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Empty auditoriums have their own charm, Haseul thinks. She looks out to the empty chairs, knowing how much she’d love to see them filled and watching her sing. But in a way, letting her voice echo throughout the vast, vacant space is satisfying in it’s own way too. She takes a shaky breath. It is , she reminds herself. Haseul likes practicing. She likes to believe in hardwork, so she stays later than everyone, memorizing, dancing, singing with more heart than was asked. Because it has to count for something. So dutifully, she stays. Lately the resolve has been crumbling, but still. Still. “Haseul unnie!” Haseul tenses only slightly for a moment, before she paints a smile on and looks back towards her loud hoobae. “Jiwoo,” Haseul collects herself, ignoring ugly thoughts. “What are you still doing here?” Kim Jiwoo smiles that megawatt smile everyone loves. Haseul can only muster half the wattage. “Ah, the director said that you were staying here late to do some runs and I didn’t know if you already had dinner or anything—you forget sometimes—so I brought you this!” She hands Haseul the bag she’s carried all the way here. Haseul takes it and looks inside. It’s a sandwich. Actually it’s three. “Um, one is a meatball, another is a tuna, and one more is a steak and cheese. I didn’t know which one to get you so I just got three? Just pick which one is the best sounding!” Haseul blinks, processing the amount of words rapidly firing at her but nods after a moment, taking the meatball sandwich. “Thanks Jiwoo, you didn’t have to do that.” “Of course I did!” Haseul can’t help the cringe from Jiwoo’s loud voice. “You work hard, you need a healthy dinner!” “...And what else.” Jiwoo laughs nervously. Haseul can see right through her. “Well...I was sort of wondering if you could...give me a ride home too?” Haseul sighs. There it is. “You’ve asked for rides home how many times now?” “I’m sorry—I swear when I get my own car and my license I’ll make it up to you!” “I bet that’s what you say to all the people you swindle rides from.” “Only you, unnie!” “That just means I’m the only one that’s a sucker enough to keep letting you have your way.” Haseul chuckles, willfully ignoring the slight bitterness it leaves on her tongue. Jiwoo is none the wiser, eyes sparkling with words unsaid. “Oh come on unnie, it’s because you care about me!” Jiwoo leans forward with a grin, doing that thing where she bends down slightly to be eye length with Haseul. Jiwoo loves lording her height onto one of the few people she can actually brag about it to. Haseul puts her hand to Jiwoo’s cheek, barely feeling it’s growing warmth before pushing the girl to the side with a roll of the eyes. “It’s the pains of being a good sunbae. Paying for the freshies and sophomores, not getting an ounce of anything in return.” “Oh come on! I promise, I really will pay you back.” Jiwoo makes a cross to her chest. “Cross my heart and hope to die!” Haseul could usually go toe to toe with Jiwoo on her zany conversation and antics, but tonight she is tired, and not herself. And she doesn’t have the energy to deal with the person that’s the reason for all of it. “Not tonight Jiwoo, I really need to practice.” Jiwoo pouts. “You don’t even need any practice unnie, you’re perfect!” Something in Haseul snaps. She makes sure it doesn’t show, but maybe Jiwoo can sense it because her smile shifts down. “Unnie, are you--” “I’m okay Jiwoo, really.” Haseul cuts her off. “Next time, okay?” Mouth still open from the abrupt shut down from Haseul, Jiwoo can only nod. She bites her lip. Haseul thinks she might say something. She hopes she doesn’t. Haseul doesn’t have the energy for more confrontation. Jiwoo must sense it. “Okay. I’ll take an uber! I could probably talk my roommate for paying for it when I get back to our place.” Haseul nods, smile gritted. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Jiwoo.” “Bye unnie, enjoy your sandwich, okay? Don’t forget to eat it!” Haseul nods, anxious for Jiwoo to leave. Jiwoo’s smile, always bright and blaring, hitches. Turns into something Haseul’s seen a few times before, but has never quite cracked (She and Jiwoo weren’t really that close. She’s just a sunbae the younger girl liked to con food from). She opens her mouth and looks like she’s about to say something, but. “Goodnight, unnie.” Jiwoo turns around and walks away. Haseul watches Jiwoo walk the distance from the stage all the way to the exit. When she’s sure Jiwoo is far away, she finally lets tears roll down her cheeks. She looked down at the script she had been reading, over and over again, to get every line perfect. In red pen, it’s written on the top right corner: Understudy . It’s the frustration, that’s the thing that gets her the worst. This was her final year in university, she worked and clawed her way from choir, to supporting, and finally she was able to be even considered for lead character. Her hard work, the grit she held onto all these years for her dream, for recognition. She deserved it. She was going to get it. All until Kim Jiwoo walked through those theater doors. She wasn’t part of any theater track classes, still an undecided major. But one day she decided to audition, and was so impressive, Haseul admits it, so damn impressive, they’d actually considered her for lead actress. Right alongside Haseul and her classmates, all who have lived and breathed performing arts classes. And then she got it. Of course, it was only a few