Chapter 22: Softly whispering
A melody that calls out to us“Sunbaenim…sunbaenim!” I heard a girl calling out to me as I was walking down the hallways, I my heels and saw one of the prettiest girls that was in 1st year of High School. She was well known for being one of the best dancers in our high school and one of the cutest girls.
“Hyerin-ssi, hello” I greeted with a little bow and smiled at her, kind of wondering why she would come to talk to me, a 2nd year student. But I kind of had an idea of why she was looking for me, but deep inside hoped it wasn’t for what I thought it was.
“Sunbaenim… I um… want to ask you for a favour…” she said as she looked down to the floor slightly embarrassed, hiding something behind her in her hands.
“Um…sure” I casually replied.
“Really? Well uh…here” she rapidly handed me an envelope and took both of my hands in hers, “Sunbaenim, please hand this over to Lee Jonghyun sunbae… please tell him to give me an answer soon” she said.
It was like the 6th letter I had received that was directed to Jonghyun, well no surprise, Valentine’s day was going to be the day after, I could only imagine the number of chocolates that oh-so-wonderful-out-of-this-world-Lee Jonghyun was going to receive. I simply smiled at the girl and nodded.
“Don’t worry, Hyerin-ssi, I’ll make sure he gets the letter.
“Thank you so much, sunbaenim! I knew I could count on you!” she chirped and with a quick bow, she just left towards an unknown direction to me.
“Yeah sure…” I sighed as I continued walking down the hall towards my classroom; I was wondering how many more girls would come up to me and give me their love letters so I could give them to Jonghyun.
“Do I look like Jonghyun’s personal assistant or what…?” I murmured as I looked at the cards that I had on my bag. I finally entered the classroom and sat on my desk before one girl from another classroom quickly rushed inside and asked me if I could go outside with her. Another letter I was guessing. This time though the girl was the president of our Chess club, why did we have a chess club? I didn’t know; our school had so many clubs so it was hard to keep track of them.
“Sunbae, I don’t know where to start but….”
“You have a letter right?” she opened her eyes wide and blushed but nodded regardless. I was right after all.
“Yeah, it’s not the first one you are entrusted today?”
“Nope, I actually lost count of how many letters I’ve been handed, but well you want me to give this to…?”
“Kang Minhyuk-sunbae”
“Oh…sure, I will give this to him” It was like the 4th or 5th letter I had got that was directed to Minhyuk, this year they were kind of tied when it came to love letters. She thanked me and quickly left off to her classroom.
“Hey, did it already start?” a soft voice whispered in my ear, I turned to the side and saw Jinae, my female best friend; I smiled and nodded in response.
“You should look at my bag; it’s filled with letters directed to them”
“And like, not a single one is yours?”
“Of course not, Jinae, why would I write love letters to my friends? It’s not like I…” like I’m in love with any of them, of course I wasn’t, they were nothing but my friends, or well my best friends but it was ok being that.
Jinae wrapped her arms around my waist and rested her head on my right shoulder, “Oh, you should at least just joke around with that, see how they react”
“No, Jinae, just no”
“You know...if you actually wrote a letter, I think you would beat any of the girls who are confessing to them, like, there’s no chance with any of them if it was you” Jinae commented.
“Tch, you are talking crazy, we are friends that’s all, aren’t we FOUR always together?”
“No!” she retorted and cutely pouted, “You three are always together, and I just tag along from time to time”
“You are pretty close with Minhyuk-oppa, aren’t you?”
“That’s…”
“Do you have a letter for him or something? That’s why you are not letting me go, Kwon Jinae?”
“N-no! It’s not like I like Minhyuk, not at all” she denied. I was never sure of what went through Jinae’s mind, she was nice and a good friend to me but, I never understood her completely. I always had the feeling she like Minhyuk, but maybe it was just my imagination, so sometimes when we four were together I would be by Jonghyun’s side more, I felt that Jinae would be mad at me if I stood too close to Minhyuk, even if we knew her for a shorter period of time. But yeah, it was just a feeling that I was betraying Jinae if I was too close to Minhyuk, ever since we met her at the beginning of our second year of high school, Minhyuk and I wouldn’t be too close when she was around.
