I used to be your typical, book-reading girl. But I never liked stories with romance in them. When I read fables about princes and princesses, I - being a 7 year old little shithead - would say something like:

“Why do I have to marry a prince? The princess is prettier.”

I could never hold on to those books for long anyway, because adults would hear me saying the same to other kids.

As I grew up, I got to read more sophisticated romance novels, and I still couldn’t feel anything. The nerdy girls my age (or, perhaps instead it is more reflective of the times to say, “thirsty”?) would talk to me about their curiosity for men with great passion and all I could do was nod. Romance just seemed like a pain in the ass. Not only the prince, but I also couldn’t care about the princess anymore.

When I got older and went through The Wild Times, I started becoming disillusioned with the concept of love. (Perhaps it’s a coincidence, but it was also around this time it became harder for me to make friends.) It was always the same. Confessions cause an uproar, but they act like nothing happened when they break up. 6 months is the furthest I had seen a pair go. Boys never refuse a confession and girls make up rumors even before anything’s said. It was like everything was following a damn textbook. To me, love was a ‘code’ to be studied.

Humans say ‘love’ is truly the most inherent and natural element of the human experience. But even before enrolling in high school, I had made a conclusion. That love is the most artificial thing in the world. You have to follow what others say, watch for the other’s back, beg for the other’s acceptance - never looking inside yourself. What could be more superficial than that?

For the moment, that was my conclusion. For the moment. That was still when I couldn’t even entertain the possibility of love entering into my own life.

A co-worker of mine said this to me the other day. “Sia, you live alone, so how come you’re so good at self-management?” Of course, it was really a rhetorical compliment of sorts, but I felt sick after listening to it. So I asked her back, "isn’t living alone common in this line of work," with another rhetorical question. She said, "that’s true, but your personality is cleaner and more careful than any married couple’s." I did not understand what she meant by this.

What’s the last song I’d want to hear before I die? This is a question that came to my mind one day. My first thought went to “A Day in the Life” by The Beatles. In one verse, there’s this part about ‘waking up’ then going ‘into a dream,’ and I always thought that was a metaphor for death. You finally wake up then have a dream right after - you just started but it ends only slightly after - that oxymoron symbolizes death for me. And that outro with its orchestral crescendo captures the extremeness of death well.

But the Beatles are too cliche. That said, I don’t want to pick an obscure song. So I think “Quicksand” by David Bowie would be better. It’s hard to explain why. Just that, as I’m losing consciousness in bed, I have a feeling the lyric - “Don’t believe in yourself, don’t deceive with belief, knowledge comes with death’s release” - will be repeating in my head unconsciously.

Rock ‘n’ roll saved my life. Thus, rock ‘n’ roll will kill my life. She would want that too.

I was invited to a university alumni reunion. I went with my memories buried inside my heart. Not many come to university reunions. University is where people with an infantilized mind inside a two decades old body go to laugh, love, drink, punch, have sex, and cry - together. Not something anyone who’s properly matured into adulthood would want to remember. Rather, we beautify our middle or high school days in nostalgia. I went to a middle school alumni meet once but have never wanted to meet my high school classmates again. The possibility is close to zero, but perhaps I was afraid I would meet her again.

The primary objective of an alumni meet is to show off, so after having met for the first time in 4-5 years, we immediately started being patronizing to one another. I don’t particularly have pride for my job so I waited until someone asked me directly. Most thought I’d become a writer, but they didn’t express too much surprise that I became a journalist. Whether it's a newspaper or a novel, they just process it all as “jobs that don’t make money.” Writing books used to be a young passion of mine. Going to university and studying literature, I decided to actualize that dream. But everytime I would try to make the stories in my head come to life, I would remember her name. And I would have a 1/3 chance of having a panic attack. So, I rescued my soul by listening to music. But nothing made me remember her more than music. After I graduated, I stopped trying to write books.

We had meat, got drunk, and talked aloud. As tales from our university days started to turn painful, we went over to more nostalgia-inducing times; back when we were even younger. I started sweating cold. Jihye, who majored in media, and for the past 3 years have been working her ass off as an assistant director, brought up an innocent tale of her first love. She used to be quite popular in our campus, so we all expressed shock that even she had such a pure youth.

The restaurant started to fill up with the disgusting scent of romance. Whenever the storyteller in focus would describe something embarrassing or cringy, we would all laugh it up, but I found it difficult to even sigh.

