(an excerpt from The Lunch Box)

III

“Please, Bo Mi-ya,”

Bo Mi avoided his gaze.  “Don’t talk to me. I hate you,” she unclasped her wrist from his hold and walked away, manning up herself so she wouldn’t cry. She had taken three steps when she was grabbed again, and was pushed against a wall.

“Please.” The boy had pleaded, and she wanted to melt on the spot. He had rested his hand against the wall and bent his arm to bring his face closer to her. “Listen.”

She had shut her eyes and let out this whimper. “Why…do you really have to?”

“I’m sorry. I know, I know…I’m very sorry,” he had said again and again. “But…please. I…I’ll come back,”

“When?” she had tried to sound angry, but it more went out like she was pleading.

Oh so sadly, the boy shook his head. He had no idea when. Tears started to gather in Bo Mi’s eyes. She wanted to beg him not to go; she was going to lose both her best friend and the one she loved. One by one, the tears skid down her cheek, and they were followed by a long stream of tears. “Don’t…don’t leave me,” she muttered.

In pity, he took possession of both her cheeks and pressed his forehead against hers. “I’m sorry, Bo Mi-ya,” he shut his eyes tight.

She sniffed, and put her hand on one of the boy’s, slowly screwing her eyes shut.

And with trembling, hesitant gestures, the two shared their first kiss.

Ew.

Bo Mi shuddered when she remembered.

She was still young back then, too young to even understand, when it happened to her. The tragedy that almost broke her life, if not for the people who loved her that helped her up.

Bo Mi could still clearly remember. As she sat there in her desk silently while not listening to what was being discussed, sight aimed at what was outside the window. Indeed, everything else seems so fascinating when you’re studying. Here she was, 16 years of age now, thinking that she’s just one step closer, yet away, from being a perfect lady. She thought she’s already moved on but now—why oh why did this have to happen? She was right from day one. Her paradise of comfort was only temporal. However she was going to face this challenge she knew not, but she promised herself she will never be as weak and as feeble as to how she bore with it before.

It was one of the times in a person’s life wherein they would have crisis on deciding what and how to feel. It was the age where they are naïve, impulsive, and hormonal all at the same time, and whatever nature throws at them they only have two choices: either grab it, or evade it.

So apparently despite of the cool nature of the girl Lee Bo Mi she was in no way holier than anyone else, that she was also a victim of the volatility of an adolescent in the progress of puberty. Other teenagers were going through choosing which dress to wear and how to bear with the feeling that the whole world was against them. Bo Mi had the greatest problem of suppressing her feelings for her best friend.

Two seats at her two o’clock was Peniel Shin, the transferee student whom she had met at the library. Bo Mi would perpetually catch sight of him whenever she would try to look at the teacher. He was always—always be in her peripheral vision, that’s why now she chose to just turn her head at the window, where she didn’t have to see him.

The girl heaved a sigh, almost really audible that the person seated in front of her turned his head, but quickly turned his head back to the front. Bo Mi resolved to stop cogitating on such matter. So she told herself to think of ‘Peminator’, her partner in the school project whom she knew not, except for the pseudonym that protected his true identity. He seemed nice, Bo Mi thought. Today she received spicy rice cakes from him, and it was kind of funny, really—it’s like he knew her. In truth Bo Mi really fancied, if not worshipped, spicy kinds of food. Though Peminator’s cooking tasted a little horrible, she decided to accept it with her whole heart; besides, her partner already told her through their first exchange of words that he had terrible cooking skills, albeit in the pressure of learning. The girl really couldn’t wait for the day when she’d met him in person.

***

프니엘: In my dream it’s noisy. There are intermittent shuffling sounds in the background, mixed with clanging sounds; tapping, like something is being repeatedly touching something hard. Telling myself to go back to sleep my body relaxes again; my breathing normalizes, my heart rate eases. However, as I command the noises in my dream to stop and for my apparition to change into another one, they don’t stop—the method doesn’t work. I try again, but no. Once more, but the same result. Adrenaline courses through my system because of the irritation; I really want to sleep—remain asleep. But, like something has plucked me out from my drowning in the quicksand of slumber, before I know it, my mind is fully awake.

Without difficulty, my eyes open. In fact I have no trouble adjusting my sight to the light; it’s as if I had never slept at all. I let my eyes roam around my surrounding and I find myself questioning, why is the ceiling different? I ask myself again about where I am—certainly this doesn’t look like my room back in Chicago; then I realize that I’m still at the dorm, having slept in the living room with the boys because we had to.