Well, that was my doing, it was because of me and because I didn’t want to hurt my friend, even if Minhyuk and I were just friends. I didn’t know if he actually noticed that, but I don’t think he did since they actually started talking a lot more, why? I really didn’t know, but sometimes it felt like they were leaving Jonghyun and me out of whatever they were talking about. Sad actually because I really enjoyed talking to Minhyuk and after being close for so many years, that he suddenly started talking a little more to Jinae made Jonghyun and I wonder what was going on.
Even if Jinae talked more to Jonghyun and was more friends with him than with Minhyuk at first, for some time now we were being left behind, it wasn’t something serious, but yeah, things slightly changed. But he seemed to be the same boy we had known for years so there was no problem to it, kind of, I didn’t know why but in some occasions when Jinae and Minhyuk left us to talk alone for some seconds I would feel uneasy, I sometimes would feel there was something I was missing, I didn’t know why. But then again, she claimed she didn’t like Minhyuk, and I just had to believe her, why would she lie to me?
We both entered the classroom and each of us sat on our respective desks, mine was in the middle of Jonghyun’s and Minhyuk’s desks, it had always been like that, ever since I met them both, “Morning, oh so-awesome Lee Jonghyun, morning oh-so-lovely Kang Minhyuk, you’ve got mail” I said as I took out several letters of my bag and placed them on their desks respectively, “Just a heads up, I won’t be carrying your chocolates tomorrow, I’m not your assistant” I pointed out to both of them as I checked inside my bag to see that there weren’t any letters left inside.
“Why are you so annoyed? Jealous much?” Jonghyun asked as he started looking at all the envelopes.
“How funny” I replied.
“Mianhe, you are going through this again this year” Minhyuk said as he placed the letters on his bag, so he was actually going to read them, Jonghyun placed them inside his notebook, I wondered if he would have the time to read them and at least go to those girls that were confessing to him with everything he had to do.
“It’s ok, I’m used to it, that’s what I get for being friends with you two” I joked around.
“I actually told her to add her letters there but she didn’t want to be turned down by you two” Jinae stated almost sounding as though she was serious, I glared at her for saying such things.
“Jinae yah! Why would you lie about that? Who wants to write letters to them? They already have enough”
Jonghyun leaned a little bit closer to me and studied my expression, “We expect chocolates from you tomorrow”
“Shut up!”
“Friendship chocolate, I think he means that” Minhyuk clarified as he looked through his notes, “We are friends aren’t we?”
I pondered about it for a second but I wasn’t sure if it was right to, I had been giving them friendship chocolates for years so it was only to be expected from me to give them something, especially if I wanted to receive something for White Day.
Valentine Day, I wondered how it would feel to actually give something to someone you like, I was so used to give chocolates to my two best guy friends but never had bothered to actually think that I could give them to someone I liked, but…back then, I didn’t have anyone I liked. I guess I was focusing too much on friendship that I forgot that I could actually get to fall in love but being so comfortable around Minhyuk and Jonghyun made me forget that once they fell in love with some girl then I would be pushed to the side and things wouldn’t be like they were.
Perhaps that was the reason why I disliked giving them those letters, then again it was the right thing to do, and them falling in love was bound to happen any day, to them and to me.
Valentine Day arrived faster than it should have and I was already expecting to see the avalanche of chocolates that were going to be found on their lockers, also being stopped randomly so they could accept their presents was going to happen several times—it was the same every year.
“Hey, earth to you here” Jinae mentioned as she waved her hands in front of me, “Are you alright? You are so out of it today”
“I’m alright, thank you for asking Jinae…”
“You seem down, what’s wrong? Are you feeling lovesick?” she asked, her arms wrapped around my shoulders as she made me from one side to another, “It’s V-day, why don’t you give a present to someone you like?”
“I don’t like anyone so I don’t have to” I explained as I held onto her hands and stared blankly at the whiteboard. Minhyuk and Jonghyun hadn’t arrived yet from lunch break so we were together on the classroom.
“But you know, there’s someone who has a crush on you” Jinae suddenly said, I turned to look at her and she was staring at me from very close, batting her eyelashes in that cute way of hers, it took me by surprise, what she had said was something I was not expecting to hear.
“W-what?!” I exclaimed alarmed.
“Ne, someone has his very big crush on you for quite some time now, it’s like the cutest crush ever, you are so lucky” she said as she hugged me tightly as though she was congratulating me.
“WHAT?!” I shouted again. I wasn’t processing what she had told me, my eyes grew wide, it was the
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