On a Monday morning, a couple weeks after the funeral, I sat in the waiting room full of people, all wedged into inadequate armchairs on the second floor of the Seoul National University Hospital. It'd been the hospital that I went to every year, to get blood work and check-ups done.

"A few surveys," the smiling secretary behind the desk had said, handing me a half-inch thick slab of forms, a clipboard, and a pen. "There's breakfast," she added chirpily, pointing at the stack of bagels, a tub of fat-free cream cheese, and a pitcher of orange juice with a think film of pulp floating on the top. Like anyone would eat in here, I thought, bypassing the bagels and sitting down with my forms beneath a weight-loss poster with a depicted model in a leotard romping through a field full of flowers.

The first page was all about personal information. Name. That was easy. Height, weight. No problem. Next page, health history. Page three, parent/family history and information. The next seven pages of physical history. Did I have a heart murmur, high blood pressure, glaucoma? Was I pregnant? No, no, and a thousand times no. One page of ual history, six pages of emotional history, on to the psychology pages.

"Kim Gwiboon-sii," the small secretary called, leading me into one of the hositals' many examine rooms. "There will be a new doctor today, not your usual."

"Oh? What happened to Doctor Sung?"

"He's on vacation," she said, calmly. "No need to worry, our new doctor is just as good. He'll be with you in a couple of minutes," she said, before leaving the room and shutting the door behind her.

I looked around, trying to relax. A few moments later, there was a knock on the door. The new doctor walked in, flipping through my forms, squinting to look at the answers. My eyes automatically widened as I realized I recognized this man. I felt my cheecks flush and I was suddenly embarrassed to be in the room. I was embarrassed about my answers on the forms he was reading.

"Kim Gwiboon-sii," he started.

"Ne.." I said quietly, looking toward the ground, hoping he wouldn't recognize me. I looked up to see where he was looking. Our eyes met. I smiled a little, still slightly embarrassed.

"Boonie?" His eyes were slightly buldged. "I hadn't thought it'd be you.. you have such a common name."

"Hey.. Onew," 

"It's good to see you," he laughed a little. "So," he cleared his throat, "What's wrong exactly?"

"I can't eat. I've lost eight pounds in the last month," I frowned to myself, most women are usually happy about losing a little weight.

"You mean you're eating less," he said.

"No, I mean every time I put something in my mouth, I puke." He looked at me sharply.

And there we were: me in a chair, him looking at my forms. He was tanner than when I'd seen him last, and possibly even thinner, floating in his white laboratory coat. It'd been six weeks since I'd last seen Jonghyun, and things were not proceeding as I'd hoped.

"Something happened,"

He looked at me sharply again, looking for answers. "Another article?"

"Jonghyun's father died," I said. "Jonghyun, my boyfriend... ex-boyfriend. His dad died last month." Jinki had known who I was talking about, on our first date, I told him all about Jonghyun and the "y" article.

He looked down at his hands, at the forms, then, finally, up at me. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"And he called me... and told me... and asked me to go to the funeral... but he wouldn't let me stay after we... he wouln't let me stay with him. He was so awful... and it was so sad... and his mother said how they used to go to toy stores, and I feel so terrible..." I blinked hard against the tears. Wordlessly, Onew handed me a box of kleenex. He took off his glasses and pressed two fingers against the bridge of his nose.

"I'm a bad person..." I blubbered, tears falling from my eyes.

He looked at me kindly. "Why? Because you broke up with him? That's silly. How could you know this was going to happen?"

I shook my head, taking one of his hands in mine. "No," I said. "I'm a bad person for what I've done to you.. I really like you. But... all I want is to be there for him, and love him, and he won't let me, and I feel so... alone."

He sighed. "It's hard when things end. Even if nobody dies, even if you part on the best possible terms and there's nobody else involved. Even if you're the one who lets go first. It's never easy. It always hurts.."

"I just feel like I made this huge mistake. Like I didn't think things through. I just wanted to be happy, and I thought I'd be able to do that without him. With you, even. I thought I knew... how it would feel to be apart from him. But I didn't. I couldn't I never imagined anything like this. And all I do is miss him..." I swallowed hard, choking on another sob. I couldn't explain it—that I'd been waiting my whole life for a guy who would get me, who would understand my pain. And when I did find one, two actually, I had pushed them both away. I thought I'd known what pain was, but I knew now I'd never hurt like this way.

He focused his eyes on a spot on the wall over my head as I wept. Then he opened a drawer, pulled a pad out of his desk, and started to write. 

"Do you hate me?" I asked.

"No," he said. "Of course, you're going to have to start eating again soon. But I think it might be a good idea for you to have someone to talk to." 

