four | prologue
We'll see if this goes anywhere.
01.
There’s a photograph of the Jung sisters. It just sits on the living room coffee table, and in summer, when we’re camped out in there, fan spinning above our heads, and the TV playing some variety show, that’s what tends to be right in my line of sight. These two gorgeous sisters, sitting side by side, candid. I’ve never asked Soojung where they were. My guess is that it was a holiday somewhere.
Jongin likes to think that he remembers every single one of Soojung’s emergencies. All of her crises. They’ve been friends since forever, and there was even a time, when they were five years old, that Jongin agreed to hold off his birthday celebrations until April so they could have an in-between birthday because Soojung didn’t think it was fair that she had to wait all the wait until October. He also thinks, as he pushes off against the pool wall, and sinks his head into the muffled quiet of the water, about the time they’d sat on the park swing set with the setting sun in their eyes, and Soojung would wish out loud that Sooyeon didn’t force her on this path to be this perfect girl -
“You don’t have to become someone you’re not.”
“But if feels wrong, you know? If I don’t live up to that.”
Jongin would see the Jung sisters during holidays and on some weekends still, and it would seem as though nothing had ever gone wrong between them. And really, Jongin mused as he pushed his arms through the water and followed the tiled black line, nothing had gone wrong between the sisters. Sooyeon was always the aloof sister, but everybody could see how much she loved her younger sister. They raised their voices like any pair of sisters would.
But something had gone wrong inside Soojung herself.
He hauls himself out of the water at this point, panting. Heart pounding, skin shivering as he escapes the water. And exactly on the dot, he hears a familiar ringtone emanate from where his gear is sitting, some few metres away from the pool on the stands. It’s getting late and the pool has started to clear out. And there’s only a few people who would be calling this late.
Jongin answers with one hand while awkwardly towelling off with the other, “What’s up?”
“Can you give me a lift?” When Soojung asks this of him, it means a few things to Jongin.
“So where’s the party at tonight?”
“Go fuck yourself.”
“Seriously, you’re going to talk to your ride like that?”
He hears her laugh on the other side, “Okay, I’m sorry. But seriously, I need a lift, and let’s not talk about what happened tonight.”
“You can tell me about it in the car?”
“Yeah fine. I’ll text you the address. You’ve just finished your swim right?”
“Yeah, you’ve got good timing.”
02.
You know that feeling of intense jealousy? The kind that rises up out of nowhere, when you’re in bed and you’re scrolling down your Instagram feed, or maybe you were just remembering about what happened earlier in the day, and your best friend’s beautiful face pops up in your mind? I hate the feeling that comes afterwards. I feel bitter, and upset, and entitled to something that’s not mine. I love Jinri, but I think sometimes, that there’s something wrong with me. No - not think. I know it.
Soojung and Jinri have been friends for a long time. So long, that Soojung has already assumed that she’d be at Jinri’s wedding one day.
Love between friends is beautiful. Soojung does her best to treasure it. She swings back and forth between familiar, uncomfortable thoughts - that Jinri is so sweet, so bright, so lovely, and what is she in contrast? Somewhat more drab, with worse eyebags and more moments crying, leaning on her best friend’s unrelenting shoulder.
Soojung always sleeps with the blinds open. Her parents scold her for it, but she keeps it open so in the morning, the sunlight streams in. Soojung likes to lie in that sunlight, warm light across her face and collarbones. When she half-closes her eyes, balls of light refracted off her eyelashes discolour her vision. She smiles, and feels beautiful. It is the quietest part of the day. No beeps from her phone, no voices talking to her, or around her. Nobody looking at her.
But inevitably the day has to start, so she pulls on black stockings and the school shirt, buttoning it up all the way, then back down two buttons. She sighs in front of the mirror, and buttons one more button up. One down again. Then one up. Her phone buzzes, and Soojung buttons the school kilt around her waist as she bends over to read the notification.
This is the start to every day, it seems. There is always that hope in the morning, that today will feel better, that today, she’ll feel lighter. Or more in control. Mostly, she’d like something about how she feels to change.
But really, Soojung knows that things haven’t changed for years. She still feels like that same awkward girl who started seventh grade years ago. Now, she’s definitely slimmer than she started, her hair is longer, and her skin is clearer. She’s more toned, and although she’s eating right and exercising a few days a week, she still doesn’t feel happy. This doesn’t make sense to Soojung, who has read every mildly reputable online source providing self-care and health tips.
