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"The North Koreans are coming to get us." The sergeant walked back and back staring red spikes into the soldiers' eyes. "Anytime, they will strike and we cannot falter, you hear me?"
Minseok's shoulders slumped at his meal, hands barely moving to shove the food into his mouth. The man had remembered wishing for the north and the south reunification for his birthdays. Now he had to fight them. His heart burned with siding with the south and being forced to hate the north.
He had grown up with a child of the north as his neighbour. The defectors were nice people and sought only peace. Why couldn't the two countries be together? Why did this have to happen? Politics had always been a sore point for his family since they were business people. Every time his company turned a north defector away, his heart died a little. There was nothing he could do. It was reasonable to not trust them, but after knowing that the potential employee had been in Seoul for ten years and the company still not accepting them hit him in ways he couldn't bear.
He didn't want to talk to Suho about these things, however. Now, something dreading his mind, clawing at his conscience. Maybe he should have intervened the hiring process. Make a change. But that was him. Hiding back so many layers, and now that he had to face this, Minseok realized how big a mistake he had made all these years.
"They're scums! They'll kill us in a blink of an eye!"
He shouldn't be tearing up at the moment or he might have to do a hundred push-ups, and Minseok thought that he couldn't do a hundred push-ups while crying.
They're not my enemies... They're people.
Finally, he could feel the delicate snow fizzling away on his nose. Strong gusts of freezing wind swept away his cowardly thoughts as he stripped off his jacket and shirt. His eyes welled up with tears, but no one was close enough to see. Stepping into the snow with his fellow soldiers, Minseok bit his inner cheeks, trying to stop his teeth from chattering.
"AHH!!"
Altogether, the soldiers shoved their bare hands into the snow and threw them over each other's bodies. Minseok felt as if the world was crashing into him. His mind was as frozen as his fingers, but he couldn't stop. His muscles flexed and burned at the cold prickles of snowflakes chucked on to him. He could no longer feel his dry pale lips as he kept digging into the pile of white and throwing it at the other soldiers.
The flakes were building on his back. Layers starting to pile on top of one another. He could feel the cold thickened on his bare body.
The other women soldiers did their fair share of going into the snow, but their clothes were spared luckily.
Everyone seemed to be having fun though. Men and women screaming and throwing snow at each other. It was then that they were lead to a small pool and with the women behind him, the men walked into the freezing water. On three, they submerged themselves into the water. Then, everyone played with the water just like they were playing with the snow.
The women were giggling and the men were slapping each other's backs as they seemingly enjoyed the harsh freezing weather. Minseok tried to participate. He was a consultant, baring fake smiles for quite a while, so this wasn't that difficult for him.
"We're doing this for our country, come on."
"Why did this have to happen? I'm wasting away my two precious years."
Whatever the stance, Minseok didn't find that that was the real problem. For him, it was the north. If they could just be together...
The night crept over his lonely thoughts as he stood guard outside of camp. His thick coat and face protection weren't enough to fight away this cold. The lone tree at the end of his eyes took him back to when he and the girl walked side by side on the pavement. The first snow falling sent a refreshing feeling he had never felt before. He remembered the way she stared so lovingly up at the frozen cherry blossoms, pink and sparkling. The pretty flowers were frostbitten like his heart being chipped away by her soft laughs and shy voice. Her pretty face bloomed and just like the frozen blossoms, her beauty embedded into his mind amidst all the chaos, he could still find her and ground himself again.
"I must say. I'm impressed, Minseok-ah." Key nodded at him with what seemed like a genuine smile. Maybe it was a real smile. "You don't talk much, do you?"
"I'm sorry, sunbae, if that is rude."
"It's fine. I hear from all the newbies, hearing their stances on these things, but I don't even know where your thoughts at. What do you think about the conscription?"
Minseok didn't like where this question was going, but at least, his sunbae sort of distracted him from the cold. "I just wish we could reunite with the north."
With no fighting, preferably.
His sunbae raised his brow, lips pulled back. The man was the assistant to the drill sergeant. Maybe his answer was wrong. Minseok should on the dehumanization wagon to save his delicate feelings from the pain, but he just couldn't. Perhaps, he might have to do a hundred lap for giving the wrong answer.
"You're a rare one indeed, newbie." His sunbae didn't say much but pat him on the back and walked back to his tent while Minseok continued his watch.
A slow deep inhale and a slow deep exhale.
The cold was starting to get to him, but Minseok knew that his person was safe and sound under the welcoming roof of their house.
Just the thought of her was enough to thaw his frozen lonely thoughts.
