Chp.22| The Trap and The Fall

“PARK JUNG SANG!LET HER GO, YOU SON-OF-A-B*TCH!!”

After being forced to break away from Jung Sang, I swung around to face the person with the annoying voice and wasn’t at all surprised to find my younger brother, charging full speed toward us. Ever seen a bird flying blindly against a glass window? That was how I described Jin Hyung at that moment.

I stepped in front of him and smacked him hard in the head, making him halt. “You annoying brat. Just what the hell do you think you’re doing, huh?!”

Jin Hyung looked up to me while rubbing his head in pain. “Ow noona, that hurts.”

“Good,” I said, grabbing at his hair and shaking his head. “Don’t you ever, ever, do that again, y’hear me?!”

“Okay, noona. I won’t. I won’t, I promise,” he cried out in a pleading tone. The tears were also seeping from his eyes due to my hair jerking. I pulled my hand away, realizing that I let my anger consume too much of me. Crossing my arms in an intimidating manner, I said, “Now, why did you swear at Jung Sang for?”

“Because I heard things. I heard that he likes to hurt girls. That’s why I came looking for you and then I saw you in his arms so I swore at him.”

It was wrong to have my younger brother acting protective of me. I never really thought he cared that much. “Where did you hear this from?”

“Shin Hye Min. She told me that Jung Sang is abusive. That’s why she broke up with him in the first place. She said that he gave her a black eye once. And that…” he paused to think of something, “that she done it with him. I don’t know what she mean by done it so I asked her what it was and she told me that I’m too young to understand and that I come to tell you about the black eye and the done it part.”

Jin Hyung had never been vague about things. He was more of the explain-it-all type. He said all of this in front of Jung Sang and myself. Growing extremely embarrassed and angry at the same time, I told him, “That’s just stupid. Why do you listen to dumb girls like that? Now, apologize to Jung Sang.”

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean, you can’t?”

He shrugged, wiping at his tear-stained cheeks and said, “I just can’t.”

“Yah! Do you want me to smack you again?”

“He’s gone, you stupid noona!”

I turned around to find that Jung Sang was somehow replaced by a smiling, cute Na-Na. That made me ponder on the fact that whenever something was going right between us, I was always left disappointed at the end.

Na-Na was looking directly at Jin Hyung. “I found you. You can’t hide from me.”

Jin Hyung suddenly pressed himself against my back with his arms wrapped tightly around my waist. “Noona, don’t let that little witch get me. She’s a freak!”

Na-Na stepped closer to us. “Jung Sang went inside, Ji Won. You should go after him before that Hye Min character snatches him away.”

I trusted Jung Sang would find every way to avoid Hye Min. What I couldn’t understand was why Jin Hyung acted terrified of Na-Na. I tried to disengage myself from Jin Hyung’s locking grip. “What’s wrong with you? Why don’t you like Na-Na?”

“I don’t like her. She’s weird. She sounds old.”

“Just because I make you feel dumb and inferior, doesn’t mean you can’t hang around me, Jin Hyung.”

Jin Hyung released me and pointed an accusing finger at her. “You see that? She doesn’t even call me oppa and she doesn’t even use normal vocabularies. She’s disrespectful. If she was my younger sister, I’ll slap and make her obey me.”

“And if you were my oppa, I would have killed you by now,” Na-Na retorted calmly.

“Whatever, I’ll kick your !!” Jin Hyung shouted out in anger.

I found myself backing away from the both of them, letting them continue their unusual bickering as I slipped back into the house and ran into Kim Tae Woo who took hold of my hand, leading me into room full of people who were slow dancing to the band playing. Before I could protest, he already rested his hand on the side of my waist, guiding me to the slow music. “Dance with me, Ji Won. I think we should talk.”

I went along with him. “Why talk like this?”

“Because Jung Sang can’t see us like this.”

I glanced around nervously. “Are you sure?”