days later till someone realized Kim Jiwoo was the daughter of a famous musical actress. The director said that’s where she got her performing chops from. After that, whatever Jiwoo could bring to the table, whatever Haseul or anyone else could bring to the table. It didn’t matter anymore. There are quiet whispers. About special treatment, biasedness. Jiwoo seems to either not know, or not care about the whispers under the stages. It’s as if she were deaf to them all. But Haseul doesn’t have the immunity Jiwoo does. She hears too many of them. The worst of it is the pity she gets from others, supporting pats on the back and reassurances as if to say they were on her side . Saying things like she would’ve never been just the understudy if Jiwoo wasn’t there. Saying things like she would’ve been shoe-in for the role had Jiwoo’s mother not been her mother . It’s unfair and downright humiliating for both her and Jiwoo, but Jiwoo just doesn’t seem to care, while Haseul cares too much. Haseul wipes her eyes and lets out a shaky breath. She looks at the sandwich in her hands, crumpled in her fist and she hadn’t even realized. She wants to hate Jiwoo. It wouldn’t be hard. Jiwoo is talkative at best and obnoxious at worst. She’s a toddler that’s been admitted to college. Hyper, too nosy for her own good, and Haseul fears she may suffer hearing loss if she’s around her for too long. She follows Haseul around like a little duck and pesters her with questions that she’d know the answer to if she actually knew anything about theater. She constantly asks Haseul for food, rides and never pays her back for gas. She also brings Haseul dinner and buys three different sandwiches because she doesn’t know what Haseul likes.She looks at Haseul as if she’s a long lost unnie, friend instead of competition, and Haseul feels like the worst person ever for even considering to hate her. Haseul grabs her bag and walks out of the auditorium, meatball sandwich slipping through her fingers and into the garbage. Guilt brews inside her but so does contempt and bitterness. She doesn’t feel like eating. Later on when she gets to her apartment, she greets her roommate weakly before heading to her room and collapsing onto her bed. It’s her last year. There’s nothing else after. She just wanted one year, one year where she could really show everyone what she’d worked so hard for. After this, Haseul will go into the work force and won’t have time to ever truly do what she wants. This is her last chance. So she makes a wish, please, don’t let her efforts go to waste. Jiwoo will get another chance. But this is Haseul’s last.
Please let her have this last chance.
// Haseul wouldn’t see Kim Jiwoo again until five years later. // Haseul steps out, nestled in a coat and scarf to protect her from the late September winds. Winter would be sneaking up on them soon, and Haseul wants to enjoy the autumn air before it’ll become too cold to wander around. She was neighborhood exploring, something she didn’t have much time with in the past month and a half after the move and the show. But with Waitress having finished her run and herself settled and moved in with a new script to start memorizing, Haseul thought she deserved a nice walk around the block. It had been a weird adjustment period when she first moved to her new apartment, it was odd not having Jinsoul be there with her. But with an amazing all expenses mostly paid sea expedition in the Atlantic being the “crowning moment” of Jinsoul’s journey towards her masters in Marine Bio (her words, not Haseul’s) Haseul could hardly fault her for choosing to go. And with her roommate gone for half a year and their lease up, Haseul decided she could probably be a big girl and afford to get herself her own apartment. It was a nice little two bedroom, one bath. It was affordable on her actress salary, had an extra room for when Jinsoul inevitably comes back from her fishy excursion, and at ten minute walking distance from the theater which is what appealed to her the most. The cute little shops in the neighborhood was an added bonus. There is a large crack on the sidewalk near a cute bookshop’s entrance, one that Haseul mindfully steps over. She pushes the door open slowly. A bell rings, but there is no one at the counter. It was a little dark, large windows doing nothing to bring light in since the tall shelves of books provided the store with more shadow than anything. But Haseul liked it. It gave the store a little ambiance. As if the store were stuck in time, moments between dusk and nightfall. Haseul is reminded of the past. A past that quickly makes its presence known. Haseul blinks. Between the shelves of books, bathed in just a dim ray of sunshine, was a familiar face Haseul had not seen for five years. “Jiwoo?” Jiwoo keeps cleaning, not appearing to hear Haseul’s call. Her nose was scrunched, like it always was when she was concentrating on something. The difference is, Haseul was used to seeing it when she was focusing on hitting a particularly tricky note, or going over her character’s lines. Not dusting the shelves of a hole in the wall bookstore. Haseul can’t help but smile. The gaps of light showing through let her see particles of dust floating in the sky. Jiwoo’s not even really cleaning anything, she’s just stirring up dust in the air. The dust tickles Jiwoo’s nose and she sneezes. “Bless you.” Haseul says, once more in another attempt to call her back. Jiwoo doesn’t even turn her way. Haseul frowns, and starts to walk