Jjung and AJ: Age 8/10

“Hey girly, you shouldn’t be going to this school. You do know it’s a boys’ school right?” taunted an older boy as he and his group of friends shoved me around.

“That’s not funny, you stupid oaf!” I shouted back. I tried to steady myself but I was just no match for the older boys. I was tortured by these older boys a lot. Most days I managed to avoid them by going to school earlier but today I was late. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to sneak past them and I got caught.

He grabbed me by my shirt. “Yah! How dare you talk to your sunbae like that! And stop using English. Just because I don’t know what you said doesn’t mean I don’t know it’s an insult!” he warned me angrily. He clenched his fist and pulled back his arm, ready to hit me. I closed my eyes, bracing myself for the impact.

“Hey, what’s going on here?” asked a voice I did not recognize from behind me.

“What do you want kid?! This is none of your business. If you know any better, you will pretend you didn’t see anything,” answered one of the boys in the group with a threatening tone.

I suddenly felt a hand rest on my shoulders. “Are you alright?” the mystery boy asked.

I was a little surprised that the mystery boy spoke English fluently. “Yes. You better leave or they’ll beat you up too,” I replied. No point in dragging him down with me.

“Yah! I told you not to speak in English! Jugulle (Do you want to die)?!”

“Sorry, my Korean isn’t very good,” explained the mystery boy. “We should just all calm down. There’s no need for violence.”

“I told you…” the older boy was getting really angry.

“He doesn’t speak Korean,” I quickly in, not wanting to get the mystery boy into trouble.

“But he’s wearing our school uniform!” the older boy scowled.

“He’s probably a transfer student,” said another boy from the group.

“Who’s asking you?!” yelled the older boy.

“Hey, I think they’re closing the school gate soon. We better go now or we’ll get punished,” squealed a different boy.

“Argh!” scoffed the older boy in frustration. “You got lucky this time, girly! Next time you won’t be!” He finally let go of me and signaled his group of friends to follow him.

“What was that about?” asked the mystery boy with a puzzled look on his face.

“They’re just a bunch of stupid bullies. This happens quite often. Don’t worry about it,” I sighed.

“Shouldn’t you tell someone?”

“I usually just avoid them but I was late today and ran into them.” My eyes widened as I started to realize. “Oh no! We’re late. We’ll be punished if we get locked out!” Without a second thought, a grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him along.

We ran as fast as we could but by the time we reached the school gate, it was locked. The teacher in charge was standing behind the gate giving us a disapproving look.

“Sorry, teacher. We ran into some trouble,” I tried to explain.

“I don’t care. You know the rules,” the teacher interjected.

“But he’s a new student…” I continued.

“That’s not an excuse. It’s worse that’s he already late on the first day.”

“But he was only helping me…”

“If you continue arguing, you will both receive double punishment.”

I had no choice but to hold my tongue. I felt guilty that I had caused the mystery boy to be punished as well. We received our punishment notice and I was told to bring the mystery boy to the principal.

“Excuse me sir, I was told to bring this new student to see you,” I said as I tapped on the open door of the principal’s office.

The mystery boy walked past me and bowed to the principal. “Good morning, sir. I am new student AJ Liu. I just transferred from the United States.”

I was shocked. I had thought that the mystery boy did not speak Korean.

“You may go now, student Jung.” The principal’s voice snapped me out of my confusion.

I bowed and as I lifted my head back up I saw the mystery boy waving goodbye to me with a grin. Well, I guess I’ll ask him later when we carry out our punishment. I hurried to class without another thought.

(Later that day…)

“Hey sorry I got you into trouble, hyung,” I apologized as soon as I saw the mystery boy.

“Nah, that’s fine. I couldn’t just stand by while a bunch of guys beat you up. You were outnumbered,” he replied with a smile.

“So if it was a one-on-one fight, you would have just ignored it?”

“Maybe…” he joked.

We both laughed. This guy is cool. I like him already.

“So it seems you DO speak Korean,” I said, raising an eyebrow.

“I never said I didn’t. I just said it wasn’t very good.”

We laughed again.

“What about you? You’re pretty fluent in English.”

“It’s a long story… I’ll tell you another time.”

“Anyway, my name’s AJ. I just transferred from the United States,” he continued.

“I heard. You can call me Jjung. What grade are you in? I’m in 2^nd.”

“I’m in 3^rd. My Korean isn’t up to 4^th grade level yet.”

We proceeded to carry out or punishment for being late for school. It was unfair that I got punished while the bullies got away. On top of that I still felt guilty that I had dragged AJ hyung in with me.

“Hyung, when we’re done, I’ll buy you something good to eat!” I needed to repay him somehow.

“Why? You still feel bad?”

I nodded.

“Don’t worry about it kiddo. It isn’t that bad anyway,” he said as the messed my hair. “Man, you need to get a haircut.”

“No. I like it long. I can hide my face with it.”

“You shouldn’t hide. You need to face the world head-on!”

He said it so emphatically that I laughed hard. “Okay…”

“That’s what my father is always telling me,” he went on in a serious tone, ignoring my laughter.

“I got it, I got it! Anyway I still owe you.”

“Fine. Whatever. I won’t refuse some good food.” He nudged me on the shoulder.

When we were done with the punishment, I took him to my favorite bakery near the school. However, he wouldn’t let me pay for him and paid for me instead. This guy, seriously. Is he a great friend or what? And I’ve only just met him.