I Meant To Behave But There Were So Many Other Options
Ji Ah looked at her stuff scattered on the floor in bewilderment. What was he doing? Didn't his mother ever teach him to never go through a girl's bag?
Young Do tossed her bag aside carelessly and moved forward to snatch Bona's bag from her shoulder. He opened it and dumped its content on the floor too, beside Ji Ah's stuff.
"Ya! Are you crazy?!" Bona moved closer, looking ready to pounce at Young Do at any given moment. However, Young Do was completely relaxed.
"Look," He said, looking down at the things strewn on the floor with smugness, then looking back at Ji Ah.
And she finally realised what he was doing when she really looked at the stuff on the floor.
She pursed her lips.. Apparently, Ji Ah's things were cheap looking and Bona's were expensive.
Realisation dawned on Bona's face too, though clouded by confusion. Ji Ah felt her face burn, as she looked away and bit her lip.
Who was he? Just who was he to do all this and humiliate her like this? Angry tears formed in her eyes.
"Bona," Young Do drawled, but his eyes were on Ji Ah. "Doesn't it look like she isn't new money?"
Ji Ah turned her head vaguely in Bona's direction to look at her.
"I don't know!" Bona said in her American accent, bending down to collect her stuff. "Why would I care?"
Ji Ah wasn't sure, but she felt that Bona was uneasy.
"You should." Young Do scoffed, smugness dripping from his voice. "If we have been lied to, then we are all victims here." He cocked his head at Ji Ah and smiled wickedly. "How would everyone react if they found out you have lied to them. Should I call them in now? and tell them everything?" Young Do said the last part in a low threatening tone.
Ji Ah scowled at him with wet eyes. Was he trying to blackmail her?
"Do whatever you want!" She said venomously, raising her eyebrows. If he were doing it because of Kim Tan then she had already told him a thousand times that they had nothing. And if he were doing it because of last night, then he was completely childish.
Young Do lifted a brow in surpise. He stepped forward and Ji Ah drew back at once, feeling her composure waver. His 6 something height wasn't helping either, as he completely towered over her.
"Should I really do whatever I want?" His voice lowered, as he smirked, his eyes twinkling with something.
Ji Ah faltered, swallowing uncomfortably as his words sunk in, but in the next moment she felt her temper rise even more. She decided she was already over the border line, so she may as well explore the country too.
"Go to hell." She spat each word clearly, gazing straight into his dark eyes while her heart hammered madly in her chest.
Bona had collected her stuff and was now watching the exchange between them with a frown.
He chuckled devilishly. "What's making you so brave, I wonder? Is it Kim Tan?" He added meaningfully at the end, making Ji Ah's blood boil.
She wanted to use every curse word she knew at him --though she knew very little curse words. She curled her faintly shaking hands into fists.
"Get lost!"
To her further chagrin, his shoulders shook with an irritating laugh. She wanted to claw that look off his face with her nails.
He stepped closer again and Ji Ah didn't flinch back this time, but she was sure she looked more pathetic than brave right now.
Yoon Chan, their class president and Bona's boyfriend, appeared unexpectedly by Ji Ah's side before Young Do could say anything more.
"What's going on here?" He demanded sternly, his eyes bouncing from Ji Ah's stuff littered on the floor to a now annoyed looking Young Do, then to Ji Ah --who most likely looked shaken.
"Young Do threw our things on the floor!" Bona complained immediately.
Young Do sighed. "I was having a friendly talk with my friend here." He gave Yoon Chan a slight tight lipped smile, gesturing towards Ji Ah. She scoffed at him.
"I know your friendly." Yoon Chan said, his gaze growing cold.
Young Do turned back to Ji Ah and clapped his hands together. "Then we will continue this conversation later." He told her with the same tight lipped smile. Ji Ah silently glared at him in response and forced herself to stay still as he moved past her to leave the class, his arm brushing against her.