Sometimes, she does feel happy - because sometimes she ignores a lot of the little thoughts and sinks into her immediate existence - as though there is nothing to worry about when you are in tartan, eating yoghurt and fruit and granola for breakfast, hair out of your face, legs propped up on the chair opposite at the dining table.
But that doesn’t last long either, and the clock breaks it every morning, reminding her that there is somewhere to be, with expectations to meet.
Sometimes, as Soojung brushes her teeth and stares herself down in the mirror - analysing that spot near her chin, and staring into her own eyes, she knows that the problem isn’t really how her body is, but more about how her mind is. She dabs eye cream onto her eyelids, blearily noting her eyebags.
But it’s okay. Jung Soojung always has eyebags, along with a winning smile and legs every second boy in the grade has eyed for too long. So really, it doesn’t matter.
She heads outside, sunlight on her shoulders, fingertips and toes slightly numb from the cold. She walks and texts. Jinri is the first person she talks to every day.
03.
The last time I went to see a school counsellor, he told me that I projected outwards. A lot of kids at school - like Chanshik - don’t like talking about the counsellor, let alone seeing him, but I find him really helpful. I’ve stopped though, because I’m going to try and take hold of my life - get some agency. Or maybe I’m just running away. Because if I stop seeing him, I stop hearing what he’s saying. But it’s not like I’m ignoring his advice either.
Jinri wakes up early in winter to make breakfast. Most recently, she’s been making oatmeal. Almond milk and oatmeal go into a small pot - she stirs two circles in the mixture - then she washes some strawberries while the oats simmer. Jinri likes the sweetness and warmth in the morning. The soft texture - the lack of some distinct texture - reminds her of childhood. When things just weren’t as hard, or as complicated. Every spoonful feels like some self-accomplishment and some kind of small success, and it’s nice. Jinri rinses the pot and bowl and spoon afterwards, before grabbing her things to catch the bus. She double checks everything before she locks the door behind herself.
Her phone buzzes as she walks, the routine morning text from Soojung. She almost misses the bus pulling up because her head is down, and she laughs and thanks the driver as she gets on. Morning happiness like this is good. She relishes it. Her counsellor told her to write things like that down, just to record them in some way. Recovery is a process of reinforcement; it’s about developing good habits and undoing bad ones.
Jinri takes naps on the bus now. She thinks it’s kind of adventurous. Before, a year ago, she would sit and her eyes would stare forward, and she’d follow the road, no matter how little or how much she had slept the night before. She dares herself to sleep now, because the reality is that she never sleeps enough, and it actually feels good to have the sunlight on her closed eyelids, and to doze off along a straight stretch of road isn’t too bad. And it’s a bit of a thrill, to not quite know where along the bus route she is when she blinks herself awake again.
And it’s always a good feeling when she watches the bus pull up next to the school bus bay, and she smiles and she says thank you to the bus driver every time. Do your best to never start the day off on a negative note. That’s what the counsellor said to her once. It’s easy to spiral down. If you start on a negative, it’s easier to end on a negative.
Jinri’s counsellor never told her what her diagnosis was, but Jinri isn’t sure she actually ever wanted to know anyway. There are a lot of labels that people spend too much time trying to live by. There are labels in school - Soojung is the hot, party girl, Jongin is the dark-haired, sports legend, Jinri is meant to be the ever-sunny, pretty girl. Chanshik is the cool arts student. It’s why he carries around pingers at parties even though he’s always sober. Then there are labels at home. Jinri doesn’t really talk about, them but she thinks about them a lot.
So really, Jinri didn’t need another label.
And more and more, as Jinri spends her maths classes at the back giggling with Chanshik between questions, and lunchtimes cross-legged next to Soojung against the wall of the senior common room, labels matter less and less, and she forms better habits like laughing, and hugging her friends, more and more.
But it’s not always that easy.
04.
Jongin’s a really odd guy. Nobody will ever say this, because they can’t see it. In fact, I don’t think I’ve heard anything actually say anything bad about him before. It’s because Jongin is the sports star. He sets swimming records, and he’s on the football team every year. He’s always coming to class late, from running around the school oval, and he’s just a nice guy. But I think he’s funny, because how can somebody be that perfect right? He’s always wearing that mask, half naturally, but half intentionally, and I think it kills him to do it.
