Jungle - X Ambassadors, Jamie N Commons
Taehyung
"AI can never replace us."
"I only said that it's saving us a lot of time. A team from Osaka was able to reconstruct the visual images from MRI scan data using stable diffusion. Imagine how any comatose patient can be helped with it." Jimin talked passionately.
Jungkook's eyes ping-ponged between us. We fell into the regular rhythm. Classes were running. We were studying again. The football practice had also started last week, and Jungkook had moved back to his old dorm after the place was renovated. I thought he'd like to stay in the VIP dorms, but Jungkook was more unpredictable than I thought.
The agitation in me was building every day when I couldn't express myself to him. Why was it so fucking difficult? I never felt this way about anyone, but when I did, I was more afraid than assured. What if Jungkook stopped hanging out with me altogether? What if he quit football? Worse, now that he had a new hobby on the street to pick his mind, he would easily switch to dancing.
He hasn't talked to me ever since the dinner. We hung out together, but he mostly stayed with the rest of the group.
Jimin has been preparing for the year-end university event. He has been doing this for three years now. Why did he have to drag Jungkook along? I knew it wasn't his fault, but I wanted to spend more time with Jungkook.
No matter if I convinced everyone in the group about Jungkook, if we didn't go anywhere from where we were in the past, nothing mattered. I had to make excuses to bring Jungkook to our dorm every time. And Jungkook should have been awarded an Oscar for his obliviousness on the matter of my heart. How could he not see? Or if he did, he should have gotten another Oscar for his acting for pretending.
"You're right," I mumbled. "My father has laid off quite a bunch of operators from the manufacturing unit after automizing the process. I guess I didn't feel kindly towards it. It's just that AI is doing more harm in some areas."
Jungkook looked at his phone. He wanted to leave this conversation with all the zeal he could muster. I could tell by his body language that he was waiting to run off.
I didn't say anything. I was getting tired of always being the one to initiate our plans or talks. He never showed any interest in our outings, and I believed that today was just not it for me. At first, we ended up taking a surprise test. Then Andre and I had a spat in the dormitory. Now that I wanted to eat dinner in peace, Jungkook refused to eat because he wanted to wait for Ulrich, who was on his part-time job, Jimin decided to debate on the unruly topic, and to top things off, Jungkook seemed like he was here against his will.
I needed to call it a day.
His phone chimed and his face lit up.
Whoever it was, I needed to find the fucker, and I needed to talk to them.
Jungkook was going to be mine, and I needed to communicate the same to anyone who wanted to look at him without platonic feelings.
He was already the most popular student in his class because of his involvement with us and in the sports club. He scored the highest marks, too, so the swooning girls were unavoidable. The Jeremy kid also batted his lashes at Jungkook everywhere he went. I didn't care about those teenagers, but whoever was making Jungkook jittery had to be dealt with.
Jimin
"Thanks, Hyungs," Jungkook air saluted us with a big grin as he stood up. "I'll see you all later."
I waved at his retreating figure as he basically ran out of the cafeteria and then I looked at Taehyung glaring at him as if he wanted to murder him. "Who called you ugly?" I snorted.
"How did you know Rose was the one for you?" He asked, his face still magnetized to Jungkook's back.
"I didn't," I answered honestly.
"How come?" His attention turned to me.
I laughed. "Rose is a pretty woman and I guess I was attracted to her. We tend to like pretty-looking people... Things. Is it not?"
"I guess," he shrugged, sighed, and then drank water. "But you guys are like soulmates or some shit now."
I understood his dilemma of finding out if what he was feeling for Jungkook was it. "Relationships work on loyalty, Tae. You constantly need to put effort. The heart and brain need to synchronize themselves for a human being to function properly and stay alive. Imagine if the heart stopped pumping blood to the brain, the body would not only be brain dead, it would die altogether, stopping the heart with it. Rose and I... It's not what it seems. We also have disagreements, but we both work towards the same goal, to stay alive, together."
"You make it sound like a job." He fell back on the chair, his head lolled back.
Maybe it was like a job. The job that one needed for happiness. "You'll see once you are committed to someone."
"Do you think you and Rose will end up together?" He then asked.
