성재:  The vibrant, fiery red curly hair is being breezed wildly by the wind, making the tresses a beautiful curtain of locks. This happens before my eyes in somewhat slow, mesmerizing  motions and finally, when the girl who owns them stands straight, tilting her head sideward in grumpy grace, “What do you want?” she asks; the ends of her brows together.

The boy who stands before her takes a moment to answer. Maybe just like me, he’s mesmerized by the pretty girl. “Hello.” He says, a very faint vestige of cockiness present in his tone.

Se Na, or who is disguised as Bo Mi as of the moment, merely flattens her eyes and replies, in a monotone of exasperation, “Hi.”

Like he’s been overcome by a certain sense of joy, the lead male character smiles widely, very much close—or maybe this really is actual—to how he smiles when he is genuinely pleased. “It was nice meeting you,” he says, and bows a little, before he walks out first.

The dark expression on Bo Mi’s face shades into something more displeased. I try to imagine how Se Na would react if some stranger—just like how Peniel-hyung’s character did in this story, would randomly say hello to her out of nowhere and for no apparent reason and walk out of the conversation first. Seeing how Se Na portrays Bo Mi right now, I realize that this is how my best friend would react also. Not confused, but annoyed. The more I look at Se Na the more I confuse her with Bo Mi; and the more I look at Bo Mi the more do I confuse her with Se Na.

I just never seem to get this thought out of my mind: Bo Mi is Se Na.

“Alright, cut!” the director says, and the flap’s clicking sound is heard across the air, signifying the end of the scene. The director says the scene is now done and that we should proceed to another one. The crew moves into a different set and while they’re at it, Se Na and my hyung take a rest.

“I have one question,” Se Na says, just within my earshot, as she and hyung walk to have a drink. “Is portraying your character that hard?”

“Hm?” hyung thinks about this for a while. “Not really; honestly I just need to do some few adjustments since my character’s qualities are slightly different from mine,”

“How so?” here I slowly walk to them.

“Peniel in The Lunch Box is a bit more cockier than the real one,” Donggeun-hyung answers.

Before I could congratulate Se Na for yet another job well done, my other hyungs suddenly swarm around her; in a seemingly animal-maul fashion, and Se Na immediately drowns in love. Changsub-hyung takes possession of Se Na’s cheeks while Hyunsik-hyung and Eunkwang-hyung grin stupidly. “Se Na-ssiiiii!”

“Oh my god, what?!” my best friend chokes, showing an annoyed reaction, but I think my hyungs don’t mind it that way. For the weeks that they’ve been with Se Na I don’t know—maybe they’ve just really grown used and fond to such interaction. Se Na has a pleasant attitude, really; but sometimes she just doesn’t feel like showing it.

“Nothing; we’re just proud of you,” Eunkwang-hyung laughs, and ruffles her hair affectionately.

Here Se Na does notice that I am around. When she looks at me my legs automatically lead me closer to where she stands and when I’m at the reach of her arm she grabs me, to wedge herself out of the dominance of the guys. “Jae, kindly protect me from those es,” she says, partly concealing her body behind me, like she’s using me as shield.

Looking over my shoulder I just grin, and tell her, “Well you seem to be very close with these es,” while pointing my hyungs with my thumb.

“They obviously haven’t told you, have they?” Se Na counters.

“Tell me what?”

“Just the other day they ambushed me in my house,”

“Oh?” I chuckle, and look at the guys for confirmation. They nod and smile. “And what did they do there?”

“Nothing important, really; they said they just wanted to pay me a visit,”

“We said we wanted to get closer!” Changsub-hyung somewhat protests.

“More like freeloaded,” my best friend snorts.

We all break out in a healthy barrel of laughs, and Se Na retells to me on how Eunkwang-hyung, Hyunsik-hyung, and Changsub-hyung’s visit to her house went. She asked me how did they get her address, then I remember I gave it to them. So that’s how, Se Na sighed.

By the time the next scene is to be filmed we all resolve to watch together the scene, save for Se Na, Changsub-hyung and Minhyuk-hyung who will film it. We all sit diligently in a row of chairs and watch our mates do their work. Beside me is where Peniel-hyung is seated and while we watch, he is the one I’m watching. He does a good job wearing a pokerface—well, that’s how it should be; but I can’t help expect something more. I start to doubt the credibility of my theory that he has a crush on my best friend. I wait and wait, but nothing happens. I don’t know that I’ve been staring at him for too long until he turns his head and queries, askance, “Yes?”

I avoid his gaze as quickly as I could, and refocus my attention back to the scene being filmed. My face is getting hot. “N-nothing.” I stammer, blinking several times.

