12

I sense that something bad is going to happen today, Jiyeon told her mother.

The morning was a bright one. The sun rays filtered through the window panes, bathing the room in an orange glow. The sun peeked over the rooftops: a blazing orange ball against the blue sky. Mrs. Park watched as her daughter brushed her locks in front of the mirror. She sighed.

“You always say that.” Mrs. Park wiped with a napkin after finishing her breakfast. She carried her plate to the kitchen. When she came back, Jiyeon was leaning forward towards the mirror, wiping something off her left eye. She faced her mother.

But this is different. I really feel something. Jiyeon told her.

Mrs. Park walked towards her daughter. She adjusted Jiyeon’s hair and presented a kiss on her forehead. She patted the area where her lips had landed and clasped Jiyeon’s shoulders. Her eyes softened.

“Nothing will happen, dear,” she assured, doing sign language at the same time. Mrs. Park checked her watch and her eyes widened.

“Honey, we’re late!” she called to her husband.

“Yeah, I know, I know,” Mr. Park mumbled as he ran down the stairs while lacing his watch on his wrist. If it was not because of his sadistic stomach, he would have been out of this house a long time ago.

Mrs. Park pulled Jiyeon into a quick embrace and said, “We cannot send you today. You’re oaky with walking, right?”

Jiyeon nodded and gave her a tight smile.

“And don’t worry about anything, okay?” Her mother gave her another kiss before opening the front door.

“Ah, look who’s all ready for school,” Jiyeon’s father commented and gave her his infectious beam. He walked towards Jiyeon, his arms stretched wide. Jiyeon went straight into his arms. Mr. Park folded his daughter into a hug and kissed her head.

“Don’t forget to lock the door.” He broke the hug.

“Bye Jiyeon!” He said as he hurried out of the door. Jiyeon followed. Leaning against the door frame, she watched as her father started the car engine. The car pulled out and Jiyeon went in. She picked up her bag and set out.

--------

The chaotic state of the classroom did not seem to bother Myungsoo. He stared at the keychain that was hooked on the corner his phone as his fingers carelessly fumbled with it. He was losing on all the games he played earlier and stopped playing altogether when he decided that its striking color was too distracting. Myungsoo let out a small sigh, and right at that moment, without his consent, Jiyeon’s grinning image flashed in his head. Before he could shake it off, Sunggyu barged in and crumbled the peace he had tried to keep so much.

“Myung… Myungsoo… Did you know—“

Myungsoo looked up at his panting friend. After regaining his breath, he straightened his back.  Sunggyu’s eyes strayed to his phone and noticed the chain attached to it.

“Is that a flower?” Sunggyu asked, laughter his voice.

“A four leaf clover.” Myungsoo corrected, slightly annoyed that the other guy was questioning his manhood, “So what did you have to say?”

Sunggyu snapped up.

“Oh. Did you know that Park Jiyeon is mute?”

Myungsoo froze. His breath stopped. No one knew that the girl was mute except for him and the teachers.

“How did you know?” He asked in disbelief.

“What do you mean how do I know? The whole school knows.”

As soon as the words escaped Sunggyu’s lips, his eyes flickered. For a fraction of a second, color seemed to have deserted his face, but these subtle changes had managed to escape Myungsoo’s normally observant nature.

“So, how did the whole school knows?”

Myungsoo had somehow able to get the question out, keeping in check of his impassivity and placidity but even so, calmness was obviously strained in his voice. Sunggyu opened his mouth to speak and at that particular moment, he was all too tempted to spill everything; to explain the whole truth regardless of what the consequence might be, but was cut short when a voice --that was all too familiar for Sunggyu-- called out from across the room.

“Yah, Sunggyu-ah! Come here!”

They both turned their head and were immediately greeted by Woohyun’s famous grin. Well, who else if it wasn’t Sunggyu’s gossip buddy?  Woohyun sent a wink in Sunggyu’s direction while waving his hand excitedly, his actions beckoning. Myungsoo watched the entire scene with disinterested eyes as though he had seen it a hundred times.

Sunggyu shot Myungsoo a final glance before turning his heels towards Woohyun, not sparing his best friend as much as another glimpse. Whatever he was about to say, were forgotten as though it had not even existed.

And just like that, the whole occurrence had ceased to live in any memory of those who were involved.

