After eating dinner with Infinite, Miyeon and Sunggyu insisted on going shopping, but Hoya, Dongwoo, and Jaesoon wanted to go to a movie. I didn't want to be Sunggyu and Miyeon's third wheel, so I went with Jaesoon. Miyeon didn't seem to mind.
I didn't know what movie we were seeing, and I didn't really care. I was just there so I didn't have to be lonely.
"Does anyone want popcorn?" Hoya asked. All three of us blinked at him.
"We just ate," Dongwoo said, "But I guess if you're going to get some, I'll take some."
"Awesome! You guys go find our seats!" Hoya walked excitedly toward the food line while Dongwoo lead Jaesoon by hand to our theatre. I walked behind them while smiling. The way Dongwoo looked at her was contagiously sweet. There was a hint of a smile on his face at all times, especially when she spoke. He held her hand delicately, but soon their fingers were laced together comfortably. Like they fit perfectly together. Like puzzle pieces.
"So, Jinhwa," Dongwoo diverted his attention from Jaesoon for the first time all night to talk to me, "Interested in telling me what's going on with Sungyeol?"
"Nope," I said simply.
"Why are you avoiding him? He's not mad or anything," Dongwoo said lightheartedly.
"I'm not avoiding him," I denied, "I'm just not in the mood to talk about it."
"Hey, I don't blame you," Jaesoon said, leaning across Dongwoo so she could speak to me directly, "Leave her be, oppa."
"Sungyeol is my friend," Dongwoo said, "I'm just trying to help him out."
"Am I not your friend?" I pouted.
"You are. And you're Sungyeol's friend, too, so you shouldn't avoid him."
"I'm not avoiding him," I denied again, "Let me have a day, please."
"Fine, fine… But a day is all you get!" Dongwoo chuckled and turned back to Jaesoon. Watching them, while extremely cute, made me involuntarily think of Sungyeol. I wondered if he would have tried to cuddle up with me like Dongwoo did with Jaesoon. I wondered if he would put his arm around me during the movie like Dongwoo did with Jaesoon. I wondered if he would hold my hand like Dongwoo did with Jaesoon. Even after Hoya came back, I subconsciously wished I was sitting next to Sungyeol. Thankfully, Hoya kept whispering funny commentary to me throughout the entire movie. If it hadn't been for him, I wouldn't have enjoyed myself at all.
( Text me when you get a chance. I guess we should talk. )
Initially, I thought for sure this message was from Sungyeol, but after staring at it for at least five minutes, I finally believed that it was from Dongwoon. It had been two weeks now, and he hadn't returned any of my texts, any of my calls. Needless to say, my heart started to thump. Hard.
"Unni," I tugged Miyeon's shirt while she stood in front of me playing our new Wii.
"Sorry, am I in the way again?" she said, swinging her imaginary bowling ball towards the T.V.
"No," I paused, watching the ball on the screen go into the gutter, "Dongwoon texted me."
Miyeon spun around, "Really?" she sat down next to me, "What'd he say?" I showed her the text message and she scoffed, "Wow, can he be any more of a baby. 'I guess we should talk.' Yeah, Dongwoon, I guess you should quit ignoring my maknae!"
"Should I wait or should I text him now?" I asked, clueless when it came to these things.
Miyeon thought for a minute, "Tell him you'd rather talk in person."
I took a deep breath, "What if he changes his mind, though…"
"What if who changes his mind?" Song-E asked as her and Jaesoon walked in from the grocery store.
"You're never making us go to the store again, maknae!" Jaesoon complained, "We don't know what half of this stuff is on the list."
"Dongwoon texted her," Miyeon said, answering Song-E's question and instantly reverting Jaesoon's attention to our conversation.
"What? When? What's it say?" Song-E finished setting down the grocery bags and came to sit with us on the couch.
"Just that he wants to talk—"
"It says, 'I guess we should talk.' Like, come on, he can stop being such a baby now," Miyeon said protectively.
"What would he change his mind about?" Jaesoon asked.
"If I said I'd rather talk in person, what if he decides he doesn't want to talk at all?" I pouted. This was too complicated for me. Why couldn't we just forget that any of that shit ever happened?
"He won't do that," Song-E said, "Don't you listen to me at all?"
Song-E had been telling me for the last week what Gikwang had been telling her. She said Dongwoon does nothing but mope and talk about me. According to Gikwang, ever since he ran out of the food I made him, he won't eat anything else unless he absolutely has to. And apparently, he fell asleep on the couch two nights ago with his phone in his hand, and his thumb ready to dial my number. I knew all this was probably true, but I still didn't want to push this. I wanted it to go as smoothly as possible.
