I Hate Me, Too | Han Seojun

12

Seojun's POV

Present

I stand there, waiting--panicking--for her to say something. Every second of silence feels as though it's becoming harder and harder to breathe. She just stands there and continues to look at me.

"What did you just say?" She asks after it feeling like an eternity. Her words were no longer sounding like one big run-on sentence, she asks clearly, her tone was low.

"Please don't make me repeat it." I plead, tears rolling down my face.

"Say it again." She commands.

"Jugyeong-"

"Say it again!" She yells, stomping her foot. She looks back at me, rage in her eyes. "Say it again Han Seojun." She says in the same low tone, but newly rage filled eyes.

"I-I saw her that day."

She scoffs.

"The other part."

"I," I take another shaky deep breath in while looking down, I meet her gaze again, "I killed her."

As if I said the words for the first time, her expression returns to how it was when I originally said it.

"So I didn't mishear." She says, not breaking eye contact. "You saw her that day?" I nod my head. "Tell me, what happened. What did you do?" She asks as if she was trying to hold back from pushing me down the rest of the stairs.

"We had a fight," I start, "It was about you." I say.

She raises an eyebrow. "Me?" She asks, "What about me?"

"She came over to my house, upset about something, and when I left her in my room to get her water, she found my cast-"

"What does this have to do with me?" She asks, raising her hand to stop me from beating around the bush.

I sigh, running my hand through my hair, becoming frustrated with how I am having to relive my idiotic actions.

"I kept the cast because of what you wrote. I liked you and she knew it. She accused me of keeping the cast because I wasn't over you and I was only using her to get over you-"

"And were you?" I run my hands over my face, groaning as I crouch on the step. "Han Seojun." She says. I run my hands from my face to my hair again as I look up at her. She looks down at me, rage no longer in her eyes, but disbelief and disgust.

"I was," I finally admit, "Only at first."

She scoffs as I stand back up.

"How dare you?" She says, looking at me with complete repulsion. "Do you understand how messed up that was? You used her for you own benefit, a sick girl at that, and you still felt okay with that?"

"Of course not! I really did like her, I..." My words trail off as I try to collect my thoughts, "I realized I loved her too late, I can't take that back."

"Was that all the argument was about? You just told her you used her and you let her walk out?"

"No...I denied it."

"You're insane!" She says in disbelief. She laughs slightly, becoming pissed off, throwing her hands in the air and letting them fall back to her side. "What else could you have possibly said, or not say, in your case?"

"She was walking away and I called out to her...but I called her by your name." It became silent again. That same deafening silence that felt like it was constricting my lungs. "She said she hated me and then left. That was hours before..." I stop because I felt if I kept talking, she would kill me.

She looks away from me, turning her head. She 'tuts' before turning to walk away.

"Jugyeong." I call out to her. She ignores me and continues down the stairs normally, as if what I told her sobered her up. "Jugyeong." I repeat as I try to catch up to her. "Jugyeong." I say as we reach the bottom of the stairs, grabbing her arm.

She turns around, yanking her arm away from me. "Don't touch me." She seethes. She turns around and takes a few steps before stopping and turning back to me. "I really thought I killed her." She says, her voice breaking from new tears forming at the thought. "I really thought I drove her away again and that it was all my fault. For the past two years, I kept trying to imagine what would have happened if I had went with her to the academy that day. For the past two years, I've wanted to die. So, Seojun, you wouldn't have been responsible for one death, it would have been two. Would you be okay with that?" She asks rhetorically. "Considering you never told me any of this prior, I guess you would have." I open my mouth to speak, but all that comes out are incoherent mumbles. "You stood there, next to me the night they pulled her body out of the water, at her funeral, and even spoke on her behalf at the school and not once did you feel guilty then-"

"Of course I did! I never, ever, intended to hurt her-"

"But you did! You did and you didn't care until she was dead!"

"That's not true! You're not the only one who has been wanting to change the past, running scenarios on how you could do anything and everything to keep her alive!"

"So why didn't you throw out the cast? Huh? If you really cared about her so much, why didn't you?"

"I wanted to! I wanted to so badly, but a part of me still liked you. A part of me. Not all of me, the rest cared about her and only her." I say, determined.

"Bullshit."

"Go ahead, don't believe me, living with the fact that I broke her heart has been killing me. Do you think I stood there as we watched the news that night relieved? Do you think I was overjoyed at her funeral? I love her, Jugyeong! I love her!" I yell furiously.

It was silent again. She looks me up and down, slowly, like she was trying to detect whether or not I was lying.

"She was my best friend Han Seojun," She says, pointing a finger at me while gritting her teeth in anger, "Not your toy."

She lowers her arm back to her side and turns away from me for the last time before walking away.