Field of Dreams

Assignment

Yoon Se Ri

It was year 2013, when I first saw him. Alone in the baseball field, swinging the bat over and over again with only the sound of the ball machine accompanying him.

I was in my 2nd year of college, going through the motion as a journalism student. And that week, I got an assignment that I dreaded the most. Writing a sport column for our school magazine. Don't get me wrong, I liked sport.. well, sort of. I worked out regularly, and.. that's it. I didn't think writing a sport column was my forte. I was more.. a fashion kinda girl, or.. beauty product. Give me anything, just not sport.

I was practically begging the assistant to switch topic, but he refused my request. A journalist should have a broad knowledge of topics, he said. I inwardly huffed and begrudgingly went to the library to start searching for any topics that I wanted to cover. What's been going on anyway in the sport world? And that's why I ended up in the baseball field. Baseball was a hype because Hyun Jin Ryu would go to MLB and played for the LA Dodgers. I wanted to cover that.. I think.  I wanted to see how that news would impact college baseball player.

I was thinking about that when the ball was LITERALLY coming at me.

"Watch out!" good thing someone alerted me because I ducked out at the last minute and the ball just smashed the seat behind me. In a flash, that someone was in front me. And.. my heart did a somersault. Because this guy was.. gorgeous.

"Hey, you okay? Sorry, usually no one is here when I do this." His voice was pretty deep. And soothing. So I just nodded.

"Yeah. Thank you for the alert." He just nodded and stood up.

"Okay, be careful. Good thing I finish my training." He nodded and started to went down the stairs back to the field.

"Wait, I'm Yoon Se Ri from Media and Communication Department. You with the team?"

He stopped in his descent but didn't turn around, so I descent to his level and stood before him.

"Yes, why you ask?"

"Well, actually.. I need to do an article for the sport column of our school magazine. Do you happen to know Hyun Jin Ryu?"

His expression changed drastically when I mentioned Hyun Jin Ryu.

"Who doesn't? He was like the best pitcher in Korea, he's four seam fast ball is second to none! I tried to imagine him pitching to me everytime in the batting practice." His eyes shone, he looked so passionate talking about baseball.

"I will not pretend that I understand what you're saying." I laughed. He smiled his first smile at me. And what a smile that was. And he had dimples. Be still, my heart.

He thrusted his hand to me, and introduced himself. "I'm Ri Jeong Hyeok from Engineering department."

And that was our meet cute, folks.

***

Apparently, I was a very ignorant person, because Ri Jeong Hyeok name was big in our school. Well, not only in our school, but all over the country. Or so Seo Dan said. He was the star shortstop of our baseball team and all college team.

"Good thing, then. He could give me a pointer and honest feeling about the whole situation with the guy, the one who'll go to America."

"Yea, I still can't believe though he agreed to meet with you. He's famous for his hatred to everything media."

I shrugged my shoulder lightly. "Maybe he's just took pity on me. Or.. because he almost cut my head off with his ball." Seo Dan laughed at my joke and we proceeded to talk about something else.

Ri Jeong Hyeok promised me he would meet me after his practice at 5 pm. I planned on going to the baseball field again prior to that. If I was lucky I could probably take some pictures of the field and.. probably him to compliment my article. Of course, I didn't want him to think that I was not serious about this assignment so I put on my research hour about baseball in general and about Hyun Jin Ryu in particular. I wanted to impress him.. I guessed.

I tried to watch a game with my sports junkie brother, Yoon Se Jun, but.. still I couldn't find myself attracted to the sport. I merely attracted to the parade of good looking players. Don't judge me, please. Se Jun gave up on me in inning three when I yawned for the eleventh time. This game was boring. So that's what my first question to Ri Jeong Hyeok.

"What do you love about baseball? What makes you fall in love with it? Because I can see it that you really love it." We sat down in the coffee shop near the campus. Their americano was my favorite. Though turned out Ri Jeong Hyeok was not a coffee person.

He looked at his hands before launching into something more akin to speech than answering my question.

"You know, at first, it was seeing my brother playing it that makes me want to try it too. Because, as you see it, I'm not a.. a.. big talker if you know what I mean. And so does my brother. But I see him playing with his teammates and he looks happy and he found his community. I want to replicate that.

"But then, I put on my gloves, I take the bat in the batting cage and hit ball after ball after ball. And it's freeing. It felt so good to hear the bat clashing with the ball and then you track the ball and it flies. It was really what made me fall in love with baseball. Just to get that feeling again. Because you see, even now, I still.. don't have many people around me. But it's okay. As long as I have baseball."

I was not expecting that. It's so deep. I really wanted to take a picture of his expression when he talked baseball like that. Maybe next time. If he gave me another opportunity.

"So what.. you join the baseball club the next day?"

"Yeah, my mom took me to a youth club near our house but.. I was not impressive enough, so I didn't get to play that much. I might spent hundred thousands of won that year at the batting cage. And then I saw Park Chan Ho, playing for LA Dodgers. He was like the pride of Korean Baseball at that time. That's like my first time dreaming about playing this sport as an adult. That's what I wanna do in the future. Playing for not only KBO but MLB. Park Chan Ho retired a year ago by the way."

"So this Hyun Jin Ryu guy, he's like the successor of Park Chan Ho?"

He scratched his side head and seemed thinking about how to answer the question.

"Let's tabled that question for our next meeting?"

"There will be a next meeting?"

"You don't want to? You have everything you need?"

"Well.. not really.. Figure I would pick your brain about this baseball thing and you can tell me about what it means to you that Hyun Jin Ryu will go to the M.. L.. B? Is that what the league called? But.. I thought it would be a one interview kind of thing. Then you would direct me to some other players."

"Well, let's have a next meeting. Same time tomorrow?"

***