Chapter 9
“Say that again?” I said incredulously, watching Becka rub moisturiser into her neck. She rolled her eyes before answering.
“It seemed logical. Ben was planning on moving back to the city, but his landlady told him last minute that she needed the apartment back so her daughter could isolate there. Apparently, she works in a hospital. What was I supposed to say?”
“I get that,” I said, trying to keep my tone measured, “but couldn’t he find somewhere else to stay?”
Becka put the little pot of cream down with more force than was necessary.
“Everyone is hiking their rental prices up. It’s nuts! The moment the word ‘lockdown’ hit the media, landlords suddenly decided they need an extra five hundred bucks a month? Even all the short-term rentals are mysteriously twice the cost. It’s bullshit!”
“So, Ben lives with you now?”
“You’re making it sound like we’re back together again,” she said defensively.
“Are you?” I asked, evenly.
Becka was silent for a few moments, chewing her lip.
“No,” she said, but she drew the word out like a question. “I mean, it was on the table. He was supposed to be ‘wooing’ me,” she chuckled.
“’Wooing’ you?”
“Don’t laugh,” she chided me, even though she, herself, laughed. “I know how it sounds. But we were…. We were going to see how it went, with him being back in the city.” She sighed. “But then this all happened.”
It had only been a couple of days since ‘lockdown’ had become reality, but already we lived in a very different world.
The media was flooded with pictures of empty streets that probably hadn’t been empty for decades. Clear blue skies, free of air plane trails. Unconcerned urban wildlife cheerfully strolling up empty streets.
The world had evacuated.
“Where is he, then?” I asked, scanning the screen behind her, looking for evidence of the man who would ‘woo’ my best friend.
“In bed, probably.”
“Yours?” I suppressed a grin.
“For fucks sake, Ky,” she sighed. “No. In your old bed.”
“First of all, ew, second… no, actually, my first point stands.”
“I’m hanging up.” Becka reached for the phone.
“No! Stop, stop, I’m sorry,” I laughed. “Look, with the amount of shit you gave me over ‘the idol’, I think I’m entitled to a few, light jabs about ‘the ex’.”
“Yeah yeah, yuk it up, chuckles,” Becka grouched.
The state of the world had us all in a heightened state of, well, everything. This slice of normalcy with Becka was exactly what I needed.
“Speaking of the idol, how is that going?”
“Hey, we’re not done with you, yet.” I chided.
“Oh yes we are,” she scoffed. “So again, how is all of that going?”
The question was in theory a light one, but in practice it was as weighted as a lead balloon.
“In terms of what?” I asked, trying not to sound as defensive as I felt.
Becka shrugged. “I just mean… y’know. The long distance of it all.”
“I mean, it sucks,” I shrugged, and paused while I tried to think of my answer.
There was no need to put a brave face on with Becka.
She’d been there in the beginning of our relationship, she’d seen how I had spiralled, and how I had eventually made peace with it.
And she had first-hand knowledge of how a long-distance relationship worked.
“I just kind of feel… like we’re in limbo,” I said. “We talk every day and we send so many messages it could be a book.”
“But?” She prompted.
“No buts,” I said.
“It felt like a but,” Becka said matter-of-factly.
“Yeah well,” I sighed, “you look like one.”
“Smooth.”
“It wasn’t my best work,” I admitted. “There is no ‘but’. It just feels like we’re holding out for something.
We just don’t know what that is yet. I mean, I just left, Becka.
It was my choice. I left.” My voice caught on that final word.
Like the threads of a sweater caught on a splinter. Unravelling.
“You didn’t leave him, babes.” Becka’s voice was soft, her eyes crinkling in concern.
“Didn’t I? I made this choice for myself. Not for him, not for us, and now we both have to live with it.”
“What was the alternative?” There’s no judgement to Becka’s tone. Nothing but mild curiosity, as though she knew the answer, she just wanted to see what conclusion I’d come to.
“That’s why I feel so frustrated,” I admitted.
“There was no door-number-three. It was stay or leave. I just feel…” I huffed out a frustrated breath.
“I feel like I had no choice, and that we’ve all just been forced into this timeline.
Y’know? The timeline where mum has c-cancer” I swallowed thickly.
“And where I had to leave Joon, and let’s not forget the global, fucking pandemic! ”
My fingernails dug into my palms with such force that I had to make a conscious effort to unclench my fists.
Becka hummed in agreement.
“I hear ya, babes, I get it.” She shrugged.
