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Autumn arrives in a slow gust of chilly air and falling leaves and the semester begins as per normal with students and teachers alike rustling through the aged walls of the local university. Despite it being a couple weeks since term started, many plodding footsteps still find themselves shaking off the post summer laze that has a tendency to cling. Like every autumn semester, Professor Hwang Hyunjin of the Arts and Humanities Departments prepares to conduct class in lecture theatre thirteen. A range of students filter in, mostly from the Arts department but there’s a good handful of poor shmucks from other degrees who had mistakenly believed that a class called ‘Visual Arts and Culture’ would involve looking at pictures and calling it a day. It is nothing of that sort, Professor Hwang runs a brutal regime and refuses to let the sanctity of art be desecrated by oblivious students trying to fulfil graduation requirements. In spite of that, his charm, passion, and bright nature otherwise is enough for the module to remain popular amongst students.
Jiwoo shuffles in with the rest of the 10.45am shuttle bus crowd and takes her regular seat in row three. Jinsol is already there, determinedly trying to speed read a fifty-six page reading in the span of fifteen minutes. She’s impressively halfway through and still valiantly not giving up. Professor Hwang had also arrived already, clacking at his keyboard and shuffling papers in a composed sort of fluster that is artistic on him. They are post-first-assignment-of-the-term and while the students have finished their hard won battle, it seems the marking load has weathered their poor professor slightly.
“Alright, as you all know today we will be moving on to a new visual arts era.” Professor Hwang announces once the time officially hits eleven and class begins. A soft echo of sighs sweeps through the theatre but it does nothing to deter Professor Hwang. He is mid-consoling the class about the next era being allegedly “less convoluted” when there’s a soft rap against the door. A beat after, the door cracks open and a head of immaculately neat brown hair pops in.
“Pardon me,” Professor Kim Seungmin nods towards the lecture hall before he turns to the other man and lifts a small takeaway cup. “Prof Hwang, your coffee.”
Professor Hwang lets out a soft gasp and crosses over to rescue the cup, thanking him before Professor Kim makes his swift exit. It’s nothing much out of the ordinary, if you arrive early enough you could sometimes see the two walking to the lecture theatres together with their morning coffees before going their separate ways. However, to students who find much more interest in gossip rather than the impressionist era, they pounce on the chance to derail class like over excited possums.
“Prof, you’re smiling.” Someone points out with a cheeky grin.
“Oh come now, wouldn’t you be enamoured if a handsome gentleman brings you coffee?” Professor Hwang waves off with a good natured chuckle as he sets the coffee down.
“He thinks Prof Kim is handsome.” Someone else stage whispers from the second row.
“His ears are red too, Prof Hwang has a crush!” Another student sing-songs from the front row with the audacity of someone on the cusp of adulthood. “Prof Kim better be ready to be swept off his feet!”
“I do wish that you would harbor such an analytical eye when it comes to your actual assignments.” Professor Hwang rolls his eyes as he flips open his file with a decisiveness that ends the conversation. “And I’ll have you know Professor Kim is happily married.”
There’s a chorus of disgruntled murmurs and some students even try to begin a chant to comfort their professor before Professor Hwang stamps it down and directs their melancholic sympathy to the tragic subject of their pieces today.
“Hey, do you think Prof Hwang actually has a crush on Prof Kim?” Jinsol whispers to Jiwoo as their professor pulls up their slides. Having given up on conquering the reading in time, it seems like her attention has been diverted to other matters. Their other friend, Lily, is more than happy to provide her input.
“I mean there’s definitely good feelings between the two.” Lily says as if she had been waiting to voice this out the whole semester. Jiwoo continues taking her notes; she actually has to do well in this class. “But I don’t know, do you think it’s really possible?”
“Let’s be real,” Jinsol says with a certainty like she's laying down law. “Prof Hwang could be queer in some way but Prof Kim? I doubt it. He’s traditional as they come. And Prof Hwang is way too old to be pining over a doomed homoerotic relationship, he should know better by now.”
“I suppose that’s true. Anyway, Prof Kim is already married.” Lily muses with a sigh. “Plus, they’re university professors in a conservative country. Can they even say the word ‘gay’ without getting fired?”
“Yeah, they’re probably just really close friends.” The two make one last joke about how history would deem their professors ‘besties’ before turning to Jiwoo to beg for her notes upon realising Professor Hwang is already on slide fourteen and they haven’t taken down anything. Jiwoo sighs and relents because they always do the same for her in other subjects too. What are friends for after all.
