Lifeguard Jeon

° T H I R T Y - S I X °

Jungkook comes to the house to tell me. Irene couldn't bear to. He;s wearing a pressed white shirt and black bottoms. He stands as tall and straight as a surfboard. he doesn't have to say a word. My heart sinks.

Yoongi.

"Omo, Jungkook . . . What will we do without him?"

He shakes his head and touches my shoulders, gently pulling me toward him. His head into the crook of my neck, afraid to speak, I think. He takes in a deep breath and waits.

"After the service we'll spread his ashes over the water," he whispers. "He loved that beach more any other place in the world so he'll always be there, a part of it from now on. We'll see him in the ocean. We'll feel him there with us forever. We won't lose him . . . We can't."

His words hang in the air between us.

My heart will break at the service. I can't face it. But, go? I have to. My mind anchors me by stubbornly fixating on the smallest abstract details - teh way the waters darkens as the clouds shift, the slant of the sun, the soft feel of the sand shifting under my feet. Things in nature that change, but never leave.

The clouds are low in the sky. In the distance there's a rumbling of thunder. A storm is moving in. The end of the summer is closing in. Hurricane season is here. And everything will change int he weeks to come.

For me it already has.

° ° ° ° °

A big crowd gathers the beach for the funeral. A dark gray cloud of mourners huddle toegther. There are so many faces I've never seen before. Irene and I stand together to the side. Yoongi touched so many people in a personal way. he opened his heart to everyone he met, welcoming every new person and experience. At the very least, people knew him through his paintings, if not his reputation.

Jieun stands close to Jungkook, her head held high. She's wearing petite black dress with a choker. Sunglasses shield her eyes. No outward attempt to look glamorous, only she can't help it, her hair blowing with the breeze. She has the aura of a celebrity, a regal bearing. Yoongi probably had lots of special friends our age. I flash back to the sting of seeing her on the beach together with Jungkook, so close they were almost breathing in one air.

A local priest, a friend of Yoongi, leads the service. Jimin is crouched at his side, his head down, his moist eyes fixed on the distance as if he's wondering what he'll do without Yoongi, his life's companion. There's something so stoic about his bearing that I stifle a cry.

I look out at the beach while I listen, numb with stabbing sadness, imagining him sitting there looking out, the delicate paintbrush in his hand, his easel in front of him with swirls of bright colors, the brown box of chocolate chip cookies for energy and sweetness. his props are displayed there now. The thermos of water and lemon. A book of poems nearby for when he stopped painting and wanted inspiration from the written world. He was always so attentive to others. He'd narrowed his eyes, listening while he painted. Jungkook laughed one day and said, "Yoongi can't concentrate without a paintbrush in his hand."

If Yoongi were here right now he'd wave aside all the praise and shrug his shoulders. He'd thow back his head and laugh because everyone was making such a ceremony of a man who died in his sleep as peacefully as he lived, during his early evening nap, Jimin resting next to him, his snoring like a soothing white noise.

"Beloved?" he'd scoff. "I was a man, that's all. A painter. Sometimes good, sometimes not." I remember him holding his hands out to the side. "When it works, it's wonderful," he said. "And when it doesn't . . ." He gestured helplessly, not finishing his sentence. He was accepting, able to handle what came his way.

Did it take eighty years to become that way? Or was he just lucky?

ARTHUR'S NOTE: Guys, Yoongi is so carefree here. I love him so muchhh~

° ° ° ° °

The temperature is dropping, the air growing thinner and cooler. I didn't think to bring a sweater. I'm always shivering but now, to my surprise, even though I'm wearing a sleeveless dress, I'm not cold.

Irene and I walk back to the house together after the service. "Such a touching remembrance," she says, her voice trailing off.

I nod, afraid to speak.

"it's so sad for Jungkook and Jieun too. He was their only family."

I stop and turn to her. "Their only family?"

"Yoongi took care of both of them. Jungkook's abeoji died when he was small. I don't know what happened his eomeoni. No one talks about her."

"And Jieun? She's always with them." I can't keep the annoyance out of my voice. "Jungkook must be so in  love with her."

"It's not like that," Irene says.

"What do you mean?"

"Yoongi spent a long time with her mother. I'm kind of off on all this - I never felt it was my business to ask - but I think her mother was Yoongi's girlfriend after his wife died. Jieun was almost like a daughter."

"I always see her with Jungkook. It's obvious that he's so close to her."

"I don't know how it is between them," Irene says. "I guess you have to ask him."

Is it possible that I read it all wrong? I think about all my jealous feelings toward her. how I resent her. Could it be that she's just . . . what . . . maybe like a sister to him? I have to ask him. I have to find out for sure. Only not yet. It's the wrong time.

But just the fact that I might have been wrong . . . changes everything.