Array
(
[text] =>
I’ve never been a big fan of change.
My life has always been consistent, going to one school from start to finish, hanging with the same group of friends throughout, and living in the same house.
Of course, this year had to ruin this consistency, and as I gather my things, the memories come flooding back, memories I suppressed for so long.
My first friend.
The picture of us stabs me in the heart as I stare at it, frozen. Ella.
I completely forgot about her.
We went to the same kindergarten, and then primary school. We were complete opposites; she was fair and rosy, while I was dark and olive. Teachers nicknamed us the two princesses because we were both so slim with long tumbling hair. At lunch times we would sit under a tree and braid each other’s hair while telling stories of absolute nonsense. We made other friends too, together, because no one could separate us, not even the teachers.
But then high school came, and despite going to the same one, we were put in different classes. I remember feeling so alone in a class full of new people I didn’t know, and I couldn’t wait for the bell to ring so I could run to Ella, because I didn’t want to make any new friends.
She had no problem making new friends.
When I found her, she was surrounded by all these girls, pretty girls, and they were laughing and chatting like they knew each other since forever. Ella invited me over, but the entire time I just sat there, too shy to talk, not that I had a chance to since I was completely ignored.
It went on like that every day.
And then I had to accept the truth: we were drifting apart. And there was nothing I could do about it. We were as good as strangers by the end of that year, and I was lucky that Grace and Opal found me, or rather, adopted me.
However, it wasn’t long before they left me too.
I didn’t know what it was. Perhaps all the friends I made all craved a bigger more exciting social life than I could offer them, and as we all grew older, the parties increased, while my leisure time decreased, especially with all the jobs I worked.
No one stuck around long enough for me to call them a true friend.
And it hurt, that Ella moved on, and I was left behind, time and time again, because I had other interests, or rather, other problems, that were more important than someone to sit with at lunch.
Seeing her face again, captured beside a younger me in a moment of pure joy and innocence, makes it more difficult for me to pack everything up, because I can never quite pack all those nostalgic memories up. They will always be inside of me, waiting for a trigger to shoot them out again into my conscience.
“Aria, are you finished yet?” my mum calls from the next room.
“Not yet!” I yell.
I sit in the middle of my memories, all spread out on the carpet around me, and it is impossible not to sift through them, one by one, and revisit the painful past. But the more I look at all these photos, trinkets, and random toys, the more cluttered I feel, both physically and mentally.
“Maybe I can throw out some stuff…”
Facing my past like this is not easy, but as I organize everything into two piles – to keep and to throw out – my mind starts to feel a little more at ease.
“Are you sure you want to throw out these photos of you and Ella? You guys look so cute,” my mother holds up the photo of us with our arms around each other, smiling so hard our eyes disappeared, and I nod.
“That was a long time ago, Eomma, I don’t even know where she is right now, nor do I care.”
My mother scoffs. “Wow, look at you, a cold hard queen. I suppose if you won’t keep it, we can throw it away,” she shrugs, setting the photo down with the rest of the trash. “I know I have a lot of pictures I need to get rid of too.”
My father. She’s talking about all those pictures of him and with him, pictures she used to show me when I was young, and I whined about missing him, until one day, I stopped, and so did she. We take out the trash together, feeling a heavy weight lift from our shoulders.
She slings an arm around me as we trudge back up the steps and into the house, exhausted but content. “It’s about time we let go, isn’t it?”
I hum in agreement. “I think it’s well overdue.”
“Just like the bills,” my mum cackles, but I don’t find it funny. She quickly sobers up. “Too soon?” I nod.
It’s our last night here, because tomorrow, which is a Saturday, we will be officially moving in to our new house.
Taehyung’s house.
“Let’s celebrate!” my mother suddenly exclaims, throwing her hands up in the air.
I cock an eyebrow at her. “Celebrate what, exactly?”
“Our last night here, of course!” she shimmies into the kitchen and opens the cabinet, pulling out a couple of wine glasses. “It’s about time we let go – for real.“
“Mum, it’s four o’clock in the afternoon,” I remind her.
“So? There’s no time like the present,” she pours us both some Korean rice wine, pushing my glass toward me with a devilish smile. “Come on, Aria, let’s drink together!”
“Fine,” I give in, clinking my glasse with hers before lifting it to my lips, the sweet liquid cascading down my throat. I smack my lips together before downing the rest of my serve, enjoying the taste.
