In Constant Stars
23 -- p o u r  i t  o u t

In the weeks after, Daehyun became a more closed off person. It wasn’t so much noticeable in his day to day conversations with classmates, but it was mostly apparent in his behaviour around those he knew well. This also meant the moments he spent at our lively lunch table. He talked, he interacted and he did his best keeping up in every way, but there was a big gap between his old self and Daehyun after the break up. Those he only spoke to on a passing whim probably didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary, but those who did know him well could easily tell that something was very, very off.

At a certain point I was a little afraid that he might not be interested in participating anymore in the things he used to love, but then again I never really got to see him during soccer practice. According to Youngjae and Zelo, practices were the moments when he really managed to free his inner frustrations. Daehyun wasn’t an especially aggressive player. He usually had a very agile and clean playing style, in which he meticulously tried to keep up his flair. Apparently he’d let go of that style over the past weeks and he mainly focused on his job: making goals. His coach wasn’t particularly unhappy with his sudden change in style, which Daehyun was very glad about.

I was a little surprised when he suddenly asked me if I’d be there for the last soccer match before Christmas break. It’d be a casual futsal match with a neighbouring all-males high school, so it wasn’t all that important for the high school championships, but Daehyun made it seem like a big deal. Said the other school was a long-time rival of ours, that it was fundamental for our team to win. That I had to be there.

"Yeah... sure?" I brought out hesitantly.

Upon seeing my reluctant reaction, he seemed to be a little disappointed. "You don't want to come?"

"No... no, that's not it," I said, as I hurriedly brushed a loose strand of hair behind my ear and stepped aside to let another student pass me in the busy hallways. "It's just that you've never told me to come see a match before… so I don't really get what makes this one so special."

"Well, it’s as I’ve said. They’re our rivals." He shrugged casually, his eyes never quite breaking off the contact with mine.

Over the past weeks, this was what I'd noticed: Daehyun didn't stay close to me for long periods of time, but whenever we were together, he sure tried to make up for it in quality. I didn't talk to him all that often compared to the times before Jinae broke up with him, but whenever I did, I always felt this electrifying intensity. And that intensity wasn't just from my side or just from his. It was a strange mixture of chemistry and some unspoken thoughts, of which I didn't want to guess what they might entail. There was too much guessing to this all, along with this very odd tension every time we'd talk.

Before, everything was just easiness and laughter, you see. I didn't have that many serious conversations with him and he hardly missed the opportunity to either make a dirty remark or to crack a lame joke. But that had changed. Daehyun sometimes would start talking about Jinae, all of a sudden, in the middle of a conversation about something entirely different. He'd keep talking about her, even if at a certain point I'd lose the energy to keep the dialogue going. It almost seemed like an obsession and God, did it hurt.

I kept our old antics up the best I could. I didn't hesitate throwing jokes his way and faux-insulting him whenever I got the chance, but it was as though those remarks didn't hit home. Instead, the moments I did get his attention only seemed to occur very sporadically and I could never really clarify how I'd made it happen. Sometimes I'd find him suddenly looking at me with this crazy force, and it didn't even really disappear if I'd ask him about it. Another vague answer would be given and that was that. In the past sometimes he'd just let his eyes scan past me, as though I weren't there, which had been embarrassing and a bit painful. But these stares – I didn't quite know how to describe them.

So communication had become a bit... strained between Daehyun and me. He wasn't quite the same person anymore, even though that was supposed to be expected, right? Yet at the same time, sometimes he'd just seem to be exactly the Jung Daehyun I knew him as, and I'd be confused all over again.

Apparently I was the only one who had this problem. Even Heeyoung said she didn't think Daehyun was all that different compared to before, except maybe that he was a little bit more quiet and introspective than usually, but that'd supposedly change over time. Youngjae agreed with her. I had no idea what was going on.

I bit my lip with a frown and turned away so he wouldn't be able to see my expression. When I slowly looked back at him again, he was still looking at me, so I asked in unease: "Okay, Daehyun, what is going on?"

Daehyun raised a brow, a faintly amused look at my discomfort dawning on his face. "Honestly, I'm just asking you if you're coming to see my soccer match tomorrow. Nothing more, nothing less."