over. “Jiwoo?” But Jiwoo turns her back to Haseul and walks away, opening a door and closing it without looking behind her once. Haseul stands in the bookstore, confused and...a little hurt. // “Maybe she just didn’t hear you?” Haseul watches as a corner of Jinsoul’s face raffles up and down on her phone screen. Jinsoul insists on FaceTiming every phone call they possibly can, because that’s just how Jinsoul is. Doesn’t matter if she’s in the middle of the ocean on a boat going back to shore after a six hour diving session. “Soul, are you sure you should be FaceTiming me while you’re out there?” Haseul asks for the ninth time. It wouldn’t be the first time that Jinsoul dropped a phone into the ocean. She sees the shape in her phone that’s supposed to be Jinsoul shake her head and hears, “I’m not missing out on tea just because I’m in the middle of the Atlantic!” Haseul rolls her eyes. “There is no tea, Jinsoul. She’s an old college classmate that I happened to encounter.” “Encounter implies that there was some form of reciprocated communication.” Jinsoul clicks her tongue. “Girl ghosted you.” Haseul sighs and flops back down on her bed. Jiwoo has been plaguing her mind ever since that day at the bookstore. Haseul hasn’t had the time to go back, she was too busy reading her script, or finally getting the last few boxes in her apartment unpacked. Or more honestly, she was a little afraid to go back. The last time she’d seen Jiwoo… Jiwoo had left the musical. No, not only the musical. Haseul had checked around the school that week, with her professors, even her roommate. They had no clue where she’d gone. Jiwoo had left the entire school. Haseul had been worried—she was sure that she was the last person that had seen her. She’d called her, partly as a concerned sunbae, and from the dreading feeling in the back of her head. Jiwoo wouldn’t pick up. Before she could start a full search party, the director had called her in. She had the part. With no Jiwoo, then there was no lead actress. At least, not unless the understudy stepped up. Haseul remembers the desperate prayer she’d made the night she last saw Jiwoo. Something she had wished in a moment of sadness. She had felt something ominous building and feared what she would find out about Jiwoo. So when the director had gathered them all the following week after Haseul got Jiwoo’s part to explain that she had dropped out of school, that her own mother had taken her out, Haseul hadn’t questioned it too much. She wasn’t hurt, she wasn’t dead for Christ sakes. It’s not like they were friends, and Jiwoo never talked to her about her family, so it must have been a private manner. That’s what Haseul had told herself at least. Haseul could throttle the Haseul five years ago. She hadn’t known Jiwoo that long, but she remembered the time they had. The loud girl was a force of pure happiness, even if she was a bit of a freeloader. Haseul can look back at it fondly now that she had a little more money in her pockets. But any hope of going back to what they had...that was squashed before Haseul even thought it could be an option. Jiwoo had not once looked in her direction. “..hello? Haseul!” Haseul blinks out of her Jiwoo related thoughts. She brings the phone back up above her face. She still can’t see Jinsoul’s face fully, but Jinsoul is talented enough to portray annoyance even with just an eyebrow on screen. “My bad, what were you saying? Something about ghosts right?” “You zoned out through all of that?! You missed the dolphins!” Haseul frowns. “You said dolphins were the high pitched jackasses of the sea.” “Well yeah, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t get excited when you’re friend has live up close footage of them!” “Jinsoul what am I gonna do about Jiwoo?!” Jinsoul rolls her eyes, Haseul can feel it even though she’s now only seeing the crown of Jinsoul’s head. She needs to redye her roots. “Go talk to her, obviously.” “That’s literally the entire problem we’ve been talking about for the past twenty minutes.” “No, the problem we’ve been talking about was you tried talking to her, and she didn’t respond.” “Thanks for the play by play of my terrible social failure.” “What you need to do is talk to her. Get in front of her vision line, make eye contact, and be a confident gay and talk to her!” Haseul blushes. “It’s not like that—“ “Whether it is or isn’t, go talk to her, if she’s cute get her number, just take the leap Haseu— FUCKING HELL—!” Haseul watches he screen jolt violently and sees the blurry blond vision of Jinsoul desperately grab at her before she sees blue then black. Haseul ends the call. There goes Jinsoul’s fifth phone into the ocean. // The next time Haseul sees Jiwoo, it’s by chance. Looking fluffy in a turtleneck sweater and skirt walking towards the little ramen shop just a few shops away from the bookstore. When Haseul does see Jiwoo, her first instinct is to hide behind the specials board posted outside the ramen shop. It’s not like she’s been avoiding Jiwoo, she just needed a strategy before she tried talking to her again. A strategy she hadn’t thought of yet since the last week she’d seen Jiwoo. This is stupid, she thinks. She’s a grown woman. Jo Haseul can perform to a packed theater and reach high pitches most of the human population can’t. She can do this. She can talk to Kim Jiwoo. She pops out from behind the sign trying to look as collected as possible. Which wasn’t necessary, as Jiwoo is already starting to walk the other direction. Haseul won’t