-
It’s a Tuesday afternoon which means English class tutorials for Jiwoo. It’s one of the few classes that she doesn’t get to take with Jinsol and Lily because Jinsol is ahead in terms of English and it would wreck the bell curve for Lily’s Australian-raised ass to step into any English classes. It is, however, the class that is conducted by the infamous Professor Kim.
Unlike Professor Hwang who undoubtedly has a fanclub of wistful admirers, Professor Kim is more of an if you know you know type figure. He is pleasant enough in Beginner’s English classes where he gently corrects pronunciation and explains vocabulary but Jiwoo has heard that he’s a real cut-throat terror in the Political Science department where his expertise lies. His final year advanced courses are notoriously killer but guaranteed to unlock a new level of cognitive enlightenment if you survive it. Thank goodness Jiwoo would never have to experience that, she would much rather preserve her impression of Professor Kim patiently guiding them through tricky consonants than find out what it feels like to be on the receiving end of his cold, evaluative judgement.
“Prof Kim!! Where did you get your iPad cover? It’s so pretty!” A student gushes in awe before class as Professor Kim organises his desk.
“Oh this? It’s actually my spouse’s. I had to borrow it because I forgot to charge mine.” Their professor explains as he turns the iPad cover around with a soft smile. His wedding band catches the fluorescent light of the classroom. For the fact Professor Kim is otherwise devoid of accessories of any kind, his wedding ring is a piece of jewelry that seems to be welded to his ring finger. There is no doubt to what it is even though the class has never asked, why else would a man as prim and proper as him wear a ring? Anyway, though he strictly declines to share much of his private life, Professor Kim has never been awkward about mentioning his spouse on the rare occasion.
The girl then asks where it was bought from before Professor Kim gently breaks the news that it’s custom made. A faint voice in the back of Jiwoo’s mind points out that for it being custom made, it has an oddly similar art style to Professor Hwang’s phone cover but she brushes the thought away before it can coalesce into any true form. After all, she’s not here to speculate about her professor’s love lives, she's here to pass the beginner’s English course so that she can apply for an overseas exchange program with higher chances of success. Either way, Professor Kim promptly begins the lesson proper and the thought, that oddly sounds a lot like the excited chirping of Jinsol and Lily, gets buried in underneath rules of Subject Verb agreement that make no sense.
-
Jiwoo is lost.
Figuratively in the sense of English but right now more in a literal sense as she wanders the halls of the staff offices. She’s twenty minutes early to her meeting with Professor Kim and it’s now she realises that having only corresponded with Professor Kim over email, she has no idea how to ask for further directions to his office without pulling out her laptop. At this rate, she might take the whole extra twenty minutes to find this place.
“Jiwoo?”
Jiwoo startles slightly at the sound of her name and whips around in a panic, half expecting to be told off for loitering in the staff area. Instead, she’s met with the concerned furrowed brow of her visual arts professor.
“Prof Hwang,” Jiwoo breathes a sigh of relief as he approaches her.
“Do you need anything? You seem a little frazzled.”
“I’m…a little lost. Would you happen to know where Professor Kim’s office is?” Jiwoo asks sheepishly.
“Ah, follow me.” Professor Hwang beckons her gently and leads her down the corridor.
“It can be a bit tricky to find if you’re not familiar with it since it’s tucked away in a corner.” Her professor explains when they reach a door with the clear printed plaque of A/P KIM SEUNGMIN. “Professor Kim just stepped out to fetch something and will be back soon. You can wait inside first.” Professor Hwang swiftly punches in the door code to unlock the door and opens it for Jiwoo to step in. The office is as neat and tidy as the person himself with sturdy shelves that are filled to the brim with hardcover books. On the table, there’s a laptop and Jiwoo’s test paper laid out neatly in preparation for their meeting, which assures Jiwoo she had not gotten the timing wrong. Jiwoo gives a flustered bow and Professor Hwang returns her a kind smile before he leaves the door ajar behind him.
As Jiwoo sits and waits for Professor Kim to appear, she can’t help the question that pops into her mind.
Why does Professor Hwang know the door code to Professor Kim’s office?
-
Midterm break comes and goes and everyone mourns to see it pass so fast. For many students, the one week of break is spent catching up on sleep or assignments and not so much on a break at all. Nevertheless, the students still seem to have a little more vitality when they come back into class.
Jiwoo returns to Tuesday’s visual arts class with a little more spring in her step, having had more time to herself to recharge. Professor Hwang begins class lightly by simply showing pictures of art works from his personal gallery.