The sounds are still there.

So apparently it comes from my right as I turn my head there, aimed at the direction of the kitchen, and there I see easily the side view of the full body of a female, head angled down, sight aimed at something she’s chopping.

Se Na.

I get up from my lain position on the mattress without being noticed, and I clandestinely walk behind her in approach. It’s still very early in the morning, even our squirrel mom is still asleep, and here is our youngest “sister” already cooking.

I poke the back of her shoulder twice, and before she could turn her head I point my finger right at her face. When she glances, “Oh—”

Her cheek touches the tip of my finger.

Se Na quickly jerks away, laughing at my mischief and at herself for falling for it. “’Morning, Penpennie,”

“Good morning, Se Na-ssi,” I greet back. “What’s cooking?”

“Mushroom soup. Some foreign cuisine for the invalid,”

“Wow; you’re really living up to the stereotype of feeding a sick person with soup, you know that?” I jest.

She chuckles also, and replies, “Well he can eat solid food if he wants. But it will really, really hurt,”

“Really? Why so?”

“Mumps just really works that way; take it from the veteran,” she gives me a nonchalant flattening of the eyes which makes the statement even more convincing.

“Ah,” I smile. That’s when we hear someone moan from the room—

“Yeobooooo!”

“Coming!” Se Na quickly answers. “Just a moment!” she postpones her chopping of the mushrooms and wipes her hands on her apron, and then walks into the room. I follow after her. When she reaches Ilhoon’s side she kneels down and gathers the patient’s head in her arms.

“’Yeobo’?” I question, with a bewildered rise of one brow. What in the world is going on?

“I don’t know,” Se Na laughs. She seems to be okay with this. I swear, if Se Na was my girlfriend I’d pummel the guy who’d call her that, regardless if he was sick or not. “He’s been on it since this morning. I mean, 3 AM. I think he’s dream-speaking,” I think she’s having fun seeing this silly side of her oppa.

Whoa, 3 AM. Even our squirrel mother wakes up at 6. Actually even now, only Se Na and I are the only ones awake at this house. It’s a few minutes past 5. How long has Se Na been up, really? Did she even sleep? “Is he still having a fever?”

“As of now he isn’t. But later, surely, I think the fever will return. It was like this when I had mumps, too; it keeps on fluctuating. That’s what’s been happening to him since yesterday,”

I nod. “Is there anything I can do?”

“Shhh, go back to sleep. It’s alright, oppa,” she soothes his forehead when he was whimpering. She looks at me. “Just take care of yourself,” aww, Se Na, aren’t you the cutest thing on Earth? I feel sort of touched at that remark but I avoid flattering myself with it.

“I mean, in cooking. Maybe I could assist you? Everyone’s still asleep,” I insist.

What part exactly in my sentence made her smile, I don’t know. But when I say that a smile slowly spreads in Se Na’s face, and she stood up from the bed. “Okay. Come with me,”

“Put all the contents of this can there,” she points at the cooking specimen on the stove. “Add a little cream,”

“Wait, why are you still adding mushrooms when this is already a can of mushroom soup?” I query.

Se Na jerks her shoulders upward. “Well, I prefer having more mushrooms,”

“So you’re not just Fire Tooth, you’re also some Mushroom Tooth?” I suggest.

Apparently she finds this funny that she giggles. “Sort of. Maybe. Look, I think that’s already hot enough. Put the soup now,” she directs, and I obediently follow.

She observes while I put in the contents of the can, that it makes me more conscious in doing a better job. “Good,” she remarks, and hands me the can of cream. “Now put in just a little bit of it in that,” I do as she says. For a careful while we’re silent, and that’s when I break it by saying—

“We’re shooting today.”

“I know.” she looks at me for the half of a second and puts her eyes back on the soup. Maybe she didn’t get it. So I restart—

“We’re filming Chapter 3 today.”

Se Na nods. After a five-second delay she remembers, and then gasps. “Oh my gosh,” she puts her hand on , looking down at the floor in horror. “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh...”

I suddenly want to join her in what she’s doing. Before I merely took it lightly, it was very far from my horizon, but now do I just realize how close it really is. It’s like it came near without my guard. “No,” I gulp. How am I supposed to broach this? Se Na looks like she’s gonna pass out. It’s only a matter of time before I beat her to it, really. “I, I mean, uh. Maybe we can ask them that we won’t do it?” I suggest, making the mistake of raising my tone at the last syllable. Wrong. This is so wrong.

