other students already left and I was alone in the room with him.

“You wrote a lot,” Teacher Do said and smiled. “You must know a lot.”

I nodded and smiled. “Yes.”

I went outside and saw her. Sahee.

Her eyes were red and swollen, when she turned around and looked at me.

She wiped her tears with the back of her hand and closed her locker.

Sahee was still the person I loved.

I can't let her go like that.

“Sahee,” I said and tapped her shoulder.

She turned around, slowly, and avoided my eyes.

“Please forgive me,” I said and took her hand.

But she rejected my touch and buried her hand in her pocket.

“Don't Lu Han. It's better like this.” She shook her head.

Did I do something wrong? “Sahee, don't. I just want-”

“No. Stop. It can't go on like this. It would be better for both of us
if we stop seeing each other.” She tried to hold back her tears.

“No. I don't want to.”

“Lu Han-”

“No. Sahee. I can't. I won't.”

She looked at me, her eyes hopeless, filled with pain.

“I don't want to live without you.”

She smiled weakly. “But I'm like this.”

“I love you. And if you're like this, that won't change anything for me.”

“Oppa!” Minah suddenly showed up.

She looked at both of us. “Lu Han-oppa, how...?”

“I still love her,” I said straight into her face. “I love her the way she is.”

KAI.

“I love her the way she is.”

I furrowed my eyebrows, when Lu Han said this.

How can a human possibly love a machine? A machine?

I shook my head and left the school building.

Suddenly I got a message from the scientist telling me to return to the headquarters.

I obediently went straight to the little house's backyard.

I lifted my hand and typed in my personal entrance code.

6-9-2-4-6-6-8-0-0-2.

“Product JI-002 identified. Entrance allowed.”

The door opened slowly and the long hallway was covered in blue lights.

My steps echoed through the whole building which was absolutely silent, like always.

“JI-002, we're waiting for you in room 17,” the voice in my head commanded.

I turned to the right where room 15 was. The door next to it was room 17.

“JI-002.”

Five scientist were sitting at a table, one of them pointing to the chair next to him.

I sat down slowly and watched every move they made.

“You came here in autumn,” one of them said as he stood up.

His voice had a nervous undertone, but he still acted tough.

“Is there something you want to know?”

They all looked at me, while I thought. What should I ask?

“I will think about this.”

Sahee and Lu Han looked so happy together.

They spent all their time together, laughing, smiling.

Loving each other.

I went back to the bench in the park. To this special one.

My fingers rested on the carved words. On our names.

Youngae. Jongin. Love.

I think I was human.

Before I turned into something like this. Into a machine.

But why can't I remember a single thing? What happened before?

Where did I live before I died? Who were my friends?

Where was my family right now? Are they doing well?

Who is Youngae?

“Sahee!”

She turned around and faced me, surprised. “Oh, Kai?”

I knew that she was still suspicious of me.

“I have to talk to you,” I said in an urging tone.

We went to the park bench, where the carved words were written.

“So, what do you want, Kai?” Sahee asked me and raised an eyebrow.

I took a deep breath. “Before you died... what can you remember?”

She tilted her head a little. “What do you mean?”

“Do you still remember your life as human?”

She nodded slowly. “Of course, I can.”

“But why can't I?” I asked in disappointment.

Sahee looked to the ground, like she was knowing something.

“Sahee. If you know something about me, then tell me.”

Her eyes met mine. After that, she took out a little book which was in her bag.

She opened it and I could see some photos of a girl, together with boys.

“Who is this?” I asked and pointed at the beautiful girl on the photo.

She sighed, “it's me, Kai. When I was human.”

I furrowed my eyebrows while she turned some pages.

But she looks completely different right now.

On one of the last pages, there was a newspaper article. There was a boy.

Who looked exactly like me.

I gasped and Sahee handed me the book, so I could take a closer look.

“I-It's me.” My voice was feeling weak for the very first time. “Me.”

My eyes began reading the article.

18-year-old boy, Kim Jongin, commits suicide.

His dead body was found in the early morning of the 28^th January 2009.

The student died of an overdose of soporific.

My hands dropped the book, which fell onto the ground.