“Every person has a certain bias. No matter how much you try to keep a technical view, there is bound to be some of your personal experiences guiding what you pay attention to.” Professor Hwang explains as he clicks through his slides. “But that’s the beauty of art, it speaks differently to each person.” He illustrates his point by drawing similarities between the paintings that catch his eye in his spare time. “For example, here’s one of the recent paintings that has caught my eye…”
“Prof Hwang truly does have a passion for this, doesn’t he?” Lily comments with a soft laugh. “Personally, I like it the most when he shares about his own experiences.”
“Maybe we should take a page out of his book and visit a gallery sometime.” Jinsol suggests. “That ought to widen our perspective.”
The two hours pass by and by the end of class, the trio of friends are shyly approaching their professor to ask for recommendations of galleries to visit. Professor Hwang quite literally lights up when he hears their request.
“Leeum Museum of Art and the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art always have some interesting exhibitions you can check out.” Professor Hwang suggests as he helpfully writes down the names and specific gallery titles he recommends.
“Where is the last picture from?” Jiwoo ventures. The last art work in particular had caught her eye.
“Oh! That one was from the Jeju Museum of Contemporary Art. I went on a short trip during the break.”
“Ah, lucky!” Lily squeals excitedly. “Did you have fun?”
“Very much so, I think I ate so many tangerines I was about to burst!” Professor Hwang jokes and his eyes fold into crescents in a genuine way that doesn’t often happen during class. “Perhaps you can go once the term is over.”
“We’ll definitely consider it, thank you Professor Hwang!” The three bow and excuse themselves before they’re late for the next class. Unfortunately for the three girls, their bubbling plans of a trip would have to wait as there was still half a term more to conquer.
Tuesday rolls around and Jiwoo is back in English class trying desperately to memorise phrases for their upcoming Oral examination that go beyond “I’m fine thank you and you?”. Early as always, Professor Kim walks into class with a healthy glow to his skin.
“Wow Prof, did you get a tan?” Someone bluntly asks from the front row.
“Not intentionally, but I did spend a lot of time outdoors during the break.” Professor Kim entertains with a suave coolness that is polite but not overly friendly.
“Oh, like sports?”
“No. I went on a trip to Jeju-do with my spouse.” The same soft smile that always appears on his face whenever Professor Kim mentions his spouse makes an appearance once again.
Jiwoo’s ears immediately perk up despite not being involved in the conversation and that one thought she had at the beginning of term resurrects from the recesses of her mind and swims to the surface on its own accord. She shakes her head. She’s being ridiculous, Jeju Island is a popular local tourist spot, it’s no surprise that more than one of their university faculty would go there especially given how short the break is. Yeah, that made complete sense. It’s pure coincidence. And Professor Kim has been mentioning his spouse long before this whole debacle had even existed. She’s just jumping to conclusions because she’s being influenced by her peers who have nothing better to do but tease poor Professor Hwang.
“On that note, today’s conversation topic is about vacations…”
Jiwoo tries her very best to focus but somewhere in the back of her mind, the information that she has unintentionally become privy to continues jangling around like a baby’s bauble.
-
It’s the final two weeks to the end of semester. Assignments and projects are piling up, students are facing the threat of their final grade’s fate, and Jiwoo has pretty much forgotten about her growing suspicions in lieu of wrestling her final essay topic for her Visual Arts and Culture class. Her essay outline had made sense when she first drafted it but halfway through writing, she realised a contradiction in her thesis that she could not work out for the life of her. One panicstricken email sent at 2am later, Professor Hwang had kindly squeezed in a timing for a consultation.
“Apologies for the late hour, Jiwoo. This was the only time I had available to meet.” Her professor says once she’s settled down in his office with her laptop and notes.
“Not at all, Professor. I’m sorry for intruding on your time and thank you so much for your help.” Jiwoo quickly apologizes as well. The time is 8pm and Professor Hwang’s hours for consultations usually end at seven the latest but apparently Jiwoo had sounded distraught enough for him to make an exception. Professor Hwang good naturedly waves it off and assures her that such situations always pop up towards the end of term and it’s really no trouble.
“I quite like the direction that you are going towards with your essay Jiwoo but I do agree there’s quite a lot of issues you’re trying to tackle at once. That, of course, will make it more prone to running into contradictions.” Professor Hwang feedbacks after hearing out her concerns. He adjusts his reading glasses as he skims through what Jiwoo has written thus far. “It’s not a bad thing to want to relate your thesis to different issues but for the sake of your essay, I would recommend you narrow down the scope.”
