C H O P P Y | kwon minsik

t e n ; mama

        DAHYE STARED AT her phone, her lips pursed into a thin line, a frown etched in between her eyebrows. Her eyes flitted across the screen as she read the text message Seyoon had sent to her a few minutes ago over and over again. Her thumb hovered over the text bar, debating whether or not she wanted to reply back to him or just leave it alone.

        She was trying to process what he had told her and tried to swallow past the lump that had formed in her throat. She felt her eyes blur over as she scrolled to the previous messages and bit her tongue to stop her urge to cry, not out of sadness, but out of anger. She was furious, both at herself and at Seyoon. She knew shouldn't have texted him, shouldn't have shown him that his words still bothered her. She knew that she shouldn't have pushed his buttons too hard to reveal the ugly personality he truly had beneath the handsome face he wore like a mask. She knew that she shouldn't have gone against him when she still couldn't find her ground and keep herself steady.

        But how dare he threaten her? How dare he crawl back into her life just as she was beginning to get over the tremendous pain and heartbreak he had inflicted on her, just as she was beginning to feel okay, to fuck up everything she had been working so hard to build? Her blood boiled at the thought of the sly smirk he wore whenever he succeeded in getting under her skin, and felt her hand clench around her phone.

        She felt like a hypocrite for telling Jay to not go after Seyoon when she texted the latter herself. She felt awful for lying to not just Jay but to all of her friends who knew that Seyoon still affected her even to this day. It had been 6 months since they had broken up and parted their ways, but the experience of being in such a draining and toxic relationship had been seared into the deepest parts of her memory. What made her all the more angry and sad was the fact that Seyoon hadn't changed—that he was still the sly, manipulative guy she had last seen him as. He was still using people's weaknesses against them, turning the most sensitive parts of their beings into weapons to hit them with later on.

        She hated him for using their relationship against her; it was merely another weapon for him to use and hurt her with. Their relationship, one that had initially formed out of mutual love and affection, had soon turned into one of constant anger, fear, and frustration. There was no trust, no care, no love for each other between them. The lack of anything positive had been the root cause for its eventual destruction, as well as the amplifier for the fear she felt around him and his ugly persona. It was the reason why Dahye had chosen to build walls around herself and push anything away that was remotely related to love.

        Realizing that tonight out of all nights was not the time to lose her composure, Dahye turned her phone off and put it onto the coffee table in front of her. She knew that she had to hold herself together, even if that meant she had to use everything inside of her, every last bit of energy and willpower. When they were done with the after-party and returned back to the hotel, she could cry as much as she wanted to. But right now, she had to put on her bravest mask and tough it out, and act as if the brief texting between her and Seyoon hadn't given her one of the first panic attacks she had had since their break-up.

        She got up from the couch she had been sitting on for the last 20 minutes and went to the make-up table she had been perched on earlier. The stylists had left out a few products like she had told them to, and had yet to return to get them. She checked her reflection in the mirror, a manicured finger tracing the lines of her face. The pink lipstick the stylist had picked up for her suddenly made her face look pale and sick, even though she knew that it was partially because of the interaction between her and Seyoon. She wiped it off with a make up remover pad and picked up one of the tubes of red lipstick and gently glided it across her lips. The color was bold—too bold that she wouldn't wear it unless it was for an event such as this one or a performance. However, it had managed to bring a hint brightness to her face, and made her eyes stand out. She smiled at herself in the mirror, a smile so small that didn't quite reach her eyes and disappeared as soon as it had come. She looked perfect, the way she should have been looking in the first place, and nobody would be able to depict the fact that what Seyoon said to her was still in her mind.