Turning Over a New Leaf
The Lux of Love
Yeap, this is re-uploaded. I lost chapters 30 and 31 during the thing but luckily, I saved chapter 30 in my computer so here it is~! :) As for chapter 31, I have to rewrite it. I'm planning to just do a simplified, more organized version of it so yeah, it's gonna be a bit different.
[Taemin's POV]
"Damn it." I hissed, squinting my eyes and squeezing my skull vigorously. I'm trying keep my mind and body intact but all this pain's just too much. Sitting here on this park bench being given weird looks by various passersby who probably couldn't care less about my condition just makes me feel weak and defenseless. It doesn't matter whether I become invisible or not or how big of a force field I can make; I'm still unprotected, trapped in self-conflict. I am torn between letting go and fighting back. Will I let go of Suzy? Or will I fight for her? Then again, how can I beat a guy who took a bullet for her? If I were to be put in the same situation, will I take the bullet?
I closed my eyes and pictured myself being in Kwangmin's situation at the time, immersing myself in my own world of deep thought and imagination.
Hyunseung pulls the trigger, the bullet escapes.
BANG!
I took the bullet... but something's wrong. It's not Suzy whom I saved. It was Minzy and without me knowing it, I hugged her without any hesitation. Why is this so? This isn't right! Minzy wasn't there when that happened! What is wrong with me!? My shoulder's bleeding and I'm in Hyuna and Hyunseung's mansion; everything's exactly correct except for the girl that's in front of me.
I opened my eyes to see the cloudy afternoon skies, still wondering why that one inaccuracy was there. Why Minzy? I thought I got over her. We're just friends, nothing more. Yes, nothing more.
The wind blows so gently, well, to others at least. To me, the wind feels rough like sandpaper being slapped across my face. My mind's running but it has the want to just leave out everything first and only think about the good things. Then again, if I only focus on the good, the bad will never go away. I have to solve it and talk it out but taking the first step's always hard. I mean, I talk a lot and it's normal and easy to talk. To utter a word is no sweat but now that I'm put into this situation, beginning a conversation like that with either Suzy or Minzy is harder than taking a test that I am totally unprepared for. I went too far. I got into a reckless fight with my friend and even hurt Minzy 'cause of my foolishness. Putting a sticker on me with "SHAME" written on it seems like kinda legit at this point.
"Mind if I join you?" The bench rocked just a tad bit as the person took her seat, no, as Minzy took her seat.
"What's the point in asking if you're just gonna sit anyway?"
"You got a good point there." She leaned back and chuckled although it was obvious to me that she isn't feeling good. "But still, I didn't know how to start a conversation. It's not like I'll just sit beside you and sigh and stay like that forever, right?"
I faintly nodded. "Right."
There was complete silence for roughly five minutes.
"Fail," I monotonously said to break the silence.
"Oh, shut up!" She then spanked my shoulder but immediately withdrew her arm. "Ack!" she whimpered. Now that I look at her, she's badly beaten up by the final blow. Again, why did I not notice the obvious?
"I guess I'm a failure as well," I said.
"You guess?"
"Okay, I AM."
"There, you admitted it. That's the first step."
"Hey, why aren't you feeling bitter?"
"Of course, I feel a bit bitter but I have to understand that I, y'know, confessed—" She paused for a moment and gulped, feeling rather uncomfortable with the C word. "To you just after you got your heart broken into tiny bits and pieces and fought with your friend when it was clear that you would lose right from the beginning."
"So you think I'm hardheaded too, eh?"
"Exactly." She forced a smile but I could see her gritting her teeth. "You're so hardheaded yet I wanna just keep on hitting it until it smashes open!"
I tilted my head. "And your point is?"
Her hand became mechanical and she fired a missile at me. I put a force field around both of us.
Her eyes began to sparkle in a sad way as her hand turned back to normal. "Thanks for protecting me too."
I shrugged. "It came second nature to me for some weird reason and I also owe you."
"Yeah, you owe me a lot."
"Thanks for saving my life back there."
"No sweat but that's not what I meant. You broke my heart."
What? Is she serious? "Me? YOU!" I pointed at her. "YOU broke my heart!"
"No, you did!" She then slammed her fist onto the park bench with much anger and frustration. "Taemin, you get jealous too easily! You never even bothered to ask me why I was with him. You just ran away!"
"Here we go again with the running away crap! I'm sick of it!"
"But it's true. You know it, I know it." She reached out to hold my hand but stopped midway and rested her hand on top of her lap. "And you can't deny it."
I sighed. "Fine, explain to me everything about you and Taeyang. You're free to blurt out whatever and I'll just listen."
"You see, Taeyang and I were just playing some arm wrestling but you mistook it as something different—"
I interrupted her. "But you guys were holding hands!"
"Of course! It's arm wrestling, you twit! You're supposed to hold hands!" She yelled while pulling her hair then carried on with her story. "So you just glared at me and cried like the whimp that you are and ran away, never ever showing your face to me again—"
Once again, I cut her. "I'm not a wimp."
And she gives an intimidating glare.
"Fine, I'll shut up."
"Thank you," she said and crossed her legs. "When you left me, life suddenly became hard; my depression grew day by day. Eventually, Taeyang and I ended up being together but I barely had any feelings for him. Well, at first, I did or so I thought; I was emotionally unstable at the time and I couldn't make the right decisions for myself." She bit her lip as she held in her tears. Finally, she officially paused, allowing me to be able to talk again.
"Hence, the reason why you guys broke up," I said, trying to hide my guilt.
"After battling with you, I broke up with him." The tears were already piling up in the corners of her eyes. "I never realized that you were so close to me all this time. When we finally met again in Lux, I tried to play it cool but little did you know that it was so hard for me to pretend that I didn't want to wrap my arms around you and hug you tightly. I really wanted to, I really did. I missed you a whole lot."
"Look, I—"
She hugged me tight and buried her face onto my chest. Suddenly, my current problems have been replaced by the burden of seeing Minzy crying like this. "I just love you so much."
I her hair and rested my head onto hers. "Seeing you like this just makes me wanna cry as well."
"Cry for all I care! Let's cry together."
"Y'know, when you hug me, my problems seem to go away. Weird, right?" I ruffled her hair a bit. "And when I imagined myself taking a bullet for Suzy, you appeared instead of her."
"What do you think is the meaning of that, then?" she asked, hoping that I'd answer her.
"Perhaps—" I gazed at her and a tear managed to escape my right eye and soon, the rest followed. It just all came back to me, the memories of Minzy and I and that's when I came up with the conclusion that I'm completely attached to this girl; she's too precious for me to lose. "No, I do love you too."
"Are you sure you're not just emotionally unstable? I mean, there's still that Suzy thing, right? Oh, and you still have Kwangmin to worry about and don't forget, the other guys are still—"
I covered , looked at her straight in the eye and said, "I love you, I'm absolutely sure of it." I then moved my hand to brush her cheeks. "And I'm sorry for misunderstanding you."
"It's alright as long as we're together again." She nodded with a pleasant smile.
We have always been together, even when we were far away from each other. The way we handled that incident just proved it all. I was loving Minzy through Suzy which meant that I never had feelings for her; my heart was with Minzy all this time.
And so, we walked home, holding hands as a couple once again.
Comments