TaengSic (COMPILATION)

Those Three Words (OS)

I met you

When I first saw you walking through the gate, you reminded me of the golden sun peeking through the clouds after an afternoon shower. The strands of your light brown hair fluttered in the breeze as you pulled the collars of your jacket closer. You tucked your hair behind your ears as your curious eyes darted around the compound.

A lady, I presumed was your mother, accompanied you to the administration office. I didn't manage to hang around to wait for you because the school bell rang and I had to go to my classroom. At the start of the class, Mr. Kim announced that there would be a new student joining us from today. He turned his head towards the door and beckoned for the person to enter.

I had a hunch it was you and I was glad my intuition was right. You stood in front of the classroom, looking a little nervous as you gave your short introduction. Your sweet voice filled the classroom as everyone listened to you attentively before giving a round of applause to welcome you to the school.

Mr. Kim assigned you to a seat at the back of the class since you were tall. I turned my head around as I followed the trail of wisteria as you walked past me. Yuri, our class president greeted you as you took a seat beside her. You gave a quick nod to her and took out your books from your bag as you settled down in your seat.

We had lunch together in a group on several occasions. Most of the time, you would rather listen then participate in the conversations.

I like you

Yuri did a great job of being your assigned buddy at school. She showed you around the school compound, familiarized you with the school system and culture and even studied together with you. To be honest, I was a little jealous of Yuri, being able to hang out with such a pretty girl all the time.

I must admit that I was captivated by your beauty. Your beautiful eyes, your smooth and silky long light brown hair that cascaded down your back and your fair complexion. You made my heart flutter each time I saw you do a hair flip or when you smile. Your smile was as bright as the sun, filling my day with joy. When I first heard you sing during music lessons, your powerful vocals brought out the emotions of the love song and tugged at my heartstrings. I was moved to tears when you sang the last word.

The first time I had a private moment with you was on a rainy day. It was a cliché moment but I guessed that was how most teenage love stories started. I approached you and offered to share my umbrella with you. The moment you said yes, I was absolutely ecstatic! I remembered trying to contain my squeals inwardly as I opened my purple umbrella. Somehow my umbrella refused to open and I was trying my best to see where it got stuck. My nerves must have gotten to me. You took the umbrella from me, your fingers brushing against mine and sending tingles throughout my body. With a slight tug, you managed to pop the umbrella open before holding it up above our heads. That was the start of the countless conversations we shared.

It started off with schoolwork before we got more comfortable with each other and started sharing tidbits of our personal life with each other. Your parents decided to send you to study high school in Seoul so that you would keep in touch with your Korean heritage. I was glad they did else I wouldn't have met you.

As time went on, we could talk about almost anything under the sun, except about love. I liked you a lot but I was afraid of destroying the beautiful friendship we had built up. I could only push my feelings to the bottom of my heart and kept it there till the time was right.

Once, while we were lying on our backs under the shade of an oak tree at a park, I was so tempted to confess my feelings for you. It was the perfect setting; birds were chirping, a light breeze was blowing, us lying on our backs on the picnic mats after we ate homemade sandwiches and drinking sparkling grape juice.