I don’t see Jonghyun again until the next day. Honestly, I’m not too hurt about his leaving me. I’m more confused and concerned. If he had to leave because of what happened over the weekend, then I want to know why that something happened in the first place.

When I see him in the morning, he has bandages over his face. He raises his hand in a subtle salute to my presence, and then he drops himself on the chair with a weary sigh. He sits for a long time, simply staring at the table as I do work and try not to be anxious about his silence.

I’m used to my own silence. But when other people are silent, it scares me.

He coughs suddenly, and I jump, surprised by the sound. He glances at me and gives me a distraught smile, and then he says, “Life is a piece of crap, isn’t it?”

I raise my head to get a better look at him. He goes on, “It isn’t fair at all. People get hurt … sometimes for no reason. Or a stupid reason. And it’s so dang infuriating that I could just – “ he stops and pounds a fist against the table. Leaning in, he asks, “Mina … what would you say? If you could talk to me.”

I search his eyes, wondering why he’s asking me such a difficult question, wondering why he has to make me feel both insecure and safe at the same time. “Don’t you get sick of it? Not being able to say anything? If somebody came up to you and insulted you, you wouldn’t be able to say anything back. Or if someone were in danger, you couldn’t even say anything.” I think of my mom. My heart constricts. “And then there are people out there, people who can speak but don’t have the freaking guts to, people who can do things but think they can’t … people like me.” He stares long and straight into my eyes. The emotion in his irises is so heavy that I can feel my heart being drowned by the immeasurable weight. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I shouldn’t have said that … “ He reaches out to touch my face, making me aware that my eyes have begun to brim with petty tears. He pulls back, looks away, and says, “I’ve got a letter for you. I wrote it last night.” He unfolds a paper from his pocket, and with hands that shake for a reason I don’t understand, gives it to me.

I rewrote this twice, it starts, because I didn’t know if there was a particular way to say these things, and I didn’t want to make it sound like some invaluable thing, or a document that had to be signed. Or whatever.

“I’m getting water,” Jonghyun says, and leaves.

I’ve never really written ‘about me’s’ or anything. So here we go, I guess.

I’m a kid who likes to take things. I do it a lot. I feel like that’s how I am, you know, because in my life, people took things from me all the time – my parents were taken from me, my school was taken from me (although I don’t really care about that), my pride – but it’s really all my fault. I try to place the blame on somebody else but it doesn’t even make sense.

If you’re wondering what happened over the weekend, I can’t really tell you. But just know that I got my face hurt for a good reason. And I want you to understand that. Because if you don’t, then I was being stupid.

I guess that’s it. My life is pretty simple. There isn’t much to talk about.

I fold the paper again and tuck it into the pocket of my jacket. I want to keep this.

“Here,” Jonghyun says, coming back with two cups of water. I take a drink from one cup, and then set it aside. “So did I do it right? The letter?” His eyes investigate the table for his letter. “Hey, I think it was really unfair I went first, you know? I don’t write letters. I had no idea what I was supposed to do.” His cheeks start blooming red, and he gulps his drink rapidly.

I smile at him. I ponder if I’ve ever really smiled at him before, the way I am doing now. This is how I’m telling him that I understand. I understand his letter, I understand its obscure meaning, and I will continue to understand what he tells me, for as long as he’s willing to confide in me.

He smiles at me, too, and says, “Let’s not do this today. Let’s have fun.” He gets up from his chair and pushes my wheelchair out of the room and into the hallway. “Let’s tour the place. You want to?” I nod, and we start all the way from the beginning, to where the check-in desk is. The lady watches us with scrutiny, but Jonghyun flashes her a grin to dispel her worries away.

We start exploring the first floor, the only floor I’ve ever been. We pass offices and patients, volunteers and full-time workers. We pass children who are being taught sign language in a class, and many, many closed doors, off-limits to the enrolled. In reality, there isn’t much to see – mostly people and furniture – but Jonghyun is making me feel as if we are discovering Times Square.

