Pretty Pink Flowers at 22 Degrees Celsius
The snow that had piled up in the morning had all melted away. The branches on the trees in front of the broadcasting station, were full of pretty, light-pink cherry blossoms. People were gathered around under the strange tree, and were taking lovely pictures of themselves. The warm breeze blew from the west; the petals fluttered slowly down to the ground.
Unexplainable feelings found Eun Tak; it was a strange and wonderful thing. People moved underneath the falling flower petals, happily, and in between them, Eun Tak caught her eyes with another. It was the man she had met on the rooftop the other day. Petals were falling on the man’s shoulders, and the moment he smiled slightly, more petals hurled towards the ground, gracefully. And then he disappeared. With the blink of an eye.
*
Eun Tak found a nearby cafe and sat inside. There had been a lot of work she had not managed to finish, and the station was suffocating. Her fingers drummed on the innocent laptop keyboard, harshly. There were way too many things going on in her mind right now. The sun began to set, so the cafe staff lit the candles sitting on the table in front of her. Eun Tak stared at the flickering light while calling someone on the phone.
On the table next to where Eun Tak sat, customers were talking about the abnormal blooming of flowers outside the broadcasting station. As if the flowers had bloomed because of their love, the couple giggled and chatted with each other, excitedly. She could hear them giggle and chatter away from her seat, and Eun Tak blew the flame off, in annoyance at her loneliness.
“Who in the world is that guy…”
She couldn’t get him out of her head. She couldn’t stop thinking about him. After hitting send on the bottom of the mail, Eun Tak reached out for her coffee, when someone pushed the cup towards her. Without thinking, she put her coffee against her lips and tilted her head back when her eyes caught with the same person she had been thinking about.
The man was sitting in front of her so naturally, anyone would have believed that they had come in together. She stopped breathing; even the smallest things had become too extravagant for her.
It had been nine years since the Goblin and Eun Tak had sat like this, facing each other. Scared that he would blow everything away again, the Goblin stopped breathing too, and filled his eyes with the girl. In his eyes full of Eun Tak, tears started to form too. On those days when he walked across day nor night, he had been scared of that day when he wouldn’t be able to remember the girl’s face anymore. On the picture of the 19-year -old’s face, the Goblin overlapped it with the 29-year-old Eun Tak. And he seared it in his brain again. Now he could remember it whenever he wanted.
Eun Tak couldn’t keep her eyes off the tearful man, and for some reason, her eyes started to water too. Shs had a weird empty feeling for no reason, and the emptiness was spreading through her heart.
“What’s wrong with me… I’m only normal when I eat my medicine.”
She wiped her eyes quickly. He had wanted her to be happy, but the 29-year-old Eun Tak looked as lonely as the 19-year-old Eun Tak at the beach, blowing out candles on her birthday cake.
“Why are you sitting there?”
“Someone… called me.”
“That’s your problem. I’m not going to sit with you. Hasn’t the person who called you come yet?”
“They have, but they can’t recognise me.”
Eun Tak looked around the shop, but suddenly squinted at the man instead. He had been weird since the first time they had met, and he was still weird. There was no way to understand the weird man, and Eun Tak had no intention of understanding the weird man anyway.
“That’s also your problem. I’m very uncomfortable about you sitting in front of me like this. My boyfriend is supposed to meet me here soon.”
“You don’t have a boyfriend.”
Eun Tak looked at her laptop screen in annoyance, played around a bit and looked up at him again.
“You’ve cut your hair. I nearly couldn’t recognise you.”
“And you’re still not recognising me.”
“I did recognise you.”
The man’s sad laughter filled the stuffy air. Eun Tak’s heart became heavier at the man’s laughter; why was this man’s smile so lonely? Even though she didn’t want to feel those weird and strange feelings, the sadness just found her all over again. But there was also a curiousness deep inside her heart. She wanted to know who that man was. The man had a weird talent for tripping people over and dragging them towards him. She was getting pulled and pulled mercilessly. Time was ticking slowly.
“You were there earlier, weren’t you?”
“I’m someone who is there but never there.”
“In front of the broadcasting station. Where the miracle, 22 degrees celsius and pretty pink flowers, was.”
“I wanted to see someone. There is a person that I’ve missed a lot; a person that makes me think that they would come running into my arms anytime soon. But I know that nothing like this will happen, and so my heart throbs like crazy.”
His story was as desperate and sad as the stories listeners sent to their radio. All she had asked was whether he had been in front of the broadcasting station, but his one little word always made her feel terribly uncomfortable. She shut her mouth for a while before opening it again to change the topic.
“...Aren’t you going to order anything?”
Even if he wanted to order something, he didn’t have money. Eun Tak stared at the man in horror as he showed her his empty pockets. It had been very unexpected, as the clothes he wore looked expensive. Maybe those were all faux brands. Eun Tak wasn’t the only one who had not been expecting this. She had summoned him suddenly, and he had not had time to borrow money from the grim reaper.
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