----

Jiyeon could not help the uncomfortable feeling from rising from the pit of her stomach. Despite her mother’s assurance, the heavy feeling inside of her just would not go away. She would succeed in calming herself down by breathing in and out countless of time before the uneasiness would creep into her and took control, again.

She was quite late that day and the hallways were rather empty. She could hear muffled noises coming from the classroom where there was no teacher as of yet. Jiyeon took a big breath before taking a step forward and opened the door.

The room hushed as she entered, as though the class had been waiting for her arrival. She could feel the burning gazes of eyes that were upon her without even lifting her head.  For the first time in two years she had been here, she felt bare.

She had managed to stay on a low profile since the first day she was here. She had done one heck of a great job in blending in, so well that no one spared her even a mere glance; not one was even aware of her very presence. Well, that changed a little after Myungsoo had somehow included himself in her life.

So when everyone had given her such an undue attention now, she just knew that something had gone terribly wrong; that her life here would not be the same again, whether she liked it or not. 

Inept to the sudden attention on her, she pushed her leg forward to scurry quickly away but stopped short halfway. Her eyes caught the scribbles on the board to her left. Slowly, she turned her head to read them.

Her fists clenched. Embarrassment swept her. Rage and fury consumed her. Her feelings were all entangled as these unwanted emotions flooded her.

Mute Jiyeon, it read.

A string of giggles erupted from her classmates and instantly, tears stung her eyes. She bit her lower lip and blinked them back furiously. She wanted to scream and punch the people that humiliated her like this, but at the same time, she wanted to become invisible. She wanted to disappear completely so that she did not have to face them ever again.

Roughly, she clutched the chalkboard eraser and wiped the words off recklessly. Breathing heavily, she threw down the eraser back to its original place and paused. Now, she had to do the hardest thing she had ever done in her life: turning back and walk to her seat. That meant that she had to face the people who were laughing at her foolishness.

She spun around and hung her head down, not meeting the mocking glances her classmates sent her way. Their murmurs and snickers pierced her ears as she walked down the aisle. After going through what she thought was the longest and most gruesome seconds of her life, she reached the only empty seat left. Before she even had the chance to touch the chair, a girl shoved her aside and went to sit on it. She pretended to busy herself with her papers and not notice Jiyeon beside her.

 “When Yoojin is doing her work, she is completely out of this world. You have to tell her that you’re there,” one of her classmates pointed out, sarcasm thick in her voice.

“Oh! We forgot that you’re mute!”

Laughter exploded around her. Jiyeon heaved a sharp breath when she felt her cheeks burning.

“Yoojin, get off that seat.” It was the prefect. She was easy going but could not tolerate behaviors like this. The discipline master chose well. Jiyeon felt as if she had become her best friend. But Yoojin pursed her lips and crossed her arms. She leaned back on the chair.

“What if I don’t want to?” she narrowed her eyes as she looked at Jiyeon.

“You heard her, Yoojin. Get. Off.” Sunggyu cleared.

Despite his happy-go-lucky nature, Sunggyu was well feared. Yoojin huffed and stomped away. Jiyeon wanted to hug and kiss him right then. As she sat down, the Biology teacher came in bringing a stack of papers. She was a woman in mid-forties whose age had just started to show in her appearance. Grey lines streaked her black hair and wrinkles had started to carve her skin. She had extreme mood swings. When she was in a good mood, she would have this benevolent smile that would never leave her face. On the contrary, when she was in a bad mood, she would find the slightest mistake made by her students and would explode. The class stood. It seemed like she was in a good mood.

“Good morning, class.”

“Morning, teacher,” the students replied lazily.

She put down the stack of papers on her desk and gave the students permission to sit.

“Well, today I’m going to give your test papers back. And it seems to me that you guys did study hard for this test.”

Her eyes travelled to her student before breaking a smile.

“And we have Kim Myungsoo as the highest scorer. Congratulations dear.”

This time, her attention was solely on the male student on the back of the class. She looked at him proudly as if the credits were all hers that he had scored so well, again.

“And the rest of you didn’t do that badly either.”

She expressed her happiness by smiling to each and everyone while she handed them their respective papers. Sunggyu was very happy with his mark, and that rarely happened.  He craned his neck, trying to know how well Myungsoo did on this test. And boy, his jaw dropped when he saw the mark.

“How do you do that?”

Sunggyu asked, clearly amazed. Well, compared to his marks (which was just slightly above a pass), Myungsoo’s was without a doubt better. 

“What?”