“Oh my gosh,” the color on her face is draining out both of her hands are on her cheeks. “I don’t know what to do anymore,”

“Calm down, Se Na-ssi!” I exclaim, turning off the stove. I walk towards her and hold her shoulders. “I mean, I wouldn’t—I mean, well, I—we already, um. I,” dammit, I couldn’t form a proper sentence in my head!

Se Na somehow snaps out of it, and looks at me in the eyes. “Penpennie…I…I don’t want my first kiss to go like this…” she says with absolute horror.

I know that she doesn’t mean not wanting to kiss me, but somehow, the sentence makes me internally flinch. Wow, that pinches a little, Se Na-ssi, I want to tell her. “I know, I know. I respect you, okay? I’ll tell director-nim we won’t do it,”

She shakes her head, the crestfallen expression still not vacating it. “But…but the director’s orders…are absolute…”

Shaking my head, I realize that of course it is. But maybe we could ask for a little…deference? I fix myself, and manfully take the responsibility of assuring her. Though bluffing, I say, “Don’t worry, he’ll understand,”

“Or we could use some camera angle tricks or something,” she laughs, and that’s when I know my tactic is effective. But the smile quickly disappears as quickly as it appeared. “But still…you’d have to stick your face onto mine.”

I try to just joke out the hurt. “I seem really that disgusting to you that you don’t want me to get anywhere near you?”

She shakes her head, alarmed. “Of course not! I mean…” her shoulders slouch while she turns her back on me, and slowly walks to the sink. “I just don’t know…about…that much skinship with…guys,”

 “What about Sungjae, though?” I join her in front of the sink.

“I mean, aside from him.” She looks cautiously at the sleeping derps, and she lowers her voice. “I told you before, he’s my only friend,”

I try to think of what to reply to this. Looking down at the sink, I discover something, that I ask, “Oh, who used the serving tray last night?”

Se Na glances at it and sort of laughs. “Sungjae.”

“What would he need a serving tray for?”

 “For me.” she winks.

“What.” It leaves my mouth open in a state of confusion, and then I see the glass accompanying the tray, and the white liquid in the glass, which is obviously milk diluted by water. “Oh—!” it sends a happy sensation to my stomach, making me laugh. “But—but how?”

Her shoulders quake in laughter. “We talked, and he gave me a glass of milk.”

“You should’ve done that a long time ago,” I smirk. “Really,”

“Ah, I don’t think so. Maybe last night—or 1 am this morning was really the proper time. He saw that I couldn’t sleep, so he offered me milk.”

“And that got you?”

“Of course not,” she elbows me. “I was just really…touched, at the gesture. His penitence was enough for me to forgive him; I’m not that abusive, you know. But I made it crystal clear to him to not do that again because that really…hurt.” She looks down, and there’s a tender smile on her face.

Somehow, I feel self-contented at this. Subliminally the other guys have no idea what the cause of the best friends’ quarrel was, but I do. Because Se Na confided in me. She shared something—a secret, in fact—not to mention a sacred one. “Congratulations, Se Na-ssi,” I say.

“Why thank you,” she responds sweetly. “And about that, Penpen,” she resumes chopping the mushrooms. I go to the stove and turn the knob, setting it ablaze. “No need for formalities, really.”

“Oh?”

“You can just call me, ‘Se Na-yaaa’,” here she cups one side of and calls her name in a falsetto voice. A few more chops and she’s done with the mushrooms. She walks past me and spills all of them into the pot. “You know me all too well for you to be formal with me.”

I smile. “I’ll keep that in mind, Se Na-ya,” I feel giddy inside, but at the same time comfortable.

“You’re learning fast,” she remarks, and folds her arms while the white cream gobbles up all the mushrooms she’s put. We stand in front of the stove for a long, silent minute, somehow fascinated by how the soup is being cooked.

Honestly she’s cooked quite a lot. Maybe she’s cooked some for us too? I don’t know. Yesterday Ilhoon hadn’t eaten for the rest of the day so he must be really hungry. And Se Na says she likes it with more mushrooms, so she must be eating too. But really that looks—

“Yes?” I croak, blinking, quite nervous because she’s looking at me all of a sudden. I mean, staring at me wide-eyed.

Se Na decreases the gap between our faces.

“Is there…something on my face?” I swallow.

