Tunnel Light

Another rainy day. Another day of endless gray misery. Jiyu prepares her breakfast, alone, in her and her boyfriend’s shared apartment. She just made sandwiches, just a plain one, with boiled chicken breast, mayo, and nothing else. She puts one inside her lunchbox, and eats the other. Her boyfriend? Well, he already left. Jiyu clenches her fist hard. She wants to disappear entirely from the place she’s supposed to call home.

Jiyu leaves the apartment before 9AM to catch the train to work. It is packed full of people. Many are wearing office attire, Jiyu herself is no exception. The train is damp, and dampness always brings an unpleasant smell, Jiyu tries her best to ignore the smell in that 20 minutes of train ride to her office. In the middle of the commute, her phone beeps. There’s a message.

“Hey, you in the office already?” it is her boyfriend.

“I’m on my way.”

“Right. Sorry I left early, there’s an abrupt meeting. New project. I already ate on the way to work, there’s some food in the apartment right?”

“Yeah, made some sandwiches.”

“I see. You used the spam in the fridge right? There’s chili oil too. You have been looking really gloomy lately. You should really eat something other than plain boiled chicken, no?”

Jiyu only stares at her screen. She grips the phone stronger. She put it back in her blazer pocket before gazing outside through the window again—which admittedly isn’t easy since the train is full and her body is short. 5 more minutes before she arrives at the station.

Jiyu finally arrives at the station. It is still raining. She opens up her umbrella then walks quickly towards the office building. Luckily it isn’t that far, only about 5 minutes of walking from the station. However, given how hard the rain was, she still has to take off her shoes and her leggings altogether. She arrives at the office barefoot, with the miniskirt soaked despite the umbrella.

“Morning, Jiyu.”

“Morning,” Jiyu answers her coworker's greetings without much care, deliberately making it short to go to the bathroom as soon as possible.

The others just see Jiyu almost sprinting—barefoot, bare legs—to the bathroom while silently giving a judging stare. The girl has not been trying to be accepted well in this work environment she entered six months prior.

To be fair, she hasn’t got it easy. Office life isn’t exactly the thing she has wanted to do ever since she was a child. Jiyu has always liked moving, as in, doing athletic stuff. She likes sports, even competing in it as well at some points in her life. She attended a gymnastic class since she was a child, until life decided to say otherwise.

Back to the bathroom. Jiyu wipes her toned legs dry with paper towels. Patting her skirt until it isn’t dripping wet anymore. Then put on her leggings and the shoes. She then stands in front of the mirror, in there, her reflection is looking dark. She shakes her head, then reapplies her make up. She leaves the bathroom after smiling for at least a minute in front of the mirror.

“Good enough,” she thinks, as she walks leaving the bathroom.

“Are you done back there?” one of her coworkers says.

Jiyu only nods to answer, just another of those unimportant small talks. The day goes on as it always has. Boring. Uneventful—even though her boss asked her to do a shit-ton of tasks. The rain going on almost consistently heavy all day really doesn’t help in cheering up her day. Until it’s finally time to go home.

“Only two more days until Saturday,” Jiyu thinks as she packs her stuff into her briefcase. If people paid extra attention to her in that moment, they could certainly see that she’s smiling, ever so slightly.

Jiyu comes back to the apartment to see the light is already switched on inside. “I’m home.”

“Oh, hi honey!” her boyfriend comes out of the closet, his hair is still damp.

Jiyu sighs before taking off her shoes. “Didn’t you say you have a meeting today? You came back earlier than I thought.”

“Oooh, do you think a man with a meeting scheduled for him cannot come back home earlier?”

“That’s not what I said,” Jiyu says as she flings her bag across the room, she sits down on the dining chair.

“Hahahah, just joking honey. I came back earlier because of a good thing actually! See, it was a promotion. Hurray!” her boyfriend put both his hands in the air, also looking up all the while.

“That’s goo-”

“- Which means, that leaves us with free time...? How about a date on Saturday? Yeah? Yeah?!” he unintentionally cut Jiyu off her sentences, but quickly realized what he’s done. “Ah, sorry honey, what were you trying to say?”

“It’s okay. I was just saying that’s good to hear,” Jiyu smiles.

“Ah. Hahah. Phew, thank you honey,” he closes in on her, to then pat her head and kiss her hair. “Okay then, Saturday alright? I swear I’ll make it nice,” he said before kissing her forehead.

Jiyu shivers, and nods silently.

“Anyway, the bath is ready. I just cleaned the bathroom. You should shower, I’ll prepare dinner,” he says while smiling as wide as he always does.

“Thanks hun,” Jiyu smiles back.

“But what about my Saturday?” Jiyu says inside her head. She’s screaming her heart out in it.

Jiyu’s childhood was the nicer part of her life as a whole. At least that’s how she liked to think about it. She was almost 5 when she was first introduced to the world of gymnastics. She was playing with a friend in a park just a few blocks from their houses when they suddenly talked about what they like to do.

“What do you like to do, Jiyu?”

“What? Playing with you of course.”

“Nooo! I mean, like, hmm, Ah! What is your hobby!”

“Ooh, right. My Mom asked me about that before. Hmm, I don’t really know. What do you like to do?”

“Hehe. I like to do gymnastics!”

“Huh? Gymnastics? What is that?”

“It’s a sport Jiyu! Where you stretch your body, and do some poses. You know, jumping, flipping in the air. You seem like you will be reaaally good at it!”

“Really?”

“Totes! Come with me next time! I’ll ask my teacher to teach you too! But only to go easy on you since it is really hard!”

“Pfft. There’s no such thing as hard for me. Alright then, I’ll make gymnastics my hobby, Haum.”

With that, Jiyu started attending gymnastic classes with Haum.

Haum lived across the street. Naturally, coming from the same age bracket, the two got along. They share the same school, and the same class too. Haum was a cheerful kid, much in contrast to how Jiyu was, which was probably why they got close in the first place. Haum always filled the gap of Jiyu’s quietness. Jiyu on the other hand never really cared about how Haum took care of her. If anything, Jiyu was grateful for Haum’s presence.

Jiyu and Haum were an only child. Haum’s parents were really outgoing–Haum inherited the trait–, compared to Jiyu’s absence of a parent. Haum often came by Jiyu’s house to invite her to play, whether to play at the park or to play at Haum’s house. Being together both in school and after further deepened their relationship.

Jiyu was good. Exceptionally good even. The muscles in her body were supremely flexible—or so the coaches said—which meant she has a higher physical strength amongst her peers, which also meant that Jiyu has a much higher skill ceiling in gymnastics. It was relatively easier for her to do harder and harder routines as time went on. In only two years of doing gymnastics, she has already surpassed Haum in terms of her mastery of the basics.

“Hah~ hah~ wow. That was awesome Jiyu! How do you even get this good, this fast?” Haum asked in the middle of a break in their training session.

“I actually don’t know,” Jiyu answered with a smile.

“Nahhh you’re playing it cool. C’mon show me the secret!”