Jiwoo furiously jots down the advice, relieved that she hadn’t been told to scrap the whole thing like she had feared.
“But Professor, I still don’t know how to make sense of the contradiction. Don’t I need to provide a resolution to it in my essay?” Jiwoo frets.
“Do you?” Professor Hwang asks back to which Jiwoo draws up a blank face.
“Wouldn’t my essay fail to answer the question if I don’t?” She ventures in confusion.
“Arts and cultures are hardly ever clear cut, Jiwoo. I find it quite impossible to define it even after years of researching them. In fact, I enjoy my research because of their fluidity.” Professor Hwang chuckles. “The purpose of my assignment is less about answering a question and more about having students provide their own perspective on their chosen topic. What’s important is for you to justify why you view it that way. Remember what I said about personal experiences influencing how you view art?”
Jiwoo nods slowly as a new way to tackle her essay starts to take shape in her mind.
“Well, that’s all I can give you without imposing too much of my own opinion onto your work.” Professor Hwang leans back, satisfied to see the cogs turning behind her eyes. “Do you have any other questions for me?”
Right before Jiwoo can open her mouth again, there's a soft knock on the door.
“Come in.” Professor Hwang calls out.
“Hyunjin, are you ready to–oh.” Professor Kim steps in before he freezes when his eyes land on Jiwoo. “Hello Jiwoo.” His eyes flit from Jiwoo to the other man. “I did not realise you still had students here.” He continues cautiously.
“We’re just finishing up, I’ll be done soon.” Professor Hwang shoots him an apologetic smile. “I’ll meet you at the carpark?”
“Alright.” Professor Kim nods and ducks back out of the room. Professor Hwang flashes Jiwoo a warm smile as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened at all.
“I suppose that’s our cue to head home for the night.” He heaves himself out of the chair. Jiwoo supposes this must not be out of the ordinary for them at all from Professor Hwang’s reaction. What was that supposed to mean? “Professor Kim can get a little crabby if he’s kept waiting long.”
Jiwoo nods even though she has no idea what she’d do with that information and scrambles to get her things together so that she can make herself scarce. Her professor wishes her the best of luck with her essay and assures her he looks forward to reading it before sending her off.
Jiwoo returns home, churns out the rest of her essay to strike while the iron is hot and she’s able to get a new rough draft done by the end of the night. Only while she’s lying under her blankets at night does she allow her mind to replay the events of the evening and the outlandish assumption she has not allowed herself to acknowledge fully forms. But it couldn’t be.
Could it?
-
“I think Professor Hwang and Professor Kim are together.” Jiwoo blurts out the next time she, Lily and Jinsol meet. The two other girls pause to stare at her before they both burst out into laughter.
“Where did that come from?” Jinsol asks with an amused giggle. “Didn’t we settle that question at the start of the term?”
“I–I don’t know! I can’t prove it but I just have a feeling.” Jiwoo persists. The more she thought about the more it just made sense. The iPad, the door code, the vacation…it all pieces itself together with the clarity and absurdity of a mad man’s conspiracy theory.
“Come on, Jiwoo. It’s fun to gossip about our professors but you can’t actually be serious, right?” Lily replies gently, sounding in no way dismissive or condescending because she’s Lily and constitutionally made of sunshine and daisies. “Don’t get me wrong, I believe in love is love and it would make such a cute love story but Professor Kim is like, super married and last I checked, our laws haven’t progressed that far.”
“Yeah and Professor Hwang doesn’t wear a wedding band. I took his Romanticism class last year, he’d definitely be the type to wear it if he had one.” Jinsol adds on. “But I do think they make a cute ship! If Professor Kim wasn’t so obviously off the market I would be shipping them together hard.”
“That’s not actually what Romanticism means in that context but I do see your point…” Jiwoo trails off. It is hard to imagine Professor Kim diverging from the standard late thirties Korean man archetype and if she recalls correctly, Professor Hwang has fleetingly implied going on dates in candid conversation before. Maybe she was just seeing things that weren’t there after all. Yet, her gut feeling is telling her she’s right, she just knows it.
Ultimately, she lets out a sigh and concedes defeat because frankly, it really isn’t her business and she’s feeling like perhaps the post assignment stress is making her hallucinate. The faint nagging protest that tells her she’s right eventually fades out into the void as the term ends, they submit their final assignments and move on to more relaxing days of their lives. The mystery of Professor Hwang and Professor Kim remains unanswered and turns into nothing but a fond memory to look back on.
