perfect blue | jay park

i.

"God, I really hate rainy days." You looked up from your messy pile of notes, gaze shifting to instead rest upon your friend, Yuna. She stared out the large window on the west side of the classroom, round eyes following the rapid raindrops that fell endlessly from the dark sky. The gentle thudding of the fat droplets was making your eyelids droop, the continuous rhythm unconsciously playing into your already-tired body, making you want to put your head down and take a long-awaited nap. She tapped along to the beat of the rain, long, nimble fingers dancing across the smooth surface of her desk, papers long discarded and put away.

"Why?" you asked, half-heartedly, rubbing your eyes roughly before returning your attention to your notes. The teacher droned on, ignoring all of the restless students who weren't paying attention in the slightest.

"It makes everything all dull and gray," she sighed, finally turning to look at you, rather than the window, "it reminds me of before I met my soulmate."

You rolled your eyes at this. Yuna had met her soulmate quite recently, at a concert she'd snuck out to go to. You'd been the lucky one that she called first, waking you up in the middle of the night with shrill screams of excitement and pure joy. Even though you'd been tired out of your mind, there was no way you couldn't be happy for your best friend. She'd recounted the way colors exploded in front of her eyes as her soulmate had approached her cautiously, how it was like a watercolor painting come to life—not that you'd know. Those were her words, not yours. Maybe you were just a little bitter about it. You'd never really tried to seek out your soulmate, you always thought that one day it would just happen naturally, organically. You didn't want to force it. Yuna felt the same way, and you supposed that eventually, you'd just assumed that you'd both be single forever. Or at least, when one of you came across your soulmate, the other would find theirs sooner than later. But it had been around a month since that fateful concert, and you were nowhere near finding your soulmate. Yuna didn't seem to pay much attention to this, but you couldn't really blame her. If you were in her shoes, you supposed you'd be much too thrilled to focus on much else too.

"Is that so?" you asked monotonously, sucking in a deep breath as you scrubbed away at a misspelled word with your eraser. Gaze flickering back up to the powerpoint, you tried to catch up on the slide. The teacher didn't wait for slow writers.

"It is so," Yuna said, voice slightly exasperated. "Have some compassion!"

"I really need to take these notes, just hold on," you mumbled, "can't we talk about it after class?"

"Well, I'll be meeting them after class," she sighed lovingly, "I just want to complain now."

For some reason, you felt a rush of annoyance, a flush of envy. You clenched the pencil in your grasp a little too tight, the writing utensil crunching a little in your fist. "What's that all about?" Yuna asked, leaning back in her seat. "What did that pencil ever do to you?"

"I'm sick of this," you spat suddenly, throwing down the snapped pencil, "I'm so fucking sick of this."

Yuna sat up, large eyes searching your scrunched up face worriedly. "What are you talking about?"

"When will I find my soulmate?" you said, voice cracking a little at the end of your sentence. "I'm so sick of seeing in shades of gray, I hate it! I want to see color, I want to see the periwinkle sky that you described, I want to go to a concert and see all the flashing lights!"

"Oh, (Y/N)..." Yuna said, sympathetic. Her tone only made you angrier. You didn't want her sympathy. You wanted your soulmate, whoever that was.

"When will it be my turn?" you asked, hiding your face in your hands.

"Soon," she reassured you, reaching over the aisle to pat your shoulder comfortingly. "I mean, I didn't expect to meet my soulmate this soon. It just happened. I'm sure you'll meet yours sooner than later."