"Yeah, but it's just weird. Why now all of a sudden for a futsal match that isn't supposed to be that big a deal? I mean, look at you! You're hardly pumped for it yourself!"

Again, that annoying, nonchalant shrug. "I just feel confident about it."

"But even confident people are supposed to be looking forward to their match, aren't they?"

Finally, Daehyun sighed and said: "Okay, Nana, I could ask you the same thing. What's been going on with you? You've been acting real weird around me for a while now and I don't get why. You’re so cautious all the time."

I almost dropped my books at his innocent, unknowing expression as he said this. With big eyes, I stared at him, thinking that he couldn't possibly be asking this while feigning like he didn't know that things had been very weird between us the past few days. Obviously he was the one responsible for this; how could he be asking me like this was my fault? "Is that an actual, serious question or are you kidding me here? Please say it's the latter."

He blinked with his eyes innocently. "It's not though? I mean, you noticed that something's been off too, right? So what's happening?"

I considered getting really angry at him that moment, because really - he'd been the one acting weird all along! What was with those dragged out silences, his lack of playful input and most of all, the weird stares?

I realised – shouting at him in this situation wouldn’t help. He’d keep acting like his nose was bleeding, I would keep persisting, we’d get nowhere.

So I did the only thing that made sense to me. I walked away.

For once I left Jung Daehyun speechless behind, instead of the other way around.

Despite that weird occasion, it was Heeyoung and Himchan who convinced me to go to the futsal match that Friday. I’d been and complaining while they tried to pull me up from my comfortable couch and told me that I should at least watch the game for Zelo’s sake. Heeyoung had caught on to the fact that everything felt weird and strained between Daehyun and me nowadays, but thankfully she didn’t bring him up.

After that little spat-out from my side, he tried his best keeping his distance from me, like he was scared I could get angry at him any moment. Though I was glad that he didn’t try to push my buttons, I was still a little disappointed that he’d taken on a far more passive stance in this than the usual Daehyun I knew would have done.

I hurriedly changed into a more appropriate outfit compared to my pajamas. When I got downstairs, I found Himchan and Heeyoung waiting downstairs, the latter looking at her watch and tapping her foot impatiently.

“Gee, took you long enough, Nana,” she said sardonically.

I rolled my eyes and waved her complaint away.

“Now, now, ladies, let’s not fight on such a nice occasion,” Himchan brought out easily as I turned around to put on my shoes. “I’d hate it if you two would end up squabbling during the ride to the match.”

“Whatever,” I heard Heeyoung say, since my back was turned to them, “but stop staring at Nana’s , okay? You pig.”

I turned back abruptly, one shoe in my hand, ready to aim it at Himchan’s face any moment.

“Calm down, calm down!” he said, raising his arms in the air like I was a policeman aiming a gun at him instead of one of my boots. “I know how good your shoe-aiming skills are! You don’t need to demonstrate.”

I narrowed my eyes at him for his little jab at that one evening when Daehyun appeared at my ex-workplace drunk. Before I sat back down to put on my shoes without having Himchan stare at my behind, my eyes met Heeyoung’s and we shared a grin. Our squabbling, only happening when both of us were in a considerably bad mood, didn’t ever last that long, especially not when we had Kim Himchan to make it easier for us to team up on him.

As Himchan drove us to the gym hall where the match would be held, Heeyoung told us the tale of why she was in a bad mood: she’d gone on an afternoon date with a college student who had seemed very charming and very intelligent at first glance, but had spent the whole date making ist comments.

“He asked me why I didn’t cover up and said that I shouldn’t wear short skirts. Oh my god, what century does he even live in? I was so tempted to throw my drink in his face and leave,” she rattled. This, amongst other offenses (“He hates girls who wear make-up. Says they’re monstrosities trying to lead guys into a trap.” and “Every girl should be able to cook, so guess I’m not a girl, huh?”), had obviously not made it a date that Heeyoung could tolerate without getting angrier by the second. Truthfully, I felt just as disgusted hearing this.

“You know, Heeyoung,” Himchan supplied, “for someone who can read people so well, you sure have a crap taste when it comes to guys.” He stopped to focus on parking his car, though he also seemed to contemplate what he wanted to add as well. Then, when the car had come to a stop, he said: “That must explain why you and I haven’t hooked up yet.”