I lied at my turn. I lie in my job professionally, so it was not difficult creating a believable story. I talked of a first love that someone who used to be shy and quiet like me would’ve had in middle school. It was about a boy who I had only talked to once. Of course, I never talked to a boy even once during all 3 years of middle school. Everyone bought it though. They thought it was pure but bittersweet. They do not know true bitterness.

When Sunghee started talking, who majored in music composition, everyone started simmering down. Sunghee confessed to us that he is a gay man. And also that his first love wasn’t in middle school, nor high school, but actually in university. With a professor at that. (We all knew the teacher because he was one of the youngest teachers in our campus, in his mid 30s.) Giyu, who majored in engineering, and has a voice as gigantuous as his beer belly, laughed out loud. “How come only your story actually sounds like it’s from some romance movie!”

Sunghee said it’s not that fun of a story. Before then, in his senior high school year, he had awakened his sexuality. So he explained that every relationship or sexual attraction mixed with confusion caused by social pressure, were all not real. But those extreme feelings he felt for his piano teacher felt so natural, felt just “right,” that he could point to that teacher as his first love. Of course, the two never developed into that sort of relationship. To this, some people chattered, saying, “I did think Sunghee acted weird when that guy was around.”

“Now that I think about it,” Sunghee raised his glass and shook it. Smiling, he looked at the slashing liquid. “I think I wanted a man who would treat me like a father. Even when I foolishly thought I liked women, I liked the relationships I had with those sort of men the most, especially spending time with older students. An older man who would hug me like my father, but wasn’t actually my dad. I think my type is still that sorta guy. Just like how straight guys just want a mother they can fuck.”

To these words, every man in the room went dead silent, only nodding their heads. All the women, excluding me, would only look at each other’s faces with confused looks.

The night was long. Half of the restaurant had fallen asleep. Some were even whispering that they could go another round. Terrified at that thought, I just looked at my glass of water. I could see my face, blurry and distorted. That face was trying its best to smile.

I looked over to Sunghee. He was sitting by the table next to mine. Around him, his former music class buddies were leaning against him, snoring. They had a band back in university. I didn’t really like them. They had no energy. It felt like a band that was formed just because a bunch of kids who knew how to play instruments happened to be together in one spot. Couldn’t feel the rock ‘n’ roll.

Sunghee, despite having all that weight pushed onto him, didn’t really seem to mind the weight. I was curious about that. I would’ve thrown a fit. It’d be a funny scene, actually. There was a similar occurrence back when I was in high school.

Sunghee noticed my presence while looking at his phone. When our eyes met, I was surprised and instinctively turned my head. But the only ones still awake were just us two. Sunghee went over and sat next to me, smiling.

“Uh, what was your name again?” He asked.
“Sia. Lee Sia.”
“Oh. Sorry to keep asking, but how old are you?”
“27. No problem.”
“Oh. I’m one year older.”
“Yes.”
“Yeah. You can lighten up, you know.”
“No.”
“Ok...”

He showed me a smile then looked down. I stared at my glass of water. I remembered his story again. I remembered it being weirdly relatable. That made me open my mouth.

“How's your love life going since then?” I stared at him.
“Huh?” He raised his head and looked at me. “Oh, no. Had a few boyfriends. But how far can a pianist go with romance, really. You just end up becoming a slave to the music.” He had a self-deprecating attitude. I could tell this even before.
“I see. Writing is similar.”
“I figured.”

I raised my glass. With my eyes closed, I emptied it into my mouth. Now that the inside of my mouth was wet, I felt like I wanted to say something important like him too. I hadn’t even drank a sip of beer, but I ended up thinking of something so dumb. My fears idiotically shrinked.

“You know.”
“Yeah?”
“The story that I told. It was all a lie.”

Sunghee looked at me for a second, then, looking elsewhere afterwards, nodded his head.

“I thought so.”
“Really?”
“At least, it didn’t sound like a story you wanted to tell. I could tell you were omitting something.”
“That’s right. Because...”

Before continuing, I gulped.

“I like women.”
“Oh...” His mouth went wide open. His pupils started straying to the side, along with his neck. “I see!” He raised his voice to compensate for the nervousness in it.
“Be quiet.”
“Oh, then... You haven’t told anyone else?”
“Why would I do that, such a dumb thing. It’s not like there are guys out there hitting on me.”
“Makes sense.”

Sunghee just continued to nod. He stretched his arm out and grabbed a drink that somebody left. He spread his limbs out and arranged it comfortably. Looking at him, I also stretched my legs. I pulled a cigarette out from my pocket. I bought it just in case I needed to relieve some stress on the way back home, but I figured it’d be better to smoke it then. I also pulled out a lighter and lit it up.