Ji Ah went to find her bag and crouched down on her knees to pick up the rest of her stuff. Yoon Chan helped her and disgruntled looking Bona stalked away to her seat.
"Avoid him." Yoon Chan advised her as he handed her diary to her.
"That's what I have been trying to do." She mumbled weakly, taking her diary from him.
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Kim Tan didn't intend to to look into her notebook, but as he was passing by her empty spot in library, he had a glimpse of something, that caused him to look back.
In one upper right corner of a page riddled with messy words, there were some familiar looking doodles; tiny broken hearts, drawn with a pen.
Kim Tan stared, suddenly going back in time when Cha Ji Ah and Kim Tan had tried to study together, once. She was upset with him, so she was pretending to study, while doodling on one upper right corner of her textbook's page. Kim Tan had joked that it was his heart she was breaking on the paper.
He looked up at Hae Na Ri, standing in the aisle in front of him and picking out some book from a shelves. Her forehead was puckered thoughtfully, and lips were drawn into a pout.
Kim Tan looked away. Though he threw an involuntary sidelong glance at her notebook once, before moving away.
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Ji Ah carefully placed the small chocolate cake on the table.
"Should I arrange the candles too, sir?" She asked the old man.
"Sure," He said in a deep voice. "Also lit them."
Ji Ah picked up candles and began placing them in a circular shape. "I think you should lit them when your granddaughter is here." Ji Ah smiled in politness.
The old man's forhead creased and he gave a grim smile. "She is not going to be."
Ji Ah stilled and her smile faded. "Why?"
"She is busy, today." He smiled wryly gazing at her.
Ji Ah's lips parted in a 'ohh'. She understood now why the old man appeared sad.
"When does your birthday come?" He asked her out of nowhere.
"My birthday?" Ji Ah said. She didn't remember Cha Ji Ah's birthday, so she thought about her own. "It's around 3 months from now."
"Is that so?" He looked thoughtful for a moment. "Then why don't you celebrate it early with me. I will assume my granddaughter is here with me, and you get to celebrate twice." He smiled warmly at her.
Ji Ah felt skeptical. She glanced at her manager nervously.
"I will talk to him." He assured her upon noticing.
Ji Ah wasn't going to celebrate her birthday this year at all. She wasn't particularly excited for it either, but as the old man looked at her with warmth, she realised this might be the only birthday she would get to celebrate with someone like him. Besides, what could be a better birthday than cheering someone up?
Ji Ah felt a shy smile made its way to her face. "Then I should lit the candles, sir!"
The lines on the old man's forehead smoothed and he smiled contenfully.
"You can call me, Harabeonim." He told her.
"Ye, Harabeonim." Ji Ah smiled, lighting the candles one by one, then she took a seat across from him.
"I will be 19 soon, so I will assume I am celebrating my own 19th birthday." She said gleefully while the old man listened with interest.
"Let's both blow out the candles at the same time." She suggested. He nodded and pushed back his thin glasses on his nose, before turning to the cake, which was placed in the middle of the table.
"1," Ji Ah counted. "2, 3!"
They both blew at the candles.
"Happy Birthday to your sonnyeo!" Ji Ah clapped and beamed like a child, feeling good in a long time.
He chortled. "Happy Birthday to you!"
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Ji Ah thought about piano, as she chewed boiled meat languidly, sitting at the kitchen counter. Her mind kept drifting back to it.
At school, in music room, she had seen Kang Ye Seol playing piano and Ji Ah had been so tempted, but she had restrained herself. The fact that she had never learned piano -- and she found it through internet that it really wasn't that easy to play piano-- had been freaking her out lately. And the other odd things happening to her had not been helpful at all.
For example, she had been craving chocolate shakes out of blue, despite having never been fond of them before. She used to hate chocolate because it felt too sweet in beginning and too bitter after a few bites, but she had an odd craving for it now. Maybe that was due to her taste disability.