"Just do it, Jinhwa," Song-E said. I stared at her for a second too long, and she grabbed my phone from my hand, "I'll do it."
I covered my face in nervousness. I felt my phone plop down onto my lap.
"There, it's done," Song-E said. Before I could even thank her, my phone started ringing. My eyes widened. He was calling me.
"Do I answer?"
"Yes, what's wrong with you?"
"You stupid or something, answer it!"
"What if he yells at me?"
"Just answer it!"
"Yeoboseyo?" I answered nervously.
"Come over. I'm done for the day. We can talk at my house," his voice was calm. He didn't sound angry. He sounded like himself. It almost made me smile.
"Right now?"
"Yes, please. Call me when you're close… Also, you might be here a while…"
"Should I—"
"You might want to bring clothes for tomorrow, and to sleep in, just in case. It's already a little late," he said, extremely casual. I felt like this was almost going too well.
"O-okay… I'll be over soon, then."
"See you soon… little maknae," he said the last part very quietly before hanging up. The others were looking at me expectantly, while I stupidly sat there with my phone to my ear. When I finally put the phone down, I had to let everything settle before they asked me anything.
"Well?" Miyeon finally asked.
"He wants me to go over there," I said plainly.
"No," Song-E said, "We have prac—"
"Get out of here, leadernims," Jaesoon said.
"Yeah, she has to go," Miyeon said argumentatively, "This might be her only chance."
Song-E sighed, "Do you promise to make it in time for practice?"
"I promise," I said, folding my hands in a begging position, "Please let me go, unni!"
She sighed, "Fine. Don't make me regret it."
Miyeon pulled me toward the room we were now sharing to help me get packed. She tried to pick out "sexy" pajamas for me, but I packed my "cute and comfortable" ones instead. For practice, I just packed a big T-shirt and sweats, against Miyeon's advice. She said they'd make me look sloppy, but I was probably going to be leaving before Dongwoon even got up, so I didn't care.
"What are you wearing over there?" she asked. I looked down at my T-shirt and jeans. "You can't wear that."
"Why not?" I pouted, "It's just Dongwoon… he likes when I wear this."
"Wear a nicer shirt at least," she whined.
"I don't wanna," I said, zipping up my large tote bag, "He won't care."
"Everyone on the walk over there will," Miyeon grumbled.
"Good thing I haven't debuted yet," I smiled and winked.
When I finally made it out the door, I was about to text Dongwoon to tell him I was on my way when I came face-to-face with the last person I wanted to see right then. Sungyeol was standing there with his hand raised as if he were about to knock.
"Jinhwa," he said simply, almost surprised.
"Sungyeol…" I sighed, "Now's really not a good time."
"You've been avoiding me for two weeks," he said, "I hate it."
"I'm literally on my way out," I said, noting my giant tote bag.
"I don't care at all," he said nonchalantly, "We have to talk."
"About what, Sungyeol?" I said, very irritated. I started to walk off, only because I knew he was going to follow me.
"Jinhwa, stop," he said, then grabbed my arm, "Just come get a bubble tea with me or something."
I sighed, "That's it, then."
"That's all I want," he said, raising his hands, "Just bubble tea."
I groaned. I didn't care if I was making Sungyeol upset, I really didn't want to do this right now.
"Just start talking now," I said with clear annoyance in my voice.
"When you kissed me—"
"I was drunk," I said.
"I know you were," Sungyeol said, getting annoyed himself now, "But I didn't take it seriously… until you started avoiding me."
I stopped walking. He wasn't about to do this to me right now.
"I realized how much I missed having you around when you weren't anymore… I guess what I—"
"Don't."
Sungyeol blinked at me, "Don't?"
"Don't. I cannot deal with this right now."
"You obviously feel something for me, too!" Sungyeol started to get angry, "If you didn't, you wouldn't have put forth so much effort in ignoring me. Instead you would've just laughed it off and so would I."
What he was saying made a lot of sense, but I blocked any feeling I had for him away.
"So you're here to find out why I avoided you?" I asked, "I can't give you a good reason."
"I can give you a good reason. Because you didn't want to face me after I told you I didn't feel that way about you," Sungyeol took a step closer to me, "You can't deal with the fact that maybe, just maybe, there's someone out there who cares as much about you as you do about them."
"Yes I can," I said angrily, "And that person isn't you. And that's why you're here. Because that simple fact drives you crazy."
"You did the same thing to me that Dongwoon's done to you!" Sungyeol's voice rose enough that people were starting to look. I started to walk again to try to avoid their eyes. "Jinhwa… You're making this hard on yourself."