let her get away another time. “Jiwoo--Jiwoo, wait!” Still with no response, Haseul runs towards her and places a hand on her shoulder. The reaction is quick and jerky, as Haseul feels her hand whipped off as Jiwoo quickly turns back in shock. Haseul hadn’t seen Jiwoo clearly before, the store was a little dark and Haseul had been a little bit far away. There is no missing her same bright brown eyes, same full cheeks, and same wispy bangs. Bangs that hide a new garrish scar on her left side temple. Haseul can barely take her eyes off of the peeking scar between Jiwoo’s bangs, but she manages to, and instead looks to Jiwoo again. Jiwoo looks visibly shocked. “Jiwoo?” Haseul’s brows furrow. “Jiwoo, it’s me, Haseul. What happened…?” Jiwoo looks at her but says nothing. The surprise in her face starts shifting into familiarity, and then something akin to what Haseul remembers seeing on her face whenever they met. And then it turns into something sadder. Haseul gets a sinking feeling in her stomach. One that feels eerily similar to what she felt five years ago. “Jiwoo?” The younger girl frowns and shakes her head. “I don’t understand…” Haseul tries again, but trails off when she sees Jiwoo’s hands come up and make gestures that she doesn’t understand, but she’s vaguely familiar with. Jiwoo starts looking frustrated, but more than anything just resigned. She stops signing all together, instead pointing a finger to her ear. And then shaking her head. Haseul is lost. “I don’t understand, Jiwoo…” Jiwoo bites her lip, looking as if she’s trying to remember something, but shakes her head. Haseul takes out her phone and watches her type something. She gives Haseul her phone. On her notes application, two lines that sink Haseul’s heart. The feeling she had. It was this.
I’m sorry, I can’t hear you. I am deaf.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Jiwoo sits across from Haseul, looking intently at the ramen menu specials. Haseul recalls a similar scene five years ago, when Jiwoo had relentlessly bothered her after one of their rehearsals till she took her to the moderately priced ramen place a few blocks from campus. Back then, Jiwoo had held the specials menu close to her face, trying to eye the best deals between each dish. In the present, she still has her face scrunched to the menu. As if nothing has changed in the past five years. 19 year old Jiwoo talked her ear off about the different between shio and shoyu ramen. 24 year old Jiwoo has said nothing. Haseul sits, looking through the menu without anything sticking. It gives her hands something to do, appearance of being busy because she is thinking. The more she thinks, the more terrible everything in her head is. She looks up and finds Jiwoo already staring at her, eyebrows furrowed and lips turned down. Frowning Jiwoo is such an unfamiliar image, Haseul almost feels like she’s talking to a stranger. With a gap of five years and repressed emotions, they might as well have been. Jiwoo scrunches her brows, lips pursed in thought. Then she takes out a pen from her bag, grabs one of the paper napkins on the table, and puts ink to napkin. After a minute, she slides the napkin and pen across the table.
Hi Haseul unnie
Haseul blinks. Jiwoo was never so short on words. She watches Jiwoo’s eyes go back down at the menu, trying too hard to look at anything but Haseul and her napkin and pen. She writes back.
Hi Jiwoo
She bites her lip, ignores the hollow in her chest, and adds;
I missed you
She slides the pen and napkin across the table, to where Jiwoo can clearly see even if she isn’t looking at Haseul. The message brings something familiar to Jiwoo’s face, a shy smile Haseul had seen before, on the first day she met Jiwoo after the younger girl had accidentally exposed herself eavesdropping on one of Haseul’s warm ups. “Hi, my name is Kim Jiwoo.” She had said, smile shy but bright behind some prop scenery. “You sing beautifully.” Jiwoo quickly writes back and passes the napkin and pen over to Haseul.
Have you decided on your order?
Haseul shakes her head, and Jiwoo motions for her to give the note back. She gives Haseul a new message.
Do you remember the difference between Shio ramen and Shoyu ramen?
Haseul lets out a laugh, and she bashfully apologizes to the other unsuspecting customers around her for the noise. Jiwoo doesn’t notice, and keeps writing on the napkin till she has to reach for another one, to re-educate Haseul on the various ramen broths she may or may not be aware of. Once the initial awkwardness of meeting again for the first time in five years somewhat passes, Jiwoo shifts into something Haseul is more used to. Incredibly verbose. It’s something comforting, if she ignores the foreign realization that she is now reading Jiwoo’s word vomit instead of hearing it. By the time they’ve finished their food (Jiwoo’s Shoyu ramen, Haseul’s Miso ramen), they’ve written to teach other about Japanese food, which led to sushi, which led to fish, which led to Haseul’s fish obsessed roommate. The elephant in the room hasn’t stopped breathing down on Haseul’s neck, but she is very good at ignoring things. When they leave the shop, they stop just a few feet from the entrance next to the specials sign. They linger, Haseul reaching for scraps on what to do next, because she’s ready to leave, but she’s not exactly ready to say goodbye either. Jiwoo, seemingly a step ahead of her, gently grabs her hand. Haseul fights the instinct to blush, and loses. Jiwoo takes her pen and writes.