“Wow, look at you! I remember you hating it the first time you tasted it,” my mother grins proudly at me, her glass also empty.
“I guess I grew up, then,” I grin back, holding out my glass. “More, please.”
Half an hour later, we were dancing around the living room to cheesy K-pop songs, giggling like mad every time we messed up the lyrics. Our cheeks were flushed, our hair wild, and I don’t think I have ever felt this…giddy…or happy…or carefree.
They aren’t lying when they say alcohol can make you forget your problems.
But there’s one thing I couldn’t forget, or rather, one person.
“Taehyung!”
My mother dances alone in the living room while I stumble up the stairs, giving up halfway to sit in the middle, clutching my phone to my ear with a silly smile.
“Aria! You sound happy.”
“I’m very happy, Tae-tae, very very very,” I sing the I.O.I song, and he laughs.
“Is it because you’re going to be staying with me from tomorrow on?”
His question takes a few seconds to register in my groggy brain, but once it does, I gasp. “Oh, no! I forgot about that.”
“You forgot? Aria, how can you forget that?”
He sounds hurt. Why is he hurt?
“I’m sorry, Tae, my brain feels like slush,” I grab my head, closing my eyes as I try to collect my thoughts.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m okay, don’t worry!” I dissolve into giggles again.
“Aria, where are you? Are you at home?” He sounds so worried.
“Hey, didn’t I tell you not to worry? I swear, you never listen to me, Taehyung-ssi. You’re a very bad boy,” I waggle my finger in front of me, even though he can’t see me.
“I’m a bad boy?” he laughs. “Baby, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”
His voice sounds darker, more dangerous, and I can’t help the next comment that slips from my lips. “Wow, you sound so sexy.”
“Sexy?” he echoes, and that’s when something niggles in the back of my brain, something that sounds like my sober conscience telling me to stop right there, but I ignore it, because for the first time, I am free from my inhibitions, those damn inhibitions that prevent me from expressing my thoughts freely.
“Oh, yeah, I love your deep sexy voice. You need to use it more, instead of acting like a baby all the time. At least, around me.”
“You mean like this?” his voice is hoarse and gravelly, just the way I like it, and I close my eyes, smiling.
“Yes, just like that. Keep talking,” I lean my head against the wall, feeling the vibration of the music from the lounge.
“Aria, you’re acting very weird,” Taehyung says in his normal voice, and I frown in disappointment.
“I’m not weird, you’re weird,” I mumble.
“No, you’re weird. Why are you talking like that? Like you’re – oh,” he pauses. “Are you…drunk?”
“No…”
“You must be, because the Aria I know, and love, wouldn’t act like this,” he sounds so sure of himself, so certain that he knows me well, and I scoff.
“How do you know? I’m full of surprises,” even drunk me knows that that’s a total lie. Wow, I can’t even fool myself, can I?
“Wow, so Aria is drunk…and it’s not even six o’clock,” I can hear him shake his head, tutting. “I guess you really are full of surprises.”
“Hey, my mum started it! It’s her fault,” I defend myself. “I am innocent.”
“I’m sure you are, Do Ah Ri,” he chuckles to himself.
“Hey! Only my mum can call me by my full name,” I snap. “You’re not that special.”
“I’m not?” he wails. “Oh, Aria, you’ve broken my heart!”
He begins to fake sob, but to my drunken brain, it sounds like he is truly upset, so I am quick to console him. “No! Please don’t cry! I was just kidding, Taehyung! Of course, you’re special to me.”
His crying stops abruptly. “Really?”
“Really. You’re really, really, really special to me, Taehyung,” I confess sincerely. “So special that it scares me.”
I am met with silence, so I assume that he has hung up, deciding to leave my phone on the stairs and rejoin my mother, who is now in the kitchen, cooking something.
“What’s for dinner?” I ask, rubbing my hands together eagerly.
“Pancakes!” my mother replies happily, pouring the mixture into the heated saucepan.
I clap my hands together. “Perfect!”
So for the last meal in our house, we eat our drunkenly made pancakes for the first time, and they are as sweet as the moment itself, a moment that I won’t remember in the morning.
【★】
I remember everything. At least, I think I do as I rub my head, groaning. Never again, I swear to my reflection who just glares right back at me.
“It’s time to say goodbye,” my mother and I stare up at our tiny terrace house or whatever you call it, feeling melancholy. But my sadness is overtaken by another emotion – anxiety.
