Chapter 24: Secrets

“What? Why do you have to leave?” Yo-seob whined the next morning over what he called a breakfast. Not sure if it's normal, but yes, I have pre-breakfast snacks. Mom was still asleep and I decided to have an early snack down the cafe where I found him.

                “I just have to talk to Jun-hyung,” I told him while picking the cats from the bowl of animal cookies I took.

                “But he'll come, I'm sure of it,” Yo-seob said. “He told us that he will.”

                “He also told me that, but then where is he?” I said.

                “I don't know, but he even told us that he had no interest in joining the band competition.”

                “Then the more reason I have to leave,” just when I was about to stand from my seat, the door opened and Ms. Aria came in.

                “Oh, my lady, I'm sure you'll be happy to see who I'm with,” she said. I looked behind her, and for a moment I thought it would be Jun-hyung, but the newest vacationer was the person I needed the most that time.

                “Oh Gette! I'm glad you made it!” I said right after I greeted her. “How did you convince your mom?”

                “Well,” Gette somehow hesitated before looking back at the door. I followed her gaze, and after a few moments, someone came in, and my first reaction was to greet politely to the kindest lady I've ever known. “Mom wouldn't allow me, so I told her to come.”

                “I'm looking forward to our volleyball playoffs,” Gette said enthusiastically.

                “So, are you still going?” Yo-seob still asked in spite of the obvious win.

                After having a real breakfast, Gette and I decided to have a morning walk down the beach, of course, with our mothers enjoying the shade under a tree and the relaxing sound of the waves. On the other hand, the boys decided to enjoy a morning dip in the waters and play. I had to say, but they were really fun to watch. Gette and I weren't really able to focus on a single topic as huge waves of laughter would come to us every now and then because of either the boys were doing the game with much seriousness in spite of the fact that it was just a game, or the boys would do stupid things like hand standing in three feet of water.

                “How are things back there?” I asked Gette. We were sitting behind the shade of a huge rock, a few meters away from us, still playing even if the sun was about to peak.

                “What specifically do you want to ask about?” She said.

                “Would you mind if you start about... you and L? What happened, really?”

                “We separated ways,” she said. “But not really break up. He just had to focus on... something.”

                “In the competition?” I said.

                “Yeah, and so far Infinite passed the eliminations,” she said, “and so was Clear SOS.”

                “Clear SOS? What kind of name is that?”

                “Not sure, but it was Jun-hyung's group.”

                “So he joined the competition,” I muttered. “I thought...”

                “Oh... wait” Gette then stood up and dusted off the sand from her shorts. “Come with me.” We went back to the villa, to her room where she took something out of her baggage.

                “CD's?” I said when I recognized the cases she laid out on her bed.

                “I was able to talk to Jun-hyung before I got here, so...” she stacked all the CD's and handed them to me. “He asked me to give you these.”

                 She went back to the beach while I tread back to my room. There was a television there, but the only thing that you could do was to watch DVD's, no cable or even local channels. I placed the CD numbered 1 on the player.

                It was somehow similar to the last videos he gave me, when I was still learning guitar. The differences were the setting, the looks (of Jun-hyung) and of course, the message. He wasn't holding a guitar like before, but he was back to his simple jeans and shirt, the only difference was his waved hair.

                “Hey, it has been a long time,” he said. “More than half a month, right? Sorry about that.” He paused and bit his lip before smiling, which was obviously a forced one. “You're probably freaking out about the clothes, so I made this to show you how much effort I put in choosing the clothes you'll wear.” Jun-hyung then went to a room which was similar to the one I was into. The floral drapes next to a huge dresser were similar, and so was the bedding and frame. It didn't take me long to realize that he had been in that very room.

                He went on to showing me the dresses he picked. I wasn't really interested though, since what I wanted to see and talk to was the real him, but I had to watch. Maybe he was about to tell it to me in one of the videos.  It continued across the other VCD's. Most were giving the imaginary me a tour around the resort, introducing me places and people.

                In the last VCD Jun-hyung took me to a band practice room located somewhere in the south of the resort. “I had been practicing there to improve myself... it's like I was practicing for a competition without a real competition,” he said. “Sometimes I come here just to be alone... you know, when the day ?”

                Jun-hyung then put down the camera in front of a piano. “I've been practicing my piano skills too!” he said. Before he sat on the chair, he stood on the side and opened the top of the piano. He stared inside of it for a while before smiling and proceeding to the chair. “You know, you should come here sometime,” he said before playing a tune on the piano.

                “That's it?” I managed to say. I was happy to finally see him back to how I knew him before, but also a bit disappointed as I wasn't able to get the answers I wanted to get so I decided to go out and have a walk around the resort. Shouldn't put his efforts to waste, right?

