Jungkook's side
The first Spring Festival/ New Year after breaking up with Lisa, Jungkook got the news that was passed through many hands that Lisa had returned home early to await the New Year due to her losing her job. He had originally been arranged to be on duty on the second day of the New Year, and had already planned long ago to not return home to celebrate the New Year. In any case, he too didn’t like the atmosphere when they celebrated at home. Because of his father, the people that came and went at his house were all that sort of “I won’t say that I’m here to give a present, but I am actually here to give a present”, and everyone’s style of speaking was more or less that sort of “I’m flattering you very obviously, but I believe that you actually don’t know that I am flattering you”……
Plus, he didn’t want to see Lisa at all.
But in the evening of the eve of new year, he suddenly switched shifts with his colleague and returned home, it was a ten hour ride, with a traffic jam of five hours, he had never hurried on a journey on the eve of New Year, he didn’t realise that there would be so many people rushing to return home, rushing to meet the people they wanted to meet.
It was three o’clock at night when he returned home, he quietly opened the door by himself and entered his room, and without changing out of his clothes, he drew the curtains apart to look at the window of the building opposite (his), wanting to know if that person still covered her head under the blankets and used a torchlight to read fictional novels in the middle of night, if she would tear the blankets away when she felt suffocated and couldn’t breathe, the light from the torchlight would momentarily flash through the darkness, like a shooting star that suddenly streaked by.
After standing for roughly five minutes, Jungkook suddenly became aware of how his actions were very stupid, and he silently drew the curtains together.
He couldn’t swallow such resentment, yet he couldn’t let go of that pair of hands, life was so tangled as such, it was even more tangled than a sigmoid volvulus.
(T/N: sigmoid volvulus – the most common form of twisted bowels)
On the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year, when Jungkook walked out of his room, his father was so shocked that he dropped the cigarette in his hand onto some Director so-and-so who was helping him light his cigarette, the cigarette butt scalded the director causing him to howl, but he immediately put on a smiling face once again and said, “I’ll prosper after being scalded by fire, I’ll prosper.”
Jungkook was expressionless as he nodded his head and said his greetings. At the corridor outside the toilet, he once again succeeded in causing his mum to jump in shock.
No one belaboured his sudden returning home to celebrate the new year, just like how no one belaboured him not returning home to celebrate the new year. An excuse such as ‘being too busy’, flooded his entire growing up, but it didn’t matter, he was a person who didn’t like being controlled to begin with, Lisa seemed to also be aware of his habits, she stuck to him tightly, but she never meddled in any of his matters, or rather she never dared to meddle in any of his matters. Sometimes it really felt like she was so silly that it seemed like one could never think of them being together, yet she couldn’t have understood him more.
Really…… What did any of these matters have got to do with that messy-haired ex-girlfriend.
The curtains in his room had not been drawn open since last night, unexpectedly, he childishly felt that he would lose if he opened them.
No one knew he had returned, hence naturally there also wouldn’t be anyone coming to look for him, so on the first day of the Lunar New Year he covered his head and slept in his room, awakening then sleeping, sleeping then awakening, he actually used Lisa’s method of spending her holidays.
The mobile phone on the table kept on beeping, text messages wishing (him) a happy new year accumulated to the hundreds, Jungkook was too lazy to open even a single one. Occasionally, the sound of firecrackers would travel from outside the window, they crackled and clapped as if someone’s heart was exploding into flowers. Jungkook sometimes would hear Lisa’s mother’s voice, it was the high frequency voice characteristic of middle-aged women, that remained especially clear even amongst various noises –
“Lisa, don’t eat so many snacks, you’re so fat that you can’t walk out of your door already; Lisa, sweep up all the melon seed shells that you dropped on the floor till it’s clean; Lisa, it’s the New Year, why are you watching animated films……” Lisa Lisa Lisa.
This woman, no matter where she goes, she doesn’t spare one from worrying about her.
This woman, was right next door, and wasn’t going anywhere.
Thinking of it this way, seemed to somehow put him at ease.
Once again waking up from his sleep, Jungkook sat at his bedside and blearily went to draw the curtains open, just like the countless times he did so in the past, it was due to habit. The sky bore the yellow hues of twilight, the two elders of the Manoban family were eating dinner, that woman was nowhere to be found.
Jungkook sat at his bedside and looked outside the window for a good while, his line of sight was fixated on God knows where, just like that, he sat there blankly for a while, thinking of many matters yet seemingly not thinking about anything, just vacantly, vacuously sitting there.
