February ; 2016
HyunSeok knows he shouldn't have and he knows JungMi told him not to, but he found himself waiting for her to return.
He would stand behind the counter for an extended period of time just staring out the window display of the bookstore. Or waiting to hear the bell ring to signal the arrival of another person.
He started to spend his time in a constant state of denial, convincing himself that she'll walk through that door any moment now.
For hours… Days… Weeks…
Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
It wasn't until a month later, a month since he's last seen her, that HyunSeok realized that this is exactly what JungMi was saving him from; she didn't want him to wait around for her like she did for NamJoon.
That's what false hope does to a person, no matter how reasonable that person may be.
To lose all sense of reasoning and rationality is to fall victim to the distorted reality one has created for themselves in the future.
He starts to have selective hearing; he only hears what he wants to hear. He blocks out anything that doesn't feed his fantasy.
For a whole month, it's just been HyunSeok alone with his thoughts.
HyunSeok starts to imagine the what ifs instead of focusing on what is. All of this time that has passed has definitely given him time to think over the concept of what it is that keeps him waiting; what is hope and why does it make him do unreasonable things:
Hope, in itself, is a future concept. It's like a projection that cannot be labeled as true or false; one can only wait for the outcome.
The idea of false hope, however, is a concept of the past and of things that have already transpired. It arises when a hope previously held in the past has been proven false already, but that hope still remains even after the fact.
When looking at his own predicament and comparing and contrasting it to the months of waiting that JungMi went through, he starts to understand how his somewhat, barely existent relationship with JungMi differs from that of the boy with an IQ of 148.
The realm of possibilities overlaps the realm of imagination to create the intersection which is the space of hope. Their outlook and their grasp of reality heavily affect their expectations.
HyunSeok understands that there is a significant difference between false hope and lost hope:
What HyunSeok has for JungMi is false hope.
What JungMi has for NamJoon is lost hope.
HyunSeok has a hopeful outlook on a distorted reality. Perhaps his chances with JungMi were a trick of the mind; a figment of his imagination. Even if he was her dream guy with all the winning qualities, HyunSeok knows she wouldn't choose him over NamJoon. In fact, HyunSeok never stood a chance…
JungMi had a helpless outlook as she started to come to terms with the accurate reality.
She had surrendered her commitment; she had lost hope. She had waited out the long lost battle, waiting for results to occur on their own accord. But when the timeline for events of fate to occur outlast one's capacity of patience, hope is lost.
“Is there an expiration date to how long a person can miss another person?”
Even with HyunSeok right in front of her, she was always looking out the window looking for something else, or someone else.
Even when she's given up, she's still waiting. Even when it's hopeless, she's still waiting.
Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
No matter how long HyunSeok waits, she doesn't return.
JungMi doesn't visit the bookstore again. And HyunSeok decides soon enough to stop expecting her to come.
He doesn't want to wait for her like she's waiting for NamJoon.
JungMi has yet to figure out where to go from here, but HyunSeok already knows how it ends for him: he has no place in her story. He doesn't come into the picture at all. So he will have to accept that overtime.
But if he can comprehend these intricate concepts within a month by himself, he can only imagine what JungMi was thinking about during all those months drowning in her own thoughts.
If reasoning hadn't reemerged when it did, HyunSeok is sure he would have slipped into his own imagination; the line between reality and fantasy would have blurred at some point.
For JungMi, perhaps even more so…
HyunSeok wishes he never flipped through her notebook; he wishes he never read that poem or her journal entries.
He learned more about her, but at what cost?
The boy with an IQ of 148…
The boy with an IQ of 148…
The boy with an IQ of 148…
All he learned from it was that JungMi had already given her heart to another, and perhaps distance and time cannot change that.
"There could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison…"
A person can learn a lot about another person based on the books they buy. But a person can never truly know another person's story just by looking at the cover. And even then, a person cannot just suddenly write themselves into the story of another.
JungMi has written her heart out, and NamJoon is written all over it.
He should have known better…
He should have known the moment he read that poem from October 2014.
HyunSeok is a side character in JungMi's story that can never be more than that.
The boy with an IQ of 148 is the protagonist who has crossed the threshold into the unknown world and JungMi is waiting for him to finish the hero's journey. She is waiting for the hero to return.
HyunSeok pulls his thoughts away from JungMi for a moment as he wonders, “Where is the boy with an IQ of 148 now?”
YOU ARE READING
IQ148 // namjoon ✔️
FanfictionShe was a wildfire of emotion that hid in the corner between the bookshelves. And NamJoon was curious as to why she concealed her flames. SYNOPSIS; [A highly intelligent man meets a struggling college student and have philosophical conversations to...