Myungsoo gave him a blur face. Oh, how Sunggyu hated that face, especially during this kind of times.

“That.”

Sunggyu said exasperatedly while pointing at his paper. Myungsoo shrugged.

“Dunno.”

The nerve of that guy! Here he was slugging off, studying for the test to the point that he lost precious sleep, and yet he got this kind of marks and that guy who got a near perfect score had probably done nothing.

“You don’t know? Seriously? Did you even study for it?”

Myungsoo shrugged again. In truth he did study. Consistently. He would spend several hours on his desk studying every day. But he would not ever tell that to anyone.

Seeing Myungsoo’s shrugging replies definitely pulled some more of Sunggyu’s nerves. That’s it; he gave up talking to this guy.

“Park Jiyeon didn’t do that bad either, just a couple of marks below our highest here.”

The teacher announced. And when Jiyeon thought that finally, she had some reason to smile that day, someone decided to crush it.

“I didn’t know that a mute can study, I mean they can’t even talk!”

An exclamation soared from somewhere in the class, she feigned surprise, her voice mocking. She let out a triumphant smirk out as Jiyeon’s smile faded. Her statement seemed to set off a laughing spree as the students started chortling. Honestly speaking, Sunggyu did not see the humor in that and certainly did not find it funny. If she thought that they were going to stop at that, she was very wrong.

The teacher, who had no notion of what was going on, could only shake her head at the noise they were making before continuing on with what she was doing.

---------

Jiyeon kept her head down and clutched her tray of food even tighter. The cafeteria was filled with enthusiastic chatters of the students but she could feel some gazes on her and their slight murmurs as she walked pass them. Slowly, she looked up to scan for an empty space. She spotted one at the far end and started moving towards it.

Just when she reached the empty spot, someone bumped into her from behind and the sudden force caused her to lose grip on her tray. The clatters of the plates rang in her ears as it fell to the ground. When she looked around, all eyes were on her. Her cheeks burned and it felt like a ball was stuck in . She wanted to disappear into the air, right then. Embarrassment was consuming her ruthlessly.

 Upon reflexes, she spun around to see who had bumped into her. Her breath stopped. It was Sunggyu. If she thought that the day could not possibly get worse, it just did.

Tears burned the back of her eyes. She watched as Sunggyu’s back disappeared amidst the students. So, he’s a part of them now, she thought bitterly. Pain ravaged her chest. It hurt to know that the person who had saved her earlier was one of those who were against her.

She did not bother to pick her plates up and she totally abandoned her original plan of eating before making her way out of the cafeteria. Her legs were wobbly and she was trembling hard. Mustering every bit of courage and dignity left, she forced herself to walk and it took all of her will not to break down there and cry.

She walked through the cold hallways, alone. It doesn’t matter, she had always liked being alone anyways. She let out a bitter smile and let her legs bring her anywhere they wanted.

The clock tower.

She had somehow ended up here. She sat on one of the benches that surrounded the fountain. She lifted her head; her eyes studied the tower that shot up into the sky. It was beautiful. She would have find solace in it on normal days. But today the whole serene scene had done nothing but add to her sadness.

She watched as minute ticked pass. She had not realized the presence of another being.

 “Jiyeon.”

A man’s voice beside her made her freeze.  Her heart clenched too tightly that she thought she could not breathe anymore. She really didn’t need any of this right now. She took a deep breath and turned.

It was Sunggyu. He flashed her his usual reckless smile. He took the seat next to her without being invited.

“Do you usually go here when you’re upset?”

Sunggyu said, starting a conversation. Jiyeon looked at him incredulously, one moment he was out to humiliate her and the next he was talking to her like a friend would. Jiyeon did not answer him and continued to stare ahead.

He was close enough for the conversation to be heard only between them, but not enough to make her uncomfortable. 

 “Look, I’m sorry… about everything,” he expressed; he turned his head so that he was looking directly into her eyes. Guilt rimmed his voice.

He pursed his lips. Jiyeon could see that he was being sincere.

“About just now and… everything. You know, I was in a hurry and didn’t see you there. And I didn’t mean to do everything that I did.”

His voice trailed. Jiyeon did not know if it was her imagination or that Sunggyu really sounded like he was about to cry.

“Here’s a little something to apologize. I was searching for you in the cafeteria but you weren’t there. And you know, I went to search for you everywhere, I nearly gave up.”