But hyung really knows me. “Alright, Sungjae. Tell me,” he smirks.

“Nothing!” I reason, avoiding his gaze.

He elbows me lightly and giggles, “You were boring holes into my face with your gazes. How could that be nothing?”

I choke on my breath at that, and just make these wild motions of the hands that pertain I want this topic closed. “Nothing, really!”

“You could always tell me, you know.”

“I can’t tell you!”

“Why?”

“Because…” my words fail me. “Because…nothing. It’s nothing, believe me!”

I know he knows that it’s not nothing. But hyung just concedes; he knows that even forcing me will not squeeze the truth out of me. He respects this and remains quiet.

I want to know it by myself, and confirm it by myself. Why, it would be improper for me to just be like, “Hyung, do you like Se Na?” at him, now, wouldn’t it? I could do that. I could always do that. But not now. I’ll try to be the cupid of this love story without the help of anything or anyone.

The day fast forwards, and at late night we conclude the shooting, ending with the first few parts of the second episode. On the way home, I don’t go with the guys; instead I go with Se Na to her home, something that I haven’t done for maybe a few days already. Though tired, we do a lovely walk under the stars, feeling as if the world is just equal to me and her again.

“You tired?” I ask, while she looks up at the sky, with her eyes as wide as an energetic person’s during the day.

“Oh, who wouldn’t be,” she sighs, her shoulders sagging. We’re walking at an excruciating slow pace and I want to get to her apartment as soon as possible so she could rest. I stop at one step, and unclasp her hooked arm around mine. I walk to her front, my back facing her, and kneel on the ground. “Hop on, princess,” I invite, tapping the part of my back that my hand could reach.

“We’re not six years old, Jae; I’m not as light as you think I was,” she grunts.

“Well what’s your mass?” I ask confidently.

“The last time I checked…forty-six?”

I snigger. “The dumb-bells I carry at the gym are heavier.”

Se Na scoffs at this, and forces the corners of downward while pretending not to laugh, with her hand covering it. “I knew you were always conceited, alright,”

“Just—come on,” I roll my eyes with a smile. Se Na obediently positions herself on my back, and I lift her legs. She encircles her arms around my neck and puts her chin on my shoulder. “You’re not really that heavy, Fire Tooth,”

“That’s what you’d first say. But don’t blame me when you have body-pains tomorrow, okay?” she says, right on my ear. I start the march to her home.

“Yeah, right,”

But contrary to what Se Na says, her body mass doesn’t burden me that much. In the middle of our walk she keeps on asking if my body aches yet, and I answer her consistently with a No.

“Why do you keep on asking?” I say, after she inquires for the fifth time.

“Well…I…I’m really heavy,” she timidly answers.

“You aren’t. Have you even asked me what my mass is?”

“What is it?”

“Twenty-two more than yours.”

“Oh?”

“Yuh,” I nod once. “So don’t think like you’re the heaviest load in the world because obviously you haven’t met the weights at the gym,”

Se Na gives no answer for this.

After a moment of silence, I restart, “Se Na-ya?”

“Hm?”

I don’t know why but the urge to ask the question suddenly takes me over. “Even if you’d like another guy…would you…”

“Hm?”

“Would you…”

“Would what?”

“Would you still marry me?”

I could feel her body jerk slightly in a sensation of surprise. “What do you mean?”

“Well…it could be among my hyungs, Se Na. It could be one of the billions of guys in the world. It’s not like we’re a hundred percent sure that we’re the ones fated to be together, right,” we’re walking by the Han River now. It’s really nice, this place. I walk on a slower pace to prolong the conversation.

“Do you hear yourself, Jae? Because all I hear is gibberish,”

I turn my head, and when I do, I realize that her face is actually really close. “Gibberish? You know I’m just saying.”

“Well if you do want an answer,” she looks at my nose. “The answer really lies in you, Sungjae. Even if I’d like another guy, would you still marry me? I don’t know how it seems like to you, really, but for all these years I’ve programmed myself that I’d marry you when the time comes,”

I blink several times. “I’d marry you if you’re not married to that guy.”

“Exactly.”

I my brows.

“That’s the point, Jae.” Se Na clears up, her arms now removing themselves from around my neck and she puts her hands on my shoulders. “I just like that guy. Maybe there’d be a point when I will love him, but—“ she narrows her eyes and looks at me dubiously. “Wait a minute. Are you trying to get rid of me?”

“What? No!”

She clucks her tongue. “Really?”

“Really!”

“Really?”

“Really!”

“Really?”

“I’d even kiss you to prove it!”