We get into the car, one of the last things we own at this point, all our personal luggage stuffed into the backseat and boot. I type in his address into mum’s phone as she slams the door, switching the engine on. Since our car is so old, it takes a few minutes to warm up before we can drive. Those few minutes only just add to my nerves as I finally think about what we’re about to do.
I’m about to move into my boyfriend’s house…with my mum.
How many nineteen-year old girls are able to say that? Not many, I can tell you that. Even though Taehyung assured me that his family are okay with this, and that we could stay for as long as we need to, I am still anxious, because I will be meeting his family, which includes his younger brother and sister. But I am more nervous about meeting his parents, especially if he introduces me as his…girlfriend.
What if I’m not good enough for him according to their standards? What if they don’t like me because I’m too awkward, and they’ll kick us out? What if –
“Okay, let’s go!” my mum bursts into my thoughts as she turns the car into the street, so I lean back in my seat and decide that there’s no point worrying. Everything’s going to be okay, Taehyung’s voice echoes in my ears, those words that he told me in our phone call two days ago, so I repeat it over and over in my head, like a prayer.
Everything’s going to be okay.
But the knot in my stomach returns once we enter his street not even ten minutes later, since he doesn’t live that far from me. Suddenly, I wish he lived on the other side of the state, so this moment could be postponed further, but then again, I would still have to face it, because this is my new reality, whether I like it or not.
“Should we just…knock?” I ask my mother as my heart does somersaults and my stomach constricts.
“We could, unless they have a doorbell,” comes the reply as we take in the house before us, a house with a lemon tree in the front garden, as well as a four-wheel drive car parked in the driveway. It seems like your average red-brick suburban home situated in a quiet, leafy street, and for a second my nerves are non-existent, until I begin to hear voices coming from inside. Oh no.
My mother shoves me forward to the door, and I shoot her a glare, tempted to shove her back, but before I can make a move, the door opens, revealing a beautiful girl, not that much younger than me, maybe sixteen, with a small face, large dark eyes and porcelain skin.
“Ah, you must be Aria,” she smiles at me, while I just stare at her. She’s so pretty. Like, supermodel pretty.
She is joined by someone else, a boy this time, barely taller than her, with a slanted gaze and a dark swoopy haircut. He looks me up and down, then calls over his shoulder in a deep voice, “Yah, Taehyung, your girlfriend is here!”
“Her name’s Aria, dong-face,” the super pretty girl whacks him on the arm, and he is about to kick her leg when a booming voice behind them bellows out, “How many times do I have to tell you to address me as hyung, Pingu-head?”
Pingu-head? I stifle a laugh as the owner of the voice comes into view, and I can feel my mother grip my arm as he pushes his siblings aside, taking up ninety percent of the doorframe with his height. Once his eyes meet mine, something inside me softens, and all my nerves dissipate, right then and there.
“Aria,” he breathes my name out, a smile tugging at his lips. “You’re really here.”
“I am,” there’s a beat of silence where I find myself unable to tear my gaze away from his, until it is broken by Pingu-head.
“Yah, Taehyung, I don’t need to call you hyung when it’s already in your name,” his retort seems a little too late for delivery, but Taehyung nevertheless responds to him by hooking him into a headlock, and for a second, I swear it’s déjà-vu.
“Don’t disrespect me in front of our guests, Pingu-head,” Taehyung pummels his fist into his brother’s hair, before releasing him roughly to the side. When he turns his attention back to us, he chuckles sheepishly.
“I’m so sorry, Aria, Eomeoni,” he bows at my mother, before stepping forward, clasping his hands together. “Do you need help with the luggage?”
“Uh, sure,” I step back, letting him pass, and he jogs up the path of his front garden, twisting back to shout, “Hey Eonjin, Jeonggyu, come and help!”
They obey wordlessly, following his lead as they take out the suitcases from the car after my mother opens it for them, and since there’s only three heavy suitcases, me and my mum end up following them inside, empty-handed.
“Put them in their room,” Taehyung orders his siblings around as we stand in the hallway which is so much wider and brighter than ours was, and I feel ashamed taking in his spacious beautiful home. He claps his hands together and beams at the both of us, and that’s when I finally notice his outfit. A baggy white t-shirt and grey sweats, his shaggy caramel-coloured hair more tousled than usual, and his honey-hued skin glowing. He looks so good.