Don’t be a stranger, unnie. ( ^ v ^)/
Jiwoo walks away, leaving Haseul with her parting goodbye, a number, and an endearingly hand drawn kaomoji on her hand. It squeezes at her chest. // That night, she skypes Jinsoul. Thankfully, she is not on a boat. “So look at this, 12 megapixel, 10x the zoom,” “Yup.” “4k recording definition and--Haseul.” “Yeah that’s great Jinsoul.” “Haseul, are you looking at porn?” Haseul shoots her head up. “What?!” “Oh good so you were listening.” Jinsoul snickers, a pixelated smirk that Haseul grumbles at. “But seriously, were you?” “No! Jesus, weren’t you just talking about your 4 pixel zoom or something?” Jinsoul shakes the plastic rectangle in her hand. Phone #6. “Yeah, but you didn’t seem like you were paying any attention to my phone.” “Hm.” “Your phone, however.” On instinct she brings her phone down to her lap, where Jinsoul can’t see. As if she could even see the screen in the first place. “Why do you even keep getting new, expensive phones when we all know they’re just going to end up at the bottom of the ocean.” “First of all, that’s not gonna happen this time because I got this,” she shows off some button thing on the back of her phone, Haseul has no absolute clue how that’s supposed to prevent Jinsoul from yeeting her phone into the ocean for the nth time. “And second of all, let’s get back to the more interesting topic at hand.” “Not your impulse spending?” “Who’s got you so strung up on your phone?” Haseul sighs. Jinsoul is as persistent as a barracuda when it comes to anything she deems gossip girl worthy, and while this certainly isn’t that for Haseul, Jinsoul tends to make out almost everything in Haseul’s life to be more than what it actually is. “I got Jiwoo’s number earlier today.” “You what?” Jinsoul grins. “Holy shit, congratulations! I was joking about you getting her number but at the same time, I also knew you had it in you.” “No, it’s not like that--she gave it to me but--” “Ooh, she’s bold. I like it.” “No, Jinsoul.” Haseul shakes her head. “We were just catching up. And, I.” It’s hard to acknowledge, still, hours from the realization. And it’s even harder to realize that she. She could’ve. “Haseul? Hey, Haseul.” The reception where she is must be shaky, but the gruff static that Jinsoul’s voice is filtered through is enough to pull her away from the sludge of thoughts that threaten to consume her again that night. Haseul blinks and looks back to Jinsoul. She looks concerned, something rare. Haseul feels guilty. “What’s wrong? Did she say something to you?” “She’s deaf.” “What?” “She’s deaf.” Haseul says. “So we didn’t talk that much, but we wrote on napkins.” Jinsoul’s eyes are wide, mouth open, just like the fish she loves. “But, she….she’s that girl? The one that was with you in the musical? She sang.” “Yeah. She did.” It feels foreign as it leaves her mouth. Like cotton at her tongue. “Oh okay” Jinsoul nods, processing. “Wow. That sucks.” “Yeah.” Haseul shakes her head. “Just been thinking a lot about it.” “Right.” Jinsoul nods, a little solemn looking at realizing the changes the younger girl must’ve had to overcome. But she perks back up quickly. “But I’m glad you guys were able to like, catch up and stuff!” Jinsoul’s earnest effort to make Haseul smile again works, and Haseul can admit that she is happy about that. “We didn’t actually catch up. We just...ate ramen. And wrote. She wrote to me an essay about the differences between ramen soups on a napkin.” Jiwoo literally wrote all over two and a half napkins, front and back to both, explaining in detail to Haseul the differences of flavor and ingredients between broths. Ridiculously inane, and also something she’d already told Haseul before, five years ago. It made Haseul laugh and vaguely, it felt like they were young and in college again. Jinsoul laughs. “She sounds hilarious.” “She is.” Haseul smiles. “She’s always been.” Jinsoul’s smile turns teasing. “So she’s the reason why you’ve been staring at your phone?” Haseul rolls her eyes, it’s not like that. “Sort of.” She had showered earlier and reluctantly scrubbed the pen scribbles off her hand, but not before she’d put the number on her phone. It was pathetic to admit, but she’d been in a staring match with those nine numbers on her contacts list for a few hours now. “Have you texted her?” “Nope.” “Well, what’s stopping you?” Haseul sighs. “Nothing, I guess. Just,” Jinsoul rests her head on her hand, leaning forward. “Just what?” Haseul doesn’t know how to tell Jinsoul what the murky thoughts in her head say, or what the molasses drowning her chest with guilt means, so she settles for a shrug and something simple. “Nervous. We haven’t seen each other in five years.” “Well, you saw each other today!” Jinsoul leans back with an easy smile, because this should be an easy solution to an easy problem. “Just text her hi. You’ve got five years to catch up on.” She says goodbye to Jinsoul not too long after. She brushes her teeth, goes through her bare minimum skin care routine, and makes sure all the lights are off before she slides under the covers of her bed. It’s eleven at night, and still, she stares at Jiwoo’s number. She wakes up the next morning with a dead battery. // It’s two days later that Haseul finally pulls herself together and sends Jiwoo a text. She’s just leaving the theater after having done a read through of her new show, and one of her castmates had mentioned Subway. To this day, Haseul can’t think of the sandwich enterprise without remembering Jiwoo’s borderline obsession with it in college, and it’s remembering that very odd but nostalgic fact that gives her the confidence (and topic) to text Jiwoo.