"Oh, no." I said. "Not therapy."

He gave me a half smile. "Am I sensing a little antipathy here?"

"No, I don't have anything against it, but I just know that it won't help," I told him. "I'm looking at the situation realistically. I made a huge mistake. I wasn't sure that I loved him enough, and now I know that I do, and his father's dead and he doesn't love me anymore." I straightened my back and wiped my face with a kleenex. "But I still want to do this." I held his hand, hoping he knew what I meant. "I really want to do this. I want to have one thing in my life I can feel good about. I want to feel like I'm doing something right."

He smiled at me, before he sat me on the examination table, his hands gentle on my back and my arms as he tied a piece of rubber tubing around my bicep and told me to make a fist. I looked away when he slipped the needle in, but he'd done it so skillfuly I could barely feel it. Both of us watched the glass vial filling up with my blood. I wondered what he was thinking. "Almost done," he said quietly, before deftly removing the needle and pressing a piece of gauze over the wound. 

"Do I get a lollipop?" I joked. He handed me a band-aid instead, and the piece of paper where he'd written two names, two phone numbers. "Please take it," he said. "And Boonie, you've got to eat, and if you find that you can't you have to call me. Also, I really suggest calling one of these counselors."

"Do you really think that a few more days of not eating is going to kill me?" I asked, jokingly.

"It's really not healthy," he said seriously. "It can have an adverse on your metabolism. My suggestion is to start off with easy stuff... toast, bananas, flat ginger ale."

Out in the lobby, he gave me a sheaf of papers easily three iches thick. "You need to eat," he said. "It'll make you feel better."

"You sound like my mother," I said, tucking everything into my purse.

"Gwiboonie?" He put his hand on my cheek. "Try not to take it so hard."

"I know," I said, placing my hand over his. "I just wish things were different."

"You'll be fine," he told me firmly. "And..." His voice trailed off. He looked uncomfortable. "You know how you said you were a bad person?"

"Oh," I said, embarrassed. "Sorry. I just have this tendency to get a little melodramatic..."

"No, no. That's okay. I just meant... I wanted to tell you..." The elevator doors slid open, and the people on it looked at me. I looked at the doctor and stepped backward. "You aren't," he told me, before kissing my lips softly. "I'll call you later."

I went home and lunged for the telephone. My one message was from Nicole.

"Hey, unnie, it's Cola... no, not Jonghyun, so get that pathetic look off your puss and call me if you feel like going for a walk. I'll buy you an iced coffee. It'll be great. Better than a boyfriend. Bye~"

I set down the phone and picked it again again when it started ringing. Maybe it was Jonghyun this time, I thought. Instead, it was my mother.

"Where have you been?" she demanded. "I've been calling and calling."

"You didn't leave a message," I pointed out.

"I knew I'd get you eventually," she said. "How's it going?"

"Oh, you know..." I said, my voice trailing off. My mother had really been making an effort since Jonghyun's father had died. She'd sent money in a white envelope that says 謹弔.  (The Chinese characters roughly mean “I am sorry for your loss.”) She'd been calling me every night, and instisted that I come home. It was all attention that I could have done without, but I knew she meant well.

"Why don't you come home for the weekend?" my mother asked. 

"I'm busy," I said.

"You're obsessed," she corrected. "I'll bet you're sitting there, reading old love letters Jonghyun sent you and hoping I'll get off the phone in case he calls you." Damn. How does she do that?

"I am not," I told her. "I've got call waiting."

"Waste of money," said my mother. "Look, Gwiboon. He's obviously angry with you. He's not goint to come running back just yet..."

"I'm aware of that." I said frostily.

"So what's the problem?"

"I miss him," I said.

"Why? What do you miss so much?"

I didn't say anything for a minute.

"Let me ask you something," my mother said gently. "Have you talked to him?"

"Yeah. We talk." In truth, I'd broken down and called him twice. Both calls had lasted less than five minutes, both had ended when he told me, politely, that there were things he needed to do."

My mother persisted. "Is he calling you?"

"Not so much. Not exactly."

"And who's ending the calls? You or him?"

This was getting touchy. "Depends," I lied. In truth, it was Jjong. Always Jjong. It was like Nicole had said. I was pathetic, and I knew it, and I couldn't stop myself, which was even worse.

"Gwiboon," she said. "Why don't you give him a break? Give yourself a break, too. Come home."

"I'm busy," I demurred, but I could feel myself weakening.

"We'll bake cookies," she wheedled. "We'll go for long walks. We'll go for a bike ride. We can have mother/daughter time, if you really want."

"Maybe," I said. "It's busy here. And I've got to go to New York next weekend. Did I tell you? I'm interviewing Love Lee."