“My parents are not home yet,” Taehyung explains as he leads us to the living room and gestures for us to sit down. His living room is large and homely, with a white fluffy rug underneath a wooden coffee table and what feels like the comfiest couch I have ever sat on.
“Where are they?” my mother asks him as he pours us some water in the adjacent kitchen.
“My dad is at work, while my mum is shopping for groceries, since she wants to cook a big meal for us tonight.”
Taehyung delivers our drinks to us, and we thank him, finally feeling a little more at ease in his home once he sits down on the armchair adjacent to us. The lounge is brightly lit by the windows, which double as a slide door leading to a large grassy backyard with a soccer goal, basketball hoop and…
“Is that…Yeontan?” I gasp, wondering why I completely forgot about his dog. The black and brown Keeshond-Pomeranian mixed ball of fluff happily chases a pigeon in the backyard, yapping at it confidently.
Taehyung follows my gaze. “Ah, yes, that’s Yeontan. Isn’t he the cutest?”
The way he smiles fondly at his dog chasing pigeons makes me want to say no, you’re the cutest, but I refrain, because that’s the type of person I am, someone who doesn’t speak her thoughts, except when she’s…drunk.
I suddenly remember a phone call with Taehyung, and I inwardly cringe as a few of the details slip back into my mind.
I love your deep sexy voice.
I’m full of surprises.
You’re not that special.
Oh my God, did I really say all that?
“Aria, you look a little pale, are you okay?” Taehyung asks me, brows knitted together in concern.
“Yes, I’m okay, don’t worry!” as soon as the words leave my mouth, I realize that I said those exact words in the phone call as well. Except now, I’m completely sober. And for the first time, I wish I wasn’t.
“Annyeonghaseyo!”
Taehyung’s super pretty younger sister enters the room with a bow directed at my mother and I, and we bow back, giving our proper greetings and exchanging names.
“Your name is really pretty, Aria, just like you,” Eonjin says, and I have to laugh.
“Have you seen yourself? You are gorgeous!” I have to tell her, and she giggles with me, covering her face.
Taehyung watches our interaction with a delicate smile, before suddenly frowning. “Where’s Jeonggyu?”
“Oh, he went back to his room to play video games,” Eonjin rolls her eyes, and Taehyung huffs.
“Of course,” he mutters, clearly not happy with his brother, who, if I remember correctly from all the times Taehyung talked about him to me, is in his last year of high school.
“Shouldn’t he start studying for exams?” I inquire, and Taehyung looks surprised for a second, before nodding.
“Yeah, you’re right! Eonjin,” he turns to his sister, “Go tell Pingu-head to study.”
She salutes him. “Aye, aye, Captain!”
We laugh in her wake, and I have to tell him. “I love your sister.”
“Everyone does,” he rolls his eyes with a smile. Loud barking brings our attention to the window, where Yeontan presses his tiny paws to the glass, begging to be let in, so with a sigh Taehyung stands up and slowly slides the door open, releasing the tiny fluff ball inside.
And he heads straight for me.
I scream, mostly because he’s so cute, and Taehyung has to scoop him up before he attacks me with puppy kisses, holding him up for us to see.
“Tannie, say annyeong to our new housemates, come on,” he waves his tiny paw in the air as Yeontan pants, his black beady eyes switching between my mother and I.
“Annyeong, Tannie,” I coo, getting up to shake his paw. “It’s nice to meet you.”
He yaps at me, wriggling in Taehyung’s grasp so that he is forced to put him down, and as soon as he does, Yeontan jumps up to my thighs, his paws scraping my jeans.
“Hey, buddy,” I grip his paws so that he leaps back down on all fours, wagging his bushy tail at me, so I get on my knees to fully pamper him, stroking his silky black and brown fur. “Good boy,” I murmur as he closes his eyes at every stroke.
You’re a very bad boy.
I lift my hand in surprise at the memory. When did I say that?
Before I can rake through my memory, the sound of a door opening and closing echoes through the house, and a voice I’ve never heard before calls, “I’m home!”
We all turn our heads to see who it is, and I gulp as I realize who I am about to meet.
Taehyung’s mother.
【★】
don’t forget to vote ★because I just wrote 3555 words and I have to dissect a squid tomorrow at 9am ugh
save me juseyo -_-
also, as promised, dedicated to my 50th follower JimMINISJams congrats 🎉
[text_hash] => 66f2b27e
)