“Kai, are you okay?” Sahee asked me and came closer.

Her hand rested on my back, while she looked at me, worried.

“I died. I commited suicide.” I closed my eyes.

“I'm sorry,” she said quietly.

“Look at this,” I said and broke the silence.

She moved over to have a look at the carved words.

“It's yours and another girl's name.”

“I was in love.”

SAHEE.

Lee Youngae. That's her name.

I looked up her name on the internet and there were plenty of articles about her.

She was a well-known student at school, who always received good grades.

But after an incident in early 2009, she and her family moved to the States.

Early 2009. 28^th January 2009.

Lee Youngae graduated from an American school in the same year.

She's now studying at a university there.

“She's beautiful,” I admitted and shut down my notebook.

Why did Kai die? Did she broke up with him?

“Teacher Do?”

The teacher looked up and smiled at me. “Yes, Sahee?”

“Were there some students who commited suicide in the past years?”

Maybe my question was too direct, because teacher Do furrowed his eyebrows a bit.

“Yes, of course. There were a some students who commited suicide because of the stress.”

I nodded. “And did you hear about somebody called Kim Jongin?”

After a while, teacher Do nodded. “Yes, I think I heard of him. But he was attending
another school, not far away from here. But I think that school is closed now.”

“Oh.” I bit my lip. “Do you know somebody who might know him?”

“Yes.”

The number teacher Do gave me, led me to a woman who had been a teacher.

“You want to know something about Kim Jongin?” the woman asked.

She pointed at one of the chairs next to her.

Her house was quite big, considering she lived alone in here.

“Yes. What kind of student was he?” I asked.

“Oh, I can still remember him. He was a very well-mannered boy, who always gave very good answers in class.” She laughed. “Jongin was a very intelligent student, full of energy.”

I smiled. “Do you know about his friends at school?”

“Yes. Jongin used to have a lot of friends, but his best friend was probably Junmyeon, one of his sunbaes. And there was another student, I think her name was Lee Youngae.”

Lee Youngae. I straightened my back. “Lee Youngae?”

The woman nodded. “Kim Jongin and Lee Youngae spent quite a lot time with each other. There were inseparable. They were such a cute couple.”

“But what happened?”

Her face darkened. “Kim Jongin commited suicide in January 2009. Nobody knows why. He was popular at school, his friends never betrayed him and he also had a very pretty girlfriend.”

Silence filled the room. “I don't understand-”

“His life wasn't like everybody thought,” she said and continued, “Jongin was just a very good actor. He could easily hide his pain behind a smile.”

I furrowed my eyebrows. What does this all mean? “But you said-”

“I said what the others were thinking of him,” the woman simply cut me off.

I took a deep breath. “How was his real life then?”

“He came from an extremely successful family. Jongin was always under pressure, his parents always expected him to be the number one. Also, his girlfriend wasn't that innocent at all.”

The woman handed me an article about Lee Youngae. It was from 2008 and it was written in English. On the photo at the top of the article there was Youngae and another, American, boy. They were kissing each other. Dylan Herrits found his perfect girl. My eyes widened when I read the heading. The boy was the son of a famous company owner in America.

“How...?” I looked at the woman. “Youngae?”

“She was an exchange student for one year during the 11^th grade. In America, she met Dylan, like you can read and befriended with him. After some time, Youngae became his girlfriend.”

“But Jongin was still here in Korea,” I added.

The woman sighed. “When Jongin heard about this, he was heartbroken. When Youngae returned, he tried his best to win her back, but it didn't work.”

“And after this, he commited suicide?”

She nodded.

I went back to the bench in the park, where Kai and Youngae's name were carved in.

“Youngae loves Jongin.” I shook my head and turned around to see Kai standing there.

“That's why,” I concluded my explanation about his death. “Sorry about that.”

He seemed to be disappointed telling by his sad eyes. I've never seen him that sad before.

“But why did they rebuilt me exactly like this?” He looked at me. “You were put into another body. Into a new one.”

KAI.

The scientists sat in front of me, their gazes piercing me.

“Your question, JI-002.”

I looked on the table in front of me.

“Why did you choose me?”