I’m afraid of anyone seeing me smoke - no, I’m afraid of anyone seeing me do anything except stay still. So, even though the only person around to see it was Sunghee, I only let out the smoke towards the corner, in short bursts. Though, smoke would just drift by the air and spread to the whole room anyways. I kept watching out. My stress only heightened.

No matter how I tried, the smoke spread out further in the restaurant. It was my fault. Now everyone sleeping was breathing in my smoke. Smoke, and how it spread like a plague, reminded me of the social paradigm known as love. The smoke went into everyone’s lungs like a thief, though not consciously. And most importantly, had it not been for me, that didn’t need to happen. It was I who had forced upon the benzene. I felt great guilt for this catastrophe which I caused for my own selfish relief of stress. And this was the same guilt that I had felt countless times every time I’d smoked before. Yet, I never quit it.

I almost cried. I decided to stop thinking about this. I didn’t want to be known as a woman who was invited to an alumni meet, didn’t even say anything, and cried while everyone was sleeping and ran. (Though, in retrospect, I think I did end up being known like that) To reset my mind, I started talking to Sunghee again.

“What do you think about this whole, love thing, Sunghee?”
“This whole love thing?”
“Like, how it just comes to you, all that natural attraction stuff. I honestly have no clue.”
“Really? You must’ve had someone you liked too, right. How could you have found out otherwise.”
“...I did.” Maybe it was because of the cigarette, but my voice had gotten rough. I cleared my throat. “I just don’t think love’s actually all that romantic. Love was created artificially, after all.
“How?”
“For example, if we had never heard or learned about love growing up, we would’ve never thought about it. Love isn’t all that innate to human beings. It’s all social.”
“But love, in the end, is a result of a biological reaction. You can’t say it isn’t entirely based on science.”
"You might be right. Even if I didn’t know love, I would still be attracted to women sexually, and you would like men sexually. But there’s no guarantee that we would necessarily harbor special feelings for anyone or take our relationship to another level."
"Probably. In a world without love, that may end up being the norm."
"Yes. In fact, wouldn’t such a world be better? A world without embarrassing unrequited love, or confusing relationship issues; a world where people are treated as just people."
“Hm.” Sunghee wondered with a very serious look on his face, then looked at me with an answer. “If you ask me, I wouldn’t want to live in that world. Actually, it scares me, even.”

Once my cigarette ran out, I pulled out a wet wipe, folded it then put it back in my pocket. I drank another sip of water, but the ashes flushing down my throat was such a painful feeling. I laid down on the table.

“I think I have to go now.” I said, with a voice that was all dead.
“Huh? You aren’t even saying goodbye to the others?”
“It’s not like I know any of them that well.” This was half a lie. I have memories of making some good friends in university. At least, I knew the names and degrees of everyone who was there in the meet. I just stayed quiet because I was afraid to know the answer on whether they remembered me.
“Alright. Then take care, Sia.”
“Yes. I hope you find luck too, Sunghee. With romance.”
“Then I’ll pray for you too, Sia - for you to find someone. Someone who would make you stop believing in a world without love.”

I stood up right after and started running away. On the hallway leading outside, I saw Jihye - the girl with the media degree - coming out of the bathroom. Her makeup was undone. Thinking back, it seemed like she was crying back then, but everyone knew to stay quiet.

“Oh, where are you going, Sia?” Jihye had remembered my name. I had not known this. Though I did have some history with media class folks.
“I’m going home.”
“Oh, yeah. We should, too.” I heard an unusually unemphasized voice without any power from Jihye; one that I haven’t heard before. Then she, without hesitation, put strength in her voice again. “Hey, you mother fuckers!”

Jihye went inside the room again, which was mostly filled with people sleeping or a few fiddling around in their phones, and yelled at everybody. With the room having gotten loud again, I just froze there, still, not being able to get out. Everybody said short goodbyes to one another, including Sunghee, and got ready to head out. I went out before everybody. It was a late evening, at 11 PM. I keep remembering the night sky I saw after leaving the restaurant. The shape of the moon was apparent, but its light blurry. Remembering that blur, it reminds me of a different memory; a memory much, much distant.

There is one story that serves as a good example of everything I just said. It is from back when I was in high school; a story of a long time ago. It is a story of my only love. A story of two girls. A story of rock ‘n’ roll. This is a story that happened one summer, ten years ago.