My name is Park Jimin, and I'm in love with my best friend.
Her name is Lee Jinhee and I've known her since I was ten.
I dreamed to sing and dance onstage, in front of thousands or maybe more. It was a passion burning inside me. Meeting six other guys with the same flame in them, we decided to strive together.
"Teamwork makes the dream work," my friend always says.
But, I wasn't the luckiest person on earth.
My father cheated on my mother, betraying our family. The moment I found out about the truth, I was incredibly sad, angry, and afraid. The reason to those feelings is how such a person I've always looked up to could do something that horrible. It went no farther than to that. But my mother was different. Her trust and hearts broken, her disappointment turned into boiling hatred. Fights became a daily event at our house, it got harsher and more violent each day. One day, my father hurt me during a fight. I left the house repeating words in my head, words saying that he would never have intended to do that.
I stayed at Jinhee's.
The morning I returned, he was not there. Since then, my mother had to fend for us alone. She worked multiple jobs and lacked sleep. I told her that I could help by getting part-time jobs but she forbid me to do so, she even scolded. I still secretly went, though. I saved money for myself to spend, so that I wouldn't have to burden her with more than my school fee and food. Sometimes I shared some of it to Jisang, for him to buy encyclopedia books he liked reading, or even just snacks.
I thought that I was finally being something useful.
But it all crumbled down as I fell ill to a syndrome which damages my nerves, causing my legs to literally go weak. My family's financial situation troubled enough, my treatments had only worsened it. After four months of regular visits, my legs recovered, or we all thought so. I promised myself to never burden my mother with such weight again.
But my body didn't obey.
It went back, even worse this time. The principal had trusted me and my friends to perform at the School's Birthday Festival. It would have be the perfect chance for all of us to get closer to our dreams, since we heard that some entertainment companies would attend the festival to cast new talents. It would have be.
But then ill legs means that I can't dance. My friends and I have worked our asses off to choreograph and prepare for the event, but my damn illness chose to invite itself again right there. I still remember the hating I felt towards myself, hearing our group's choreography leader suggest us to retreat to performing a slow song. Just singing, rapping, and no dancing. I remembered everyone's sad eyes as they nodded and agreed to the idea, probably disappointed as that means just the same as agreeing to waste the opportunity to get casted.
My fist clenched and my teeth gritting, I told them to perform their original plan as six instead of not dancing. But all they did was brush the idea away and laughed it off, bitterness and sincerity visible on their smiles at the same time as they told me that they would never leave me out.
Not only ruining my own dream, it dragged down my six friends' dreams along.
And of course, Jisang's.
Unlike me, Jisang wanted to be a doctor. "A surgeon, so that I would be able to save lives and give them new chances," he always said. My mom wanted to put Jisang to a good school, where he would get good education and a good environment to prepare for his future. But wasting money on my treatments had ceased the hopes on making that happen.
About Jinhee, I've always realized that there was something between me and her. I never thought of it seriously since I've always thought that we would always be together.
A junior of mine confessed to me on Valentine's day. Jinhee told me to ask her out since she was my type, it felt weird, but I agreed to her suggestion anyways.
I've always said that I like people with similarities with me since I would understand how they feel and I could relate to them, the same case with girls.On our date, I learned that we actually had so many things and tastes in common. I almost enjoyed being with her, until she asked about Jinhee.
There, words could not stop flowing out of me about how great and precious Jinhee is.
Oddly, Sujin chuckled. Saying, "My assumption is right, then. So you are in love with her, sunbaenim.."
You might take me as a jerk, but I admit that I was being one at that time, since I answered her with an
"I am, am I?"
I used to like that fact, I used to think that the feeling was beautiful. But then one day, we were given an art assignment in pairs. I was teamed with Taehyung while she was with Jungkook. I knew that she liked Jungkook, and I felt happy for her, I even teased her for being in the same team with Jungkook. But when I saw the two of them laughing at me who was getting bothered by Taehyung, my eyes met hers. I don't know why, but that day, I thought that she looked so beautiful laughing. I felt myself falling a little deeper. I wished that her days would be filled with laughter and happiness. I know that I am unable to give her that. But then here's the thing,
I can't stop myself from going towards her if that was how things were.
We got a Bangtan practice that day after school. I came a bit later than everyone else, and Jungkook was freestyling with Hoseok when I opened the door. They stopped moving the moment they saw me. Jungkook then smiled and greeted me hello. I've always felt that Jungkook likes her too. It came to me during the whole practice, a feeling saying that Jungkook deserves her way more than I do.
So, when the practice is over, I asked Jungkook if we could talk.
His response after I encouraged him to walk towards Jinhee was shining eyes and a big smile, saying "Thank you, Jimin!"
After intensely contemplating, I decided to leave the world. I thought that I've already did all I can do for her, and that this is the best thing I can do to everyone. I thought that it was right.
I thought.
Everything was going as planned. Jungkook took her on a date. I told her to call me when she reached home and she did. She told me that everything went out well, I smiled and told her my last goodbye by heart as she was slowly falling asleep.
The next thing I saw after drowning was void black. I didn't know where it was, but I wasn't even curious. There I felt no time, no hunger, no pain, no happiness nor sadness, I felt nothing. It was like being awake and being in a deep sleep at the same time.
But then I heard a voice calling my name, waking me up. Then I saw her. I saw her crying in her sleep, I saw her locking herself in, I saw her skipping her meals and staring at walls and blank canvases for hours. I saw her health condition dropping for she denied sleep, I saw her lively face turn pale and her beautiful eyes gaining dark circles as its frame. From there I started feeling again, I felt the most dire guilt I could ever describe towards her.
Then I saw my friends coming to visit her. She was smiling, and even laughing in front of them. They thought she was finally getting better, because they didn't see her burying her face on her folded arms waiting for them to leave, taking in deep breaths before facing them, and zoning out once in a while on conversations.
