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One-two-three, one-two-three.
His steps are still beating out the little rhytm. It still echoes in his head, even as he walks home from the station. One-two-three, one-two-three, his feet kicking out a joyful little waltz on the pavement.
She's in his thoughts still, too. Just at the edge. He feels her lovely eyes on him, hwich should feel weird, because he noticed she didn't seem to look at him all that much actually - to the point it was noticeable.
But there were oh-so many other noticeable things about her to occupy his thoughts with.
The image of her in front of the revolving door. He wasn't shocked by her troubles with them - his time as a volunteer has made him more than aware of the wide range of what people can struggle with and left him with a deep-seated instinct to accomodate without asking questions. No, what stuck out to him was the single minded determination with which she worked on geting through, even when the standard door was already available. Whatever was a challenge for her, she wanted to overcome.
He smiles to himself in the evening. They told him she was a handful, but he found her anything but. It's been a while since someything truly extraordinary happened in his orbit. He walked home with an uncertain but delectable feeling that maybe he just witnessed a beginning of something like that. He'd have to ask her for lunch or something.
While in his chest, his heart beats out incessantly.
One-two-three, one-two-three.
***
Yes, she did look magical in a wedding dress, of course she looked magical in a damn wedding dress!
Damn spy intrigues and undercover missions, lawyering was supposed to be a desk job. He would gladly play at subterfuge every day thought, if that meant he would get more sights like this, like Woo Young Woo stepping towards him in a pristine white wedding gown, with gentle timidness on her face, her short, sleek hair adorned with an airy veil, while her big, sincere eyes looked at him. At him.
Almost.
Because her eyes were not looking at him, they were darting off to the side uncomfortably. The fine fabrics, no matter how light they seemed, made her uncomfortable. She made for a pleasing scene, but she was not a scene, she was a person and that person did not feel comfortable like this.
It felt shameful to enjoy it as much as he did, awestruck and speechless.
He hasn’t talked about Woo Young Woo to that many people in his life yet – mostly because the experience would quickly turn sour if he let something show. And boy, did he ever. He wasn’t even sure what it was that gave him away, but somewhere along the way, while he talked about her great, passionate personality, her vast knowledge or her brilliant mind (ok, so maybe it wasn’t that much of a mystery how people knew after all), someone would find it appropriate to voice their concerns.
Because apparently it was one thing to have an autistic friend. But an autistic girlfriend? Autistic wife? Autistic mother of his children? What would his family think? Some had the audacity to ask how he would do this and that with a touch-averse girl. And really, they are not prejudiced, but is that really practical?
And here was the thing.
Fuck ‘em. Jun Ho could not care less about their opinions. But there was one thing he did care about, and it was Young Woo’s opinion.
He tried his best to approach her with understanding, but he still didn’t know as much as he could wish about the life of a person with autism. His approach was less informed by any particular knowledge he had and more by a certain approach he took in responding to things as they happened, one of understanding and patience. Even after he did his research and found that yes, some autistic people did marry and start families, the question still remained. Where did Young Woo fit into all this? Was she interested in marriage, or even dating in general?
The last thing we would want to do was to force her into a mould she didn’t fit. To drag her to the altar kicking, screaming, shoving her hands against her ears, in a horrible dress.
So instead he waited, talked to her and very consistently told himself not to get ahead with his daydreams every time the image of her in that dress crept back into his mind.
***
Jun Ho knows the value that routine and predictability play to Young Woo. Predictable dish, one that will not choke her with a flavor or texture that her body refuses, shutting off the esophagus. Familiar clothes, ones that will not bite her skin with tags and itching materials. He took the time to learn about her habits, why she does the things that she does, and frequently, why she doesn’t do the things she doesn’t do.
He didn’t expect himself to come to appreciate predictability in a more intimate, personal way. All his life, the leading word to associate with “predictability” is “boredom”. Maybe “stagnation”.
But.
