The Words I’m Unable to Say

“There are going to be budget cuts.” You hear from one of your work mates. This worries you since you were one of the last ones hired. You were working at a very well known recording company in L.A. So you already knew finding a job wasn’t going to be as hard. Either way you were worried because it was so sad thinking if you’d have to move again. You’ve been moving around for a while since you decided to study abroad. It wasn’t easy for you to make friends since you saw people tend to be more serious than you ever been. Your playful and colorful personality has been hidden for quite a while, since the only real friends you had were already around the world. You had been working for a little while, and it was now that you were getting to know a couple of your work mates.

Today you got a memo from the president of the company, which really made you nervous. You already know him very well, but since the circumstances have changed, now getting this notice made you worry.

“________, please take a seat.” –He cordially says as he points at the chair in front of the desk.

“Thanks.” –You say as you take your sit and place your purse in your lap trying to not move your legs from the tension.

“As you may already know, due to financial problems we’ve had to come to the decision of making a couple of budget cuts. As a result, we’ve had to lower our staff.” –He says as he takes an envelope in his hands.

“Yes, I am aware of the situation.” –You say as you put your head down.

“Alright! Well, you’ve been one of our last hired employees, and so far one of the most talented.” –He says as he tries to lighten the dull mood he’s created. –“So we didn’t want to leave you hanging by the situation. We decided to share some of your work with some companies we’ve collaborated in the past.” –He was now handing the envelope already open to you.

You take it as you carefully look at the name and address written.  The company was J. Tune Entertainment. You had heard of it before since you had been working there, and you learned Korean as a hobby. You also loved music so much that you enjoyed listening to every kind, including kpop, so reading that the company was located in Korea didn’t worry you as much as the thought of making new friends.

You pick the letter and begin to read aloud, even though your boss already had read it.

“Greetings! We always enjoy getting letters from your company, and collaborating for you. And we are very thankful for the demos you sent us. According to all the information and demos you sent us, we believe that _________ is a very talented person. So without further ado, we are pleased to let you know that we are welcoming ________ to work for our company.”

As you finish reading the letter, you look at your boss who is already smiling. He says:

It’s been months since you’ve received the employment approval letter. You have had so many things on your mind. You’ve had to work in your Korean more and more, learn more of their culture, and also their style of music. You want to fit in as much as you can with them. You don’t want to feel out of place. It’s taken you a while to pack all of your things, most of which were already in boxes, since you always felt lazy to take them out. But finally the time came for you to move to Korea.

As you walk in the sidewalk which leads to the company, you can already see the difference. Their clothing, the surroundings, the way people spoke to each other.

“There is just so much people back home should learn from around here.” –You laugh as you think to yourself.

As you were dozing off, you didn’t realize you were already in front of the company itself. You look up amazed at the building. It wasn’t as if you hadn’t seen a huge building before, but something about being in a new country just made it amazing. As you enter the main building, you bow at everyone who looks at you. Annyonghaseyo… you keep repeating yourself again and again until you reach the front desk. You present yourself to the very pretty secretary in front of you. You had read about their beauty standards, but you hadn’t really thought about how good looking everyone you had seen was.

You finally spoke to your new manager. You were at first intimidated just because of his position, but it surprised you how nice he actually was. He took you himself around the building and showed you were you were going to live. As he was touring you, your eyes and mind automatically stayed in a very beautiful room. “The Break Room”, it was like a small room for employees to just relax after a long day of work. It had board games and video games, a refrigerator and a small kitchen. It was amazing! He said that you could use it any time you wanted, which was even better. Once he finished he told you that for today there wasn’t anything else you needed to know. That you could relax for tonight and that tomorrow you would begin to learn how to use the studio machines and computers.

“Guess having no one around won’t be as hard as you thought.” You kept thinking as you smile like an idiot to the TV. You hadn’t noticed someone was already watching you, he saw you while you smiled and sometimes laughed to yourself like a crazy person. He even saw you as you sometimes sang to the music playing in the game.

He finally approaches you while you are driving the car in your game. When you feel a presence next to you, you slowly look up. You jumped of the scare so hard that you fell off the sofa. As you realize what just happens you quickly take off your earphones, and try to shake off what had happened. You finally realized that the person had his hand in front of you to help you get up. You feel your blood coming all to your head, and you hear him give a small chuckle.