Chanshik has the worst sleep patterns ever because he’s always sleeping too late, and getting up early, and he makes up for it by napping for one period every school day. He doesn’t really know why, it’s just a routine he’s found himself in.
It’s just like how one day, he finds himself in the principal’s office, being offered the options of expulsion or counselling sessions, and he’s not entirely sure how it all turned out this way at all. It only really starts to fit together when he’s finding himself going to his science class for the first time that year, and half the class doesn’t even know who he is.
Jinri is the first one who’s nice to him, and Jongin is the second. Chanshik doesn’t think much of Jinri at first, because she just seems like that nice girl everyone votes as SRC each year, and she hugs all the girls who cry after exams. Jongin is the first person who actively chooses to sit next to Chanshik in class, and he asks how he’s been, as if they’ve been friends all this time.
It isn’t until Jongin sprains his ankle and can’t play ball for a week that the two boys sit down to have lunch together for the first time. They sit by the sports field, where all of Jongin’s friends are mucking around. Chanshik never sits there.
“When you’re not babysitting me, who do you hang with?” Jongin asks between mouthfuls of his pork roll as they sit on the edges of the school oval.
Chanshik shrugs and absentmindedly scratches the strip of skin between his sock and hem of his trousers. “Nobody, really.” The grass tickles.
It sounds too melodramatic to be the truth, but it is.
Chanshik tries harder after that, and he starts talking more, and laughing at Jongin’s really bad jokes. Jinri starts to say hi to him in the hallways, and Chanshik starts catching the eye of the girl who’s always with her.
Apparently her name is Soojung, and she’s intimidating at first, because Chanshik just can’t figure out her expression. And because she seems quite intimidating, Chanshik never plucks up the courage to actually ask her name. He just assumes her name is Soojung based on what Jinri says in passing. Jongin reassures him that he’ll eventually know the names of the people who matter, and pats him on the back.
Figuring out the people who matter in high school is a process that takes years - many of which Chanshik has already lost. He mentions this to Jinri on a hot day, where the air feels like it weighs down on your skin. Jinri offers her milk tea to Chanshik after he talks.
“You have us. What else matters?”
01.
There’s a photograph of the Jung sisters. It just sits on the living room coffee table, and in summer, when we’re camped out in there, fan spinning above our heads, and the TV playing some variety show, that’s what tends to be right in my line of sight. These two gorgeous sisters, sitting side by side, candid. I’ve never asked Soojung where they were. My guess is that it was a holiday somewhere.
Jongin likes to think that he remembers every single one of Soojung’s emergencies. All of her crises. They’ve been friends since forever, and there was even a time, when they were five years old, that Jongin agreed to hold off his birthday celebrations until April so they could have an in-between birthday because Soojung didn’t think it was fair that she had to wait all the wait until October. He also thinks, as he pushes off against the pool wall, and sinks his head into the muffled quiet of the water, about the time they’d sat on the park swing set with the setting sun in their eyes, and Soojung would wish out loud that Sooyeon didn’t force her on this path to be this perfect girl -
“You don’t have to become someone you’re not.”
“But if feels wrong, you know? If I don’t live up to that.”
Jongin would see the Jung sisters during holidays and on some weekends still, and it would seem as though nothing had ever gone wrong between them. And really, Jongin mused as he pushed his arms through the water and followed the tiled black line, nothing had gone wrong between the sisters. Sooyeon was always the aloof sister, but everybody could see how much she loved her younger sister. They raised their voices like any pair of sisters would.
But something had gone wrong inside Soojung herself.
He hauls himself out of the water at this point, panting. Heart pounding, skin shivering as he escapes the water. And exactly on the dot, he hears a familiar ringtone emanate from where his gear is sitting, some few metres away from the pool on the stands. It’s getting late and the pool has started to clear out. And there’s only a few people who would be calling this late.
Jongin answers with one hand while awkwardly towelling off with the other, “What’s up?”
“Can you give me a lift?” When Soojung asks this of him, it means a few things to Jongin.
“So where’s the party at tonight?”
“Go fuck yourself.”
“Seriously, you’re going to talk to your ride like that?”
He hears her laugh on the other side, “Okay, I’m sorry. But seriously, I need a lift, and let’s not talk about what happened tonight.”
“You can tell me about it in the car?”
