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Lee Changsub

I owe you my entire life.

<<>>

I was twelve when Changsub came into my life. He was the new kid in town, whose family was from Seoul and they moved to Busan, and lived in the same neighbourhood as mine. Our houses were very near to each other, he basically moved to the one, empty house, in front of ours, across the little street.

I met him one day, after my mom and I came back from our grocery shopping. It was evening, and I could still clearly remember, what he had worn on that particular day. He was wearing a hideous, oversized, orange-coloured shirt, with an oversized pair of jeans. He looked goofy and dorky. I didn’t even like him – one bit.

“Hoya-ah, say hi to your new friend.” My mom told me to greet him, tapping my shoulder. I stood quiet, pursing my lips, and I stared hard at him – for no particular reasons.

When I didn’t extend my hand for a handshake, Changsub did it first. He smiled a weird smile to me, and offered me his handshake.

“Hi, my name is Changsub. Nice to meet you, Hoya.”

He did a mistake, right at that point. People were only allowed to call me Hoya, if I gave them the permission.

So I snapped, and I glared – before I accepted his handshake.

“Howon.” I corrected him. “You’re only allowed to call me Hoya, if we’re close.”

<<>>

I did everything that I could to avoid Changsub – but he, on the other hand, was rather insistent on trying to become my friend.

I came across him at the playground, one evening. He was playing with his helicopter toy, and I was too engrossed playing with the monkey bars. I heard that doing monkey bars could help you to grow, so that was exactly what I was trying to do. I wanted to grow taller.

“Hoya-ah, do you always do this every evening?” He approached me with a question. I was still hanging and swinging from one bar to another.

I only replied him, when I reached the other side of the monkey bars, wiping the dirt off my hands.

“Howon.” Once again, I corrected him. “Yes, this is what a real man does.” I replied him with somewhat a cold tone.

He chuckled slightly at my reply, which caused me to throw a deadly glare at him.

For a while, he was quiet - then he came back to become that annoying Changsub again.

“Do you want to play this?” He offered me his helicopter toy. When I didn’t answer him, he came closer to me and gave me the remote control, instead.

“Here, you can play this.”

I stared at the remote control, and for some reasons, I couldn’t decline his offer. So, I took it and skimmed through the buttons. I saw it before on television, so I sort of knew how to play it.

It didn’t take long for me to familiarize myself with the buttons. With a slight push of the accelerator button, I could see the helicopter flew high up to the sky. I found myself gasping out of admiration from time to time.

Changsub and I stayed a little longer playing with the helicopter on that evening.

I’ve always wanted a helicopter toy, and Changsub was the first boy who was willing to share his toys with me.

<<>>

We weren’t exactly friends, and I didn’t exactly allow him to call me Hoya yet, although every once in a while, I didn’t really mind it when he started to call me Hoya, oftenly.

“Does your mom know that you’re here?” He asked me with a frown. His bag pack looked somewhat heavy and almost too big for a small boy like him. I always think that Changsub made himself looked like a turtle and God knows, what on earth did he put inside his stuffy bag and this was exactly one of the reasons why, I didn’t really like him in the first place. He had a strange sense of fashion for a growing boy and just being seen together with him at school, was already enough to mortify a cool guy like me.

By the way, we were at an old coal mine, somewhere a little far off from the school. I liked the place, because it was peaceful and I enjoyed swimming at the river. The place was my territory, my own little place to escape from the reality of life, that I sometimes abhorred.

“Nope.” I simply shrugged and walked a little faster than him. “You should go home.” I told him.

“But Hoya, this place is sort of dangerous.”

“I’ve been here for numerous times, smart kid.” I snapped him in an aggravating tone. Changsub was a nice kid, but sometimes, it bothered me how he would talk too much that it gave me a headache.

“If you say one more word again, then you should just go home and stop following me around.”

That shut him up for a while – at least until I decided to jump off from the bridge for a swim.

“Hoya! Are you crazy?” He yelled at me, but being the stubborn one, I shrugged him off, took off my uniform and pants, and stood right at the edge of the old panel’s bridge.

“This is what a real man does.” I said coolly, before I bade him with a salute and jumped off.

I was always the bold one, I always loved challenges and there weren’t a single thing that I was scared of.

But I guess sometimes, timidness is what it takes to lead a life.

The last thing I heard was my name being shouted from afar.

Then everything went blank and the silence was like death to me. 

Since I have an early day off from classes today, I managed to write a simple update. I hope I won't disappoint you guys with the story ^^

Aejiecha & dinobunny, aww thank you for the compliments :) and i think you guys got it right.

eternalove5: awww thank you bb <3 hope you get well soon ~