22. Noah
22
NOAH
I run back to my room, trying to forget what I just did. Maybe I stepped out of line by kissing her cheek, but something in her expression made me want to. I wanted to offer some kind of comfort to her. And I wanted a way to say thank you, too, for how she stood up for me again.
I thought I’d been doing a pretty good job at hiding how much everyone else’s opinions were affecting me, but I think the cracks are starting to show. I froze when Ryan spat near me, not expecting him to stoop so low as to do something like that. If Izzy hadn’t spoken up, I don’t know what else he would have done.
Since Luke said he thinks I’m being bullied, I haven’t stopped thinking about it. It doesn’t sound like something that could ever happen to me, especially not at a new school where no one even knows me. But I think it is.
After last year’s incident, I’ve been working harder on trying not to react so emotionally to stuff. But I worry I’ve gone too far, and now I don’t react enough. When Ryan did that, it felt like my brain shut down, like I was outside my body watching it happen to someone else. It scared me. I don’t want to become so detached from my feelings.
I get ready for bed by showering and changing into sleep shorts before I settle down. At the start of practice, Mr. Reid and Luke announced that there’s going to be a trip to France for a football tournament with a couple of other schools from around Europe. It’s during half-term break in February, so it doesn’t interfere with any of my classes or exams.
The only issue is that I already told my grandparents I would visit Korea during that break. My parents won’t say anything if I tell them I want to go to France. At this point, I think they’ll go along with pretty much anything I decide to do if it’s something that’ll make me happy. And even though I’m confident that Halabeoji will want me to choose France over him, I still want to talk to him about it.
I check the time to make sure he’ll actually be awake. The eight-hour time difference combined with his usually early starts means I talk to him most nights. It’s just after six in the morning in Korea so I call him, and it only takes a few seconds before he answers.
“Kkumie, how are you?” he asks, his voice brighter than mine has ever been that early in the day.
“I’m good. I just wanted to talk to you about something,” I tell him.
“One moment, I’ll go inside.”
The low hum of crickets chirping in the background disappears as I hear the sliding door close.
“Okay, what is it? Does it have to do with your new girlfriend?” he teases.
I knew Eomma would tell him at some point, and I’m surprised it’s taken so long for him to mention it.
“I was wondering when you’d find out,” I say, rolling my eyes.
“I kept waiting for you to bring it up, but you never did,” he tuts. “How could my Kkumie not tell me that he’s got a girlfriend?”
Every time he says the word, it feels like a physical knock against my chest. It’s all too easy to pretend my relationship with Izzy is real. It’s harder to lie to myself that my feelings for her are fake.
“I was going to tell you,” I say, resting an arm behind my head to lean on it. “It’s still new.”
“Is she pretty?”
“So pretty. The most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. And she’s smart, too. We study together and she always gets the answer before I do. And she has the kindest heart in the world.”
I close my eyes, drawing her face in my mind—sparkling green eyes, gorgeous pink lips, the girl of my dreams.
“She sounds amazing. I hope I can meet her one day,” he says, and my mind goes to places it shouldn’t.
It goes to taking her to Korea, back to my hometown, to my grandparent’s house. It drops her right in the middle of so many wonderful memories I have there, imagining making future ones with her. It has her sitting on the floor next to Halabeoji, both of them putting in the effort to communicate with each other even with a language barrier. It has her in my arms, looking at the flowers he grows while we sit under the stars.
A loud noise on the other side of the phone pulls me out of that dream.
“Are you okay?” I ask, hoping that nothing bad has happened.
“Just your Halmeoni moving some stuff around. How are your studies going?”
“Really well,” I tell him, updating him on my grades.
“I’ll buy you something delicious when you come home,” he promises, and I remember why I called him in the first place.
“I don’t think I can come to Korea in February,” I confess. I don’t want to disappoint him by not visiting when he’s already looking forward to it.
“Why not?” he asks, but there’s no ire in his voice—there never is. It’s just simple curiosity.
“There’s a school trip to France to play football with some other schools. I think it could be fun.”
“Of course you have to go, Kkumie. I’ll always be here waiting for you.”
I tip my head up to the ceiling, my eyes stinging for I don’t even know what reason. I wish he was in England with us. I hate that there’s so much distance between us, hate that there’s only this small window of time in the day when we can talk to each other.
“I’m going to see if I can come for a few days after. Maybe I can fly straight from France to Korea.”
As soon as I think of the idea, I pull the phone away from my ear and put it on speaker so I can start looking at flights.
“If that’s what you want to do, we can figure it out.” There’s a clattering sound in the background again, and I hear Halmeoni calling for him. “I think she broke something. I’m going to go and check on her. Let me know what you decide on. I’ll be happy even if you only come for a few days.”
“There’s a few flights that could work,” I tell him. “I’ll ask Eomma and Appa about it later.”
“That sounds like a good idea. Goodnight, Kkumie. I love you.” I hear him shuffling around, starting to make his way toward wherever my grandma is.
“Goodnight, Halabeoji. I love you, too.”
We hang up and I turn on my side, my head heavy on the pillow as I hope that sleep will come quickly.
It doesn’t.
Instead, I find myself staring through the gap in my curtains at the starry sky outside, wondering if Izzy is doing the same.
* * *
The rest of the week passes pretty normally. I show up at Izzy’s room every day with breakfast, we walk together to homeroom, and we carry on as normal. She doesn’t mention the kiss, so I don’t either.
That doesn’t mean I haven’t thought about it. A lot. Way more than I want to admit.
“Are you going home for half term?” Izzy asks me as we walk back to her room. We’ve spent most of the evening studying together in the library to get as much done before the break.
“I’m not sure yet,” I tell her, rubbing the back of my neck.