Panic assaulted him suddenly, were you really longing for her that much? Were you really longing to see her that much? Were you really that afraid that without you, her days could still be filled with colour and wonder?
No.
No, right?
There were two knocks on the door, and it opened without waiting for his response. Aunty Li stood at the doorway and said, “Little Jeon, your parents went off for a banquet, they asked me to come here to make dinner for you, I’ve finished preparing dinner, I’m going off.”
“Okay,” Jungkook nodded his head, but just as she had turned around and was preparing to leave, he suddenly called out, “Aunty Li.”
Aunty Li thought that he still had some matters to address, and stood on the spot unmoving, waiting for him to speak.
“It’s been exhausting for you, take care,” Jungkook said this, swallowing this sentence – “Do you know where the girl from the Manoban family opposite us has gone to?”
How would she know, she wouldn’t know. He had actually become so ridiculous that he was seizing people to question them, it was really ludicrous.
Aunty Li smiled benevolently, “Eat well, happy new year.”
“Happy new year.”
He was once again alone. He would be lying if he said he wasn’t lonely, but one got used to it after being lonely for a while, don’t they? It was just because it once had been bustling with liveliness and noise, returning from that to loneliness, was just like a stage after a curtain call, disappointing and desolate.
After he was done eating dinner, Jungkook did a simple packing up, actually there was no need to pack anything, he had only taken out a set of clothes from the travel bag he brought back yesterday. He then went to the station to buy a bus ticket, to return to the city.
The long distance bus on the night of the first day of New Year was very empty, plus there weren’t many vehicles returning to the city, the driver was perhaps rushing to return home and reunite with his family, the bus drove at lightning speed. One had to say auspicious words during the New Year, it was totally driving at a speed that was courting death.
When he was almost reaching the city, Jungkook received a call from his mother, only then did he remember that he had been distracted when he left, and had forgotten to inform (his parents). His mother criticized him with a few sentences, their contents being nothing else but how this child that he was had never been obedient since he was young, and had insisted on choosing a career as a doctor that was so busy yet couldn’t earn lots of money, the girlfriend he used to date dated was also not reliable, thankfully they broke up early……
Jungkook had been silently letting her nag on and on, till she used an unintentional tone of voice to intentionally bring up, “I heard that that daughter of the Manoban family, has been going on a few blind dates lately.”
“I’m preparing to get off the bus, let’s leave it at that.”
He was originally a person whose emotions did not fluctuate significantly, yet in that moment he felt like he was almost unable to bear it, and perhaps would say some hurtful words towards his mother, yes, he blamed her, he always had.
It was total darkness outside the window, and he didn’t know where the bus had travelled to, but it didn’t matter wherever the bus went, in any case, no one was waiting for him, and he also wasn’t rushing to meet anyone.
As he had slept a lot during the day, Jungkook couldn’t sleep when he reached home, humans when too bored would always do some unfathomable things. For example, Jungkook presently had taken out ink, a calligraphy brush, and writing paper, and was preparing to pick up calligraphy after many years, he took up his brush for a long time yet couldn’t lower it to the paper, he didn’t know what to write, and was afraid that he would accidentally write out that name.
His line of sight fell on his mobile phone on the table, hence he picked it up and opened up each text message wishing him a happy new year, and used small script the size of housefly heads, to copy out the text messages……
It was so senseless, he might as well pluck out his own hairs to play with……
New year text messages were always the same few repeated words, there wasn’t much creativity, but then again, no matter how creative you were, you couldn’t wish one a sorrowful new year, I hope you die quickly. This would appear to be rather hard-hearted.
When your heart had been unable to be at peace the entire day, and you had finally calmed it down with great difficulty, if a sudden event came along, that kind of emotion, was like one having tried to commit suicide three hundred and sixty times and finally succeeding in dying after great difficulty, only to have a miracle doctor turn up and simply revive you, really, f*ck all females in his family.
Jungkook’s sudden event was Lisa’s text message. He didn’t think that there would actually be Lisa’s text message among all those text messages wishing him a happy new year. He also didn’t think that Lisa’s text message would be this played down, she said, “Hey, happy new year, Lisa is here to deliver her well wishes.”
So, he was now only a member of her mass text-messaging group.
The soft calligraphy brush, was pressed and rubbed onto the writing paper with great force, wringing out circles the size of coins, the ink spread out in a feathered and furry manner, like a withdrawn hedgehog.
Sometimes, he really felt that admitting that he couldn’t be without another person, was the most difficult thing on earth. He was afraid that he would be like a snail whose shell was broken, an exposed soft body that could never again receive protection.