The One That Got Away

In your final moments, there is only one person you can think of ever turning to. It wasn’t even hard really—it shouldn’t be. Not when she exists.

The one that slipped from your fingers once before—An Yujin.

On your right, she’s what you expect her to look like: a mixture of panic, thrill, and regret. Your group never really took to having a ‘group mom’ or ‘group dad’, but Yujin automatically filled that role. She was the dependable leader. The one who could effortlessly balance the chaos and the mischievous along with what was responsible and what needed to be done. But that wasn’t the only role she filled in your life.

An Yujin was the one who got away.

Staring into her dilating pupils, you notice a sort of light flickering in her eyes. It’s tiny. Almost imperceptibly ignorable. But when you focus on it, your own eyes go wide—not in horror, not in fear, but rather, in awe.

As the mote of possibility beams right at you, swallowing you whole, you accepted your momentary blindness and allowed the unknown to consume you.

“Ya, are you going to pick a song or what?”

You blink. Twice. That was … weird. You don’t remember what happened, but you could have sworn something bit your subconscious like a hungry viper striking from the bushes. It felt like something from the past suddenly took a hold of you, but you just couldn’t tell what.

You shrug. Eh, what’s the point? Everything’s alright now. You blink two more times to shake off the aftereffects of that darn camera flash. As you do, you go for your unfinished beer and down it all in one go.

You chalk up the random pangs of nostalgia to being at your ten-year college reunion. Just being surrounded by all these familiar faces from the past—faces you once studied with, crammed with, fought with, celebrated with; and faces you thought you would see again at the next lunch break or the next time your unfortunate ass ended up in Saturday detention again—brought back a lifetime of experiences to the forefront of your mind.

It’s overwhelming. But it cascades over you like a life-giving waterfall, filling your veins with renewed energy. So you let it.

Your classmate next to you jabs you with his elbow again. “Ya, are you going to sing or not? Fucking pussy. Ten years and you still haven’t changed.”

You swat him on the back at a very specific spot—a spot you and the other boys used to hit against each other for the stupidest reason—and earned a pained groan a man nearing his thirties would make before you snatch the faulty microphone from him. “Fine, if I have to I guess.”

“The hell you mean ‘if you have to’? It’s our reunion. Ten years man! We do this every year. Now just pick a damn song and be done with it so we can get back to drinking.”

Rolling your eyes, you scrolled through the same old app on your phone that listed out the song digit combinations, and when you find a song that suited your tastes—and your alcohol level—you queue it in, slump forward, and sigh.

You remember the lyrics like the back of your hand. This is your sentimental song. The song you would only ever sing to yourself when in bed trying to pry tears from your eyes, in the bathroom when you know you’re alone at the apartment or in your old dormitory, or on the walk home under the rain after a particularly exhausting day.

You know this song. You know this song all too well.

Then, you hear it. You hear her name.

“Oh my god—she actually came. Ya, An Yujin! You’re here!”

And you forget every fucking lyric of this song in an instant.

She’s being greeted by her old circle of friends who are celebrating how pretty and youthful she still looks despite how long it’s been. She’s ducking to both avoid and teasingly include herself in pictures when batchmates who haven’t seen her in forever want a small token to remember her by for tonight. She’s even eyeing the food, scanning to see if there’s any leftover tteokbokki she could snag before starting her night on alcohol.

Everyone’s watching her like she’s got some sort of spotlight beaming down on her—and by the gods, she is glowing. That smile of hers is like a beacon of hope that no one could ever hope to look away from.

Everyone’s watching her, but she’s looking at you.

She’s looking at you with that signature smirk of hers—that small gesture haflway between a chuckle and a lip bite—that you know is reserved just for you. Yujin’s still standing, but when she pouts her lips and twitches her right cheek twice, you instantly know what that means.

So you wipe the drool from your lower lip, close your pathetically dropped jaw, and clear your throat, scooting over to one side. Once she sees this, she smiles wider like she just regained some new life, and excused herself from the others to make her way to you.

It’s a tight squeeze, and the guy from earlier is bitching about it, but you don’t mind. You make it work.

As she steps behind the backs of like five different men to get to you, you stretch your hand out, and for a moment, she hesitates, but she takes it like she always did—like she still owned it—and pulled herself downwards into a sit right next to you.