Heeyoung flipped him the bird before stepping out of his black, shiny car.

Indeed, Kang Heeyoung was on a war path. It didn’t take long before Jongup and Yongguk realised this as well after we met up with them, so eventually I was the one who ended up sitting right to her, while an unsuspecting high school student we didn’t know sat to her left.

Zelo ran up the tribune ten minutes before the start of the game and asked me if I’d brought his lucky wristband with me, since he’d accidentally left it at home. I couldn’t figure out for the life of me why a goalie like him would wear a wristband during soccer matches, but apparently he did because he genuinely believed that it would help him perform.

After I told him that I hadn’t known that he needed it, Heeyoung spoke up with a forced smile on her features. Faking a sweet voice, she said: “But you can have a good luck kiss from me?”

“Gross,” my brother spat, as his face crunched up in genuine disgust. If he hadn’t been somewhat fearful for Heeyoung, I supposed Himchan would have burst out laughing at the expression, but he stayed eerily quiet next to me. Zelo shot Heeyoung a Look and said: “What’s up with you? Did the cold get to your brains?”

He quickly dashed off the stairs again before Heeyoung could claw at him.

Right that moment, I realised that Heeyoung’s bad mood couldn’t possibly be caused by just a date gone wrong, however horrible it might have been. As I gave her a careful glance from the side, I decided that I’d have to ask her about it after the match, though I had a hunch that it probably had something to do with her parents. As far as I knew, only her parents could get to her this much.

We didn’t let Heeyoung’s grumbling bother us when the match started. And sure enough, after a good ten minutes she started getting into it as well. It helped that the match was quite eventful. Both teams were good, but it was obvious that ours had the upper hand. Daehyun dashed across the field, making it seem like gliding over the smooth surface was an easy breeze while avoiding the players from the other team. None of the no-nonsense playing style that Youngjae and Zelo had been talking about the past weeks was apparent; Daehyun was definitely showing off here. And he did it incredibly well.

There was something about seeing him put his everything into the game. Generally Daehyun was very lax about a lot of things in his life. I couldn't recall any moment when I saw him be as passionate as he was that moment. The most wonderful part to it was probably that he'd be running to and fro the whole time until he got switched out, without the tiniest hint of complaint. Every time he dribbled with the ball, he would be wearing a ridiculously huge grin.

It was a side to him I didn't mind falling for.

Halfway through Youngjae was switched in. Known for his tactical play style along with quick and useful tricks, he was one of the starting members on the usual soccer team. Himchan, the one he always bickered with, suddenly became all the more passionate about the game. At one point he even got up to start shouting: “Yoo Youngjae, move your ! What's with this crappy play?” Youngjae made a goal less than ten seconds after this, which abruptly silenced the idiot standing next to me.

It was ten minutes before the end of the game - we were winning by a 7-3 lead - when one supporter from the other school started cheering loud enough for his clamours to echo through the sports hall. I looked back to take a look at that supporter when my eyes accidentally met Kim Jinae's, who happened to sit a few rows behind us.

There are a lot of things you can think when you see someone you feel betrayed by. And it was odd. I wasn't the one she had betrayed. It probably wasn't even fair to say that she'd betrayed Daehyun, yet that was exactly how it felt like. The thought that Jinae had hurt Daehyun so bad, that she'd done him so much wrong, was one I couldn't suppress. My eyes narrowed ever so slightly, but she still caught on.

She looked down. Then, Jinae stood up and apologised to the people sitting next to her profusely as she made her way out of the row to leave.

In a world where stupid decisions couldn't be made, I would have turned back and pretended that I hadn't seen her. I would have acted like nothing was wrong and that her and Daehyun's problems weren't my business. In such a world, I wouldn't have followed her to confront her.

Of course that's not how things work.

I caught up with her just when she was putting on her coat while walking to the entrance of the building.

“You said you loved him,” I spoke loud and clearly, to make sure that she’d hear me even though I was behind her and she couldn’t see me. The words held just enough power for her to understand that I wouldn’t easily let her go and she came to a halt. Turning on the balls of her feet, too casually for my taste, a somewhat sickening, forced smile on her face, she did what I wanted her to do, except I still didn’t feel satisfied.