Someone mentioned subway to me earlier today. Are you still eating it for every single meal of the day?
Jiwoo texts back a few minutes after Haseul does.
They’re very good and affordable sandwiches!
She sends another, seconds after her first.
But no, unfortunately I’m responsible now u^u
Haseul snickers. She’s walking, a brisk fifteen minutes to her apartment. Expertly stepping over the cracks of the sidewalk and avoiding the few others walking as she texts Jiwoo, she barely feels the cold at all.
You, responsible? Are you sure?
Jiwoo pings right after.
I’ve grown up a lot since then, unnie
It’s odd how she feels that it’s just like the old days, when it could be anything but. // They keep texting like this for weeks. It reminds her of the odd talks she and Jiwoo used to have, late in the auditorium when Haseul would stay late to practice, and Jiwoo would stay late because she had nothing else better to do that night. And while it feels like Haseul is living in the past, slowly, their present lives trickle into their conversations too. Haseul, a little apprehensively, tells Jiwoo about her work in theater, nothing like broadway or anything, but known and successful enough to make a decent living. Jiwoo is ecstatic, and while she could just be hiding it, Haseul thinks the excessive exclamation marks and emojis are sincere. It makes her feel a little silly and embarrassed worrying about it so much in the first place. I have to confess, I saw you at that bookstore a couple of days before we met at the ramen place, Haseul texts her one day after Jiwoo mentions her workplace. She was a bookstore clerk, one of the two employees under her boss slash friend.
What? You did?!
Yeah, I called out to you but you didn’t turn back, I just thought you hadn’t heard me.
It’s easier somewhat to acknowledge. There are a few differences between the Jiwoo now and the Jiwoo before, and her not being able to hear is certainly a huge difference. But if Haseul is being honest, Jiwoo actually eating salads now is also a gigantic difference. And the fact that she actually goes to sleep at a decent hour instead of two in the morning. There’s loads of big and little differences between past and present Jiwoo, but there’s also many similarities, the subway obsession, the insane blocks of words Haseul has to process through when Jiwoo tells her about some random fact she remembered today, other things that made Jiwoo Jiwoo . Jiwoo’s text is a series of distressed emojis, and then, Ahh I’m sorry! You should’ve tapped me on the back or something!
It’s fine, we eventually found each other again, right?
Haseul waits for a few minutes before Jiwoo texts back.
I’d always wanted to see you again, and then we did. Like destiny.
An uneasy fog sets in Haseul’s chest, whenever things like fate, and wishes, and destiny ever came up. Another blue bubble pops back up again.
But we could’ve made it sooner than later! Don’t hesitate to turn me around next time!
