Within These Shadows || Park Chanyeol/Do Kyungsoo || Book 1

13

Jay fiddled with her pen, sitting at her table; attention far from the books open before her. She pressed the switch of the table lamp over and over, making a continuous clicking noise.

"Jay, stop doing that. It's disturbing." Mae said, without turning from her table.

Jay stopped pressing the switch; she nervously gulped before turning around to face Mae.

"Mae? Do you have a second?"

The latter turned around to face her friend, "Yeah. Why?"

"I uh...had something to say."

"What is it?"

Jay felt nervous; she knew Mae would be happy to hear the news that she was about to give to her. Yet, she felt nervous; she wasn't sure why, though. Maybe because starting classes at the dance academy meant she was willing to accept the tragic events of her life. And even though she told herself over and over that she wanted to, was she really ready to? Because if she did accept, what then? What came after?

"Mae, in the last session with Dr Debra, I had talked to her about dancing. And I...have enrolled for dance classes in an academy." Jay kept her eyes fixed on the ground. "It's been so long since I last danced, that I've lost the fitness and physique needed to start again. I can't join the club in this state, so I thought I should take some lessons before joining. My classes start from November."

After a few minutes of silence, Jay raised her head to see the look on Mae's face: streams of tears were running down her cheeks but she was smiling at the same time. Mae jumped out of her chair, crossed the small distance between themselves and hugged Jay with all the energy she could muster up, almost knocking both of them off the chair.

"Yah! Where do you get so much energy from?" Jay cried out.

"I am so happy...I can't even express it in words! Thank you, Jay. Thank you so much! For trying, for taking a step. Thank you."

Mae's words made Jay's eyes brim with tears. She said nothing, but only held Mae tight, close to her. Holding her best friend close to her, Jay wondered why was she even nervous about telling Mae that she had joined dance classes. Because, only she could be the happiest person alive besides her mother, knowing that Jay was on the road to recovery. She was the one who was with her, through it all; the ups, the downs, the constants, the voids, the silver linings...all of it.

*

"It's really weird, you know. I mean, he's got common courses with me but I haven't even seen him once after that day!" Jay said, taking her seat at their usual table in the cafeteria.

"You're still stuck up on that guy?" Mae asked, clearly amused.

"It's like he's a ghost or something." Jay's frustration was clear in the way she broke her wooden chopsticks apart.

"Pray real hard, and you might just find your prince," Mae chuckled.

"Haha, you're getting so funny these days, Mae, that I find it hard to keep a straight face!" Sarcasm dripped from Jay's words, causing Mae to stick out her tongue at her.

"May I join?" A smiling Chanyeol stood before them, food tray in hand.

"Do you even need to ask that anymore?" Jay chuckled. "Just sit down!"

"Hehe, thanks!" Chanyeol laughed lightly.

"Unnie, can I join too?" A hyper Jung Yang Mi ran over to their table, balancing the food on her tray carefully, so as to not drop them.

"Yah! Do you really not have friends or what? Always hanging out with your sunbaes!" Jay pointed at her with her chopsticks.

"Jay-ya, can you go to the hospital with me after class?" Mae smiled sweetly at her friend.