When he walks around town and sees a beluga-shaped plushie in a shop window. When he stumbles upon a nature documentary late in the evening. When he orders gimbap for takeout after a stressful day out.
It makes him think of her. Every time, it’s like she left pieces of herself scattered around the world for him to spot and think of her. Every time, it makes him feel a little lighter, walk with a little more spring in his step, see the colours of the world a little less realistically, a little brighter and more pastel, like they’re starring in a damn romcom. Every time, he thinks “this is something Young Woo would love” and smiles.
Because she’s just predictable like that.
***
He texts her sometimes in the evenings, when he finds something online he thinks she might like. He’s soon made his peace with the fact that she knows so much more than him, so whatever weird creature he sends her for her amusement, she already knows it and has something to tell him about it. This is fine too. Giving her an opportunity to talk seems to make her just as happy and she’s an infinite well of marine knowledge, about so much more than just whales.
She tells him about the sea snails living deep in hydrothermal vents of the Indian Ocean, obtaining food through symbiosis with a species of bacteria and filtering iron salts from the water to build scaly armours with them.
She tells him about the leafy seadragons, who look like living pieces of seaweed and are different from seahorses because their tails are not prehensile and they keep their eggs attached to their tails, rather than in their bellies.
She tells him of the Portuguese man o’war, which looks like a jellyfish, but isn’t one, it isn’t one in general, because it’s not a singular organism – it’s a colony of organisms who all perform narrow, specialized functions within it, like a hivemind.
She tells him about fish of all kinds of bizarre shapes, of sarcastic fringeheads who use their comically huge mouths to fight for territory, of tasseled wobbegongs, who are sharks, but you’d never think that because they don’t look like any shark you’ve ever seen, of macropinna microstoma with its eyes encased inside a transparent skull, of the sea lampreys who look like you took one of those horrible trap holes with spikes angled inwards, and then made that thing a mouth on an eel.
It leaves Jun Ho thinking about the variety of nature and about the great & many wondrous ways to be alive.
Still, whales remain her most beloved. If Young Woo loves the marine life in general in the same way a kid might love dinosaurs, in a distant and awestruck way, then she loves whales in a way someone might love dogs, wanting to fill their house with them and rescue every stray off the street. Of course Young Woo can’t turn her house into a whale shelter, but her room is the next best thing.
He never texts her about whales. The rest of ocean’s creatures she can talk about over the phone, but he wants to be there when she talks about whales, he wants to watch her enthusiasm. Her face doesn’t always light up, she doesn’t always smile prettily, but her body does always make it clear she loves talking about it. Sometimes it’s in her movements instead, quick, erratic and jerky, as a gesture of her arm sends a narwhal sailing through the air. Whatever it might be, he always feels honoured to witness it.
***
The first basement floor is just on the right side of busy, “lively”, rather than “overwhelming”. He can tell by the way Young Woo’s posture is more relaxed, not slouched apprehensively. He watches her meticulously unpack the box with her lunch, the small, intricate ritual of it, her fingers seeming almost reverent. He takes a bite of his own food and waits patiently. He doesn’t have to wait long.
- Have you ever heard of 52 Blue?
He shakes his head, a little amused, because that sounds like a title of a sci-fi series.
- I’m afraid not.
Her expression goes serious and she slaps both her hands on the table, before she starts:
- It’s also known as The Loneliest Whale – that’s weirdly poetic, a thought flitters through Jun Ho’s mind, but he doesn’t want to interrupt. – It emits calls at a unique frequency of 52 hertz, which is where the name comes from, see? It’s the only individual producing calls at this frequency. It’s migration patterns most closely resemble those of the blue whale, but those only emit calls at 10 to 39 hertz, which makes 52 Blue’s call much higher in frequency. Presumably it cannot communicate with other whales because of this. There are some who theorize that the whale could be deaf.
She goes quiet for a second – uncharacteristic for her rapid-fire delivery. Her fingers flex, twined together on the table in front of her, and she stares off into some point beyond his shoulder. He waits for her to find her words.
