(four)

The next day, things were awkward in the morning at home. It was a Friday and while having breakfast, neither my dad nor I talked. The morning and afternoon just passed. I was cranky again, snapped at the club members, apologized and wearily, came back home.

Even more wearily because Eunhyuk was walking with me.

“Jin Hee-ah, something wrong?”

“Nope.”

“… Something is wrong. Tell me.”

“Nope, everything’s fine.”

“Aish! Jin Hee! You always do this! You keep everything bottled up inside of you, you never let it spill! You know that being like that isn’t good, right?”

I stayed silent. I didn’t want to respond by saying something I’d regret.

“Jin Hee-ah,” his voice softened. “You can trust me with problems can’t you?”

I badly wanted to retort that I did trust him, but what he did made me cut those strings of trust. But I didn’t.

Finally, after noticing him gazing at me sadly for a pretty long 10 minutes, I sighed and gave in.

“It’s nothing Eunhyuk. Just the same, my dad won’t allow me to go to Seoul. Another stupid fight.”

“Oh,” he said and shoved his hands into his pockets. “How much are the savings now?”

“Ah… last time I counted, it was close to 15,000 won. But then, I have been saving since 10.”

“Woah! I’m sure you can get to Seoul and Jeju with that!” he exclaimed, wide eyed.

“Jeju?” I snorted. “Eunhyuk, you need more than that! Jeju is an expensive island! And anyways, going to Jeju isn’t my dream.”

“I know.” he said softly.

For a while we just walked in silence. Then the silence became unbearable.

So I decided to interrupt it by asking one of the most stupidest questions I could ever ask.

“So. How’re things with you and Shwi Sul?”

He slightly grinned and kicked a stone. “Stuff’s okay.”

“Hm.”

“Jin Hee-ah?”

“Yeap?”

“Do you remember what day Sunday is?”

Of course I knew what day Sunday was. The day we confessed to each other, two years ago. I wonder why he brought it up now that he had somebody else. Naturally, wasn't he supposed to forget it? And didn't he have any shame asking this? After all, we both knew who broke the relationship we had. Right, it was him.

I just decided not to reply to that.

“I’m home!” I said kicking open the door and hugging my mom who was in the kitchen.

“Welcome back Jin Hee. Oh right, your father wants to talk to you. So get it done with.” my mom said while washing dishes.

I grunted and dragged my feet to my dad’s office-room. I walked in.

He looked up from his work and told me to sit. Not that he has to tell me to sit. I sat.

“Jin Hee-ah, I’m reall-“

“I’m SORRY!” I bowed my head. “I didn’t really think at that time… and I even threw stuff on you. I'm sorry.”

He looked surprised for a minute and then his face broke into a relieved smile. “I’m glad. And I’m really sorry too. I didn’t think much about it.”

I went and gave him a hug.

After that, we spoke some random stuff for a little while and then, before I could go upstairs my dad called me.

“Jin Hee-ah, here, this. It fell down yesterday,” he stretched his hand out, holding something. I took it in my hand.

The bracelet. I turned it over and found that someone had attached two broken ends together so well, it was hard to tell it’d been broken. So this was what fell down yesterday when I'd stormed at my dad.

“Oh, dad… you didn’t have to fix this. But thanks.” I said and smiled.

“Ah, no, I didn’t fix it. It was the new staff member.” he smiled back.

“Eh? You mean… Donghae?” I was surprised. Really surprised.

“Yeah. I think he stayed up half the night to fix that. He looked really tired when he gave it to me this morning.”

Small tears stung the corners of my eyes at Donghae’s act. He didn’t really have to do that. This bracelet held memories I didn’t want to remember.

“I’m just going to the planetarium!” I yelled and ran out the door.

I ran, ran really fast. Why? Why did something like this have to be fixed? Why did Donghae have to stay up all night for something small like this? If he thought this was somehow precious to me... he's gotten it all wrong!

At that time, I don’t know why I ran. But I still did, because something in my heart was telling me to go over to him right then. And someplace in me, something felt warm.

“Donghae!” I burst out onto the rooftop, gasping for breath. Yeah, he was there with his telescope again. He looked alarmed when he saw me.

“What?! Something wrong?” he asked, standing up quickly.

“This.” I held up the dangling silver bracelet.

“Oh... um… I fixed it up. I hope it looks okay.” he said and grinned.

“No it’s NOT okay!” I cried and wiped off a few hot tears that had started to stream down my cheek.

“J-Jin Hee-ah? What’s wrong?!” he ran up, clearly more alarmed. He held my shoulders and shook me.

When I calmed down, he led me to the benches and I sat down. He said consoling stuff and finally I opened up. I told him that the bracelet was from Eunhyuk; I told him about Eunhyuk and me. All the time, he didn’t say a thing, but I felt as if a huge rock had been lifted off my chest.

Finally when I was finished, he sighed and smiled softly at me.

“Jin Hee-ah, come here.” he patted the space right next to him. I felt a bit embarrassed but sat close to him anyway.

“Here, focus using this knob.” and he made me look into the telescope.

What I saw through that just took my breath away. To actually see the moon, so close, so white and shining its light in all it’s glory… I even saw stars. It was just… so…

“You know why those stars are in their places?” he started, in his soft voice. “Because they have gravity. And because of gravity, they attract each other, so they stay put in those places. Except the moon. It chose a path around this earth. We’re all like this too, we get attracted by other people’s gravity… and when things hurt, we just stay rooted to that place, remembering all those times. But you know, you gotta learn to be like the moon. You have to stay strong and forget... and make your own path.” After this, he looked straight into my eyes.

He was… Donghae really made me realize a few things.

“T-thank you Donghae.”

“Anytime. I’m always here if you need me okay?” and he right royally, pulled me into a warm and cozy hug.

“Okay.”

Author's Note

(Oh so, hey there :D

I just updated chapters 3 and 4 today.  so this was all I was doing today, my Japanese text is lying unopened, untouched. I don't really care xD

so, tomorrow is (or more like it already IS - it's 1:30am, friday early morning here) FRIDAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

ARGH, I can't wait for break tomorrow!!

And thanks a lot to those who subscribed. I got some five or six subscribers today.

right, so 'night ne.)