And as quickly as Jiwoo put it, she quickly clears the fog bringing Haseul down. Jiwoo has always made her feel many things. // Some of the cast go out to lunch at a nice Mediterranean restaurant a couple of blocks away from the theater, opposite direction of where her apartment is. She likes them enough, they’re all great and hilarious, but also professional and hard working. It’s why she feels especially guilty when they have to catch her attention a third time from her phone. Jiwon, their Ilse, pats her on the back and reassures her it’s fine, and their Moritz, Jungwoo, gently teases her sheepish expression. “Noona it’s okay, you should go talk to your girlfriend.” Hasuel sputters. “My what? ” “You’re talking to Jiwoo, right?” Seokmin, their Melchior, smiles around the lip of his lemonade. “It’s okay, we get it.” Haseul looks at them incredulously. Had she really talked about Jiwoo this much to them? “She’s not my girlfriend.” An unbelievable amount of dubious eyes stare back at her. Haseul sputters, again. “She’s a hoobae.” Haseul takes a gulp of her water, trying to push down the growing blush creeping up her neck. “It’s not like that.” “You could’ve fooled us.” Heejin, the assistant director and arguably the one she’s closest with out of all the cast, gives her a raised brow and a knowing grin. “ I’m your hoobae and you don’t smile like that for me.” “Could we get back to topic please?” Haseul puts her phone in her coat pocket, the coat propped up on the chair so she knows she won’t be tempted to look. Jiwoo can wait for a bit. “We weren’t talking about much, just about how hot the theater is.” And the conversation quickly shifts into portable air conditioners. Haseul interjects here and there with her own quip, trying to ignore the buzzing in her coat pocket. Heejin and Haseul walk side by side back to the theater. Naturally, Heejin teases Haseul once the older girl finally takes her phone out and responds to the buzzes the whole table had heard earlier during lunch. “Must be a real important hoobae.” Heejin teases, laughing as Haseul’s cheeks dust pink. “She’s just bored at work and whining at me to text her back.” Haseul grins, pocketing her phone as soon as she’d sent her text. “I told her I’d treat her out for dinner today.” The smile is still fond, but there’s trepidation in her voice that Heejin doesn’t know Haseul well enough to decypher. Still, Haseul looks happy. “Aww, date night!” “It’s not a date!” “Take her somewhere nice, sunbae!” Haseul gives up. -- “So...you took her to Wendy’s.” Jinsoul says over the phone. “On her birthday.” Haseul doesn’t need to see Jinsoul to know she is giving her probably the most judgemental look she’s ever received in her life. One she’s getting a thousand miles away. “She likes Wendy’s!” Haseul says, and to defend herself, she adds, “And I tried to offer to take her somewhere nicer, but she wouldn’t have it.” “You couldn’t even get her to go to like, I don’t know, a Chili’s?” “Jinsoul, how is Chili’s any better?” “Better than Wendy’s! ” Haseul sighs. When Jinsoul puts it like that, it does sound. Terrible. But Jinsoul didn’t know the history these two shared over terrible fast food places. Back when Haseul would rehearse until the very late hours of the night, and how Jiwoo would be the only one willing to stay around till those late hours, then somehow rope Haseul to eating midnight McDonalds chicken tenders and McFlurries. Maybe it was the familiarity that kept the night from turning awkward. It had been the first time since their ramen dinner that they’d met again in person. Haseul has put it off for a while, but with Jiwoo’s birthday having crept up on them in no time at all, it just didn’t feel right to not do something for her. Jiwoo had looked happy. She liked her burger and smiled brightly and seemed as glad of Haseul’s company as Haseul was of hers. Haseul still has the napkin from dinner, filled with their words and scribbles.
Best birthday dinner I’ve had in years
Haseul had laughed.
What kind of birthday dinners have you been eating?
Jiwoo smiles.
The ones where it’s just cake.
She’s not sure if Wendy’s is entirely better, but it’s Jiwoo’s birthday, so what she wants, she gets. “Hello Miss Jo Haseul? Miss Jo Haseul?” Jinsoul’s voice breaks through her memories. Haseul blinks back into the present. “Oh my god, she dead.” “Jinsoul.” She says, with enough feeling to let Jinsoul know she’s rolling her eyes. “Hi welcome back, I’ve been trying to ask you about the details of your date.” Haseul blushes. “It wasn’t a date.” Why does everyone keep thinking it's a date? “Yeah, because you took her to Wendy’s .” “Oh my god.” Haseul falls onto her bed. “I treated her to dinner. It’s her birthday, and she’s still my hoobae. It’s my responsibility.” She hears a snicker over the line. “Yeah, okay, keep telling yourself that.” “Bye, Jinsoul—“ “Aww c’mon wait wait—I promise I’ll keep my mouth shut! Just tell me what happened!” Haseul frowns, turning over and leaning her head on her hand. She check the time—already 11. “Why are you so interested?” “Because, I know you said it’s not a date, but it’s the closest either of us have gotten to a date in like, a year .” Jinsoul whines. “Let me live vicariously through you!” Haseul shakes her head and shifts, laying on her back again. She looks up at the ceiling and recollects. “There’s not much to tell. I walked over to the bookstore, we walked down the street, I was thinking of taking her to a restaurant a few blocks from my place but she pointed to a Wendy’s before we could get there with her puppy dog eyes.” “Hmm.” Jinsoul makes some sort of noise. Before Haseul can