Chapter 22

I went up to my room and changed out of my school uniform into comfier clothes before going into the living and plopping down onto the couch next to my father again. Even though I tried forcing the surprise out of him, he said I had to wait and that I’d be very happy once I hear about it. I didn’t argue with him any further since I trusted him. I looked at the clock on the wall and listened to it tick. I was just about to turn on the TV, but the doorbell had rung. I seriously didn’t want to get up right now, but I had no choice. I got up and made my way to the door. It couldn’t be Jae Kyung or Ji Min because they would constantly ring the doorbell or better yet, just barge in because they knew where the spare key was and besides, Ji Min was at training. That had me wondering who it could have been at my door. I opened the door and peeked out a little to see Chen standing there. I was surprised since I hadn’t seen him all day at school nor was I expecting him to be standing here in front of me at my house.

“Chen? What are you doing here?” I opened the door wider to let him in, but he only stood by the door step. “D-did you want to come in?”

“Get ready.” He said waving at me. “I’m going to take you somewhere.”

“W-what?” I would have never suspected this from him.

“Come on. It’s getting late out. The longer you take, the fewer things we get to do.” He pushed me back inside and made me go get my belongings.

“Who is it?” I heard my father coming towards the door.

I stopped midway up the stairs and tried to run back down before my father could see who it was, but I was already too late – my father was eyeing Chen.

“Appa…” I didn’t know what else to say.

“Hello sir.” Chen bowed respectively, which made my face turn red. “I’m Kim Jong Dae.”

“Huh? Kim Jong Dae?” My father raised an eyebrow as he looked from me and then back to Chen. “Are you my daughter’s boyfriend?”

 “No.” I quickly replied before Chen could say anything. “H-he’s just a friend.”

“A friend, huh?” I heard Chen scoff under his breath.

“That’s too bad, Ga Eul.” My father chuckled at me. “He’s quite handsome – probably the most handsome boy I’ve seen.”

“Thank you, sir.” Chen’s face turned pink.

“Appa, go away.” I shook my head from embarrassment.

“Alright. Alright. If you’re taking my daughter out on a date,” My father turned towards Chen with a smile. “I hope you take good care of her.”

“I will, sir.” Chen said smiling, which made me forget what I was doing again.

I physically hit my forehead with my hand and shook my head. This was embarrassing.

“What are we doing here?” I asked.

We ended up at the Han River and he had two bikes ready for us. He got on one and waited for me to hop onto the other one. Because he wouldn’t answer me, I got onto the bike and he started pedaling away from me. I didn’t understand what he was trying to do, but I followed after him anyway because it looked like he just wanted to ride along the river – many people do this often so it wasn’t just out of the ordinary.

I was kind of glad that we were doing this; the wind breezing past us was refreshing and seeing so many people out at this time of day was more than joyful. I liked seeing the older men and women smiling at us while we pedaled past them or seeing little kids waving happily as if they had just gotten candy to eat. I wish I had done this more often – it was good for my heart anyway since I was being active. My heart was probably really happy to get a little exercise in.

Because I wasn’t watching where I was going, I had lost Chen in the crowd of people who were biking as well. I stopped pedaling and looked around to find him, but I was out of luck. I got off my bike and set my bike onto the rack before taking my Polaroid camera out from my backpack. I took a picture of myself and the bicycle that I had just used – it looked like everything bike out there, but I just wanted one with the one I rode personally. Not even that, but I took a picture of the path that we went through – this included the many children and older men and women who we had passed as well.

“You forgot to take a picture of me.”

I turned around and saw Chen standing behind me with a paper bag filled with sandwiches and two bottles of fresh juice. I wondered if he had gone off purposely so he could do this. He pulled me away from the bike racks and we sat down on a random spot in the park with our legs in pretzel-leg form. We looked ahead of us at the river and the people who were passing by while we ate our sandwiches in silence. Kids yelling and screaming while other people were talking didn’t count as silence – we not talking did.

“How was school?” Chen asked taking a sip from his bottle of juice.

