Bad Timing

Part 2

A dog once fell in love with a dandelion. The dog knew that the dandelion may leave with the wind one day but the dog still chose to stay.

Did the dog have it all? Or did it actually have nothing?

In your bedroom, you looked at the toy charm that you had gotten for him, which was clutched in your hand. It was a funny looking alien with a huge heart as its head. You had planned to see how Taehyung reacted to your "confession" and the escape plan was to say that this is a toy for Yeontan.

Yet another premeditated disguise. You couldn't own up, even to yourself, that you liked him. You constantly tried to disguise it and always reminded yourself that he was the popular guy and that there was no reason he would think of you specially. On hindsight, you realised that subconsciously you had always harboured some hopes.

In reality though, everything was a concoction of your mind. You hardly hung out with Taehyung or his friends when in school. That is why you had no idea how he generally acted towards his friends, which most likely consequentially led to your misinterpretations of his actions. Was it his fault that you thought that way? It definitely wasn't.

Was it your fault then? Not that much either. During the past few months, you probably went through the emotional cycle of a rescue dog that had just been adopted. At the beginning you did not know what to do with the new-found attention given to you, were you supposed to like it? Then you started growing accustomed to it and eventually you started to develop feelings of your own.

At that thought, you picked up the queer looking alien toy, and stuffed it into your drawer. "Out of sight, out of mind", you thought as you shifted to lie down on your bed, having been exhausted since the moment you left that theatre.

But you couldn't calm your mind down. If the problem was all the while in your head, then you are the only one who can solve this problem. In order to do that, the first step was for you to face it. You sat up and looked at yourself in the mirror.

Yes, you like him, more than just a friend but you were never one to pine over the popular kids in school. To the contrary, you had intentionally tried to keep a distance from them because you never felt like being a part of their world would do you any good. So why Taehyung?

—

The sky was filled with storm clouds on the day when Lula was brought to the shelter. She was a shivering little westie, her fur was a shade of dark grey and she had a frail frame, alluding to the difficult times that preceded this moment. Despite all this, she remained cautiously friendly when you tried to clean her up. She reminded you so much of Snowy.

While you tried to bathe Lula, you saw how her skin was inflamed from the condition she contracted in her neglected state. Little time was lost before you alerted Jinhee, the vet on site. You heard her little whines as Jinhee tried to ascertain her condition which made you felt as if something was swirling around in your chest; there was despair, there was regret and suddenly you found yourself shaking in the same way Lula was.

The conspiring universe must have sensed your distress during that moment because as they would have it, thunder struck and the rain came pouring down. Lula was visibly afraid of the roaring thunders. Unfortunately, Jinhee had just left a moment ago to look for some medication and there you were, by yourself, in the vet's room with a traumatised dog. In any other situation, you would have confidently tried to pacify Lula but not today. You were struggling to keep yourself afloat, having been sucked back into the memories you wished you did not recall.

As if he heard your internal call for help or perhaps, he heard the weak yelps of desperation from Lula, Taehyung burst through the doors of the room. Strangely, Taehyung had a knack for calming the puppers who were afraid of thunder. He sat down next to Lula and started singing ever so softly while petting and stroking her back. As you listened to his low soothing voice, you felt your breathing slow down too, the tears which had collected in your eyes flowed out but your heart was slowly weaning off the feeling of fear and pain it was experiencing a moment ago. You cautiously looked up to meet Taehyung's eyes, and he looked back at you with concern.

"Are you alright? Did something happen just now?", Taehyung asked you in a gentle unobtrusive manner when you two were leaving the shelter. Your eyes shifted from him to the road uncertainly and you stammered, "I ... I was ... it's just that some time ago ... she reminded me of...", you started to sound increasingly distressed, evident from your shaking voice, which was quite a contrast from your usual demeanour.

"Y/N, Y/N, Y/N", he called your name a few times in his still assuringly soft tone until you stopped stammering and looked up at him. "You don't have to talk about it now if you don't want to. I thought you would want to talk about it but it's fine. What's more important to me... I mean, I just wanted to make sure you are feeling OK now", Taehyung said as he stopped in front of you and placed his right hand gently on your shoulder.

—

There was not one thing that you could specify but you liked him for his warm personality, for the comforting presence you felt when you were hanging out with him and for how he was sincerely trying to understand your feelings but never forcing you to face them when you were not prepared to. He was like a patient fosterer, ready to be your new best friend but at the same time being totally understanding that there are emotional vacuums which you may not want to touch even if he felt like he could help you with it.

At last, however, it was never meant to be more than that. It was ablur now but you tried to recall what made you think that Taehyung may have some hint of feelings for you. In the end, it almost certainly was just all of your own feelings being superimposed over his actions which made you think that way. Just like how you thought the movie today was some kind of a "date", when he actually just intended it to be a friendly meet up.

Instantly, you felt like you wanted to outright burst into tears but you couldn't because what was there even for you to cry over? Self-pity in a self-made situation was the last thing that you should indulge in. That said, when emotions and logic meet, emotions often prevail.

Your eyes were already tearing up and you felt the mildly burning trail of your tears slowly trickling down your cheeks. You felt embarrassed, shameless and just genuinely annoyed at yourself.

As logic slowly crept back into your mind, you scoffed a little at yourself. How long more were you going to act this way? There really wasn't anything that happened that deserves this much despair over. In the end, it was all just nothing. Right?

—

A dog once fell in love with a dandelion. The dog knew that the dandelion may leave with the wind one day but the dog still chose to stay. "It doesn't matter what you see me as, a lover, a friend or just someone passing by in your life. I will not disturb you and I will not leave you, but if there comes a day and the wind carries you away, if that is what you wish for then I will watch you fly away."

The types of relationships in this world are aplenty.

You naively thought it had to be all or nothing. Now, you start to see that there were always other options, somewhere in between. Taehyung saw you as a friend. And you, began to think that you can do that for him too. At least for now, it will be something.