He said lightly. Sunggyu extended his arm and her eyes strayed to his hand. There, neatly tucked between his fingers was a milk carton. Jiyeon could not hide her surprise and Sunggyu saw this.

“Sorry, I couldn’t get you any proper food. Everything was finished.”

Sunggyu gave Jiyeon a guilty smile and beckoned her to take the milk he had bought her. Jiyeon took it and a ghost of a smile landed on her lips. Sunggyu looked at his watch.

“I need to go now. If you ever need anything, I mean anything just tell me.”

Sunggyu gave Jiyeon a look that she interpreted to be sympathy. He then waved and walked away. Jiyeon did not know what made her trust that guy, but she did. After all he was her first friend in times of her need.

------

The last bell announced the end of school. Myungsoo remained seated as the class buzzed around him. He scrutinized the figure of the girl as she gathered her things and walked out of the class. Jiyeon. He wondered how she must be feeling right then.

“Let’s go.” He said to his friend that was staring at Jiyeon as well. They both stood up and walked out of the classroom. On the way to their lockers, their way was disrupted when they met with a crowd that had gathered in the hallway with Jiyeon and a girl in the center.

“That’s Choi Yeseul,” Sunggyu whispered.

“Aren’t you the one who was rumored to be with Kim Myungsoo?” Her high pitched voice rose over the murmurs of the crowd. She crossed her arms. Then, she laughed scornfully.

“I wonder who even spread the rumor. You know what? You are so pathetic.” Satisfaction curled in her voice.

“Kim Myungsoo will never date a mute like you.” She spat and eyed Jiyeon with spite.

“What do you have to say, eh girl?” She leaned towards Jiyeon.

Myungsoo could see Jiyeon’s red eyes and clenched fists.

“Oh no!” Yeseul hugged herself dramatically, “I have nothing to say because I’m mute.”

The crowd roared with laughter and Myungsoo was reminded of the conversation her had with Jiyeon’s father when he at Jiyeon’s house that day.

“Why didn’t you enroll Jiyeon in a special school?” Myungsoo ask.

“Because the world is normal.”

“Huh?” Myungsoo looked at the man, baffled.

“Because the world is not mute. The world is not blind. The world is not deaf. The world is normal. I want her to know how it feels like so she can learn how to adapt to the world earlier.”

Jiyeon steadied her heavy breath. Tears had already pooled in her eyes. She could not let it flow. She could not show her weakness. She looked at the girl with malice.

From the corner of her vision, she caught Myungsoo and his friend outside the crowd. They walked forward and just like that, the crowd cleaved to make way for them. His cold eyes looked forward and did not even flinch to look at her. His expression was impassive and walked with a callous attitude. Time seemed to freeze for a while when he was a step in front of her. She looked at him hopefully.

He walked pass her. He walked pass her as if he did not even know her. No, he walked pass her as if she did not even exist. Sunggyu stopped, confused. He gave her the look he had given her earlier during break time before walking away to catch up with Myungsoo. That look: Jiyeon began to doubt it was pity he had felt for her.

Her eyes followed Myungsoo’s disappearing back. Her heart was yearning for him to turn, just turn; just look at her once, please. He walked straight ahead until what was left of him was just a simple reminder to her that he had been here. Even though she had expected it, it had hurt regardless.

Her heart snapped. Myungsoo left her. Grief swept her and without her consent; her knees shook. Myungsoo left her.

The tears she had tried so much to keep rolled down her cheeks. And just like that, her will to not appear weak in front of those spiteful people was carried away with the wind.  A snort greeted her hearing and before long laughter rang mercilessly in her ears as they rejoiced to her breakdown. But Jiyeon was no longer aware of the crowd around her. She bit her bottom lip so hard, she could taste the chalky blood, trying her best to prevent a sob from escaping her lips.

Myungsoo left her.

-------

A/N:

So I have an advice for all the readers: If you ever esked someone clever if they study  for their tests/exams and they say not really or I didn't even study that much or I don't study everyday or I don't realy study cause I'm lazy, never EVER EVER believe them. I have experience. Ok. 

When I'm writing this I feel like puching Myungsoo's face. Hahha. Seriously he is soooooo BAD. JUST GO AND SAVE JIYEON LAH -----> a Singlish expression. Yes, I am from Singapore. But that is how the storyline goes so I had to make Myungsoo do that. ehhehehhehe 

Remember to drop a comment and punch the suscribe button! ^^ Not literally. Don't break your computer screen.

-Faith