I couldn’t sleep well last night.
Barely able to fight off drowsiness during my lecture, as soon as it was time for the break, I headed to the cafeteria on the first floor and bought a strong cup of coffee. Only after downing half the bitter coffee in no time did my heavily clouded mind begin to wake up. I still had one major class and one liberal arts class left. I didn’t have any expectation of returning home to rest well, thus I had no strength to endure the time. For the next few days, I wouldn’t be able to sleep at my own will anyway.
Today marked the second day since he left for an overseas business trip. And it would be two more days before he returned. This meant there would still be two more days of sleepless nights before I could sleep well like I usually would. I couldn’t sleep no matter how tired I was, and this was torturous. Though it had been years since that man and I had the mansion to ourselves, I still couldn’t completely relax as if my past life was gone. Perhaps because of the nightmares that seemed to come to me every time he left the house, like it was waiting for that moment.
[Ji Cheonghyeon]
Returning to the lecture hall, I idly stared at my phone before finding his contact. Just seeing his name on the screen was comforting, even without exchanging messages with him or hearing his voice. The simple act of tracing his name with my fingertips calmed my jittery mind a bit, but having his name in front of me made me miss him even more. Filled with longing, a sigh unknowingly escaped me.
I managed to get through the first day somehow, but on the second day, I had the inevitable nightmare. I was still terrified of nightmares. Even though I knew they couldn’t harm me, I couldn’t treat them simply as just dreams.
When that man was away from home, it felt like I was defenselessly exposed to nightmares. Some nights I was very lucky to go without a nightmare, but most of the time, I was tormented by them. I thought I was completely liberated when I no longer had nightmares about my mom since the day I started sleeping in the same bed with him, but I soon realized that I was mistaken.
On the first night he was completely out of the house, I was beaten almost to death by my mom in my dream. Waking up, the pain was so vivid that I had to catch my breath. The nightmare, tormenting me as if my mom’s consciousness had really returned, was brutal. Since then, nightmares came not just when he was out working late or sleeping late, but they somehow knew when he was on business trips and wouldn’t be back for a while. Today would be no exception. The thought of battling nightmares alone in that big bed without him made me dread going home.
My gaze lingered at his name on the screen for a long time when suddenly, the screen changed. My finger, acting impulsively before my brain could process it, had tapped the message icon next to his name.
Below the three-syllable name ‘Ji Cheonghyeon’ at the top, the message box contained no casual conversations or trivial chatter exchanged between him and me. There were only notification messages of missed calls or the inability to reach him. He preferred immediate conversations via phone over the inefficient method of waiting for a text reply, hence the call notification messages were all that remained.
The hand not listening to its master didn’t stop there. By the time I came to my senses, words were appearing on the screen.
I wouldn’t say unnecessary things to him, or act childishly out of character, nor tell him about my nightmares. I had no intention of cluttering his mind with such trivial concerns of mine. However.
[I miss]
I couldn’t stop the feeling of missing him.
My hand moved on its own, typing the words.
‘I miss you.’
I wasn’t hoping for a reply, I wasn’t hoping he would call me, but it was just that my weakened heart moved on its own. It wasn’t that I expected to receive a response from him, but rather that I couldn’t contain the desire to express my feelings.
“Now, let’s continue with the graph. The most common mistake students make is here-.”
I hadn’t realized the professor had returned, and I was startled out of my reverie. I hastily hit send, closed the message box, and dutifully put my phone back in my bag. I didn’t use my phone often, so I wasn’t good at discreetly checking it during class like other students. I needed to put it out of my sight to focus on the lecture. Just as I was trying to concentrate on the lecture again, it hit me.
A sudden realization struck me like lightning. I became aware of what I had just done.
My mouth involuntarily fell open as the realization hit me. I couldn’t believe I had sent him a message saying ‘I miss you’ because my hand moved on its own. I must not have been in my right mind due to sleep deprivation. It wasn’t as if I had said it to his face or over the phone, I had sent it in a message that left undeniable evidence. And to top it off, I sent it right before class, so my phone was now out of my sight, making me even more anxious.
I, myself, felt it was uncharacteristic of me to show such a toe-curling display of affection, I wondered how weird he would think of it. It would be nice if he thought of the message cutely, but what if instead he thought I was doing something out of the ordinary because I had another favor to ask him. I felt suddenly hot, as if I had a fever. My face was flushing.
…Was this what it’s like to like someone?
Doing things out of character, worrying about how they might react, and fearing they might not appreciate it.
Because he was my first in everything, there were many times that I felt perplexed.
I waited anxiously for the class to end more than any other day. The sleepiness that I had struggled to shake off had long vanished. As soon as the lecture ended, I grabbed my phone from my bag and turned on the screen. There were no new messages or calls. It was likely a busy time during his business trip, leaving him no free time to make personal calls. Instead of feeling relieved, it felt like my punishment was being extended. Why wasn’t there a function to cancel sent messages? A sigh escaped my lips. I couldn’t muster the courage to re-read the message I had sent him, so I didn’t open the message box again. I simply turned off the phone screen and headed to the next classroom. The lecture had ended so tightly that I would be late if I didn’t hurry, so I decided to postpone my self-reproach.
The temporary wakefulness from the shock was short-lived. My overwhelming drowsiness continued to torment me, making me forget about the message.
When all my lectures were over, my focus shifted to not doze off and drive home safely, and I once again forgot about the message I had sent him. Not only had I postponed my self-reproach, but I also continued to put off even checking what I had written and sent to him as I left the university.
The public parking lot wasn’t very close to the school. It really would have been more efficient to commute here by bus. But even trying to not drive the car here was out of the question, and parking inside the school was not an option either. To avoid unnecessary attention, I stuck to my initial plan, consistently parking in the public lot and walking to school.
However, it turned out to be a completely fruitless effort.
‘What’s that imported car? Was it a three-letter or four-letter brand… Ah, I forgot again. Anyway, someone saw it parked in the public parking lot. People are speculating that you don’t want to attract attention but can’t use public transport, wondering how delicately you were raised to be doing that. Also, a classmate from the fashion department said that from head to toe, everything you’re wearing costs a fortune… Is it really true?’
Having failed to check the module syllabus beforehand, I couldn’t avoid lectures with group projects. I remembered the short conversation with my group members, who subtly asked me about these things, and felt a headache coming on. I thought I had been quietly attending school, but I had been the center of gossip without knowing it. All this effort had been in vain. Now that it turned out this way, I considered parking the car at the university instead of going through the hassle, but couldn’t bring myself to validate those rumors and scrapped the idea.
Make me feel happy and supported by leaving a comment!