“Why weren’t you at school?” I asked looking over at him. “It seems like you haven’t been going to school lately.”

“I’ve been busy.” He shrugged as if this was normal.

“What’s more important than school?”

“Dreams.” He replied rather quickly.

“Dreams?” I asked confused.

He nodded his head.

“What kind of dreams?”

“Everyone is different.”

“Then what about your dreams?”

“You would only make fun of me.”

“You’re judging me.”

“I’ve been judging everyone then.”

I nodded my head. “Well?”

“Well what?” He was trying to beat around the bush and that’s one thing I’ve noticed a lot about him – he never went full on answer to this day.

“Tell me about your dreams.”

“Well, I went to sleep…” He started off. “And when I woke up, I realized… I realized…” He stopped talking and started laughing.

“Yah.” I glared at him after I hit his arm. “Stop joking around.”

“Oh come on, Ga Eul.” He started laughing even more. “It’s funny how worked up you’re getting just because I won’t tell you what my dreams are.”

“I’m not asking much.” I rolled my eyes.

“Fine. Then why don’t you tell me your dreams?” He raised his eyebrow at me. “If it’s not so much, tell me all about yours.”

My heart dropped down to the pit of my stomach as soon as he told me to tell him about my dreams. Was it even okay for me to dream? I couldn’t even think straight now that he had put this into my mind. I’ve honestly never thought about my dreams only because I didn’t have them like I used to – if my heart wasn’t a problem, they’d probably still be there. I shook my head as I looked up ahead at the river.

“You’re right. I am asking for too much.” I didn’t want to tell him that I didn’t have dreams nor did I even have the right to dream because it was never going to happen… I was never going to get the chance to make my dreams coming true. “Forget it.”

“Why are you suddenly so sullen?” He turned his body towards me to get a better look at me. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No, you did nothing wrong.” I said letting out a sigh. “I’m just tired.”

“You’re lying to me.” Chen grabbed my chin and forced me to look at him. “What did I do wrong?”

“Everything.” I looked away from his eyes.

“But you’re still here.”

I didn’t say anything.

“Seriously, Ga Eul. Stop being so down about whatever you’re thinking about.” Chen let go of my chin and sipped onto his bottle of juice again. “Why does it feel like we’ve switched places?”

“What do you mean?” I asked curiously looking at him now.

“It’s like you’re the one holding in all of these feelings and now I’m the one expressing them, trying to force it out of you.”

“But it’s not like that at all.” I denied.

“Then tell me what’s on your mind.”

I shook my head. “I’ll tell you when I have a reason.”

“See, you’re acting like how I used to be.”

“You’re still like that.” I shook my head with a small smile on my face.

“But I’m starting to open up more.”

“I’m glad you are.”

“Then why don’t you open up to me?” He asked.

“Open up about what? I feel like you know a lot about me more than I know about you.” I sighed as I leaned back on my hands that were touching the cold grass. “Shouldn’t it be me who gets you to open up to me?”

“No.” He shook his head.

“Then it looks like we’re leaving it at that.”

“You’re stubborn.”

“And so are you.” I retorted.

“Fine.” Chen stood up. “You want to know something about me?”

I looked up at him as if he had just become a whole new person. “What are you doing?”

“Follow me.”

It was getting dark out and I didn’t know what he was trying to do at this time. I stood up on my feet anyway and followed after him due to curiosity eating me inside. I followed him all the way up to the bridge that was across the Han River. He leaned forward on the bridge and took a deep breath before closing his eyes and letting the wind caress his skin gently. I followed suit, but instead of closing my eyes, I watched him in case I would miss something he did.

“Ji Min told you that he was training to be an idol, right?” Chen finally spoke after what seemed like forever.

I nodded my head, but realized he wasn’t looking at me. “Yeah.”

“Did he say anything else?”

“No, but how do you even know of him being an idol?” I questioned. “Wait. Is it because he’s in the same dance class as your friends?”

“I’m in it too.” He chuckled as if this was funny to him.

“I didn’t see you in it today either.”

“That’s because I had a different kind of training today.”