“I can only imagine how frustrated you feel right now. I just think you need to give yourself a bit of grace. Seriously, Ky. What choice did you have? The walls were closing in. Even without the lockdown, your mom would still be sick. She hasn’t got the flu, she hasn’t broken her hip.
She has cancer. That’s not the kind of shit you deal with from thousands of miles away.
When life gets that real, you go home, which you did. It’s how it’s supposed to be.”
I admired how black and white this situation was to Becka.
“And what about my relationship?” I quirked my lips, like I was asking in jest, but really, if I was honest with myself, I just wanted someone to tell me the answer, instead of tearing myself part to reach one
I expected Becka to deliver some sass; some wry, witty answer that was as much a non-answer as it was real wisdom, so when she sighed and frowned, her sudden melancholy surprised me.
“I think you know already the answer. If it’s meant to be, it’ll wait.”
I swallowed and nodded. Because yes, that was the conclusion I’d been heading towards, for some time.
The Following week.
“Mum,” I called, “you’ve got a delivery!”
I picked up the brown parcel, still damp from where I’d liberally sprayed it with lilac-scented disinfectant.
Thankfully, Royal Mail were still operating despite lockdown, but it had taken a little while to get use to the contactless style of delivery.
The local posties were used to swapping pleasantries on doorstops with the people they’d delivered to for years.
Now, they dropped parcels in designated safe spots and waved from the end of the driveway.
Because Mum was going to start chemo soon, we’d taken to spraying everything with disinfectant.
“What is it?” She called from the kitchen.
“How should I know?”
I walked through the hallway to the kitchen.
“I’ve not got x-ray eyes.” I put the parcel down on the kitchen island where Mum sat, finishing up her breakfast.
She wiped her hands on a tea towel and pulled the sealed box towards her, frowning down at the label, before shrugging.
“Wouldn’t be the first time you’ve forgotten what you’ve ordered, eh love?” Dad chimed in from across the room.
Mum didn’t dignify that with a response as she reached for a pair of scissors.
“Here, let me do that, Mum.” I reached over her and grabbed the scissors, pulling the box towards me.
“I am capable of doing somethings, Kaiya Thompson,” she grumbled.
Maybe she was, she was less stiff every day, but I still saw the way she winced when her arms extended.
I cut through the tape on the box and was just pulling the cardboard flaps aside when Mum slid the box back across the counter.
“Ah, ah, ah,” she scolded. “Don’t be nosy.”
I raised my hands in the air, and watched as she reached into the box. The expression on her face morphed from interest to confusion as she rummaged through the contents. She pulled out a metal container with Hangul written on it. Mum frowned.
“What’s this?” She held it out to me, as though my months in Korea made me the resident expert. But before I could take it from her, she pulled it back.
“Oh, there’s a card.”
She put the metal container down on the counter, and pulled a white card from the box. Turning it over, I could see the handwriting on one side.
“Mrs Thompson,” Mum began. “Someone once told me this helps with nausea. I hope you don’t need it, but if you do, I hope it helps.” Mum finished reading, and put the card down, turning to me with a strange, soft sort of expression.
“Who’s it from?” I asked, even though I knew.
Mum slid the card over to me, where I could clearly see his name etched at the bottom of the card. Baek Jihoon.
My heart seemed to swell in my chest.
“He’s a good’un, your young man.” Dad said, ruffling my hair as he came over to peer into the box.
Hours later, I snuggled up in bed, and held my phone tightly. I stared, wishing I was looking into his eyes as he lay next to me, instead of through a screen.
“You didn’t need to do that,” I said quietly, conscious of the late hour and my parents sleeping.
“Was it too much?” he asked, and from the way he frowned, I could tell he was genuinely worried.
“No! She loved it!”
In addition to the container of ginseng tea, Jihoon had included a thick pair of merino wool socks and some luxury hand lotion.
“The website I read said chemotherapy patients often get cold,” Jihoon continued, visibly fretting, “but I’m worried that it’s weird that I got your eomma socks.”
I held a hand over my mouth, trying to stifle my giggle.
“It was perfect, Joon. You’re perfect,” I said softly, enjoying the way his whole face relaxed as he grinned that lopsided smile.
“I’m glad you think so, even if it’s not true.”
“It is true,” I insisted, glad to be playful with him, instead of facing the sadness that had seemed to hover over much of our interactions these days.
“Perhaps, I am just perfect for you,” he said.
And I couldn’t think of a single argument to that.