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Dasol knows it’s coming and yet somehow, the sting of it still hurts all the same. Like seeing someone’s fist in slow-motion as it’s coming towards you but still getting knocked off your feet regardless.
Thank you for your consideration, the first line reads and Dasol can already feel the dread pooling in her stomach. Unfortunately, at this time we cannot offer you a position…
The train blares with the announcement of her stop and she stumbles onto the platform in a daze. She makes it two blocks from the station before the clouds let loose, a torrential downpour whirling into being after seemingly thin air and drenching her last good suit.
Dasol stares up at the clouds as the rain pours down on her. They didn’t say it was going to rain.
She rummages through her bag for an umbrella before remembering that she broke it last week, when the wind knocked the top half clean off.
Dasol knows that she should technically be grateful. She counts all the things that she has that other people would kill for.
Her aunt’s letting her stay in the area while she looks for jobs nearby so she doesn’t have to pay for rent. Her uncle lets her borrow his commuter card so she doesn’t have to pay transit. Both of them offer her food from the restaurant as long as she pitches in, although they’re definitely getting the short end of the stick. Her cousin let her borrow his switch for a whopping two hours last weekend before barging into her room to take it back. She has a cool and awesome girlfriend that somehow doesn’t think she’s a complete and total loser. She has a cool, awesome, employed girlfriend.
Dasol glances around the empty street before finally resigning herself to her fate and squatting on the sidewalk. The rain slips down her neck, soaking her shirt and she tries to summon the energy within her to care but comes up empty.
She thought she was getting better but every now and then, she’ll hit a wall like this and she feels like she’s backsliding completely. Her chest feels lighter than it used to, a bit more clarity in her life but it’s still so hard to breathe.
Abruptly, the rain above her stops and Dasol jerks her head up to find Yuri standing with an umbrella over her, smiling. She squats down next to Dasol when she shows no sign of moving, tilting the umbrella so it’s covering both of them.
“What are you doing over here?” Yuri asks, although the look in her eye says that she already knows. Dasol humors her anyways.
“Trying to actively decompose and become one with the dirt.”
Yuri points out two worms inching slowly along the sidewalk.
“They thank you for your sacrifice,” she says and Dasol snorts.
The rain pitter-patters along the sidewalk around them and Dasol stares and watches the droplets splatter against the cement over and over again.
“I failed another interview today,” she says and Yuri hums. “I thought it would get easier with time, like, I dunno, taking steps into a cold pool. But I was wrong. Each rejection hurts just as much as the first. And I know I said that I was working towards something now, that I have a goal in mind but sometimes it just still feels so heavy, like the weight of everything I need to do is going to fall on my chest and crush me.”
“So make it smaller,” Yuri says and Dasol tips her head to look at her.
“What?”
“The things you need to do, make them smaller,” Yuri says again. “Tell me what you’re going to do today, starting from right now. Leave nothing out.”
“Okay,” Dasol says slowly. “I’m going to get up and walk back to my aunt’s place for dinner.”
“Wrong,” Yuri says. “You’re going to eat dinner with me.”
“Yuri,” Dasol whines, even as her mouth starts to water. Dasol’s favorite food is free food but even she can start to get sick of her aunt’s rice and boiled fish after a while. “That’s too much for me to ask.”
“Nonsense,” Yuri says, elbowing her. “You’re paying with your company. The food tastes better when you’re there. Besides, who else is going to eat naengmyeon while it’s raining with me?”
Dasol cracks a smile at that. Drinking ice-cold broth when she’s already soaked to the bone kind of sounds awful but now that Yuri’s mentioned it, she’s starting to get a craving for noodles.
“Alright then,” she says. “You’ll let me pay for ice cream afterwards. My mom gave me some spending money.”
“Fine,” Yuri concedes.
“I’ll buy an umbrella at a convenience store and I’ll walk home. I’ll take off my suit and take a nice, long, hot bath to scrape the rainwater off my skin. I’ll put on my pajamas and run a load of laundry because I’m out of clean underwear. I’ll watch the most recent episode of that awful drama my aunt is addicted to, with the three pairs of in-law couples, and then I’ll crawl into my bed and pull the blanket up to my chin and sleep.” As she talks, Dasol finds it a little bit easier to breathe, like she’s tearing off bits of the future into small pieces to chew instead of trying to swallow it whole. Yuri grins at her like she planned this all along.
“Good. You forgot one thing though,” Yuri says and Dasol blinks at her.
“What?”
Yuri grins and leans over to kiss her on the cheek.
“This,” she says, smiling, and Dasol is left stunned on the sidewalk as Yuri pushes herself back up to her feet. “Now hurry up, I’m hungry!”
Dasol stares up at Yuri, palm extended to her, her free hand still clutching the umbrella. Her stomach rumbles and that makes the decision for her, a grin splitting across her face as she stands up and takes her hand.
Above them, the sun starts to break through the clouds.