Her Voice / han sanghyuk (#14)

Episode 16

JooEun

I sat down at my desk table at home, all surrounded by books of all my favourite genres. In front of me, there was a note and there was a pen in my hand, I wrote something down in that piece of note.

Would you be friends with me?

I cringed internally and crashed that note up and threw it aside after restarting with a new piece of note, it is way too clingy and it could be done better. I looked towards my left and there were all the discarded pieces of paper that were left laying down on the floor like nobody's business. I have been sitting down for the past hour trying to write a note to Han SangHyuk.

It is not a love letter of any sort, it is a thank you note to him, a note that conveys my thankfulness for the past two days that I have been with him. The first day in the auditorium and the second in his house, I have never expected that he would be next to me for the two days. I thought that I would be spending it all alone but he unexpectedly was there even though I hated him.

But he has changed, in my opinion, he has become more friendly and caring. He is different and I like that he is different, he should be like this towards his classmates. Maybe they will like him if he was a bit kinder, more thoughtful towards him and they will like him.

But I don't think that he ever cares how his classmates think about him, they said that he is way too rowdy and is a troublemaker, everyone should stay clear of him if he ever comes close to them. I think that they are too mean to think of him in that way, he isn't rowdy, he is a troublemaker but he is kind. That's why he doesn't have any friends...

And I want to be his friend. I gave him the note and left the garden after putting down Chloe gently, I couldn't bear to stay in the same place as humans wait for him to read the note. It is cringy and I don't want to cringe, and moreover, I don't want to see him cringe. What if he throws the note away?

I went back to class and I sat down in my seat which my bag was on top of it, DongWoo sunbaenim waved to me as I turned towards him. 'Good morning!' I said to him in sign language and he replied back with 'You too...' the same way, it seems that he has taken some effort to learn a bit of sign language last weekend and he has made a tremendous amount of improvement than last time where he mixed up most of the signs.

"JooEun ssi, you seem weird today. Did something good happened to you earlier?" He asked putting his hands together. Does the encounter count as something good?

I had met the true owner of Chloe, the feline whom I have always presumed to be a stray cat who resides in the school garden and he has given me the full permission to take care of Chloe as he is not in the position to do so since that his grandmother is allergic to cats. If she wasn't allergic, he would've brought her home, bathe her with the best feline bath products and have given her the best environments to live in. Who knows where Chloe sleeps at night?

But I'm glad that I have been able to take care of the feline in his place, bring her back home after school today and buy her the best necessities that Chloe would need and calling myself the assistant caretaker of Chloe. And he is the master caretaker of Chloe or is there another better term for it?

I waved a hand and passed him my phone after texting. "Nothing, I just slept well last night." He read out loud and I smiled.

The day went by quickly and it was time to have lunch, I grabbed my wallet and a hand tapped me on my shoulder. It was HakYeon sunbaenim, I smiled and he tilted his head a little, asking me to have lunch with him. I followed him but I got stopped by Han SangHyuk looking rather angry at HakYeon sunbaenim. "What?" He questioned him.

"What are you guys trying to do?" He asked him back and I sense that they are going to fight again.

"Can't you see that everyone is going for lunch? Of course, WE are going for lunch." He emphasized the 'we' and I looked at each of them back and forth, looking at their facial expressions wanting for the right moment to separate the two of them.

"I'm eating with JooEun." He said looking at me. "Since we are friends now, we are supposed to do everything together." He didn't throw the note away...

"What? You guys are friends? I thought that you two disliked each other." He stated the obvious.

"Can't enemies become friends?" He replied. "Miracles can happen and so does our relationship has changed for the better."

'Let's just go for lunch together.' I told them by sign language using all the hand gestures to tell them that we are going for lunch which means that the three of us are going for lunch.

"At least JooEun gets the idea, unlike you." He stood next to me. "Let's quickly go before all the good stuff gets stolen."

"Good idea provided that you don't get all the good stuff." HakYeon sunbaenim replied and we got to the caféteria in silence with the rest of the student body staring back at us. We have a very strange combination of people together, the kind senior that doesn't tolerate injustice, the new student who is a dumb deaf, the school's troublemaker walking in one line. It is no doubt that we wouldn't attract any attention.

2 weeks ago, we wouldn't even come close to each other and everything that happened for a reason. If I hadn't requested to enrol in this school, I wouldn't have met both of them. If I hadn't approached HakYeon sunbaenim for directions to the dance club, I wouldn't have known him. If he hadn't bullied me, HakYeon sunbaenim and he wouldn't have gotten into a fight. If I hadn't got into the auditorium, I would've got locked up with him for the whole night. If I hadn't run away from my family, I wouldn't have met his sister and went to his house and again spending the night with him again.

And we are friends because of all that and we raise a cat together. We have a connection now.