“YAH!” I was shoved from behind. I just ignored it completely, acting like it didn’t happen.

“Yah! I’m talking to you!” I kept going about my day, closing my locker and walking away.

“WALK AWAY !” I froze in my steps. I heard a faint ‘Key’ warning him. “Go ahead and walk away from the one person who has been there for you each and every time! Go ahead a sulk and deal with your problems alone, worrying everyone around you! Go ahead and be the cold hearted stupid I never thought you’d be!”

Tears were b my eyes. I did not move.

“One thing goes wrong, and you dump everyone. Is this how it’s gonna be?! Every time you have something to deal with you dump us and put us through the torture or watching you suffer?! You act like you don’t know us! Then what?! You’ll come running back when you think you’re okay, only to push us away again when some other ty thing happens?!”

Grad was right around the corner and I completed everyone’s masks, and l left them on Key’s door step so he could pass it out. I guess that’s what set him off.

“Key that’s enough”

“No! She doesn’t ing understand that she isn’t the only one hurting here!” I heard his voice crack, and knew that he was crying. “After every ing thing we’ve gone through, you get cheated on and forget about me?! Forget about us?! You selfish !”

“Key shut up!”

“Yunho must be so ing proud of you Jae!”

I ran back and slapped him, tears streaming down my eyes. I was upset that I had my heart ripped out, I was upset that I was too much of a prideful person to reach out for help, I was upset at how much I was hurting everyone around me, I was upset I hurt my best friend… and I was upset at the person I was becoming. Key slapped me back equally as hard, and I saw Taeyeon come running with Ms. Kwon.

“My office. Now.”

*

Ms.Kwon sat there quietly, astounded at how far Key and I seemed, even if our chairs were inches apart. We’d usually be holding hands or he’d be glued right next to me. I needed that warmth, that affirmation someone was there for me.

“Will someone please tell me what the problem is?” We were both quiet, no one saying a single thing. We would glance at each other, but if our eyes met we’d look away. I could tell that Key was hurt, angry and all sorts of other things.

“Fine then we’ll just sit here until someone decides to talk” she crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair looking at the two of us. Key muttered something under his breath and Ms. Kwon perked up. “Please speak up Kibum”

“ this, I’m not dealing with this ” and got up and started walking towards the door in her office, picking up his bag.

“I-I’m sorry” it didn’t come out as loud as I wanted to, but he heard it and stopped. “I’m sorry Kibum… I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to hurt you or anyone… I just-I’m sorry” my voice fell at the end and the tears I had been holding in, came out quietly. I didn’t sniffle, or make any sound. I felt guilty for even crying because I wasn’t the one who was hurt in this situation. If anyone should be crying it should be Key. I felt him come back to the seat and sit in it, arms and legs crossed.

“Why are you apologizing Jaemi?” she asked gently.

“I hurt people that I didn’t mean to hurt”

“Why did you hurt them?”

“Because she’s too scared to deal with her own emotions” Key was always blunt, I knew that. Ms. Kwon gave him a warning look. “It’s true. She hides what she feels all the time because she thinks something is wrong with her, instead she pushes her problems and everyone who had any implication in it away.” He scoffed and leaned back in his chair.

“It’s my fault” both people turned to look at me.

“What’s your fault?” Key leaned in closer to me when Ms. Kwon asked that.

“I get too attached and when things don’t go my way I screw up again. Just like I did with Yunho and now with you and Donghae” Key turned to face me and took both of my hands.

“What happened to Yunho was not your fault and the way you acted was nothing to be concerned about. We all mourn after losing someone Jaemi, that’s normal and you did not screw up.” He looked me straight in the eyes as he told me that and gripped my hands, as a tear fell down my face.

“Ugh, sorry” I sniffed wiping the tear away with my hand.

 “You need to stop being sorry for things you shouldn’t be sorry for. You shouldn’t apologize for crying” his snarky voice came back, Key was now back to being his normal self.

“Jaemi, Key is right. You seem to think the way you act to things aren’t normal and you blame yourself for it. Looking back, that’s what nearly caused you to slip into depression. You’re lucky you had and still have people to help you past those moments. I’ll be quite frank with you though. Although we love you and we’re always going to be here for you, there might come a time where our words aren’t good enough for you. This is the problem and the mountain you need to climb over. Accept yourself Jae, stop beating yourself up” by that point she had walked around and sat at the front of her desk, as opposed to behind it like earlier. She was right, and so was Key. This was the biggest thing I had to overcome.

“Now, that can’t be the only thing that’s going on. Who’d like to talk?” Key looked at me and nodded his head.

*

After meeting with Ms. Kwon, I slowly started getting back to the way it was before I became really close with Donghae. Leeteuk was there with Taeyeon from time to time, but other than that, I hadn’t seen the other two. When I ran into Eunhyuk, it was really awkward and the only thing he wanted to talk about was Donghae and his story, but he kept hesitating to talk to me, fearing I’d get upset again.

