It Ends with Us • Kim Mingyu

[fifteen]

"What the hell are you crying for? Oh my god." I panic on the way of finding napkins. The ones closest to me are wrapped around the silverware, so I pull them out as fast as I can, resulting in a clank of the spoons and knife. I push them away to one side and hand over the napkins to Jeonghan.

"Why're you crying?" I ask again.

Jeonghan doesn't say anything. He folds the napkins inside his pocket and excuses himself to the restroom. Some of the food we ordered comes in the mean time. When Jeonghan comes back, his eyes are swollen, his nose red. He scans the table of food, then sits down and pretends to search in his phone something important.

"I think I know the owner of this bakery," Jeonghan says. "Must be on Instagram, or was it Facebook? I can't remember. I saw an ad."

"Dude." I can't help but say. "Stop turning this around. Just tell me. Why were you crying?"

Jeonghan shuts his phone. He tosses it beside him and brings the plate of bagels close. He tears a piece and puts it in his mouth. "I had a thing. I don't know why. It was sad listening to you."

"Sad?" I ask, dumbfounded. "Which part made you sad?"

"All of it." Jeonghan says uncertainly. He swallows the bagel like a it's a boulder stuck in his throat, and then sips from the new juice he ordered a while ago (some kind of exotic grape flavour). He takes the knife and spreads cream cheese on the remaining bagel.

"You in all those years. Mom. Mingyu being a target. I can't imagine. When did so much happen? Why did it happen? What you had to go through...how did Mom do it? How did anyone do anything?" Jeonghan looks at me, as if I'm holding the answers.

I look away from the table to the streets outside. Everything seems a bit calmer there, a bit out of my reach. There is a thin string of sadness spiraling around us like a web, while outside the night covers the people ambling down the sidewalks like a soft filter. Their eyes dazzle under the mellow street light; they seem content engaging in conversations, exchanging leisurely smiles, awed of their existence in the spark of present.

I wonder -- do we seem content to them as well? Say if we did, how does it affect our individual reality? No matter how we're observed, it doesn't change what is happening to us. Nothing is changing for me, is it? I don't know the reason why Mom did what she did and how, why it turned out for Pranpriya like that, why Mingyu got caught up in everything. I can try to think of a reason but it won't be the truth of the matter, because everyone went through their own version of reality. My perception alone can't make it up for everyone, not even close to what they went through, and it makes me hesitant to talk about it. What if something crucial gets missed out? I feel like I'll be doing someone injustice.

"I don't know," I say. "I wish I did, but I don't really know. Guess it just...happened, you know. It doesn't really matter how."

"But--" Jeonghan opens his mouth, but then retreats. The struggle for words is evident is on face, his jaw contracting, brows frowned from denial, fingers gripping the edge of the table. He stays like that for a few moments, then drops his head with a sigh, shaking it.

"Do you want this bagel?" Jeonghan says. "It's too dry for me."

I nod and draw the plate close to me. I eat it dipping in the chocolate sauce that came with the waffles. Jeonghan goes for the butter croissant. Oddly enough, he uses fork and knife to eat it. I tell him I've never seen anyone do that with a croissant. Usually, people just take bites. Jeonghan shrugs and says he doesn't want get his hands dirty -- the water here is freezing ice.

"So," I say, shaking the crumb off my fingers. "I told you whatever you wanted to know. Can you tell me what happened with Dino?"

Jeonghan looks up from his plate. "What happened with Dino? What do you mean what happened?"