"You were saying?" Jinae asked, even though she'd definitely heard me. Her eyelashes fluttered as she blinked just a bit too much for someone who didn't purposely want to irritate me.

This was probably what Daehyun had meant when he described the Jinae in the past as a spoilt girl, someone who'd storm out if she didn't get what she wanted. Through her quiet and demure behaviour, it was easy to forget that she might have her own thoughts that completely opposed the way she acted. She was wearing a mask of friendliness, but right that moment, she had every intention of stepping on my toes.

I gathered my patience to make sure her antics wouldn't get to me. Slowly, I repeated: "You said you loved Daehyun. And he loves you. I don't understand why you broke up with him."

The fake smile promptly disappeared and her eyes took on a hard look. In the blink of an eye, Kim Jinae's mask had completely crumbled. In some kind of screwed up way, without really intending to do so, I had infuriated her so much that she let go of the pretence of always being smiley and lovely, the pretence she'd lived with ever since her parents' death.

"You don't understand, huh? Of course you don't understand, Choi Nana! Of course you don't get it after you kiss my boyfriend and make me doubtful about the one person I thought would always be by my side!" she exclaimed, slowly taking steps towards me, until we were directly face to face and I could see every part of her anger clearly for myself. "Do you really not see it?"

I slowly felt my resolve falling away as I bit my lip. Maybe I did see it. Or maybe I didn't. I frankly didn't know if all I saw was truth or lies, or something confusing in between.

But that wasn't why I was here, I told myself, and I didn't allow myself to stray from my main motive. I needed Jinae to know that she was making Daehyun suffer. And clearly, she herself wasn't at all happy with the current situation either. She had to see what she was doing to the both of them.

"He loves you. He always says that. How he wouldn't leave you. He screwed up once, but everyone can tell how much he regrets that and that he's determined never to make a mistake like that. How could you just ignore that?"

"'Ignore that'!" she repeated, throwing her arms up, acting as if she couldn't believe my words. "You think I'm ignoring–"

Suddenly, halfway through her words, she stopped. Just by herself. A halt came to the sentence she'd initially wanted to throw in my face, but she was stopped by her own train of thoughts that came rushing by with a noise and speed one couldn't simply imagine. A lot of things happened to her simultaneously. Her posture lost its fierceness, she dropped her head. Her eyes lost the anger she'd been aiming at me, and were instead filled with sadness.

"You think I'm ignoring Daehyun," she said, not so much a question as it was a statement. She sounded so fragile, just that moment, that I questioned myself on what I was doing, really. What did I want to achieve by confronting her? "You think I don't care about his feelings, don’t you? You think that I don't see the way he looks at me whenever I walk by and have to pretend that I'm happy with the way things are right now. That I don't want to see his sadness and instead just want to throw it back to him like it means nothing to me. You think that I don't look back at him whenever he's passed me by."

I felt myself pale as the realisation hit me. Silence befell us. When she looked up and I looked down, it was obvious that we had a mutual understanding, even though so many words were left hanging in the air.

“You’re still in love with him?”

I didn’t need to hear her answer to know that Kim Jinae was as much in love with Jung Daehyun as she was the moment I'd first met her, the moment I'd done the English project with her and the moment she discovered that Daehyun had cheated. Those feelings had probably not faltered, perhaps not even when Daehyun told her about that one evening. Those feelings would probably never change.

It struck me how wrong I’d been to follow her and confront her this way. Of course she was angry. I just jumped straight into it and automatically assumed that Jinae was the one in the wrong here. Here I was, judging again, without even knowing what was really going on. Jinae wasn't the bad one here at all, and chances were, Daehyun probably wasn't either. Sometimes loving someone was just so punishing that nothing could be blamed, except for those feelings and those feelings alone.

"I'm sorry I accused you," I whispered, looking back up to meet her eyes sincerely.

Jinae sighed and blinked away the daze that she was stuck in.

"I can't say that it doesn't hurt, what you said," she responded, never really addressing my apology.

Jinae took in a deep breath and threw her long hair behind her shoulder. Like she was recharging, I saw her slowly take another few deep breaths, until she could finally muster up the courage to smile. This time it didn't look that fake, though I could tell it wasn't entirely genuine either.