But I did, I saw her do all that.
After curling on her bed all night thinking, she talked to her mom the next morning that she decided to return to school.
I watched as she took the wrong direction towards my house and stared blankly at the road until her father finally drove her there. I saw her realizing that people in school were distancing themselves from her. But then as expected, it was my friends who swarmed her desk and welcomed her back to school.
Then I saw Namjoon talking in private to her. I heard him talking about her date with Jungkook. Then he talked about Jungkook feeling guilty for something. I don't recall her telling me that something bad happened in her date, something that makes Jungkook feels guilty.
What were they talking about?
On the school's break time, I saw Jungkook greeting her awkwardly when she almost bumped into him. Then I remembered seeing Jungkook being all quiet compared to the others when they were in her house.
Why is Jungkook feeling bad? What actually happened?
Overwhelming brightness suddenly appeared in front of me. I jumped backwards and covered my eyes with the palms of my hands. All of a sudden my head started to hurt and there was sharp and noisy voices filling my ears.
When I opened my eyes, everything was illuminated in red lights.
Then I saw her, shoving her sleeping pills into her mouth and forcing it down her throat. I saw her lying on her bed, with no hints of life present on her. I saw her parents hysterically crying as they found their dead child. I pulled my hair and crouched, begging for it to stop.
And it did stop.
But then I opened my eyes and saw her in front of me. Her lips smiling but her eyes swollen and wet with tears.
I screamed. I cried and blamed myself. I kept on yelling that I was sorry but my sentences were all jumbled up. I thought that everything was over for I already left the world, I thought that I've finally reached peace. But I was too selfish and didn't realize on how things would be for others I held dear.
"Park Jimin," a voice that was definitely not hers boomed.
I looked up and saw that she was gone, and everything went back to how it was, black and empty.
"Park Jimin," the voice called me again.
I answered and tried to look for the owner of the voice, but the voice told me to stop and just listen.
The voice told me that I had something I had not tell her, a message that had failed to get to her. Then it told me that I have been given a chance, a chance to get the message to her. I did not know and I still don't know what that message was, but I felt my heart beating again the moment I heard I can finally see her again. The voice told me to not waste this opportunity, I got ten sunrises before I should return.
I could almost cry out of happiness and thankfulness, but I got no time to waste. The moment I opened my eyes, I was standing on the school's cafeteria, lining for food. Taehyung, who was getting his food in front of me, suddenly turned around facing me. His eyes widened the moment he saw me.
"Tae-taehyung.." I stuttered.
"Jimin-ah?"
"I-i..." I did not know how to explain things to him.
"Why are you holding a tray? Didn't you say that you came here only to get milk?"
I tilted my head, confused.
"Where is Lee Jinhee by the way?" he asked.
Finally getting myself together, I grabbed his shoulder and asked back "Right! Where is Jinhee?"
"Geez dude I asked first. The last time I saw her was when the bell rang, in the classroom. But weren't you with her?"
I pushed my tray over to him and made my way out from the line, running up the stairs towards our classroom.
Feeling the wind blowing my hair backwards as I ran, I suddenly came to realize the fact that my legs were actually strong enough. I was surprised, but that did not matter to me that time. I had to get to her, fast.
Seeing her slumped on her desk, everything flashed inside my head. Scenes of us as kids, walking together on our first day of high school, and me hugging him for the last time. Tears welled on my eyes, I looked up the ceiling and tried blinking them away. Taking a few deep breaths, and staying silent, I approached her.
My desk..
I pulled the chair from my desk closer to hers and sat backwards on it, facing her. As she was facing down towards the table, she had not recognized my presence. I saw her sketchbook opened on her desk, revealing a picture of a lily messily colored in black, white, and red.
"Yaaah... That is one ugly drawing," I said while trying my best to giggle.
Since then, I had pretended as if nothing had ever happened to me. I acted like everything is perfectly normal. It was because I don't want to hurt her and make her all sad and gloomy again by bringing up the truth that I did that. I finally got to see her laugh again, and I'm not going to take that away from her.
But as I have said before, seeing her laugh, I felt myself falling.
I did not know that returning here would only make me fall for her all over again. But everything was way to beautiful and blinding. It was as if I was given everything I wanted, which I didn't get on my life.
I was happy and I thought she was too. But as time passes, I felt like there's something bothering us, and it's consuming the both of us slowly from the inside. It felt like fear, worrying, and it made us somehow unhappy. I brushed the feeling away since I've always thought that together, unhappiness is an impossible feeling.
Everything was proven wrong when a kid asked me,
"Ahjusshi, are you a bad person?" right after I help him get his toy airplane which was stuck on a tree.
"Yah, what are you talking about?" I chuckled at his words which I thought was random.
What he said next awakened me,
"Then why is that noona over there crying?"
I turned my head and stole a glance at her, who was looking down and wiping her tears. Then I felt a crazy pain inside my chest.
What a fool I am. Even now, I can't seem to do anything right.
She is unhappy.
In order to make it up to her for my lackings, I took her to the beach. She liked it. She was smiling and laughing all the time, she ran around like a kid and even challenged me to a sandcastle building contest. Our minds refreshed and our heart relaxed, I tried to push her back to Jungkook since I know I can't be with her forever.
When I thought that I was finally doing the right thing,
She confessed to me.
I used to blame life, I used to blame fate. But now that I see it, maybe it was me all along.
Maybe, it was just that I am too deeply flawed.
Now that they are actually on my side and giving me second chances to almost everything, I just had to break her heart, again.
My name is Park Jimin, and I'm in love with my best friend, even though I clearly don't deserve to be.
And have I told you, that tomorrow morning would be my tenth sunrise?