"Really? Ooh, she is such a great actress."

"I'll tell her you said so."

"And listen... don't call him anymore. Just give him some time."

I knew she was right of course. A) I wasn't stupid, and B) I'd been hearing it from Nicole, and from every single one of my friends and acquaintances who had even a passing familiarity with the situation, and I'd probably be hearing it from Commdes, too, if only he could talk. But somehow I couldn't stop. I had turned into someone I would have pitied in another life; someone who searched for signs, who analyzed patterns, who went over every word in a conversation looking for hidden meanings, secret signals, the subtext that said, Yes, I still love you, of course I still love you.

"I'd like to see you," I told him shyly, during Five Minute Phone Conversation #2.

Jonghyun sighed. "I think we should wait," he said. "I don't just wasnt to jump right back in again."

"But we'll see each other sometime?" I said, in a tiny little voice that was utterly unlike anything I'd normally use for conversation, and he'd sighed again.

"I don't know, Gwib," he said, "I just don't know." He'd used the nickname that I'd hated so much while we dated. This was the first time I longed to hear it.

But "I don't know" wasn't a "no", I'd reasoned, and once I had a chance to be with him, to tell him how sorry I was, to show him how much I had to give, how much I wanted to be back with him... well, then he'd take me back. Of course he would. Wasn't he the one who'd said "I love you" first, three years ago, as we'd held each other in my bed? And hadn't he been the one who was always bringing up marriage, always stopping on our walks to admire babies, always steering me toward jewelry shop windows, and kissing my ring finger and telling me how we'd always be together?

It was inevitable, I tried to tell myself. Just a matter of time.

"Let me ask you something," I began.

Woohyun shoved his glasses up his nose and murmured his drink order to the cashier. 

"Explain men," I said.

Woohyun raised his hand. "Are we speaking in the abstract or the specific here?"

"It's Jjong," I acknowledged. Woohyun rolled his eyes. Woohyun was not a fan of Jonghyun.

"I just want to know," I said. "I mean, the thing that I don't understand..."

"Spit it out, Gwiboonie," Woohyun urged. The barista called my and Woohyun's orders, and we sat at a table

"Well, it's like, okay, I know that I was the one who wanted to take a break, and now I miss him, and it's like, this pain..."

"Is it a sharp stabbing pain, or more of a constant throbbing ache?"

"Are you making fun of me?"

Woohyun stared into my eyes, his own brown eyes wide and innocent behind his faux gold-rimmed glasses. "Well, maybe a little bit," he finally said.

"He's completely forgotten me," I grumbled. "It's as if I never even mattered...like I never meant anything to him."

"I'm confused," said Woohyun. "Do you want him back, or are you just concerned about your legacy?"

"Both," I said. "I just want to know..." I gulped a mouthful of iced coffee to starve off the tears. "I just want to know that I meant something somehow."

"Just because he's acting like you didn't mean anything doesn't mean that you really didn't," said Woohyun. "It's probably just an act."

"You think?"

"The guy adored you," Woohyun said. "That wasn't an act."

"But how can he not even want to talk to me now? How can it just be so completely..." I sliced one hand through the air to indicate a violent and absolute ending.

Woohyun sighed. "For some guys, it's just like that."

"For you? I asked.

He paused, then nodded. "For me, when it was over, it was always over."

"I just think that I made a mistake," I said. "Did you ever break up with someone and think you made a mistake?"

Woohyun shook his head, wordlessly offering me a sip of his latte.

"What should I do?"

He drank, looking thoughtful. "I don't taste the hazlenut in here. It almost tastes like peanut butter to me."

"You're changing the subject," I grumbled. "You're... oh, God. I'm boring, aren't I?"

"Never," Woohyun said loyally.

"No, I am. I've turned into one of those horrible people who just talks about their ex-boyfriend all the time, until nobody can stand to be around them and they don't have any friends..."

"Gwiboonie..."

"...and they start drinking alone, and talking to their pets, which I do anyway... oh God," I said, only half-faking a collapse into the table. "This is a disaster."

The manager hurried over. "Madame!" he cried. "Is everything all right?"

I straightened myself up, flicking bits of crumbs from Woohyun's scone from my dress. "Just fine," I said. He bustled off, and I turned back to Woohyun.

"When did I become an madame?" I asked mournfully. "I swear, the last time I was at a french cafe, they called me mademoiselle."

"Cheer up," said Woohyun, handing me the last of his scone. "You're going to find someone much better than Jonghyun, and you'll be happy, and I'll be happy, and everthing's going to be fine."

I was really feeling faux glasses for Onew and Woohyun in this chapter for some reason..

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-Minjee♥