#048
Part 2
Even though they were still second-years, the homeroom teachers of each class were busy scolding the students sternly whenever they saw them. They desperately tried to boost the students’ motivation to study by explaining how important the coming year would be and what this time in their lives meant.
However, even while watching such teachers, Yechan remained absent-minded throughout. His notebook was filled with doodles that only Yechan could understand.
Yechan, who had been staring blankly down at his notebook, secretly unwrapped a candy and put it in his mouth. It had become a habit by now.
Jiwoon’s scent filled his mouth. He connected his fragmented thoughts with the candy’s stickiness. His head was full of Lee Jiwoon.
“Seo Yechan, are you okay?”
Taehyun asked. Yechan didn’t answer.
Minho tapped Taehyun’s shoulder. After hesitating for a moment, Taehyun quietly returned to his seat.
“……I’ve never seen him like this before. What should we do?”
“Let’s just wait and see. He’ll tell us about it.”
“Fuck, have you ever seen him talk about his own problems first? What the hell is up with that hyung to make him like this?”
“They were close. They must have fought. ……Keep it down a bit.”
Taehyun and Minho whispered quietly so Yechan couldn’t hear them. Yechan’s food intake had noticeably decreased from before. Yechan, who now only sucked on candies that he used to barely touch, looked as if his soul had left his body.
Yechan was continuously replaying his last meeting with Jiwoon. At some point, he had been stuck on that rooftop.
Jiwoon’s gaze, expression, and voice became clear then scattered, over and over again. And rejection, rejection, rejection.
Yechan’s heart froze. It cracked. Finally, it shattered with a snap.
In dreams where he met Jiwoon, Yechan asked what he had done wrong. Jiwoon had no answer.
In those dreams, some days he would warmly embrace Yechan like before. And on other days, he would just pass by as if he couldn’t see Yechan at all.
Yechan kept asking. Did I treat hyung too carelessly? Did I say something that got on your nerves? Or, or do you just hate me now?
* * *
“Hey, eat this.”
These days, Taehyun and Minho would buy bread and milk for Yechan. Yechan’s face had gotten even thinner. Yechan said he was fine and only put candy in his mouth.
“Yechan. Here.”
Minho unwrapped chocolate and held it out. Yechan, who had been staring at the chocolate, put a piece in his mouth and chewed. It was the chocolate he had eaten with Jiwoon in front of Choi Yeon once.
Yechan went to Jiwoon’s class for several more days. But among the third-years who attended regularly, Lee Jiwoon was nowhere to be found.
Every time Yechan saw Park Kyungjun, Choi Min, and Yoon Jukyung, he felt like he was going crazy. He wanted to grab someone by the collar.
* * *
“Why are you like this lately? Where have you left your mind? You know it’ll be hard to get into the next class if you keep this up, right?”
“Yes.”
Yechan answered the academy homeroom teacher’s rebuke. Yechan’s academy mock exam report card was terrible this time.
It was only natural. He couldn’t study. Even when he opened his workbook, he only saw the blank spaces. Even though the academy was filled with the heavy atmosphere of approaching senior year, Yechan couldn’t properly feel that atmosphere and just continued his thoughts.
When exactly did Lee Jiwoon decide to disappear? Did I really not know anything? Lee Jiwoon’s resolve that must have been mixed somewhere in the air – did I really not notice it at all?
* * *
“Wow, it’s cold. It’ll be cold this weekend too, right? I promised to watch a movie with Hana…… I should tell her to dress warmly.”
“I told you not to talk about Hana.”
Two weeks had passed since the Suneung. Minho, whose relationship with Yujin had ended up as just a fling, waved his fist at Taehyun.
Yechan smiled slightly at the sight. He remembered the trip to Yeosu. Then memories of kissing and embracing Jiwoon suddenly attacked Yechan.
The memories stirred up a storm. Take care. As Yechan recalled Jiwoon’s voice, the smile immediately disappeared from his face.
Ah, that was when. The day when Jiwoon, who had given him the meteor shower, turned around and went down the stairs.
Yes, that day. He had already on that day…… on that day.
Only then did Yechan finally come to fully realize his situation. He had been abandoned that day.
Lee Jiwoon had abandoned Seo Yechan. The moment that sentence was completed, tremendous fear pierced through Yechan’s body.
All those firsts became mirages and disappeared in an instant. Jiwoon flowed out of Yechan’s hands like sand. He couldn’t catch him. His heart froze once again.
It was cold. It was lonely. It was desolate. It was bleak, depressing, and heartbreaking. And it hurt so much.
* * *
“Seo Yechan, what are you doing for Christmas? Want to go to church together?”
“You’re thinking of saying church but sneaking off to a PC room, right?”
“How did you know?”
“It’s obvious.”
December had arrived. Hearing Taehyun’s suggestion, Yechan shook his head again this time.
Taehyun made eye contact with Minho and clicked his tongue. Yechan’s words had noticeably decreased.
His academy class had also changed to B class. Yechan, who had always been assigned to A class since he started attending the academy. Yewon’s puzzled questions followed Yechan as he moved classrooms, but Yechan didn’t respond.
Lying on his bed, Yechan looked at Jiwoon’s photo and closed his eyes. In the place that had become empty overnight, Yechan was alone again.