“Why not?”
I haven’t told Izzy about my parents. Even though she told me about hers, I didn’t want to mention it then and take away from what she was telling me. And there hasn’t really been any opportunities for it come up naturally in conversation since then.
Even though I’ve tried to be better at talking to them and keeping in contact, I haven’t. I mainly speak to them through Mina, getting updates from her as she passes on news to them. The guilt I feel whenever I speak to them myself is so overpowering that I’ve been avoiding it as much as possible.
When I do work up the courage, our conversations are always surface level. They both check in to make sure I’m eating enough and keeping up with schoolwork, but it never goes past that. Since Mina told them, they haven’t asked anything else about Izzy. I think they’re waiting for me to mention her first, but I want to keep them separate in my mind.
I definitely can’t tell them about Ryan or the fact that most people in my year seem to have figured out what happened at my old school. My parents are both still dealing with their separation, and it doesn’t seem fair for me to burden them with my problems— again .
I glance down at Izzy as she waits for my answer, wondering if it’s okay to tell her. Her parents are still together, but she must have dealt with a similar feeling when she left them. Even if it wasn’t the same for her, I know I can trust Izzy.
“My parents decided to separate over the summer. I feel like if I go home to one of them, it’s like I’m betraying the other. So I think it might be easier to stay here over the break.”
I anticipate Izzy asking why they separated, or how long it’s been going on for, or how I feel about all of it. Instead, she offers a solution.
“You could always spend a few days with each of them. Three days with your mum, three with your dad. And then come back early before school starts to get settled again.”
Her solution is simple enough, but then the guilt comes with which one I’d pick first. Would they see it as me taking sides by wanting to spend time with the other before them? During the summer, it wasn’t much of an issue. Before I ran away to Korea, they decided how our time would be split. But I haven’t asked either of them if that’s how they still want to do it.
“I’ll think about it,” I tell her. “What about you?”
We reach her room and I open the door for her, entering first to hold it open. I put her bag on her desk, pulling out the chair so she can sit comfortably. Izzy takes her seat, and I grab her crutches to lean them against the wall. Then, I sit on the edge of her desk, like I’ve done every day this week.
We fell into this routine quickly, and it’s become my favourite part of the day. I watch as Izzy takes her hair out of the braid she’s had it in all day, her fingers running through the golden strands in a way I want to replicate.
“I’m going home. My brother’s proposing to his girlfriend next week, and I’m helping him out with it.” She’s got a huge smile on her face, clearly excited to talk about it.
“Oh, really?” I ask. I’ll listen to her talk about it all day if it keeps her smiling like that.
“He’s got it all planned out. I have to take her to the cinema and he’s going to be waiting there with a movie he’s made for her.” The glee in her voice is adorable.
“He makes movies? That’s pretty cool.” I cross one ankle over the other, getting more comfortable on the desk.
“Isaac studied animation at university. He made a movie when they were seventeen of their whole relationship until then, so he’s added to it for this.”
What a lucky guy , I think. To have had enough of a relationship with the girl he was with at seventeen to make a movie of it. To have that same girl still in his life years later.
“That’s really sweet,” I say, as I try not to insert myself in that same position. I’m getting way ahead of myself for thinking of Izzy like that—thinking of a future with her.
“They’re sickeningly in love, it’s gross.” She rolls her eyes as she says it, but I can tell she doesn’t really mean it by the way her lips quirk up at the ends.
“When did they meet?” I like hearing about her family. I’m curious to know as much as I can about her.
“They both went to Coates, too. Remember I said they’ve got that written in the stars thing going on?” she asks.
I nod, thinking back to that walk on the field where this whole thing started and my life changed.
“They met on the first day of school,” she continues. “They were in the same class, found out they had the same birthday, and the rest is history.”
Izzy sighs, her mood shifting in an instant. She drops her head, and I do the same, watching the way she plays with her hands folded in her lap. I reach out tentatively, nudging her chin up gently so I can see her face. She tips her head to the side slightly, staring down at the ground now instead, but she doesn’t move my hand off her face.
“What’s wrong?” I whisper. She was just so happy. I want to know what made her sad.
“Sometimes, I think...” She sighs again, battling with whatever words she wants to say.
I move my hand so I’m cupping her cheek and run my thumb across it. I don’t rush her for an answer. I just wait for her to get out of her head and come back to me.
“I don’t think I was ever meant to fall in love like my brother did. He met his person when he was eleven. Isn’t that crazy?”
She finally looks at me, and there’s a shine in her eyes that I try my best to ignore.
“You’re only seventeen. There’s so much time left,” I tell her as she leans into my palm for a second.
I want her to take comfort in me, to lean on me. But when our eyes meet, she gently pulls my hand away from her, placing it on the desk between us instead.
“I just don’t think it’s meant for me,” she confesses.
Her voice falters on the last word, and she looks back down at her lap. I catch the quiver of her chin as she tucks her bottom lip between her teeth.
For the first time, I’m glad she’s not looking at me, because it makes my next words easier.
“I do,” I tell her, my voice quiet as I try to fight back my own feelings. “I believe one day you’re going to meet a guy who sweeps you off your feet, gives you everything you deserve, and more.”
And the fact that it won’t be me, kills me.
Izzy doesn’t say anything. I watch as she joins her hands together, soothing herself the way I should be doing, the way I wish I could. But that’s not my place.
“I should get back to my room.”
I’m worried that if I stay any longer, I’ll say words I can’t take back.
“I’ll text you,” she says quietly, but she doesn’t look up at me.
I stand up, putting some distance between us to stop me from doing something stupid like touching her face again. I grab my bag and leave her room, not daring to glance back at her as another piece of my heart shatters.