“Hey, hey, look at this,” he would say with excitement, and then proceed to show me something I’ve seen before. He’s smiling so much that I question if it’s natural. Doesn’t it hurt to smile, with his face beat up like that? I’m sure it wasn’t only his face that was hurt. There are times when I see him uncomfortably shift from one leg to the other, or when he stops moving to focus on that one pain that bothers him. I’m sure his discomfort doesn’t match the discomfort I feel when I worry about him, but I hope he gets better, soon.

“This is your chance to make friends,” he tells me. “Besides me. See?” Jonghyun points to a group of people that look to be about my age and says, “When I’m not here, you can chill out with them. You wanna meet them?” I nod, only because he expects me to, and he pushes me toward the group.

We make a round of introductions. I’m not very good at remembering names, so I only know them by how they look, or how they dress. There’s a girl with really cool red glasses, a guy with a black cord around his neck, another guy with eyelashes longer than any female, and a girl with a pixie hair cut.

“Remember their faces,” Jonghyun orders. “They’re your friends from now on.” He guides me back to the room, where he relaxes in the seat. “Oh hey, it’s lunch time,” he says when he sees the clock. How is it that that much time passed already? “I’ll get us lunch,” he says. “Stay here.” He leaves, and I watch him go.

As I wait for him to bring back food, I take out his letter and read it again. I think I’m going to hang this in my room.

“Excuse me? Mina?”

I turn my head to see Jonghyun’s grandma standing in the doorway. She waves and comes inside with a phone in her hands. “Is Jonghyun here?”

I shake my head and point outside of the room. She nods, but instead of going to find him, she sits beside me. How have you been? She asks.

Okay, I say. After some hesitation, I ask, Is Jonghyun okay?

She sighs. I don’t know. He won’t tell me what happened. But … he got accepted to another school.

What?

Another school decided to take him in, she admits. But he says he doesn’t want to go. He wants to keep coming here even though he finished his community service hours last week.

I consider this. Jonghyun finished last week? So his coming here for the past five days is because he wanted to, not because he had to?

His grandma smiles secretively. He didn’t want me to tell you that.

I can feel the letter in my pocket through the layers of thread protecting it from my skin. He kept coming … for me? I insert my hand in my pocket to feel the letter and remind myself that everything he had done recently was through his own volition.

“Grandma?” Jonghyun walks in with two trays of food. He sets it on the table, and then, seeing his phone in his grandma’s hands, takes it from her. “Oh. You came to give me this?”

“You forgot it in your room,” she tells him. “I wanted to hand it to you before I go to a meeting.”

“What meeting?”

“They’ve got a meeting for the main benefactors,” she says. “Don’t worry, I won’t bother you guys.” She pats me on the shoulder. “Have fun.” She exits the room, and Jonghyun takes her chair.

“Come on, eat up,” he says. I take the spoon and fork and start to eat the familiar food. We chew in silence, not conversing or even looking at each other. Jonghyun finishes first and waits for me to finish my food so he can take it away. He gets up to put the trays away, and then he comes back with a lollipop in his mouth. “Free lollipops,” he says, giving me a purple one. “You have to teach me some more, you know, sign language stuff.”

I show him how to say two things today – how was your day and it was good. We practice it for a while, and Jonghyun messes up, but he looks like he’s having a fun time doing it. He didn’t bring the jar today, but he promises to put the sentences in the jar when he gets home.

“I’ll make sure to learn all of them,” he says, “so that you can write me a letter this time.”

That was our agreement, and I’m looking forward to it. I want to write him a letter, too. My letter might possibly be a lot longer than his, but I hope that when my time comes, I’ll be ready to write about everything relevant in my life. I want to tell him about my dad, and my ex-boyfriend. I want to tell him about my mom, and the accident. I even want to tell him that I was the reason, even though I might make myself out to be a criminal. I want to tell him about every little crevice in my life, no matter how small or insignificant. I feel like I can trust him, and I feel like, if I talk long enough, he’ll understand.

If he asks, I would gladly put my heart on the line.