"For now I just want you to know," she said slowly, "that I don't want to be that girl. I won't be the girl holding onto him desperately when I know that I've already lost him. He made a promise, a long time ago. A promise he’d never forgive himself for breaking. So he chained himself to it, thinking that he’d be able to keep it up eternally. The thing he didn’t understand was that his eternity wasn’t meant for me, nor for that promise he made. If he wouldn’t free himself from that chain, then I would. So I did."

Moments after she left, I was still at that same place at the door of the gym, repeating the same questions in my head. Only I could hear them, but they were actually questions I wanted to ask Jinae. What had she lost him to? Or actually, who had she lost him to? What happened? What changed?

I should probably have been hopeful. Maybe even ecstatic.

Jung Daehyun had fallen out of love.

But all I could wonder was how long I would be able to admire Daehyun, the one who couldn't see that Kim Jinae was probably the least spoiled person he'd ever known, while I would always stay so unchangingly selfish. So selfish that I wouldn't be able to do what she did.

The game was obviously already done by the time I got back to the hall. Everyone was so caught up with our victory that no one asked me where I’d gone, to my relief. I felt too shameful to admit that I’d just jumped to conclusions again and hurt someone deeply in the process.

She asked me not to tell Daehyun that she’d been there, during his game. I had this feeling that he wouldn’t need me to tell him to begin with. Jinae was the first person he went looking for in crowds.

Youngjae and Zelo noticed me and, in all their adrenaline-rushed joy, came running to me all the while exclaiming: “Did you see my score? Did you?” and “That last save, I bet that was one of the most beautiful dives coach has ever seen, don’t you?”

I couldn’t help but to smile at their silliness. “Nice job guys. You were looking really good out there.”

Youngjae suggestively raised his eyebrows as this, an action that was usually more of a signature to Himchan than it was to my geeky friend. I playfully punched him in the arm and told him to get a shower quick because he stank of cheesiness.

Soon the two of them launched in their excited playbacks of spectacular moments during the game and I looked past their shoulders. Daehyun was getting congratulatory pats on the shoulder for the four goals he made. Some girls came flocking to his side to give him a quick congratulations as well, but oddly this didn’t make me feel envious or jealous. My mind kept going back to the conversation I’d had with Jinae and all the implications of what we’d discussed.

If Daehyun wasn’t in love with Jinae anymore, what was going on then?

Our eyes met and he called me over with a wide smile, one much like the one he’d worn during the entire game. I excused myself to Zelo and Youngjae, though I doubted that either had heard me. I made my way over to the star player of the team.

“Not too shabby, Jung Daehyun,” I joked once I’d reached him.

He stopped wiping the sweat from his forehead when he heard this and turned to me with a disbelieving look on his face. “’Not too shabby’? Has Zelo taught you nothing about soccer? I was legendary out there!”

“Wow, very modest,” Heeyoung grumbled from next to me. Probably realizing that she was being rude, she turned her back to us and started talking to Yongguk.

Daehyun looked at me with a raised eyebrow, obviously trying to see if I knew what was going on with her. I shrugged and he decided not to pursue it any further.

“It was a figure of speech. I was pretty impressed. Though I have to say that I’m not planning on becoming one of your fangirls just yet.”

“Shame,” he replied without having to think about it. “I’d think that the sight of Choi Nana cheering me on in a shrilly voice would be terribly entertaining.”

Before I could tell him that I’d never do that, not over my dead body, he was distracted by the call of his name from his coach. He nodded to him and then quickly turned to me. “Hey, wait for me at the exit? I need to talk to you a little bit about something.”

“Uh, sure,” I said with a curt nod or two. “I’m not going to wait for more than fifteen minutes though, so you’d better hurry up.”

“Yeah, no problem.”

I watched his back, clad in blue and white, as he strode confidently to our team’s changing room.

Jung Daehyun was back to being his old self. I had no idea what had brought on this sudden change again.

True to his word, it took less than fifteen minutes before he met me at the door of the building. Sports bag casually slung over his shoulder, his hair still wet and unstyled from a quick shower, he appeared completely content with his slightly slouchier appearance than usual. I’d looked up carefully when he stopped in front of me and I couldn’t help my eyes from slowly taking in the sight in front of me.