"You're over-thinking this entire situation," I said calmly. I had composed myself and repressed my anger.
"Because you gave me way too much time to think," Sungyeol was cooling off, too, "seeing as you haven't spoken to me in two weeks. The only reason you're not being direct with me is because you know you have feelings for me, too. And that's why you got so angry."
"No, Sungyeol," I said simply, "I got angry because this is the absolute worst time for this."
"There's never going to be a good time for it until you're honest with yourself," he said. We'd stopped walking again. This time, though, we just stood there staring at each other.
"Well?" I asked.
"Well, what?" Sungyeol asked.
"Is that all?"
He was frustrated, so he let out a single chuckle, "Yeah, that's all. Call me when you wake up." He pushed past me angrily.
I just stood there. All these thoughts hit me at one time.
First, Sungyeol was right. I had avoided him for the past few weeks just like Dongwoon had avoided me. I ignored every text he sent me, I sent his calls straight to voicemail. Even when Jaesoon invited me to hang out with her and Dongwoo, I declined because I figured he'd try to talk to me about Sungyeol. It wasn't that I was hurt—I was afraid of being hurt. Sungyeol was the one who said that's not what he wanted with me. Talking to him wasn't going to change that. And if it did, how would I ever choose between him and Dongwoon.
Second, I thought about how crazy it was to compare Dongwoon and Sungyeol. I was on my way to Dongwoon's. I didn't care about Sungyeol the same way I did about Dongwoon at all, but that didn't mean I didn't care about him. Sungyeol was… a friend. Right? Yeah. Dongwoon was more than that. I would deal with this Sungyeol situation later—I had a bigger fish to fry. This Dongwoon situation had caused me to lose weight and a lot of sleep. It was making me physically ill. I texted him to tell him I was on my way.
( Hurry up, slow poke. )
I let myself smile as a tear fell from my eye. I didn't know where it came from. I didn't know who I shed it for. Instead of thinking about it, I just flicked it away as I headed towards Dongwoon's.
I didn't have to wait long at all for the door to open after I knocked. Dongwoon let me in before saying anything. He took my tote bag and set it by the couch. Then he sat down and patted the seat next to him. I sat down obediently.
He sighed, "Hi."
"Hi," I repeated.
"I don't want to be mad at you," he said simply.
"It's not as easy as just saying it. You can't help it if you're hurt—"
"I am," he said, "Hurt, that is. I am hurt. But I'm mostly hurt because I've been away from you for so long."
"Dongwoon…"
"I don't want anything like this to happen again," he said, "Let's just go back to before any of this even happened."
I thought about that. If I went back to before any of it happened, I wouldn't have told him that I loved him. "So all the things I said…"
Dongwoon cleared his throat, "The things you said… I'll admit, I had been waiting a long time to hear those words."
"But?" I said, expecting to be shut down.
"But if that's what it took to make you realize your feelings for me… I wish the kiss had been from me, is all," he wasn't looking at me.
"Believe me," I exhaled, "I do, too."
He looked at me finally, "Do you still mean it?"
"Every word," I said, feeling a lump forming in my throat.
"Me, too," he put his hand on my knee. I wanted to smile, but my eyes got teary instead. I was so confused about everything.
"You don't look happy," he said.
"I wish you hadn't ignored me so long," I said, trying hard not to sound strained when I spoke.
"I was pissed," he said defensively, "If you saw me kissing Yuri from SNSD, you'd be pissed, too."
"And I would probably yell at you like you yelled at me, and I would've probably slapped you. But I wouldn't have ignored you for two straight weeks. I couldn't torture myself like that."
"Fine, I'm a big baby. I'm sorry," he ducked his head to try to catch my eyes.
"Don't do that shit again, Dongwoon," I said, voice finally breaking and my eyes watering freely. He chuckled. "I'm serious, don't!"
"I love you, Jinhwa," he said, pulling me into a tight hug. I was shocked out of letting myself cry. Instead, a smile found my lips.
"I love you, too," I said quietly. He gave me a slight squeeze before pulling away. He had a brand new look in his eye. Our faces were almost touching. This was it. This was going to be the moment we kissed. I was ready for it. Nothing else was on my mind. All I could see, all I could breathe was Dongwoon. I waited for him to just close that infinitesimal gap between our lips.
"Finally," he said, "You finally admit it."
"Shut up and kiss me," I laughed. And he listened. His lips pressed into mine and it was like a parade began in my head. That thing people talk about—the fireworks. They really happen, you know.