“Hi, you,” she says, eyes unable to meet yours. She’s either looking at your poor choice of beverage or the half-eaten forkful of tteokbokki on your plate. But not at you. “Been a while.”

“Hey to you too,” you reply, voice sounding weaker than you intended, and you hope she doesn’t notice. “Been a while myself.”

Fuck. You are a fucking idiot. Who even says that?

But your regret converts into warmth when she chuckles at your silliness, shaking her head. She pushes your thigh with a hand, tapping it as if to test the waters, before leaning her entire arm on it now like she used to. “You’re just like how I remember you. It’s … crazy. But also strangely comforting.”

She couldn’t have said it any better. You realize this when you reach for your fork and bring it to her face instead of yours. Yujin eyes you weirdly, but without another word, she eats off your utensil like she used to from ten years ago.

It’s … strange. It’s strange how the body remembers all of these like muscle memory. How you know to pull back her hair and tuck it behind her ears when she stoops down so they won’t get into her food. How she recalls with perfect precision which parts of your stomach and waist to pinch to get you sensitive and ticklish. How you both know what the other is thinking before they can even say it, making finishing each other’s sentences a typical Wednesday for you rather than a scene straight out of the movies.

And god, does it feel … good.

You don’t even hear what your batchmates are saying—if they’re taking jabs at you, trying to whistle at you and Yujin, or if they’re even talking to you at all. You don’t process the myriad of small encounters and little memories forming all around you in the midst of the slowly filling restaurant. You don’t even remember why you second-guessed coming here in the first place to meet everyone.

Now that Yujin’s here, everything just started making sense.

But the thing is, it hurts. It fucking hurts.

And you of all people should know why.

Once all the food has been eaten and everyone’s satiated with their sudden appetite for booze—you have to admit, there’s something about reunions that really makes you want to drink more—you all settle the bill. You reach out, offering to pay for Yujin, but she snaps back at you with a growl that warns you to back off in an instant—and you end up letting her pay for her share.

Everyone’s saying goodbye, taking final pictures, holding onto wrists and arms and hands as if they will never see each other again. But when you think about it, are they really overreacting? You haven’t seen most—if not all—of these people in over a decade. Will there even be a next time? Will you ever see each other again?

It’s in the midst of this sort of pseudo-existential crisis that an arm wraps around yours from behind just as you were about to leave for your apartment. It hooks itself in such a claiming way that feels equal parts gentle and confident at the same time. When you glance to the side, you see who it is.

An Yujin. Smiling up at you like this much was to be expected.

“Still living in that run-down apartment of yours? Mind if I walk you there?” she asks like she has nothing better to do. You know she does. You can’t recall her line of work or how busy she is on the daily, but you sure as hell know there are about ten other people who would have killed to be in your spot tonight. But you don’t let it get to your head. “For a summer night, it’s pretty chilly. Forgot my jacket at home too, bummer.”

“You know, I should be the one walking you home. Not the other way around. Afraid I might end up being a stalker of yours?” you tease as you begin walking, allowing her to clutch you like your hers. Because she allows you to tease her like she’s yours. “And hey, I’m not taking any apartment slander tonight. That’s the same damn apartment that’s housed your homeless ass for years, mind you.”

She chuckles and crinkles her nose, pressing her temple against your arm now. “Yeah, remember the time I stumbled through your door when your girlfriend at the time was giving you a blowjob?”

“Let’s … maybe not bring that up,” you plead, not wanting to recall you only got hard the moment she walked in. “But if we’re playing dirty, I do remember the time you were crying to me on the phone about the bastard I told you to fucking stop dating for months. But you couldn’t could you? Something something never find a guy like him, something something let him ruin you. And he did, didn’t he?”

“Oh shut up,” she scoffs in a tone that you sense isn’t playful anymore. “Quit it.”

You chuckle and lean in about to kiss her head to reassure her otherwise, but you stop.

Why the fuck were you going to kiss her?

She clocks your sudden tension and glances at you, so you pull away. Your eyes do this thing whenever they’re about to meet—they fucking dart away. “Haha … but yeah. Who would have thought your heartbroken ass was just outside my door.”