Regret ➳ Bang Chan

Chapter 2

Jungha was walking through the halls, with her black backpack slung loosely over her shoulder, when she felt something come in contact with her ankle. Before she knew it, she was on the ground, and everyone in the hallway was laughing at her.

Her face immediately turned beet red. She got up and dusted her skirt off, looking up at Joohyun, who had her annoying signature smirk printed across her perfect features.

Jungha gulped and walked away quickly, before Joohyun could say anything to make her feel bad about herself.

★

The rest of the day went by pretty smoothly, which surprised Jungha, but also made her even more scared for what would be coming later on.

She had been paired with Hyunjae for their History project, as nobody had wanted to do the work with either of them, solely because everyone found them weird, or antisocial, but Jungha was used to this behavior from her classmates, so it didn't bother her as much anymore. The thing was, not everyone bullied Jungha, or called her pathetic, or laughed at her, but they didn't help her either. The ones that weren't bullying her just watched sadly, or ignored it. Maybe that was because they were scared of Joohyun. Jungha had, however met a few people who were nice when they were alone. Away from the eyes of others.

She didn't talk much to Hyunjae, he mostly did the research, and she assembled the information.

At lunch, she went to the library to study for her Literature exam, which was only a few weeks away.

Everyone was worried about the upcoming exams, as they were in their graduation year, and the stress levels were just piling on. It didn't help with the fact that bullying was a serious issue at their school. A few months before Jungha's year, a small group of pupils were expelled for severe verbal bullying apon their classmate.

Joohyun wasn't one of the people that had gotten expelled for the bullying, as she wasn't really involved in it, but she had completely changed as soon as she reached graduation year. Maybe it was the stress of work that caused her to change. Maybe it was personal issues? Maybe she had a bad influence.

When break was over, Jungha went back to class, and then studied in her free period, too.

The teacher dismissed her class when the bell rang. Everyone piled into the hallway, desperate to escape the dreaded place.

Jungha opened her locker and took out her umbrella. It had rained a few times that day, and she was certain it was going to rain again.

★

Jungha took the route across the bridge, as she needed to buy some food for dinner. She wouldn't have any time to cook, as studying was the main priority at the moment, so ramyeon was dinner for the night.

As she slowly walked across the bridge, running her fingers along the worn out, wooden edges, she felt a cold, hard hand poke her in the back.

She cringed at the pain and turned around, slowly looking up to meet Joohyun's lifeless eyes.

"Where are you going, pig?" She asked

Jungha gulped. Once. Twice.

"Just getting some ramyeon for dinner, Joohyun." She answered, scared of being hit again.

"Is that because your dead grandma can't make food for you anymore?"

Tears threatened to spill.

Joohyun's eyes moved down to what Jungha was holding in her hand.

The umbrella.

As swift as the wind, Joohyun snatched the umbrella out of the hands of Jungha.

Joohyun turned the umbrella in her hand, staring it it with a glint in her eyes.

"That's my... please, Joohyun. Don't do anything." She pleaded, desperate to have the umbrella back in the safety of her hands again.

Joohyun walked over to the other side of the bridge, staring at the water, the dumb smirk making its second appearance that day.

"I don't think you need this anymore, right?" Joohyun asked, teasing the umbrella over the edge of the bridge.

By now, Jungha was just silently pleading with her, unbelieving in the fact that Joohyun would do something so despicable.

"Oops," Joohyun blurted, shrugging as the umbrella fell down, hitting the choppy waters of the river below them.

Jungha couldn't handle it anymore. She broke down, crying her eyes out, receiving a hard kick in the stomach from Joohyun.

It felt like hours that she had sat there, silent tears escaping her eyes, and maybe it was.