Key, Tiffany and I were walking down the hallway and almost everyone had gone home. We had decided to stay a little longer to work on my routines, and fool around in the dance studio. Grad was tomorrow, and we had planned a huge sleepover at my house with all the girls and Key. We were getting closer to the main entrance when a loud bang made us jump.

“Stay away from me!” We all stopped and quiet down.

“You have to tell her the truth!” Key pulled us both to stick to the wall and crept down slowly.

“What truth is there to tell?! You really did kiss me and brought me to the bathroom!” I recognized the voices now.

“You lied to her! You ruined everything!” I knew that crack in his voice meant he was crying.

“Well maybe you shouldn’t around! I was only being nice!” I grabbed Key’s sleeve not wanting to inch forward anymore and just find another exit to leave through.

“I didn’t you!”

Silence.

“You know damn well that we didn’t go all the way!” I was frozen on spot.

“Your hands were down my !”

“And I stopped when I realized what I was doing! I stopped even before you could get into mine! You urged me on and you know what alcohol can do to me” she scoffed.

“Why is it so important that she forgives you?!”

“Because I love her!” everyone gasped. “She’s the only one who understands me and treats me like a person, something you never did!”

“This isn’t my problem Donghae…. If she’s so important to you then why aren’t you fixing your problem?!” the clicking of her heels began to echo in the halls.

“I didn’t love you” the sound stopped. “Is that why you’re doing this to me?” there was silence for a few moments before the clicking resumed, and the pace got faster and faster until she was running down the hallway. Donghae yelled out in frustration and started beating up a locker, and Key took this opportunity to run away with us.

*

“es Hay!” Taeyeon’s voice echoed through the front room of my house.

“Hello girls” My mom giggled and greeted them with a big smile and Taeyeon flushed, bowing in apology. “It’s nice to see you over”

“It’s nice to see you too Mrs. Jung, how are you?” Seohyun quickly picked up the conversation, saving Taeyeon from any chance of embarassement.

“I’m good, but more importantly what about you? Graduation is tomorrow! Aren’t you excited?” everyone nodded their heads, “I’ve got some snacks in the kitchen that I’m sure you girls would love to snack on while having your prep night”

Soon everyone came through my bedroom door, and we had mattresses set up on the floor with pillows and blankets. Key was playing music through my stereo and going through my lap top as everyone came in. We all started by getting into our PJs, Tiffany with the pink night gown, Seohyun with her bunny button up PJs with matching bottoms, Taeyeon wore her tank top and boxer shorts, Key sported his black and electric purple short shorts and loose t-shirt, while I had on a baggy t-shirt and boxer shorts. After setting out hairs in rollers, and putting hydrating serum on them, we began to on our facial masks and being girly. We took a bunch of quizzes in magazines like teen girls would and did our nails. A soft knock at the door interrupted us.

“Sorry to disturb you girls, but just to let you know we’re hitting the midnight curfew, and I’m sure you don’t want bloated faces and eye circles tomorrow” my mom’s head poked in and smiled at us.

All the girls gave a pretend exaggerated whine, that caused my mom to laugh. We all started to get ready for bed, the five of us cramming into the bathroom. After brushing and washing masks off and doing our usual night time routines, we headed to my room to go to bed. It was cute since some people brought eye masks because of the fact I slept with the lamp on.

“I swear Jae, this is the reason why you aren’t growing taller” Key grumbled, pulling his mask on.

“How do you explain me then?! I always sleep in the dark!” Taeyeon caused us all to laugh.

“You shouldn’t be talking either Key!” Key threw his pillow at Sunny, hitting Tiffany.

“Ow! You guys are such children” she laughed, and threw a pillow at Seohyun. We all ended up having a mini pillow fight before my dad knocked, telling us to keep it down. We were all still laughing like children, until finally we started to calm down.

“Can you believe it? We’re all graduating, and yesterday it actually so far behind us” Taeyeon sighed.

“This time last year, Jae and I were getting plastered in her room with a bunch of coolers” I snuggled closer to Key, who was sharing the bed with me.

“I was doing stupid with Jessica” Tiffany scoffed.

“Y’know she’s kinda a blessing in disguise” you heard a faint ‘ouch’ from Sunny, who was probably smacked my Taeyeon.

“I guess if it weren’t for her, we wouldn’t have met each other” Seohyun’s comment caused silence to happen in the room.

“I guess I should be thankful to her then” Key wrapped his arms around me when I said that. “She’s done so much to me, but given me so much more”

“You’re too forgiving Jae, I would just beat her and say don’t come back” I giggled at Key’s comment.

“Tomorrow we all head to the ceremony together, then the luncheon, then the dance…” Seohyun drifted off.

“I hope Teuk recognizes me…” a big yawn came from Taeyeon. Soon everyone was drifting off.

“Good night Jae” he snuggled closer.

“Night Key” a couple minutes later, steady breathing was heard throughout the room. I was the only one who remained awake. I carefully grabbed my phone, trying not to wake Key, and played around on it. I went through all old data and deleted some of it. That’s when I saw that there was a message from Donghae, one that was marked read, but I never recalled reading it.

‘My username for my blog is EastSeaNemo’