I Hope Love Is... [On Hold]

Ninth Verse

Ninth Verse

It started out so simple
baby who would have known
back when we first met
that I would love you...

-translated from “First Love”
from Future Colors' third album Future Perfection

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Time stood still for one perfect moment. Minha thought his heart would stop too. He stopped feeling the rain falling on them and the cold wind blowing around them-- the only thing that he was conscious of was the softness of her lips under his. It wasn't the time or place he would ever have imagined for a kiss, but... it was glorious.

Finally, he lifted his head. Bea's eyes fluttered open and she blinked at him dazedly. They stared at each other, trying to come to terms with what had just happened. 

From the look on her face, she felt the same way I did. I feel... I feel like the earth turned upside down underneath my feet, but at the same time I'm floating in the heart of the universe. 

A heavy roll of thunder startled them both back to awareness of the real world. They looked up at the same time to see the dark sky flashing, the flashes coming nearer and nearer. CRACK CRACK! Arrows of lightning stabbed the clouds. 

“Uh-oh,” Bea said. “We need to run. Fast!” Even as she spoke, the rain began pouring heavily.

He didn't answer. He just climbed up on the dike and helped her up. Keeping hold on her hand as she followed close behind him, he ran the last few meters to the orchard, slipping and sliding but somehow managing to keep on the path. In the orchard they encountered Biboy,  Ana, and Carol, coming back with two umbrellas to look for them. Bea slipped her hand from his grasp the moment she saw her cousins.

Biboy looked Minha up and down and shook his head.

“What happened to you two?” he asked. “We thought you were behind us, so we went to T'yo Freddie, and then when we reached the fishpond and looked back, we couldn't see you. I guess Manang Bebeh's prediction came true-- you fell off the dike, huh?”

Ana clucked in distress. “Oh, Oppa, your clothes! And you're both all wet! We have to get you to the house right now. You might catch cold!”

Behind him, Bea groaned, having remembered that possibility too late.

“If you start saying you're dead, I won't forgive you,” Minha muttered to her.

Mia noona shrieked loudly when they came into the house. As luck would have it, she was in the laundry room, waiting for the tumble-dryer to finish drying some clothes. Although she immediately clamped her hands over her mouth, her voice had attracted the attention of Jungkyu, Junhee, and Jae sunbae, who came running from the kitchen to see what dire thing had happened.

“Take off that wet jacket immediately, Minha-ya,” Mia noona ordered. “Someone get towels, quickly. Bebeh, what happened?”

“Bea's all wet and muddy too,” Jae sunbae interrupted. “We'll save the questions for later. Right now, these two need warm baths and dry clothes. Why don't you take Bea off to our room and the boys and I will take Minha up to their room?”

Before he could help it, Minha began sneezing. Bea was visibly shuddering. Fortunately, Junhee and Carol quickly got an armful of towels from the linen closet. Without further ado Mia noona swathed them both in the biggest towels and hustled them off.

* * *

“Sunbae, don't scold Bea,” Minha said in between sneezes. “I insisted on going with her. It was all my fault.” He'd taken a long hot shower and put on a warm tracksuit, but he still kept sneezing and his head was beginning to feel a bit stuffed and aching. “She kept telling me to go back and she also tried to stop me from taking the shortcut over the dike. I insisted I could do it, but I slipped and fell anyway... and since she tried to help me, she fell, too. The blame is all mine. I'm sorry.”