Yeonjun POV
The next day, at work, I come face to face with Taehyun, who doesn't recognize me at first when he gives me his order. It's when I ask him for the particularities of his drink that he looks up.
"Yeonjun, is that you? What are you doing here?" he whispers, probably thinking that I can't chat with people at work. My boss didn't say anything against it, but I still don't dare take too long, there are other customers.
"I work here to help my mother financially. So, whipped cream or not?"
"Yes please. How's Beomgyu?" he continues.
"Not great, but it's a long story. We can meet up this afternoon and I'll tell you, alright?"
"Sure, yes, sorry for keeping you" he says as he pays and takes a seat. I take care of other customers, finish my shift, and text Taehyun to ask where he wants to meet. He asks me if Mom isn't gonna need me, I tell him she's at work, and that I'm eating alone anyway, so he suggests we go to a restaurant together, saying it's his treat. I can't refuse that, usually if Kang Taehyun is willing to pay for a rendezvous, he's desperate, but I still feel embarrassed about having him pay everything. He gives me the address of a restaurant he likes, and I drive there. When I arrive, he's just taking a table. I join him, and we take a seat. Taehyun wants me to tell him the whole story now, but I don't want to make the atmosphere gloomy, and I don't want to get myself gloomy so fast, so I tell him I'll choose my food first. He does too, getting the hint. He's a smart boy, he understands hints like that. We both choose our food, and once we've ordered, he asks what happened again. This time, with my heart beating hyper fast, a feeling of loneliness with it and probably tearful eyes, I accept to tell him what happened. He looks rather shocked once I'm done, and gives me a look of pity, but not the type of pity that says 'oh my poor soul, I'm so sorry, this world is really cruel', the type of pity that says 'fuck this world, will he make it out?'.
The angry pity, basically.
The type that I don't mind being looked at with.
He doesn't ask me any details other than what I told him. He doesn't even ask questions. I think he understands how much it hurts.
Or at least understands the words. They say you can't understand the feeling if you haven't felt it.
That afternoon, after Taehyun and I have gone our separate ways, I feel at a loss with myself. I have no inspiration to do anything. I don't want to go see Beomgyu. I'm not sure why. I just don't feel like it. I guess I'm just scared. I text him though, maybe he'll see it. I apologize, and tell him that I don't feel like seeing him. I'm scared of it being too honest, but you can never go wrong with the truth. Or at least, you can never go as wrong with the truth as you can with a lie. Beomgyu says it's understandable. I tell him I think it's because I'm feeling a little down. He sends me a laughing emoji, and still tells me in which ways he got better. He says that he can now carry some of his weight, and turn over himself and roll around the bed. He can take his phone alone, he can lift it up - although not for very long. I cheer for him, tell him that's amazing, that I'm happy for him.
At least it means that he's getting slightly better.
Because I can't exactly tell how I feel myself, I decide to go home.
I don't know how I feel. Isn't that a little weird? How is one supposed to not understand how they feel? As someone who has never felt anything close to what people call depression - term that has by now been vulgarized by self-diagnosing - I have always been able to understand my own feelings. I could write them down on a piece of paper, with precise adjectives, beautiful words - or at least I think are beautiful - and hopefully well-explained emotions. At least I could understand them. When I read them through again, I think to myself 'This actually feels accurate'. But right now, now that I'm trying to write these same emotions down to try and find them, I feel like giving this feeling a word of emotion, like 'happy', 'sad', or anything, doesn't feel right, but saying that I feel numb is also feeling wrong.
I twist my pen around my fingers, thinking about how to explain my emotions. I also feel like I need to justify that feeling, like I'm not supposed to be feeling it right now.
How does one explain the things that I'm feeling? I feel numb, but at the same time, there's something there that's not numbness. It's a weight. A weight on my heart that probably shows my amount of guilt, grief and sadness. For lack of better term, I think I feel lost. Not lost literally, not lost because I don't know something, but lost because I don't know what to do. A lot of shit has gone down these past few weeks, almost a month, and I desperately wish I could have a positive impact in Beomgyu's recovery. I want to do something. I don't just want to sit there and watch as doctors check him up and give him meds. But I also know that I can't do better than them. And there's something else, something different. It's some sort of emotion. I can't quite identify it, I think it's pride. Pride for Beomgyu's recovery? I think so.
But all I write is a single word nonetheless.
Numb.
After writing that down, I think a little bit deeper. But I can't find anything, and when I think about it, I realize that I don't actually need to know exactly how I feel. That's the point of life, right? There's not only blank spots in reasons for this world but also in reasons for our feelings. So I decide that maybe it isn't needed. After all, if I showed all these words I've been writing over the years to people, would they be able to understand how I felt like I do when reading them? Will they even be able to feel how I felt, or are these emotions too specific, too much of a part of myself? We don't react the same way to the same things, we don't feel the same feelings. Happiness can be felt differently depending on the person. Maybe what I feel as numbness is what another person perceives as anger, or pain. That's the beauty of life. You can put two lambda people in the same place and have them feel things. Their feelings aren't the same. The background plays a part, the cracks, the breaks, the aches or the laughs, the smiles, the humors. And of course, their personalities influence them too.
But I'm getting distracted.
I choose to go downstairs, and watch TV until Mom comes home. She doesn't take long, and I decide to help prepare dinner. I warn my boss that I'll be coming Saturday morning - in two days and he says he likes how hardworking I am. I really feel proud. I can barely believe that I always thought that I'd never be able to keep a job. I feel so, so happy. The numbness of the day has truly died down now.
The next day, again, I go to work during the morning, which I surprisingly now think is just 'the usual' and decide to take a quick lunch before checking in on Beomgyu. When I arrive at his room, I see him out of bed, in a wheelchair, looking out the window.
"Beomgyu?" I ask, trying my best not to surprise him.
He turns his chair to me before answering "Hi Junie! How are you?"
"I'm doing okay, you?"
He does circles in his chair "I'm out of bed"
"I can see that"
"I'm very happy. I can talk too"
"I can hear that too"
"But the doctors say I shouldn't talk too much. They're right, in a way. It's tiring"
I give him a hug, with slight difficulty because of the wheelchair.
"Yeonjun" He says in a more stern voice.
"Yes?"
"The doctors also told me that my bottom motor nerves have been completely destroyed by the illness. I can't stand anymore, can't carry my own weight. I'm completely paralysed to the waist".
I purse my lips and nod softly, looking down. We all knew this would happen, but now that it's out, it's even harder to cope with.
"But, on the brighter side, I'll be able to go back home on Monday! We can go out together again! Promise me we will, you wanted us to go out"
I laugh. I completely forgot about that. "Yes, it's true"
I end up spending the afternoon with him. Not that I mind, I love him and cherish every moment I have with him.
We chat about his health, about my health, about Taehyun, about what happened to me yesterday, about how I've been doing since he's been taken in. I think he's worried about me because of yesterday, and I think he has every right to be worried. I explain I believe what I felt was just a mysterious, passing feeling that makes life what it is. He chuckles saying that I can get really dramatic when having an existential crisis. I blush. I have never thought of it that way.
That evening, although I know that I need to, I don't want to leave him. I kneel down so we can kiss and am forced to leave at 7pm, when he needs to eat, but I promise him that I'll come back Sunday.
And so I leave.
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Hello!
It's been a while, but hey, at least there's an update.
I don't have anything else to say so...
Bai bai
👋