A Watercolor Life

“This is… good.” He was eating faster than a starved street dog.

“Never would’ve guessed.”

He looked up from his plate. “Hmm?” He covered his mouth with his napkin and wiped away the red sauce from his dripping taco. Lary smiled.

“Oh, nothing.” She looked down at her plate and expertly took a bite of her taco, knowing how and where to bite so that none of the stuffing would come out. Unlike Seungho, who was positively dripping all of it on the plate and table cloth. She pulled her lips into a small smile. Amateur.

“So, Lindura,” she wiped her lips, “is there something else you like besides playing the piano and magic tricks?” She was nervous. This suddenly felt more like a date than anything else. But his smile was infectious, and she felt her smile come to life as well.

He seemed to get himself together before shrugging and nervously laughing. “I like to sing.”

“Really? Well, me too. In the shower.” Another bite.

“I also like dancing.”

“And…?”

“And?” He took another bite.

“What else? Come on, there has to be something nobody knows.”

“I love…” he seemed to hesitate, laughing and scratching his neck, a bit too nervous for his upcoming confession. “I love sleeping.”

She had to laugh at that. Who would’ve thought the leader of MBLAQ would be a sleepy head. In honesty, she wasn’t that shocked, but she felt like laughing. “How much?”

"How much what?" He still had a hard time understand her English.

"Sleeping. How much do you like sleeping?" She was too amused for her own good. He smiled back softly.

“A lot.” She frowned. He was being a killjoy now. She sipped some of her iced tea.

“A lot, huh? I also love sleeping. Nothing can wake me up.” He seemed to perk up at this.

“Nothing?” His smile suddenly looked teasing, full lips pulled back to show her those perfect teeth she admired so much.

“Yeah, nothing. I’ll probably even attack you.” She smiled around the rim of her glass. “Or bite, whatever you like best.” After that they talked about everything and nothing, commenting about their lives and family and childhood. When Seungho was little, he had been a nerd and not very sociable, while she had been quite the opposite. But there was this moment when the conversation spiraled to its death. Seungho was starting to talk about how he met the members in MBLAQ, and when he got to a certain part of the story he went mute. He just stopped.

In fact, his smile seemed to die. His whole face fell and withered and blanked, turning into this terrible grimace. It was awful. It was like coming home from a hard day of work, only to find your dog missing. It made her stomach shrink, made her fingers twitch, made her throat itch. It was wrong. It was terrible, it wasn’t pleasant. She suddenly felt this impulse to apologize.

“Lee Joon talked to me the other day,” his voice was clipped and professional, a bit out smile forcing around his tense muscles. She wanted to reach forward and hug him and tell him it was going to be okay. Another part of her wanted to run to the studio and strangle Joon. Her past mistakes always seemed to haunt her, and she didn’t know why.

She slouched in her seat, pretending to be taking another swing from her ice tea, yet noticing with great horror how her nerves ate her up inside. Slowly, completely, evenly. She didn’t want to talk about it, as childish as it was. She cried over it for days, why couldn’t he respect that? She was fed up with it. She thought that ‘incident’ had been forgotten and buried down a 200m deep hole. She felt smaller than tiny.

“You did?” Her voice was a high squeak, and she tried to relax her vocal chords by laughing. She couldn’t look at him in the eye. “What did you two talk about?” She tried to smile. She couldn’t smile. She couldn’t breathe. It was too hard. Anything at that moment could’ve been easier. She felt like crying.

“He… He told me…” His voice was cracking, falling, breaking. Like a small fissure, expanding from his voice to his face. She dared take a look, and nearly cried out with surprise. He wasn’t the Seungho she knew. He wasn’t the Seungho she came to admire and respect. He was nothing like him. Sitting across the table was a broken man, a fallen soul, a heart-wrecked person. It wasn’t him. But it only lasted the briefest second she had even lived to experience. After undergoing one of his famous speeches regarding responsibility and respect, she had somehow expected him to scold her. She had never expected this.

“He told me how much you liked paper cranes.”

He looked at her in the eyes. They both knew he was lying. Joon never saw her do a single paper crane, hearts and cubes maybe, but paper cranes were left to the confines of her newly acquired office. And he knew that too. But he said it with such innocence and think voice, that she knew it was hard for him to say it. She was bristling inside, wanting to stand up and tell him off for being a coward. But she was also cowering.

“I do.” She wanted to choke. “They bring good luck.” She wanted to cry.