“Walk with me?” he asked, his voice quiet and a tad huskier than usual.

It wasn’t really like there was anything else for me to do. I nodded and followed him out.

Daehyun’s legs were longer than mine, and I noticed that he walked faster than I did. It wasn’t like I really had to work to catch up, but if I didn’t adjust, I would be lagging behind. It didn’t take long for him to notice that as well and he slowed his pace to that of an easy stroll.

“Thanks,” I murmured and he answered with a lopsided grin as he looked at me with crinkled eyes. He was so amused.

“Sorry I made you wait,” he started after a few minutes of easy silence. “I just wanted to apologise to you. You were right. I’ve been behaving weirdly lately to you and it’s not fair to blame it on you.”

I shrugged. “Thanks… It’s alright. And well, it’s not like you really blamed it on me.”

“Yeah, but still…”

There was no use dwelling on this too much. Fact was, he’d been off his game, I hadn’t really known how to respond to that and that led to some weird tension. I guess it wasn’t fair of me to expect him to be all normal after he’d taken the blow of the break up.

“The reason I really wanted you to be at this game was because I knew Jinae would be there. You saw her, right? She was a few rows behind you, to your right. The goalie of the other team is her cousin, the one she lives with. They’re pretty close, you see. And he’s very protective of her; it used to drive me nuts.”

I could slowly feel my mind drifting off again, because the way he spoke reminded me of all the other times he’d reminisce about her and I wouldn’t know what to do. Most of the times it felt to me like he was only saying those things to satisfy himself anyway, so I’d let him be.

“I was really anxious for the game. Just knowing that she’d be there, not to support me, but to support the opposing team – I couldn’t really handle it. But then I thought maybe having more people there to support me would help, so I asked Yongguk and Himchan hyung, but you too. I’m really glad you came.”

Wait, this wasn’t how those monologues of his were supposed to go. I halted in my steps and stared at him weirdly. He burst out laughing when he looked back to me and saw my disbelieving expression. But soon, he calmed himself down and said softly: “Honestly, Nana, having you there really helped me in many ways.”

“You didn’t seem nervous at all, though?” I blurted before I could help it. “I mean, you did great out there, almost like it was so easy.”

He grinned. “Yeah, I kind of changed my mind about it. It’s not so bad, having her watch me.”

I nodded briefly. I still felt disappointed. A little used, like I was originally supposed to be his shield or something. And then he said something that made my insides flutter.

“I mean, why worry about having Jinae’s eyes on me when you’re watching me too, right?”

It was like he was flirting with me, perhaps, but it sounded too genuine to be a flirty comment. It was a real moment of thankfulness, much like that time on the roof when he said I might have saved his life that Wednesday evening. I hadn’t known what to say then and I sure as hell didn’t know what to say now either. I looked up at him and found him smiling brightly.

“Thanks, Nana, for putting up with my crap this whole time.”

He promised me that he would try not to act so weirdly anymore, though I couldn’t bring myself to believe him entirely.

“And you have to promise me that you won’t be so cautious around me, ‘kay?” he asked, finally, when we arrived at the bus stop where I needed to be. He would need to take the subway to his house. “I appreciate that you care, but I’m fine now. No worries about that.”

This, too, I felt a bit hesitant on. I chewed my lip before I said: “Okay, if you say so. I didn’t even realise I was doing that before you pointed out that I’d been acting weird too. I’m sorry I did that.”

“’Tis alright. I mean, I get it. Given the state I was in, it must’ve been hard not to think that things were weird,” he answered with another smile gracing his features. He was so smile-y today, it felt contagious.

Soon we bade each other goodbye. For a second time that day, I watched his back as he walked away from me, taking in all of him: his straightened stance, his happy stroll, that sports bag over his shoulder and the way his jacket was blown back by the wind. He almost seemed to be his carefree self again, much to my relief.

I was sure that there was something going on with him. I had no clue what it was, but it did reflect in the way he talked to me. The jokes weren’t there, as well as the innuendos. Sometimes I’d find myself looking for his playfulness, simply because I missed it, but this wasn’t really that bad either. Maybe having heart to heart talks with Daehyun wasn’t so bad.

I decided not to ask him about it. If Daehyun felt ready to share his thoughts with me, he probably would.