Another thing; she would often see something or hear a song that she would feel she had seen this thing or heard it somewhere before, yet she just can't put her finger on it. It gave her a constant feeling of anxiety. As though she was supposed to remember something, but can't, no matter how much she strained her memory. Some things that felt familiar yet so unfamiliar at the same time. One day, she broke down into tears when she saw some attractive looking handmade soaps on a stall in street. The Ajhumani selling it offered her a free one out of pity. That one green coloured soap still laid in a drawer in her cupboard, though she had not looked at it again since then. She blamed it all on her depression episodes, but deep down she felt something was off.
Perhaps it was the injury on her head that messed with her mind so much. She thought about one more appointment with her psychiatrist, as Mr Seo had suggested, but what was the point when she couldn't talk her heart out? She had gotten medicine to calm her after her nightmares. That was enough for now. As for her Amaxophobia, she liked to pretend that she had no phobia.
The truck nightmare, she must have seen Ji Ah's accident before she blacked out, but she couldn't remember it in her conscious mind. She assured herself, cleaning up and standing up to go out for a walk.
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As the test papers were getting distributed, Ji Ah didn't feel the same anxiety she usually did when she sat down for a test. She could even fail this test and go home bouncing on her feet because her father wouldn't be waiting there to raise hell. Though she didn't plan to fail; she just didn't feel pressurized to get the first rank.
The test ended and Ji Ah handed back the paper, feeling satisfied with her performance. She didn't believe she would get any exceptional rank, since the students here had special expensive tutors hired for them by their parents. Ji Ah could never match their intelligence.
While everyone was handing back their test papers, Ji Ah caught Young Do glancing at her. She threw him a frosty look before standing up to retrieve her notebook from the teacher's desk. Ji Ah didn't see Young do following her.
When she grabbed her notebook, another hand grabbed it too. Ji Ah looked up to see an impish looking Young Do staring at her. Ji Ah tugged at her notebook, but he didn't let go. She glared at him and tugged at her notebook once again. He still didn't let go. Ji Ah scowled at him. An annoyingly amused smile was settled on his lips.
Ji Ah grasped her notebook with both hands and went to yank it out of his hold again.
He let go of it abruptly.
She gave a small gasp, as she stumbled backward with her own force, but managed to regain her balance.
Young Do looked like he were going to crack his jaw with how wide he was grinning at her.
"Aish!" Her hand twitched while restraining herself from throwing the notebook at his smug face. She scowled at him through a few strands dangling in her face. That for some reason seemed to amuse him even more.
Her cheeks felt hot and her eyes darted around once to see everyone into their own world and no one had seen Young Do making a fool out of her.
Clutching her notebook tightly in her hands and resisting the urge to stomp her feet childishly, she turned on her heels and stalked off to her seat. She set down her notebook heavily on the desk, causing her to receive a few looks.
He has some nuts loose. Ji Ah decided as if trying to comfort herself by that thought.
Young Do came back to his seat next to her. She brushed strands out of her face and flipped open her notebook roughly, ripping a page.
The class began and she did her best to make Young Do feel like he had suddenly gone invisible.
"Ya." Young Do called out to her softly when their teacher turned their back to them. Ji Ah ignored him and kept taking notes indifferently.
"Ya." Young Do called out again, slightly louder this time, perhaps assuming that Ji Ah had not heard. She ignored him again and stared at the board.
She flinched when Young Do hit her desk softly with the tip of his foot, jerking her pen with the movement and distorting her written words. Ji Ah cursed his long legs inwardly.
"Ya." He hit the desk softly again. However, Ji Ah was hell bent on ignoring him now.
She started humming casually, as she continued to write random things in her notebook.
"Ya!" Young Do hissed, hitting her table harshly now, distorting her words again.
They were receiving looks from the people around them, but one scary look from Young Do and everyone went back to their work.
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Since I was late for the update last time, so I am updating early now. I got bookmarks and favourites so thats motivating me to write more. :D
~Fawns