- I thought about 52 Blue a lot when I was younger. - when she speaks now, it's stuttering, her voice devoid of that uninflected, rapid-fire quality, a tell-tale sign she's hit the wall of facts and is now delving into something... else. - Because I am autistic, it’s not always easy for me to tell what others are feeling. My dad says that it was worse when I was a child, that it wasn’t even that I didn’t know, so much that I didn’t truly care to know. I don’t remember myself as a child, but I do remember caring a lot about what 52 Blue must’ve felt like. I thought I knew what it must be like. To want to connect so much but being unable to, because you were somehow born emitting the wrong frequency and now no one knows how to read you.
He doesn't say anything, he knows she's not done yet, but his hands shake a little as he brings the chopstick to his mouth. He wishes he could reach into Young Woo's chest and pull out that feeling. He doesn't wish to change her, but he does burn with a desire to change a world which makes her feel that way. Retune. Readjust some dial. Anything.
- No one’s ever actually seen it, you know? The 52 hertz whale. They only ever made recordings of it. When I was a child, I thought that I will become a scientist and make actually finding it my life’s mission. And then, once I find it, I’ll get in a wetsuit and diving gear, dive down to meet it and maybe it’ll turn out that I, too, spoke in 52 hertz all along. Of course, I didn’t become a scientist. It was only ever marine biologist of attorney, and attorney was easier. But I still think about it.
Jun Ho knows at this point Young Woo’s penchant for talking in extended metaphors. Others caught up to some degree too, learned to tell when she was just going off and when she had some hidden point she was getting to, in her meandering way. Most of their coworkers have taken to cutting in when she got like this, asking her to skip the buildup and get to whatever point she actually intended to make. Jun Ho tended to opt against it – why wouldn’t he, if it helped Young Woo express herself? If it made her feel like she conveyed her point better to a world that so frequently misunderstood her?
- Finally, I came to work here, I met you. You are the first person who’s not a part of my family who picked up on the call. I care about my dad a lot, even if I can’t always show him, but it makes me feel reassured when I find that people outside my house can treat me like that too.
Reality is shifting all around him. Time slows down, then speeds up, then does a somersault. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, don’t get ahead, don’t…” but it’s too late, neuroreceptors already fired and his insides swirl like liquid, and a wave of giddiness he feels nearly knocks him out, makes him sick but in the best of ways.
- Oh? Does that make me another 52 Blue?
She looks at him for a moment before schooling her face in an expression she undoubtedly spent a lot of time training in front of the mirror. He can see the photo underlined with a description – “confusion”.
- No. The whale is a metaphor.
He nods thoughtfully.
- Of course
- It’s a metaphor for neurodivergent life. “Neurodivergent” is a term used to differentiate those with conditions like autism, ADHD, mental illnesses or trauma from the general population without turning to stigmatizing language of juxtaposing us with “normal” people. You are not neurodivergent, you are neurotypical, which is the opposite of the term. You are more like… - she pauses, looking for the right way to put her thoughts – You are like a marine researcher who took the time to study the whale and decode its signals and find it, because he cared about it so much and wanted to actually see it.
Oh, no way.
He looks at her, her eyes darting nervously around. She seemed nervous, a little uncomfortable and he’s sure now. His hunches are not misleading him about what’s happening.
He would sweep her up in a hug if given the permission. He would sweep her off her feet, let everyone see, take a page out of her book and take the filter of social propriety off the feelings swirling madly in his chest.
But. He knows it would overwhelm her, cause her distress. So instead, he puts his hand on the table between them. Just a noncommittal offer.
- Jun Ho, are you offering to hold my hand? – she asks.
- Only if you want.
For a second it feels like he miscalculated, but then her fingertips rest against his, an awkward, flitting movement before they settle more comfortably.
He wants to laugh. He wants to tell her he loves her. He wants to sing her a whale song. He kinda wants to kiss her too.
But this is fine.
- Thank you for telling me, Attorney Woo. I’m happy to have discovered you too.