ACOUSTIC LOVE ; kim doyoung

05 | half an explanation

Doyoung has been rendered speechless a grand total of four times in his life.

The first time was when he was six, and his parents announced that the Kim family was moving to London. He remembers exactly how nauseous he felt, the uncertainty of a new country simply not sitting right in his stomach. He remembers dropping his favourite pencil to the ground, and not caring about how the tip shattered. He hugged his mother tightly and asked "why?" a million times, not understanding why his parents would want to uproot the family.

It didn't make sense to him at the time, even though he vaguely knew that his mother was British. But all his friends had Korean names and looked the same way that he and his sister did, so he never understood what being British meant.

He remembers coming to the United Kingdom with his foreign accent, seeing his father slowly slip back into English. It was broken at first, like Doyoung's and Dahyun's, but at least their father had spoken English before, and he picked it up quickly.

Dahyun was smart too. It didn't take long for her to adjust, and she had no trouble making friends in her new school. The only one who had difficulty with the language was Doyoung.

He felt voiceless for that period of time. Not quite feeling at home, despite how welcoming his classmates were. Just the sound of English made him wince, and he wanted nothing more but to go back to Korea.

Until Yuta introduced him to music.

Nakamoto Yuta was nothing short of extraordinary in Doyoung's eyes. He had longish—for a boy—brown hair that he tied into a ponytail, and he didn't seem to care if the others called him a girl.

He had asthma, but he was never deterred by it. He was much stronger than Doyoung, although he looked skinny, and he always tried to include Doyoung in conversations long after their other classmates had grown tired of trying to talk to him.

Yuta knew what it felt like to be alienated, not because of intentional exclusion, but simply because you didn't understand the language. He knew what it felt like to be homesick even when you returned "home". And Doyoung needed someone like that.

Yuta invited him over to his house one day, and Doyoung had been enraptured by the drum set. Yuta had offered to let him try but Doyoung had refused, content with just listening to Yuta play.

Doyoung had asked his parents if they could buy a piano after that. For a while, the family couldn't afford it, so Doyoung settled for going over to his friends' houses to play the piano, and his parents paid for him to take lessons at a small music studio.

Over time, Doyoung became reliant on music as his source of comfort. It helped him to clear his mind when he didn't feel like doing anything, and it was the only constant in his turbulent life.

The second time Doyoung had been struck speechless was when Dahyun took a gap year instead of going straight to university.

Dahyun was better at academics than Doyoung was, so he had always taken it for granted that she would go to university as soon as she graduated from high school. However, at that point in time, their parents were unable to pay for her tuition fees unless she got a scholarship. So when Dahyun didn't manage to get the scholarship, she took a gap year instead, starting a band on the side while she worked part-time jobs to save up for her tuition fees.

Yuta had been invited to join the band, having become a close friend of both Dahyun and Doyoung. His age was in between both of theirs, so it became natural to think of him as both of their friends. He had grown in his skills since then, and was a proficient drummer, so Dahyun had invited him to join her band.

Doyoung remembers feeling left out, jealous of the two older people in his life who were having fun together while he had to go to school. That was what made him want to quit school, but he didn't. Not when Dahyun begged him to stay in school.