I get a face gag for this, and that’s when Se Na stops. “No need for that. Fine,” she snorts. “Now where was I. Oh, yeah. Love,” she looks at the horizon. “I might love that guy, Sungjae, but even if that time comes I think I’d still choose you.”

“Why so? You love the guy,”

“Oh so you really are trying to get rid of me. Put me down,” she frowns.

“Seriously!” I whine, and reason with her that I am just absolutely curious. “Just answer me straight and stop twisting my words!”

This alarms her a bit; I might have sounded stronger than I intended to be. So she fixes her attitude, and after some peace, finally answers, “If I love him, I’d still choose you. Now don’t ask why; I just couldn’t imagine a life spent with a guy that’s other than you, Yook Sungjae,”

It would have been another thing if she called me with just ‘Jae’ or ‘Sungjae’, but with my full name as the conclusion of her sentence just gave me this sense of flattery, or maybe more than that—it involves this funny feeling in my stomach that rather made me half-unease and happy at the same time. Think about it—even the sentence itself is so full, and I’ve no doubt about Se Na’s honesty. When she says it, she means it. She’s so damn honest sometimes it’s obscene. “But…just know, Se Na. don’t think I’m giving you away or getting rid of you or whatever…” I carefully form the sentence in my head. “If you’d really come to a point when it’s not me who you want anymore, it’ll be alright for me,”

Se Na looks at me like she’s trying to read through my soul. Sad thing for her is, she can’t, because my statement is sincere in the purest way possible. It’s not ambiguous even in the very least. Not even some reverse-psychology technique. It’s true. All true.

The rest of the walk comes in a silent one, but the hush is kind of obtrusive. When we reach her apartment I have already straightened my thoughts. While she unlocks her door, I tell her, in a steady voice, without really looking into her eyes, “Sorry.”

“For?” she push-opens the door and walks in, with me in tow.

“I was really annoying a while ago.”

“No,” Se Na puts her sweater on a chair. “You were just curious.”

On a table nearby, I see a compilation of papers being arranged less-than-neatly. I walk to it and pick the folder up. “Thank you. Because honestly I also don’t know what I was saying back there,”

Se Na stands beside me and takes a peek on what I’m looking at.

“What are these?” I query, glancing at her.

“My works.”

“These? All of these?” I gasp, making a quick flip of the pages with my thumb. It’s as thick as a book!

“Yeah. That’s a compilation of all my stories,”

“Can I read them?”

She looks at them for a second of two, like she’s trying to remember something. “Okay; you may.”

“Can I take it home?”

“Only if you wouldn’t let the other guys see it.”

“Why can’t they?”

“It’d be embarrassing, Jae.”

“Why?”

“Other writers would say that, too; they don’t want people who are too familiar with them reading their stories.”

“Okay, okay,” I bob my head twice. “Thank you,”

“Sure. Are you going back to your dorm?”

I turn my head to where the clock should be, and I realize that I really should. “Oh, it’s late. Yeah.”

“Bye, then,” she puts her hand on my right cheek and plants a kiss on the other. “Good night, Sungjae.”

I smile. “Good night, Se Na-ya,”

“Bye,”

“Bye.” And I close the door, and head to where my home is.

By the time I get home, I don’t sleep yet. I spend an entire hour reading a seven-chapter lachrymose story by Se Na, and aside from the excellent plot, her writing—her writing is just flawless. I’ve always known that Se Na has a really wild imagination, but now that we’re grown-up, I dare say she could rival the ideas of those people who are well-known in literature. So smart, so talented. Pyo Se Na. my best friend is perfect. I read until my eyes fail me, and I resort to sleep, having just read a really good bed-time story.

The next day, the shooting continues. Yet again it’s a break time for us, and, after the talk of last night I feel like I’ve cleared up my mind a little bit. The wondering on how it would be if the future was not half as much as how we have planned still plagues me sometimes, but I choose to shrug it off. Come what may, that’s how the saying goes. Who am I to decide, really?

I look for Se Na across the set, but she could be found nowhere. No, this is a little unlikely. If she were anywhere near here she could be found easily. This could only mean one thing, then: Se Na is somewhere, where she wants to be alone.

As if governed by some instinct, I study where would be the most secluded place here in the set. Right. The rooftop. I’m not totally sure about it but nonetheless I resolve to go there, and after several flights of stairs I feel like my energy’s depleting. I climb a couple more, until I am only one staircase away from the rooftop. Oh, there she is. Going down the stairs at the same time. Such luck. But seemingly there’s something wrong when I see her going down with eyes half-closed, and her steps are languid; and I scream her name before she completely faints and fall down the staircase.