“Yeah fine. I’ll text you the address. You’ve just finished your swim right?”
“Yeah, you’ve got good timing.”
02.
You know that feeling of intense jealousy? The kind that rises up out of nowhere, when you’re in bed and you’re scrolling down your Instagram feed, or maybe you were just remembering about what happened earlier in the day, and your best friend’s beautiful face pops up in your mind? I hate the feeling that comes afterwards. I feel bitter, and upset, and entitled to something that’s not mine. I love Jinri, but I think sometimes, that there’s something wrong with me. No - not think. I know it.
Soojung and Jinri have been friends for a long time. So long, that Soojung has already assumed that she’d be at Jinri’s wedding one day.
Love between friends is beautiful. Soojung does her best to treasure it. She swings back and forth between familiar, uncomfortable thoughts - that Jinri is so sweet, so bright, so lovely, and what is she in contrast? Somewhat more drab, with worse eyebags and more moments crying, leaning on her best friend’s unrelenting shoulder.
Soojung always sleeps with the blinds open. Her parents scold her for it, but she keeps it open so in the morning, the sunlight streams in. Soojung likes to lie in that sunlight, warm light across her face and collarbones. When she half-closes her eyes, balls of light refracted off her eyelashes discolour her vision. She smiles, and feels beautiful. It is the quietest part of the day. No beeps from her phone, no voices talking to her, or around her. Nobody looking at her.
But inevitably the day has to start, so she pulls on black stockings and the school shirt, buttoning it up all the way, then back down two buttons. She sighs in front of the mirror, and buttons one more button up. One down again. Then one up. Her phone buzzes, and Soojung buttons the school kilt around her waist as she bends over to read the notification.
This is the start to every day, it seems. There is always that hope in the morning, that today will feel better, that today, she’ll feel lighter. Or more in control. Mostly, she’d like something about how she feels to change.
But really, Soojung knows that things haven’t changed for years. She still feels like that same awkward girl who started seventh grade years ago. Now, she’s definitely slimmer than she started, her hair is longer, and her skin is clearer. She’s more toned, and although she’s eating right and exercising a few days a week, she still doesn’t feel happy. This doesn’t make sense to Soojung, who has read every mildly reputable online source providing self-care and health tips.
Sometimes, she does feel happy - because sometimes she ignores a lot of the little thoughts and sinks into her immediate existence - as though there is nothing to worry about when you are in tartan, eating yoghurt and fruit and granola for breakfast, hair out of your face, legs propped up on the chair opposite at the dining table.
But that doesn’t last long either, and the clock breaks it every morning, reminding her that there is somewhere to be, with expectations to meet.
Sometimes, as Soojung brushes her teeth and stares herself down in the mirror - analysing that spot near her chin, and staring into her own eyes, she knows that the problem isn’t really how her body is, but more about how her mind is. She dabs eye cream onto her eyelids, blearily noting her eyebags.
But it’s okay. Jung Soojung always has eyebags, along with a winning smile and legs every second boy in the grade has eyed for too long. So really, it doesn’t matter.
She heads outside, sunlight on her shoulders, fingertips and toes slightly numb from the cold. She walks and texts. Jinri is the first person she talks to every day.
03.
The last time I went to see a school counsellor, he told me that I projected outwards. A lot of kids at school - like Chanshik - don’t like talking about the counsellor, let alone seeing him, but I find him really helpful. I’ve stopped though, because I’m going to try and take hold of my life - get some agency. Or maybe I’m just running away. Because if I stop seeing him, I stop hearing what he’s saying. But it’s not like I’m ignoring his advice either.
Jinri wakes up early in winter to make breakfast. Most recently, she’s been making oatmeal. Almond milk and oatmeal go into a small pot - she stirs two circles in the mixture - then she washes some strawberries while the oats simmer. Jinri likes the sweetness and warmth in the morning. The soft texture - the lack of some distinct texture - reminds her of childhood. When things just weren’t as hard, or as complicated. Every spoonful feels like some self-accomplishment and some kind of small success, and it’s nice. Jinri rinses the pot and bowl and spoon afterwards, before grabbing her things to catch the bus. She double checks everything before she locks the door behind herself.