-
The term ends, deadlines pass, and students all gleefully flutter off to enjoy their winter break. Unfortunately for faculty members, they are shackled to work just a couple of weeks more to finish up marking and grading their classes before they can officially bid goodbye to the term.
“If I read another essay of baseless sweeping statements stacked together masquerading as a thesis, I’m going to gouge out my eyeballs.” Hyunjin groans as he rips his reading glasses off his face so he can massage the crease in his brow. “I explicitly told them not to write like this after the midterm.”
“There there, they’re still learning and growing little fledglings, aren’t they?” Seungmin consoles as if he hadn’t just brutally slaughtered his advanced classes. But in the case of Seungmin, he has already established a reputation of being a merciless marker. He walks up to behind Hyunjin to massage his shoulders and Hyunjin tips his head back to rest against his stomach and pouts.
“I’m fine with learning and growing little fledglings, but there’s a difference between those who are trying but confused and those that just don’t care.” Hyunjin grades the essay a C-. He remembers this student, or at least the blatant absence and shoddy work of theirs. It’s always like this with the general education classes that students are forced to take. Thankfully, he only has a couple more scripts of this module before he can move on to his actual classes where students are actually interested in what’s being taught.
“I can’t do this anymore Minnie, they’re going to give me more gray hairs than I already have.” Hyunjin laments dramatically and swoons backwards.
“I keep telling you to take a sabbatical.” Seungmin chuckles as he cards his hands through Hyunjin’s sliver speckled black hair. It’s genetic rather than stress related, Hyunjin has had white hair ever since they were in their mid twenties. A feeble attempt by the universe to even out the otherwise genetic jackpot that is Hwang Hyunjin. “Spend more time painting and whatnot. What about your plans to put together a gallery of your own, hmm?”
Seungmin cups the cheek of the man below him. Hyunjin’s own hand comes up to rest over it, his finger rubbing over the smooth wedding band. Unlike Seungmin, Hyunjin wears his on a chain around his neck because he spends way too much time fiddling with different artistic mediums and one ill fated pottery incident later, Hyunjin had become sufficiently scared and kept his wedding band safely tucked behind his shirt and out of the way of any of his artworks ever since.
“I know, but I do enjoy teaching the classes I get to design. Hearing student’s perspectives always inspires me.” Hyunjin sighs wistfully. Alas, it is part of his teaching contract that he also takes on general education classes. “And also, money.”
“I can support the both of us just fine for a little while, my dear. We’re more than comfortable.” Seungmin persists as he pinches Hyunjin’s cheek in jest. “Don’t you want to enjoy the pampered housewife life?”
“Careful Kim Seungmin, if you treat me too well I might drain your savings and run.”
“And run too? You wound me.” Seungmin places a hand over his heart in fake hurt. “Does fifteen years mean nothing to you?”
“Yeah, if you really love me you’ll be with me for fifty. And then some.” Hyunjin quips, turning around in his chair and crossing his arms over the backrest to grin up at Seungmin. Hyunjin is just saying shit, there’s nothing left to prove when they’ve already done that time and time again. They're already married in every sense of the word except legally and it doesn’t bother them all that much. After all, they had already chosen each other long before they even realised they could call it love. Their marriage didn’t need to be defined by documents, it was defined by coffee scented mornings and the matching set of toothbrushes in an apartment they could call their own.
“Let’s go on a trip after the grade submissions.” Hyunjin declares after he closes his laptop for the night.
“Not to Jeju again I hope, I still smell tangerine rinds under my fingernails.” Seungmin jokes. He’s not particularly fond of tangerines but Hyunjin sure is. “And the orchards might not have recovered from your visit yet.”
“The break is longer this time, so we can look into further places.” Hyunjin stretches and yawns, there’s a satisfying crack in his back. He makes grabby hands and Seungmin helps to pull him up before slipping a hand around his waist to pull him close.
“There’s a baseball game I want to catch at the start of next month so we need to be back before then.”
“Boo, men and their baseball.” Hyunjin grumbles. Seungmin giggles and pecks his cheek because he knows it means no real bite. Later on, it would be Hyunjin who splurges on good seats so Seungmin can hoot and holler to his heart’s content while Hyunjin politely claps and holds the portable fan up for him.
But for tonight, they quietly brush their teeth next to each other and tuck themselves into bed, settling into the quiet contentment they have built for themselves.