“Oh great, I finally meet someone other than my boss here and I embarrass myself.” You thought to yourself as you take his hand and he pulls you towards him. This makes you fall into his chest all sudden. You could feel he works out a lot, his stomach was really hard. You are still in the same position for a second, but seems like he didn’t mind. He just gives a slight cough laugh and keeps on smiling to your head which was still in his chest. You finally realize in the position you are and you back away from him quickly.

You finally can see his face clearly. He’s tall, and you can’t help but to immediately notice that he is extremely handsome. His smile is brighter than the room itself, and though he’s wearing eyeglasses you can feel his eyes examining you. You quickly turn your face away trying to avoid his gaze, and then you bow and say:

“Mianhamnida!”

He notices you aren’t from around here and he says roughly:

“It’s okay. Ni-ce to meet you.”

You can see him trying to make an effort to speak English, so you can’t help but to smile at this. He blushes a little and looks down and scratches his head. You can see him trying to speak again, seems like he’s carefully gathering his thoughts. You try to quickly tell him something to avoid his further humiliation. So you say in Korean:

“It’s okay! I can speak Korean.”

He sighs in relief, but with a bit of frustration in his eyes.

“Oh! Mianhamnida! I didn’t…” –He quickly stops as he realizes what he’s about to say.

“Don’t worry! I know I don’t seem like I can speak Korean, so I understand.” –You say politely, as he blushes knowing that’s exactly what he was thinking.

Quickly the atmosphere becomes very awkward as you both stand there avoiding each other’s eyes. He finally says:

“So… You like video games?”

You try not to let him know of your love for them, and you answer: “A little.” –You lied as you were scared of having someone judge you again for being such an “immature adult” as you had heard people say before.

He smiles knowing you were lying to him. He could see you were a little shy, so he didn’t say anything else about it.

“How about we play a little?”

You look at him in loss of words; you smile a little and nod.

“C’mon then!”

You sit at the sofa as he takes the sit next to you. You grab the controller trying to avoid his gaze.

You begin the game and slowly begin to relax with him. You start to say he cheated when he wins, while he sometimes says you cheated when you win. You have a very great night with him. It’s actually the first time a guy hasn’t complained for being you in front of him, even if you aren’t even dating him, you feel really happy and satisfied that somebody is alright with whom you are.

As you stretch in front of the sofa he begins to pick up the controllers and the soda cans you guys left. You check your phone for the time and realized you had stayed up more than you were supposed to. And you had to wake up early that same day for training. He notices your surprised face and asks you what’s wrong.

“Uh… Nothing, I just have to work in a couple of hours and I stayed here playing games.” –You say really ashamed of yourself.

“Oh! Mianhamnida! I took a lot of your time didn’t I?” –He says feeling sorry.

“Anii! Me staying here it’s my own responsibility. You have nothing to do with it. But I have to go.” –You say as you pick the bag you had brought.

“Where are you going? Do you live near?” –He asks worried.

“Ne! I live in the dorms, I moved in today.”

“I can take you there! I have to go there too.”

“Arasso!” –You say smiling widely.

He smiles back at you and looks at the ground blushing.

You began to walk through all the hallways which seemed so short before. You kept silent for a while, you just walked.

He finally breaks the silence:

“So? We’ve been talking for the past hours, but we haven’t officially introduced each other.”

“Right! I completely forgot!” –You were so busy bonding through the game that you had completely forgotten to say present yourselves.

“My name is Lee Joon!” –Again trying to show off his English- “Nice to meet you.”

You can’t help to smile as his adorable attempt. He actually did better than the first time.

“My name is _________ah. Nice to meet you too!”

He smiles and says:

“Your Korean is very fluent! How long have you been living here?”

“Today is actually my first day. But I had studied Korean years ago.”

“That’s great!” –He says as we finally reach my door.

“Thanks! Well I’m here!”

“Guess this is goodnight?” –He says as he seemed like he didn’t want to go.

You nod kind of sad too.

He scratches his neck as if he was trying to say something to you. But you see his words don’t come out. You quickly see that when he’s being more serious he gets nervous, but when he’s being his crazy way he’s just a little boy who would say anything without minding what other people thought.

“See you around…” –He says, not satisfied. You know he wanted to say something else, but he just couldn’t.

“Night Lee Joon!” –You smile at him while you close the door and he begins to back off your door.

In the hours of sleep you had left you wondered if he really had something to tell you. You could tell that he wasn’t very good with his words. He would sometimes say things he didn’t have to, or sometimes couldn’t say anything at all.