“The last time I saw him, he went upstairs with Hye Min.”

I gaped at him. “What?!”

“Shhh, not too loud.”

“But---"

“He’ll be okay. Jung Sang isn’t that type of person---it’s just that---lately I’ve been confused myself. I don’t understand what he’s trying to do. I mean---this girlfriend thing. The reason why I helped him was because I thought he wanted some temporary girlfriend to make his ex jealous.”

“Oh gosh, this is so cliché. This is the part where I get all upset over it because it’s supposed to be some kind of misunderstanding right? I’m supposed to feel like I’ve been used, right?”

“Err…I don’t…think that’s the case. I was just asking you to help me. I need to know what he’s feeling right now. If he wants Hye Min back or whether he wants to be with you.”

Everything was starting to fall into place. Perhaps that was the reason why there was so much tension between the two lately. Tae Woo was probably trying to push Jung Sang back with Hye Min.

“Why?”

“Because that stubborn never knows what he wants when it comes to his girl.”

“Tell me something. Why did he really break up with Shin Hye Min? And why does he hate her so much? Did she cheat on him?”

“She made a mistake. She made him choose.”

“Choose?”

“Yeah. It was either ping-pong or her.”

“Wow, what a selfish b*tch, and then what happened?”

“He chose ping-pong. So they broke up.”

“Wow, what a selfish bastard, and then what happened?”

Tae Woo’s brows creased together in puzzlement. “You’re not at all affected by what I’m telling you?”

“For all I know, you could be lying about the whole thing, just so you can make yourself look good so that you could impress me and then end up betraying your best-friend by trying to steal his girlfriend and I realized that I'm speaking in circles.”

Tae Woo quickly lowered his eyes. I noticed that his lashes were pretty too. “Damn.”

“I’m right, aren’t I?”

He shook his head slightly. “That was my first intention but, no. I’m just trying to help.”

“In what way?”

“We have to test his feelings.”

“And?”

“I’m just the man for the test.”

It was wrong. Everything about it was wrong. The truth was, I wasn’t so sure about how Jung Sang felt about me either. Hye Min left him because she wanted to be the first important thing in his life, not the second. I knew how much ping-pong meant to him, and you could also say that I accepted that. First or second, I didn’t really care---so long as I got to see his face and that he took that extra time to see mine. That my friends, is the first phase in falling in love.

“You mean---make him jealous?”

He smirked impishly. “If I could get him jealous, then we have our answer, don’t we?”

“What do you get out of this, Tae Woo?”

“I get the girl, of course. That all depends on Jung Sang and whom he chooses.”

“And who’s the girl? Don’t tell me it’s Hye Min,” I said, testing to see whether it was Hye Min that he really liked in spite of the fact that I knew what his answer would be.

“Well...”

I interrupted him. "How can you be so sure you'll get the girl?"

He turned the question back on me. "What girl, can't I get?"

Seeing the arrogance was starting to leak through, I told him bluntly, "You're not that hot."

"What?"

“YAH!” someone shouted at us.

I turned to see Hye Min standing beside Jung Sang who kept on a straight face, watching us with one hand tucked inside his pocket. “The music has stopped already. Shouldn't you be getting off the dance floor?” Hye Min added.

Kim Tae Woo smiled. “Test number one is over, Ji Won.”

My jaws dropped suddenly. I started to piece two and two together and understood what had just happened. That sneaky bastard had tricked me. He had everything planned. I fell right into his trap without even agreeing to it.

“Now, we’ll see what he does,” Tae Woo spoke inaudibly.

Jung Sang just looked at me unfazed by it all. There wasn’t even a hint of an expression on his face. Then he walked away, acting like he had seen nothing.

My heart fell.

It was the last time I seen his face that night.

The party ended there for me.

---

I showed up at school the next day, half-asleep and emotionally confused. What I thought was a start to a new relationship, turned out to be the end of it. Go figure. You can't always get what you want.