Her phone buzzes as she walks, the routine morning text from Soojung. She almost misses the bus pulling up because her head is down, and she laughs and thanks the driver as she gets on. Morning happiness like this is good. She relishes it. Her counsellor told her to write things like that down, just to record them in some way. Recovery is a process of reinforcement; it’s about developing good habits and undoing bad ones.
Jinri takes naps on the bus now. She thinks it’s kind of adventurous. Before, a year ago, she would sit and her eyes would stare forward, and she’d follow the road, no matter how little or how much she had slept the night before. She dares herself to sleep now, because the reality is that she never sleeps enough, and it actually feels good to have the sunlight on her closed eyelids, and to doze off along a straight stretch of road isn’t too bad. And it’s a bit of a thrill, to not quite know where along the bus route she is when she blinks herself awake again.
And it’s always a good feeling when she watches the bus pull up next to the school bus bay, and she smiles and she says thank you to the bus driver every time. Do your best to never start the day off on a negative note. That’s what the counsellor said to her once. It’s easy to spiral down. If you start on a negative, it’s easier to end on a negative.
Jinri’s counsellor never told her what her diagnosis was, but Jinri isn’t sure she actually ever wanted to know anyway. There are a lot of labels that people spend too much time trying to live by. There are labels in school - Soojung is the hot, party girl, Jongin is the dark-haired, sports legend, Jinri is meant to be the ever-sunny, pretty girl. Chanshik is the cool arts student. It’s why he carries around pingers at parties even though he’s always sober. Then there are labels at home. Jinri doesn’t really talk about, them but she thinks about them a lot.
So really, Jinri didn’t need another label.
And more and more, as Jinri spends her maths classes at the back giggling with Chanshik between questions, and lunchtimes cross-legged next to Soojung against the wall of the senior common room, labels matter less and less, and she forms better habits like laughing, and hugging her friends, more and more.
But it’s not always that easy.
04.
Jongin’s a really odd guy. Nobody will ever say this, because they can’t see it. In fact, I don’t think I’ve heard anything actually say anything bad about him before. It’s because Jongin is the sports star. He sets swimming records, and he’s on the football team every year. He’s always coming to class late, from running around the school oval, and he’s just a nice guy. But I think he’s funny, because how can somebody be that perfect right? He’s always wearing that mask, half naturally, but half intentionally, and I think it kills him to do it.
Chanshik has the worst sleep patterns ever because he’s always sleeping too late, and getting up early, and he makes up for it by napping for one period every school day. He doesn’t really know why, it’s just a routine he’s found himself in.
It’s just like how one day, he finds himself in the principal’s office, being offered the options of expulsion or counselling sessions, and he’s not entirely sure how it all turned out this way at all. It only really starts to fit together when he’s finding himself going to his science class for the first time that year, and half the class doesn’t even know who he is.
Jinri is the first one who’s nice to him, and Jongin is the second. Chanshik doesn’t think much of Jinri at first, because she just seems like that nice girl everyone votes as SRC each year, and she hugs all the girls who cry after exams. Jongin is the first person who actively chooses to sit next to Chanshik in class, and he asks how he’s been, as if they’ve been friends all this time.
It isn’t until Jongin sprains his ankle and can’t play ball for a week that the two boys sit down to have lunch together for the first time. They sit by the sports field, where all of Jongin’s friends are mucking around. Chanshik never sits there.
“When you’re not babysitting me, who do you hang with?” Jongin asks between mouthfuls of his pork roll as they sit on the edges of the school oval.
Chanshik shrugs and absentmindedly scratches the strip of skin between his sock and hem of his trousers. “Nobody, really.” The grass tickles.
It sounds too melodramatic to be the truth, but it is.
Chanshik tries harder after that, and he starts talking more, and laughing at Jongin’s really bad jokes. Jinri starts to say hi to him in the hallways, and Chanshik starts catching the eye of the girl who’s always with her.
Apparently her name is Soojung, and she’s intimidating at first, because Chanshik just can’t figure out her expression. And because she seems quite intimidating, Chanshik never plucks up the courage to actually ask her name. He just assumes her name is Soojung based on what Jinri says in passing. Jongin reassures him that he’ll eventually know the names of the people who matter, and pats him on the back.
Figuring out the people who matter in high school is a process that takes years - many of which Chanshik has already lost. He mentions this to Jinri on a hot day, where the air feels like it weighs down on your skin. Jinri offers her milk tea to Chanshik after he talks.
“You have us. What else matters?”