He couldn’t even give her a fucking smile, because somehow, they both knew it hurt too much. She resented him for ruining the happy moment they could’ve shared, they could’ve had, they could’ve cherished. She just wanted to know why he did it. Why he said it. But she couldn’t talk around the slipknot that was around her throat, constricting and restricting. She didn’t reach for her almost empty iced tea, for her hands were shaking too much. It was too silent. Too dull. Too sad.

“You believe in luck?” He was looking down at his glass of water. She could barely blink fast enough or breathe. It hurt. She wanted to know why it hurt.

“I…” what did he ask? “I believe in opportunities.”

The ones I’ve lost.

“I see.” He took a drink of his water and waved over a waiter, telling her he was going to pay. She insisted on paying, but he said that wouldn’t be nice of him, and she relented. Like any lady should. It was like this disgusting routine. A perfect way to end that gutting conversation. A fitting way to end that perfect moment. And when she bumped into him on the way out, she ducked her head.

“I’m sorry.”

Because she couldn’t stop the tears. Because she couldn’t stop the mistakes. Because she couldn’t suck it up and explain. Because she just wasn’t sure anymore. Because… because she was her, and everything ended that way. It always ended that way. So wiping away the tears and smiling, and hugging him while hiding her face was okay. Because that was what girls like her do. They pretend. They smile. They try not to sodden other’s mood and try extra, extra hard in getting better.

“Here,” she reached into her bag, bangs hiding that broken, broken, face. She handed him her last paper crane. “It’s for good luck.” One last smile. “Hope you have a nice evening.” One last bow.

“… thank you.”

One last mistake.

But that was okay. Because inside her car, watching him take a taxi, she felt the restraint in her heart go loose with the pain. It was okay because for the moment, there were no smiles, no mistakes, no bows, no paper cranes. Just another wrecked heart.

The cold air rushing around her. That wasn’t okay. The hand grabbing her shoulder. That wasn’t okay. And when she turned to look over at her captor, she felt speechless. She felt pained and mute and terrible all over again. And this time she couldn’t smile and tell him good-bye. This time she tried to look away, a small hiccup leaving her pursed lips. It hurt. It hurt like it shouldn’t. And she didn’t know why. Tussled haired and despairing, she ducked her head and bit her lower lips, screaming at herself to stop. To stop because he was there. He was watching her. And she deserved it.

Yet, her chin was pulled up, and her eyes were lured in by those perfect almond ones. She couldn’t stop the tears. She couldn’t stop the pain, the ache, the hurt. It rolled down her cheeks in the form of tears. And he stopped them, in the form of a kiss. His full lips resting against her cheek; his hot breath tickling her warm skin, his gentle fingers brushing her tussled hair.

“It’s okay.” He pulled her closer, the car feeling too small and too much of an obstacle, yet nothing compared to that deep crevice that had formed between them. She felt like a little girl, clutching his black jacket, bringing her face right against his chest and crying. She was mumbling and stumbling, telling him again and again and again how sorry she was. How she regretted it. How she wanted to erase that mistake forever. He voicelessly comforted her with his hand entwined in her hair. She could breathe.

He pulled away, and she held onto him harder, clinging on him for dear life. Because she couldn’t watch him leave again. Because she did that once, and she wouldn’t commit the same mistake harder. He reached into her hands, and pulled them away from his jacket, kneeling down and looking at her in the eyes. The ache, the pain, the hurt. His fingers wrapped around her own. And for a small moment, the hurt wasn’t that severe.

“Lary,” he was breathless. He was, like her, speechless. “Lary, look at me.” She couldn’t respond. “Larythzza.”

She looked up. She looked right into his eyes, and he asked him everything and yet nothing. Her lips were parted, her eyes were swelled, and her heart was torn. She didn’t know why. Nothing made sense. Everything was hot and cold and it hurt.

He pressed his forehead against hers, sighing softly and soundlessly. She could smell how his cologne mingled with the underlying scent of tacos and masculinity. She felt safe. But it wasn’t right. Not yet. And she didn’t know why. Only how. As she breathed the same air he did, she knew how. And that was safe, that was better. She didn’t want to pull away and she didn’t. He didn’t, either.

“I… I need to…” she was still hiccupping, her warm cheeks feeling cold and alone when his thumb wasn’t stroking them anymore. Instead, she was rewarded by the soft caress of his lips. She felt desperation gnaw her alive, and her throat felt like it was about to burst. He couldn’t leave. Not again. So she did the unthinkable. She did what girls like her never do.

She kissed him.