Having tasted the sweetness of dependence in that cold, empty spot, Yechan didn’t know what to do. He could never go back to the time when he didn’t know Jiwoon.
Opening his eyes again, Yechan looked at Jiwoon’s photo. He didn’t want to be alone. He was scared. He missed Jiwoon.
Another week passed. Study still wouldn’t come to him.
Only after all that long time had passed did Yechan finally ask the question. What was I to hyung?
Suddenly, anger welled up. How can you just leave after making someone who was living well without hyung like this?
Yechan’s anger grew day by day. He hated Jiwoon. He resented him.
And one night, Yechan found the answer to his question himself. Lee Jiwoon hadn’t just abandoned him. He had played with him and then thrown him away.
His body trembled violently. The sudden thought instantly consumed Yechan.
Why? But didn’t you once think that way too? Wasn’t Lee Jiwoon convenient for you?
No.
Only realizing how precious something was after being abandoned.
No, no.
Why are you acting like this when it’s all too late?
No, no. It’s not too late yet.
No, it’s too late.
Yechan continued to crumble.
Before he knew it, it was Christmas. After eating the cake his mother had bought and entering his room, Yechan fidgeted with his phone.
His finger habitually opened the message window with Jiwoon. Looking at the messages they had exchanged, Yechan quietly turned off the screen.
While blowing out the candles on the cake with his mother, Yechan made only one wish. Please bring Lee Jiwoon back.
Seo Yechan needed Lee Jiwoon. He wanted to have him. He felt like he would die if he didn’t have him.
And so another first was added to Jiwoon. It was the first time since being born that he had wanted something this desperately.
Yechan panted with thirst every single day. His patience gradually wore away. His lips, bitten so much, never stopped bleeding.
December 31st arrived. Yechan, who had been staring at unreadable foreign language passages in his room, picked up his phone again. Then he accessed the SNS where he had only created an account and searched for Jiwoon’s name.
Finding Jiwoon’s account wasn’t difficult, and Yechan held his breath. He could see new photos of Jiwoon, not the ones from the album he looked at every day.
They were from the past. Though there were only a few photos, his heart pounded at the small face that looked much younger than he remembered. Starting from the oldest photos, Yechan clicked on each one to take in Jiwoon’s appearance, then clicked on the most recent photo.
“Ah……”
Tears welled up in Yechan’s eyes. “Not a sled.” It was the photo Yechan had sent to Jiwoon during the school trip.
There had been a day when he had smiled at Jiwoon’s words about wanting to sled on the grass-covered royal tomb in the photo he had sent. Tears fell endlessly.
After crying for a long time, when he looked at his phone again, the date had already changed. It was January 1st.
* * *
Only after the new year began did Yechan’s vision clear enough to look around him. Having experienced shock, self-hatred, loneliness, fear, and anger, Yechan’s heart was empty.
Yechan left his empty heart as it was. He knew that nothing except Lee Jiwoon would fill it anyway.
“Wow…… This is vacation. Is this really vacation?”
After finishing roll call and receiving his schedule, Taehyun sighed deeply. Today, Yechan had been lying face down on his desk since morning. It was a rare sight.
“He was always mentally absent, but he never lay face down…… Seo Yechan is really a senior now.”
Taehyun ruffled Yechan’s hair as he lay face down, then stopped abruptly. Taehyun looked at his hand touching Yechan and frowned.
“Kim Minho. He’s sweating?”
“In this winter?”
At Taehyun’s words, Minho got up from his seat and slightly lifted the jumper Yechan was wearing, then touched the back of his neck with his hand. Minho’s face crumpled.
“Seo Yechan, sit up. You have a fever.”
“What?”
At Minho’s words, Taehyun made Yechan lift his head. Taehyun, who had touched both his own and Yechan’s foreheads, made a gasping sound.
“Hey, hey! Are you okay? Your head is fucking hot!”
Yechan sat up with a dazed face. His eyes couldn’t focus properly. Frowning and touching his own forehead, Yechan collapsed onto his desk again.
“Taehyun, watch him. I’ll go tell the homeroom teacher.”
Minho left Yechan with Taehyun and ran out of the classroom. Shortly after, Yechan was loaded into an ambulance and taken to the hospital.
Yechan was out of it. He thought he could see Taehyun and Minho’s faces, then the homeroom teacher appeared. Then soon a paramedic was sitting beside him as he lay down.
Even in the midst of all this, Yechan’s fevered mind arbitrarily thought of Jiwoon. The injured knee from when they first met, the “puhuhuh” laughter flowing from the phone, the lips that crunched and chewed candy, the cheeks slightly reddened from smiling, the fingers organizing wrong-answer notes after exams, the voice that languidly called “Yechan,” the eyes that melted sweetly when they kissed, the arms that clung to him desperately when fevered with heat……
But that Lee Jiwoon wasn’t there. Lee Jiwoon isn’t here. Lee Jiwoon isn’t here, I’m telling you.
Seo Yechan, Lee Jiwoon isn’t here, I’m telling you.
Yechan’s brain spun arbitrarily. He didn’t want to wake up. Jiwoon seemed to be right in front of him, but then his vision flickered rapidly.
He missed him. He missed him so much. But Jiwoon wasn’t by his side. Yechan was afraid to open his eyes.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