Soo Jin was already interrogating me at my desk before class started. “I heard what happened last night. Everyone’s talking about it. They say Jung Sang is super hot and y now. They also mentioned that the two of you broke up!”

“Did we? Gee, I wasn’t even aware of it,” I said, sounding like a zombie, resting my face against my books. “What else did you hear?”

“That Park Jung Sang and Kim Tae Woo are enemies now because of you.”

“Really?”

“I heard they fought last night too.”

I lifted my face to stare at the gullible Soo Jin. “Yah! You heard all the wrong news. Where do you get your sources from? Geezes.”

“Just watch. Watch they both end up not showing up for class today.”

I ignored her and decided to close my eyes for a second or two.

The next time I opened my eyes, class was beginning. Kim Tae Woo and Park Jung Sang entered the class late together.

Just what I expected, nothing of the ordinary. The two looked like they were getting along just fine. There was no change in their attitudes towards each other. However, I did notice one big change. The atmosphere in the room had shifted dramatically. The girls that hated Jung Sang before battered their lashes at him and whispered excitedly amongst one another, complimenting on how good he appeared.

Jung Sang was indeed the current hot topic to them.

He spared a single glance in my direction and when he saw that I was looking at him, he looked away quickly.

What was this? Did he think he was too good for me?


---


Lunchtime also .

I sat alone, playing with my lunch by poking repeatedly at it with my plastic fork, trying to take my eyes off the dozen of girls that gathered like a hungry pack of coyotes surrounding Tae Woo and Jung Sang like their preys.

I still couldn’t figure out the reason why he was ignoring me so I became frustrated. The next thing I knew, a hand tapped me on the shoulder, shifting my attention away. “Looks like your loverboy has found himself some new lovers.”

Yoon Tae sat on the table, resting his feet on the chair. “You have dark circles around your eyes,” he remarked.

“Thanks, but I realized that this morning when I looked into the mirror. Can’t blame me for looking bad, I only got a few hours of sleep last night,” I muttered miserably.

Yoon Tae plucked the apple off my tray and bit into it. “Having problems with Jung Sang?”

“Yeah, I think he’s angry at me for slow dancing with Tae Woo last night, so he’s completely ignoring me.”

“Did you talk to him?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know he’s ignoring you?”

“Because…look at him. He doesn’t care. I’m sitting here all alone.”

“Do you sit with him every lunch?”

“No.”

“Then what makes you think he’ll sit with you today?”

“Shut up, Yoon Tae. You’re not helping.”

“I wasn’t trying to help. I was just asking you questions,” he said, taking another bite of his apple. After chewing on it, he asked, “Need some advice?”

“Sure.”

“Go talk to him.”

“No.”

“Need a better advice?”

I glared at him. “It better be better.”

“Let me beat some sense into him. I’ll get him while he’s still crippled.”

I plopped my head down in hopelessness.

"ACK! THERE'S A IN' WORM IN THIS THING!!" Yoon Tae spat out.


---


Every single trophy was knocked over; some were even broken in half. The room looked like it had ransacked by some psychotic intruder---except that an intruder would never put holes into the wall for no reason.

“This is what he did to his trophy room last night. Everyone thought some one might have tried to trash his trophies, but Jung Sang admitted that he did it,” Na-Na exclaimed. “When asked why he did it, he said because he felt like it.”

I felt suddenly afraid.

Very afraid.

He wrecked his trophy room because he was angry. I didn't mind. So long as he didn't go around killing anyone.

“He went looking for you to ask for a dance. Then he saw you with Tae Woo. That made him upset.”

I had to admit, it was sweet and a little psychotic of him to get riled up like that. However, I had my answer. He was angry because of me.

I was angry too.

I wanted to kill Kim Tae Woo.

I hated this annoying third/fourth wheel that was going on. It was turning into some kind of ing drama. I was going to correct that.

Gosh, I hate sounding like the antagonist.