“Wait.” I creased my eyebrows. “A-are you training to be an idol as well?”

He nodded his head slowly.

“W-what?” I was confused.

“You asked me what kind of dreams I had – I want to become a singer.” He looked over at me with a serious face. “I’ve always wanted to become a singer even if it sounds a little ridiculous.”

“I don’t find it ridiculous.” I replied.

“My parents think it’s the stupidest thing they’ve ever heard.” He shook his head as he thought back at his own thoughts. “They kicked me out of the house and called me useless because I told them that I wanted to drop out of school for this.”

I didn’t speak. I decided that I would just listen to him since he doesn’t open up often to me – I was trying to cherish this moment of him telling me about himself. I should have brought a recorder to record all of this so I could remember every second of it.

“They were disappointed that I would have done this since my hyung had wanted to be something else than a doctor.”

“What’d he want to be?” I asked.

“He wanted to become a professional gamer.” He chuckled. “My hyung was always such a loser when it came to things like this.”

“And did he?”

“My parents don’t know, but he’s currently in school going for his bachelor’s degree in criminal justice.”

“So he wants to become a cop?”

Chen nodded his head. “My hyung is actually very smart and intellectual, but my parents don’t see it and always put him down.”

I nodded my head slowly.

“That’s why they put so much pressure on me; they want me to go be a doctor like every freaking parent wants their kids to do, but it’s not for me. I told them that I wouldn’t do it – it was stressing me out.” He blew out a sigh as he ran a hand through his sandy-colored hair. “Because of my retort, they kicked me out of the house saying that if I don’t come back with a degree, I’ll stay out on the streets until I find my own place and money.” He laughed. “Don’t you find it funny? They’re not even doctors and yet, they expect their kids to be. They drove me under a rock. I was stressed – I didn’t know what to do with my life.” He shook his head slowly. “I was starting to feel convinced that maybe this life wasn’t for me because when I started training, I was getting stressed from having to perfect everything and not only that, I had to take care of myself, but with no money and no job, it was hard.”

I stood in silence.

“I tried applying at jobs, but they wouldn’t accept me because I didn’t have any open hours for them – getting a job was useless. I was always hungry and even though I wanted to go back home, to this day, I tell myself that I will not go back until I show them how successful I am. I never felt so poor in my life. I felt like I was alone with nothing left.” He clasped his hands together and smirked. “I was thankful to have Lu Han, who constantly always lent his ear to listen to me, Xiu Min, who fed me and took care of me like an older brother, and Lay, who often encouraged and motivated me” He turned around so his back was now against the railing of the bridge.

“Then why did you attempt to kill yourself if you were so thankful?” I had to ask since it seemed like he had avoided this.

“Depression really gets the best of you when you feel like there’s nothing left of you – it felt like life was just toying with me, as if it was making fun of me.” He his lips and frowned. “But it looked like someone also kept bothering me when I tried to kill myself.”

I scoffed. “Yah.”

“But I’m more than happy to know that you were there when I tried to kill myself.” He reached over and grabbed my hand, surprising me. “I would have never gotten this far with training. I finally got a job after my second attempt of suicide, my vocal lessons started getting better, and it also looks like my brother is going to graduate soon.” He smiled happily. “We’re going to make our parents proud no matter how upset they are that we didn’t choose the path they wanted us to take because my hyung will become a cop who cares for our citizen and I will become the singer who touches people’s hearts and especially my parent’s.”

I would have never thought things were this way for him. I couldn't even say anything. I took my hand out of his grasp and this only made him look at me weirdly. The corners of my lips curled up slowly before I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him tightly. I rested my head onto his chest and listened to his heartbeat - he was always warm wheenver we touched.

"Thank you, Ga Eul." I heard him whisper before he hugged me back just as tightly.

*A/N: I've been working so I'm sorry for the lack of updates! But I still promised you, if you guys have seen it, I will be double updating, but the update will not be posted until later! Please wait for it! And thank you for reading :DD Please read and comment. I'd love to hear about your opinions, so please don't be a silent reader. Thank you and read with lots of love! Keke~! Muah