listen

She has probably adjusted the camera a gazillion times, untangled the wires under his desk and repositioned his mic at the optimum distance. Does it matter? Will it matter? She doesn’t know. Will he like it if she props up his headphones near or far away from his mic? Would he like to be positioned somewhere else?  She brings out the small bottle of blueberry tea she had picked up earlier just for him and sets it down near his microphone. She knows he loves this, and she hopes that it will be enough.

There is the unmistakable sound of boys coming down the hall all of a sudden, deep laughter bouncing off the walls as they make their way to the studio. She hastily straightens her dress, adjusts her jacket on her frail shoulders in an attempt to look better. She catches a glance of herself in the mirror and it immediately she picks at it. What is there to like in a girl with a spattering of freckles across her cheeks and nose? It was out of place in asian face like hers. Then again, everything about her was so out of place. Unconsciously, she lightly traces her fingers across a scar on her lower left cheek. It is faded, but it catches the light when she turns her head. This is what she is conscious of the most, but it doesn’t matter- will never matter to him. Already, they are filling in the studio with their heavy footsteps, the shuffling of clothes as they hastily make their way to their seats just before the radio show comes back on. They rush to greet Ryeowook, and in the hustle and bustle of boys, she cranes her neck a little, just a little if only to see if her efforts have made any fruit.

She watches him untangle more wire, push his mic back and slip on the headphones like she didn’t spend fifteen minutes figuring things out for him. This is a splinter she will keep stepping on- that no matter how much she assumes she knows, she never really does.

He turns his head and sees her in the corner, and a small smile draws itself onto his lips, but that is it.

That has always been it.