                “Hey, where have you been?” Doo-joon asked as soon as I came in the common room. It was already past afternoon when I finished the video, so their previous activities had tired them up. The guys were watching a 50 first dates in the common room, while our mothers were happily chatting with each other over some pies. “In my room, watching some home videos,” I said, dropping the part that it was from Jun-hyung. I asked about the movie they were watching in spite of the fact that I already knew about it. I went over the group and checked them out.

                Yo-seob was so engrossed with the movie. Hyun-seung was watching him instead of the movie and would chuckle when Yo-seob would blush because of the romantic scenes in the movie. Dong-woon would laugh out loud every now and then when Adam Sandler would get himself into trouble just to make his beloved remember. Doo-joon looked bored as he was playing with a PSP on his hand.

                “You don't really like romantic films, do you?” I told him.

                “Yeah, not my thing,” Doo-joon said. “Hang in there,” I said as I was about to turn around, but then I counted them. “Where's Gi-kwang?”

                “Ah, he drove your best friend back to their house,” Doo-joon said. “She said she'd go back to get something,” Dong-woon said, “Something about a phone being left at home... hers being battery dead?”

                “Ah, right, she probably left mine when she went off yesterday,” I said. I checked my mom seated on the couch and not on the usual wheel chair. I kissed her forehead and asked how she was. “I'm great, Ms. Aria baked the best pies I ever tasted my entire life,” she said. “You never told me that all of the mothers here are musicians,” she added.

                “Really?” I said. “That's great! Would you like to play together?” The ladies looked at me in surprise, it was Mrs. Domingo who broke the silence. “Sure! But where can we do music around here?” I took them in the practice room that evening, and Ms. Aria guided us to get there.

                As soon as we got in, the ladies went onto their instruments of choice, and did concert-like performance of the songs I have only heard during Blast from the Past Sundays.

                “How did you know about this place? If only you told us...” Dong-woon said.

                “A little bird told me,” I said, “Besides, if I tell you, you wouldn't be able to enjoy the vacation.” I looked back at the performance in front of us. Gette's mom was on the violin, and Mom was on the piano, playing the song dad used to play to her when he was still around. The piano. Then I remembered the video.

                “Mom, I think I forgot something in the practice room,” I told her when I brought her back to our room. “I'll just go back to get it.”

                “Is that so? Then be quick, you're not supposed to miss dinner,” I promised her that I would be back by dinner. I ran as fast as I could, back to the practice room. As soon as I got there, I locked the doors, and went directly to the piano. I opened its top and peeked inside where I found something that wasn't supposed to be there.

                I looked at the thing Jun-hyung must have hid inside the piano. It was a black bar with numbers on it. At first I thought it was a phone – I would really be happy if it was a phone – but it wasn't. It was a remote control, but it controls what? I thought. I pressed the on button, and suddenly, a grumbling sound was heard. Slowly, a wide screen television was revealed, coming out from a space in the ceiling.

                After it completely came down, the screen and the word “playing” was flashing on the side of the screen. A few moments later, the screen showed Jun-hyung's face. The background was the same practice room and he was sitting on the piano chair.

                “Hey, if you're watching this video, then congratulations! To me, actually, because that means you still want to see me. Thank you for that.” he said. “I know you've got a lot of questions, and hopefully this video would answer some of them.”

                “I know you've been wondering why I suddenly became cold to you... It's embarrassing, but... I sort of hated you because of what you said to your best friend. Gette never told me anything. I just heard the two of you talking when you decided to confront her about her feelings. It felt like I was tricked, so I got mad. But then I also got mad to L.  I couldn't understand it at first, but then soon, I realized that it was because you liked him.”

                “He was jealous?” I muttered as I slowly got onto a seat. “Oh, stupid girl!” I said as I smacked my own head. How could I be so... slow?

                “At first, I didn't want to accept it... the feeling was new to me so I tried to run away. I tried to embrace a whole new life... a life that I tried to run away from. I know you're probably asking what but I still couldn't tell you anything, but I want you to know that... I regret having this life I'm having right now.”

                “I want to go back to how things were, but that won't be easy,” he continued. “As much as I wanted to deny it, I have to face the truth that I could never, ever turn everything back to normal.” He paused for a long while before smiling.

                "I hope you enjoyed my gift. I couldn't think of anything else to give, since you can buy whatever you like, so I decided that the best gift would be your reunion with your mother."

                 “Did you miss me?” he suddenly asked. "Knew it!" He said as if heard me say yes. "But I couldn't come. You know why. Gang stuff."

                "What gang stuff?" What specific stuff hindered him to be Jun-hyung?

                "But don't worry, soon, everything will be alright," he said before the video ended. It left me with another question in my mind. What will he do to make everything alright? I stood up and was about to leave the remote when I remembered to check if it has a cable connection. We had no news about the competition and even though there are TV's in the all rooms, they only had local channels.

                Same with this huge LCD TV.

                Hence, I browsed through the local channels and settled in a news program. One of its headlines caught my eye. It read as follows:

NRBC Shoot out: Minors kidnapped, Band competition cancelled.