No answer. There’s a crease between her brows and she’s getting closer by every second. I tilt away, not sure about what she’s going to do.

“W-w-what are you doing, Se Na?” I’ve tilted for a few degrees already I’m creating an acute angle.

She stops, just when her nose is about to touch mine. “Just testing how your face would feel like on mine.”

“What?”

She looks away. “I just thought practice makes perfect.”

My lower lip juts outward in thought. “You…you’re practicing for the…you know?”

Nodding twice, she sighs. “At least my first kiss is going to be stolen by someone I know,”

“Whoa. You really worry about that? Sungjae’s right over there. Go and kiss him.” Is it just me or I suddenly sound…snide?

Se Na just shrugs. “No. I’m good.”

Just in time, the alarm in Minhyuk-hyung’s phone rings, which causes him to stir, and everyone who’re sleeping beside him. Or maybe not everyone—Sungjae is still busy snoring like the bear he is. One by one, everyone rises from their beds, some reluctant, some still very sleepy, some not knowing what world they are in. Mother squirrel rubs his eyes and smiles when he sees the sight in the kitchen (I’d never cease to wonder how his fans would react if they see this). “Good morn, sweetie,”

“Morning, oppa,” ‘Sweetie’ blithely smiles.

“Good morning hyung,” I say.

Minhyuk-hyung walks and, with whatever is in his mind, encloses our muse in a hug. “You shouldn’t be cooking breakfast.” He somehow slumps into her, maybe because he’s still really sleepy. “You’re a visitor,” he draws out and starts taking out the ingredients for the boys’ breakfast.

“Ah, aniyo, aniyo; it’s alright. I’m watching over Ilhoon-oppa, after all,” she turns to look at Sungjae who’s still in a state of coma. “Is he always the last one to wake up?”

“He and Ilhoon. Sungjae’s the worst, though; he has the worst sleeping habit.” I chuckle.

Se Na giggles, and walks to her best friend, kneels down, and starts scratching his arm. “Jaejaeeee,” she coaxes.

Sungjae mutters something that goes along the lines of pumpkin soup and yellow side dishes.

His best friend laughs. “Jaejae, wakey-wakey; rice and kimchi,”

“The two have made up already?” all drowsiness escapes Minhyuk-hyung as he asks me with flabbergasted eyes.

I nod twice.

This seems to be quite a spectacle inside the dorm that, in this very early hour in the morning, everyone is intrigued, but pleased, that they’re smiling. They all exchange glances and then look at me, and I give them a nod and a clandestine thumb-up.

How? Hyunsik-hyung mouths at me.

Long story. Tell you later. I mouth back.

“Umfff,” Sungjae stirs in his position.

“Yoooooook, wake up. We still have to be early today,” Se Na whispers in his ear, but when he doesn’t budge, sighs in exasperation, and takes both of his hands to pull him out of the bed. I think the boy’s already awake but purposely makes himself heavy, that she’s forced to dive down on the bed, or on top of him, exactly.

“Mmmorning, princess,” the guy cheekily smiles back, with sleepy eyes and rough voice, while his best friend’s chin is on his chest.

“Gaaaaah, you sneaky cat. Wake up now, really!” Se Na snorts and pokes a finger on his forehead. “But yes, good morning, too,” Se Na picks herself up from her position.

Sungjae raises an arm, gesturing Se Na to pick him up.

“Aish, really—” she grabs his arm and together, they walk to the kitchen.

“Let’s hear it for the best friends! They’ve already made up!” Eunkwang-hyung cheers, and we all follow his example. The pair just laughs.

I’d kind of miss Se Na, maybe, but for me, seeing them together again is much better. Before my day has even officially started, it’s already pleasantly promising.

Today is a fine day.

fluff be with you! HEHEHE Sungjae is a terrible flirt don't you think

ah, anyway, TLB's third chapter is kind of short, right? Don't worry, it'll be continued next chapter (no one seems to be really curious by the storyline of it, haha). 

oh, I have something important to say. You know, about last chapter, I hope you learned something. Make peace with your friends, okay. treasure them. these are some words from someone who'll be apart from her friends in two months' time.

and I had finally used my self-authored favorite quote last time. "Words are clumsy, but silence can also drive people apart." HAHAHA. TACKYYY.

now the greatest question. 

PenNa: to kiss or not to kiss? :p

I'll try to update. Encouragements are highly recommended.lol

I hope you had a good read! see you soon!

-b