"I don't know," I shrugged. "Quit being so whiny. I have work to do." Stretching my limbs, I took notice of him. He looked really dejected today. I thought he just needed time with everything.
I walked back to my dorm alone while thinking about what Tae had asked. I've lived my entire childhood and pre-teen learning about numbers and money, and when I was an adult, I didn't get to act on my biological urges. I liked a girl at school, but there was never the right time.
My mother's condition was something my father wanted to keep private, and I agreed with him. I didn't have many friends growing up in school. I was afraid that if I let them near me, they'd see how problematic I was. Someone with no passion, timid, confused, and unambitious.
The thought enraged me on lonely weekend nights. That was when I picked up dancing after watching a reality TV show. I started dancing in my room. It was something that brought fleeting happiness which was just mine, safe from anyone's eye. I taught myself to dance, and then when I was in high school, I took contemporary as optional.
The fact being divulged was that I didn't think Rose and I were going to be the end game. Never being in a relationship before, when I found certain tension and attraction between me and her, I thought it was my only chance to feel anything remotely close to love and relationship.
We started because we clicked, and looked good together, but I thought if I felt so strongly, it would embarrass me with her, and yet, it didn't happen. I couldn't deny my love for her, but that all-consuming feeling was never there. I cared about her. I constantly urged her to talk to me so I could be with her through her familial issues. The intimacy has also been active and passionate. How would anyone know what love was? Has anyone ever felt it?
Jealousy. Obsession. Indignation. Everyone experienced them all the same, but love? It was different for every individual. Perhaps my thought-of definition of love didn't exist in life. Maybe that was why I was disappointed and angry at myself to some extent. I was nineteen back then, soon to be twenty. It would be a shame if I said I didn't experience true love when I had. What Rose and I had was love. And I was certain that I'd in the future establish my uncertainties debilitating.
Jungkook
My dance trainer was late this evening. I'd been taking various dance form classes for days. My trainer was a 20-year-old, chic lady. She wore baggy clothes and a backward cap every day. Her wavy ponytail was always hanging low, and she wore excessive perfume, perhaps to indemnify the sweating. She always smelled nice.
But now that she was here, I didn't spare another second and began stretching. The small wireless speakers were loud enough for my small dorm. She had said that my body knew the basics of moving and isolating, that I had a sense of music, whatever that was, and that I'd learn faster.
She wasn't wrong. We tried B-boying on the first day and it took me three more days to perfect my postures and find my balance. Then we experimented with break dance, locking, popping, and hip hop.
Jimin was going to hold auditions in two weeks. The event was bigger than I'd anticipated. There was a notice put all around the campus about the auditioning committee and the accepted forms of performances. Each person had to either perform in a duo, a group of not more than five, or solo. And we had to prepare the stage for a whole minute and a half.
I'd quit my part-time job before the vacation started. I was supposed to get back to it, but this was more important. It was just a matter of a few more weeks. I needed help in preparing the act for an audition. If I got selected, I'd then have a choreographed routine to perfect, which I could. I'd also slowly figure out a way to spare a few hours for work. I'd cut my nap time.
Besides, I had earned — if not good — a fairly praiseworthy amount in a few weeks, courtesy of the rich son of a minister who commissioned my sale. I was yet to give that money to Ulrich. He thought I'd never be able to go through with the job, but I couldn't wait to see the look on his face when I gave him the money.
"You are distracted, Jungkook!" She yelled at me. Her voice was husky, pleasant on the ears. Sometimes I intentionally made boo-boos just so she could raise her voice. She was diminutive in stature, but fierce while dancing. Her face never lost composure when her voice raised, which was the best part about her. She betrayed no emotion and I desired to master it for myself.
"SORRY, MA BELLE!" I chuckled, and she must've seen through my act. She sighed, resigned by my behavior.
I could never work in a serious environment. I needed to break the tension before it began.
"From the top," she rewound the song and clapped on the beats, staring at my feet with critical eyes.
I started dancing again. Before Ulrich came and found me mid-theatrics, I had to get done with it and wipe the room clean of evidence.
At least eating late had one perk, I got to have a cold meal with my friend.
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8 May, 2024