continue, Jinsoul speaks again. “Yeah but did y’all kiss?” “Do you want to hear the rest or not?” “Sorry, continue.” Haseul holds back another sigh. “We ate, talked, Jiwoo is just as messy of an eater as she was when we were younger, then I walked her home. She doesn’t even live that far from here, just a few blocks.” “You walked her home, that’s cute!” Jinsoul says. “But did yo—“ “I said goodbye and she went inside and we did not kiss, Jinsoul.” She hears a long sigh. “Disappointed but not surprised.” “What were you expecting?” Haseul asks incredulously. “It’s just,” Jinsoul takes a pause, then continues. “You’ve been talking about talking to her a lot recently, and I know you guys were together a lot before—” “She was my hoobae. She stuck around during rehearsals and was just the one that happened to stay as late as I did.” Haseul smiles. “Although I think a lot of the time she just stayed to annoy me.” “I see.” There’s a tilt to Jinsoul’s voice that only happens when Jinsoul is song about something. Haseul doesn’t like it, because it usually means she’s gonna lose, or Jinsoul’s about to unleash a plethora of marine biology facts on her. “What’s that supposed to mean?” “Nothing!” She hears some shuffling on Jinsoul’s side. “It’s just. Kinda cute.” “What’s cute?” Haseul asks, tone wary. “She stayed late to wait for you.” Jinsoul says. “You said before that she clung to you and tagged along wherever you went, right? She must’ve really cared about you.” “It was more like I was the only one who’d tolerate her freeloading.” She hears Jinsoul sigh. “There is no getting through to you, you know that?” Haseul hums. She doesn’t want to explain exactly to Jinsoul that she is aware of Jiwoo’s affection. She’d been her favorite sunbae, for some reason. Haseul didn’t deserve the praise then, and she certainly doesn’t now, but she keeps quiet. Eventually, Jinsoul hangs up when she’s remembered she does actually need to do some work. Haseul bids farewell and turns over in bed. She stays, laying on top of the covers on her bed and looks to the ceiling. She reminiscences. Jiwoo in all honesty had been an incredibly outgoing and likeable girl. She still is. But back then, many of the students like her had felt bitter seeing the spunky girl skip beyond the metaphoric line and steal the lead role. Funny enough, Haseul herself, the girl everyone had thought would be the sure pick for the lead actress, was the most welcoming and kind of them all. Haseul had never seen anyone be outright nasty to Jiwoo. But now, older, wiser, and with less sheer will to ignore everything to just make it , Haseul doesn’t really remember that many people going out of their way to be friends with Jiwoo either. It wasn’t because Jiwoo hadn’t tried, because she still remained incredibly friendly, despite the subtle exclusion of her or the passive aggressiveness of some of the others. If Haseul hadn’t been there, she would’ve been incredibly lonely. She probably still was. Haseul feels a drop in her chest at this late revelation. Jiwoo was talented. She sang like heaven and even back then Haseul had firmly respected the powerful voice that Jiwoo had hid behind her goofiness and immaturity. She’s not above admitting that Jiwoo’s voice had brought her to tears. And now she’s realizing, she should have cherished that voice more, they all should have. She should have cherished Jiwoo more, but. Haseul groans, wishing she could take back the years of regret. They’d always been there, simmering, but Haseul had kept them far back in her mind. With Jiwoo starting to become a fixture in her life again, and this time with Haseul dead set on not losing her again, the older woman would have to face old demons. A buzz from her phone breaks her thoughts. Haseul grabs it, ready to roll her eyes at what she suspects is some text Jinsoul’s made to make another jab at her again, but it’s not from Jinsoul.
Thank you for tonight unnie! My birthday wish came true today!
Jiwoo. Haseul smiles fondly, the depressing thoughts a few moments ago slowly wilting for now, just from one message from the bubbly girl. She curls up in bed as she texts back, It’s no problem, Jiwoo. I had a lot of fun tonight, even though you refused to let me take you out to a real restaurant.
Wendy’s is a real restaurant! All fast food places are real restaurants, they’re just faster!
Haseul rolls her eyes, but can’t help the growing grin. If Jinsoul were here, she’d never hear the end of it. But before she can respond, she gets another text. You’re not gonna ask about my wish? Haseul’s stomach lurches at the word. If you tell people about your wish, then it won’t come true. Haseul waits, watching the small dots on the message screen as Jiwoo types. Finally, she responds. The only one who can make my wish come true is you. Haseul’s eyes widen. What-- Bzzt. Another message.
My wish for free food!!
Haseul stares. Then types.
...I really shouldn’t be surprised.
Haseul sighs. With another groan, she rolls off of bed and heads to the bathroom, getting ready for bed. It doesn’t take long to brush her teeth and wash her face, but when she comes back to bed she sees texts she’s missed from Jiwoo ten minutes ago.
Unnie, it’s 11:11. Make a wish!
Unnie! What did you wish for?
:( Tell Jiwoo please?
Goodnight Unnie, thank you again for today. I’ll treasure it always
I hope your wish comes true
Haseul’s breath hitches at the last text, fingers clutching onto the phone tight enough that in the back of her head, Haseul worries that it might break. Haseul goes to bed that night with a weighed heart, half an hour past 11:11, wishing she had been a better person for Kim Jiwoo.