Seven

Hope In The Garden

Mum was a teacher, she taught me and a host full of other kids, Hoseok was one of them. We were close, he was one of my Mum's favorite students, but well we drifted apart as we got older. So when he came to the funeral it was a really great surprise, none of my friends could really understand what I was going through but Hoseok was kind, gentle and sympathetic. After the funeral at the wake he sat besides me in the garden, on a bench and just listened. He didn't make useless cliched remarks, he just listened and gave me tissues for my tears

He made me give him my telephone number after the funeral and sent me messages every day for that first month. He was a god send!

Dad was totally helpless after mum's death, I gave up my flat and moved back in with him, into the house where I'd grown up. I was still working at the florists though, but I had to get Dad up and make him his breakfast every morning before I left for work, when I got home every evening he'd be more or less where I'd left him, sitting in a darkened living room, crying sometimes, often nursing a whisky. I should have made sure he ate better then, mum would have, but I was just bringing home take out, too tired to cook. I was still grieving too, we were a pair of wet weekends, sad and pathetic.

Hoseok's messages were the only good thing that I had in my life, he'd leave me good morning messages. We'd message each other most of the day and at the weekends he'd call me. I didn't call him, he's an idol, I had no idea what his schedule looked like and I didn't dare to call at an inappropriate moment. He went on tour with the group and he made sure I got a postcard from every place they had a gig, he made me smile, he was the only light I had in my life.

That's when Dad had what they call a Mini Stroke, he was rushed into hospital and stayed there for a few days. The doctors called it a warning, said that he needed to change his lifestyle. I cried the night Hoseok called me, the night Dad had been admitted to hospital. I hadn't meant to splutter like a little kid over the phone, but when I heard his voice calling me from the dorm where he lived with the other guys I just burst into tears. I could hear some of the guys asking if everything was okay in the background which sort of made it worse. How could anyone care so much about someone he'd not seen in years and how could 6 other guys who didn't even know me care about me?

He was his wonderful self, he listened as I cried out all my stress, talking to me softly and gently. He sent flowers the next day. I cried then too, when I got home to find the flowers on the doorstep.

Dad wasn't in hospital very long, and then he was put on a fairly strict health regime when he got home. He was still struggling with losing mum, so was I but I had to look after him. I never missed a day of work either, if I'm honest it was good to be away from his grief, although my co-workers looked at me like a broken toy. In the end I told dad to talk to the doctor about how bad he was feeling and like the crumpled old paper bag of a man that he was, he did.

The doctor prescribed him an antidepressant and told him to get out of the house and volunteer. I suppose the idea was to get him to understand he wasn't alone in feeling bad, and that's how he ended up tending the gardens at the old folks home. It helped too, he got up without being asked, some mornings he was up before I was and I'd find him dressed and making coffee as I readied myself for work.

It sounds like he didn't work at all but he'd been given compassionate leave that year which had inevitably turned into two years, he's a professor at the college, it's how they met, in Teaching college before I was born. Anyway, so he was gardening for the elderly and it really did take him out of himself, I could almost envision him going back to taking classes again.

Not for long though, he had a massive coronary episode, that's what the doctors called it, a heart attack, a bad one. I've never been more scared in my entire life, he was rushed into the hospital and spent weeks in intensive care. I was still dragging myself to work after they first admitted him, making funeral wreaths, everyday thinking I'd have to make one for Dad just like I had had to for mum. My boss would regularly tell me to go home, or go be with my Dad. Except I just couldn't, I couldn't bear being in the house alone and every evening going to sit with him, with wires and tubes coming out of him was like being trapped in a nightmare. He'd had emergency open heart surgery to save his life, and the bandages were like a sickening reminder of how close I had been to losing him. Every moment in that room, wrapped up in plastic gowns and caps, because he was so sick anything might have killed him, it was like some kind of perverse torture.

I was at work one day, during that awful time, when Hoseok turned up and god I thought I was going to collapse. The tears started running down my face before I even knew they were there. He came up to me and pulled me into a hug. It was the safest place right then, I hadn't felt that safe since I'd been a kid and my dad or mum had hugged me.
"I couldn't leave you here, going through this on your own," he whispered gently into my ear.
"Maybe you should take the day off," I heard my boss say over my sobs. I felt Hoseok nod and he took my coat and bag from her and led me out of the shop.
I slowly stopped crying, but by then we were in the car with his driver and heading towards the house. When we'd arrived he took my keys off me and opened the front door, the driver quietly left us alone, I kind of felt sorry for him but I was grateful as well. Hoseok worked in my kitchen as if he'd never left and made us lunch.
"I should have come earlier," he said over lunch.
"I didn't expect you to come at all, I know how busy you must be!" I replied.
"How could I let you go through this by yourself?!" He said looking at me intensely, concern written all over his face.

I managed to eat without crying, and he held my hand all the way through lunch. After lunch we went out to the garden, holding hands, it was the flowers that got me. Mum's rose bush and the narcissi that Dad had planted after the funeral. I suddenly thought what if that's all I have left of them, what if those narcissi are the last thing he plants in the garden and I burst into tears.

Hoseok embraced me then too, and as I looked into his face I realized how much I was in love with him. It was like the tears had left me seeing things clearly. I blinked a few times, blinking away the tears, he looked at me with such care and love in his eyes, I pulled him tightly into me and kissed him. My lips wet with tears, my kiss filled with hope. I felt him kiss me back, but then he pulled out of my kiss, and looked at me. He was so shocked, I thought for a horrible moment that he didn't feel the same way, then that big beautiful smile spread across his face and he pulled me into another kiss.

It was filled with hope and as hot as fire. There were promises in our kiss, and I believed every single one of them. I couldn't let him go and it felt like he didn't want to either. In the end we pulled away just to catch our breathes and our foreheads touching, I stood in his embrace. We eventually went back into the house, when we finally realized we were out in the garden, because until that second the place we were wasn't important.

We stayed together all day, and later we went to see Dad. He'd been moved out of ICU and was well enough to sit up. He looked relieved when Hoseok came into the room, as if he felt happy to see someone looking after me. Hoseok asked me to get a coffee and when I came back, well I have no idea what he said to my Dad but I'm not quite sure if I've ever seen my Dad smile that wide before.