cadenza

@minjixmi

something about today just felt good. jiae woke up with a spring in her step, feeling refreshed for the first time in days. she had no idea where this came from but decided to take full advantage of it while she could. with the promise of a day off to herself, she decided to pull herself together and go explore. she took the time to do a full face of makeup, fix her hair, and put on her favorite dress. why not look as good as she felt? she debated leaving her violin behind, but as if it was a safety blanket, she exited the sauna she’d been staying at with a smile on her face and case in hand. 

there had been a handful of places that jiae passed at night that she wanted to visit during the day. in fact, she made a list and kept it folded perfectly in her pocket. a bakery, an ice cream shop, park, aquarium, and first on her list; oopsie daisy, a flower shop. she could imagine the smell of peonies, daisies, roses, sunflowers, everything filling her nose and she hopped a bit in excitement. jiae had always loved flowers, receiving a bouquet for her birthday every year.

after rounding a corner she could see the flowers practically pouring out of the shop window. she hurried down the street and stopped to take it all in. after feeling so miserable lately, it was the simple things that brought her pure happiness. and what did she do when she was happy?

she would play. 

in seoul, she was known as the ‘siren of the violin’. a prodigy moulded like clay into living and breathing her instrument, as if it was a second heart. jiae took out her violin, placed it into position, and began to play. 

youngjae’s careful with what he says. every single word that slips over his lips could concern her more, and he definitely doesn’t want her to pass out because she’s not able to breathe calmly. “try to calm down, alright? count to ten and breathe in on one, hold your air until five and let it out slowly. alright? one, breathe in, five, breathe out.” he was worried that there was someone that scared her, because he most definitely didn’t look like he could protect here if she was in danger - and he couldn’t.

any other circumstances jiae would laugh at his comment, surprised for someone to be saying anything of the likes. but she could barely focus on that right now with such a clouded mind. it felt like everything was behind a thin veil, just barely able to see. so she’d had a panic attack, in public. wonderful. boy was she going to kick herself later for that. 

being comforted by someone other than her mother felt strange, but it gave her heart some reprieve from the ache it had been feeling. again, allowing her guard down was something she’d surely kick herself over later, but for now she needed it.  

“my family hurt me, and then i lost them entirely.”

when the words were spoken into existence, she felt incredibly lonely. it was then she realized just how alone she was now. sure, her mother was out there somewhere, but jiae could never go back to her. she was the reason that she was hurt for so long and her mother deserved to know a life without that, a chance to start over like she had. his hands helped stop the shaking a bit, a weight upon them to keep her grounded.

inhale. 

one, two, three, four, five.

exhale. 

the male was tired. he was on his way to work, makeup already on his face and lingerie underneath his normal clothes. his makeup covered only the dark bags underneath his eyes, though, nothing special. he didn’t really pay attention to the other passenger, until he saw her. he had seen her before, he had seen her every day when he drove to work, to be exact. he assumed that his workplace was near the where she lived, or at least in the same area, since he got off the bus at least one stop before her.

she seemed to be tired, too. with his headphones in his ears and his current favorite song silently playing in the backgrounded, he slowly turned around a little bit. she was sitting two rows behind him, as usual, because the four old lady always wanted to sit in the same rows - and nothing could stop them. he noticed that something was off. at first he thought that she was just tired, but she now looked like she was having a full panic attack. and without thinking about what he was doing, he stood up and made his way to her, sat down without asking and placed his arm on the top of the seatback.

“what is a beautiful lady- never mind, let me get straight to the point. are you alright?” he asked with a hint of worry in his voice. he wanted to make her a compliment first, he wanted to loose the situation up, but that would’ve sounded like he was hitting on her; and he was in fact not. “your breathing was so fast, it looked like you had a panic attack.”

she could hear her heartbeat in her ears, pounding and drowning out everything else around her. she could feel her pulse in her fingertips, all too aware of everything and nothing all at once. this was bound to happen, but did it have to happen on the bus of all places? why not in the shower when she could be alone and crawl into herself?

what pulled her back down to earth was the sudden body next to her. it was if jiae had blinked and they were there. it took her off guard that she looked up so quickly, eyes stinging, shoulders pulling in together. at first she just stared, a second feeling like an eternity. she was coming back to her mind, one memory at a time. at last the sound of the honk, the rumbling beneath her seat.

“is that what that was?”

this definitely wasn’t the first time jiae had a panic attack, not with the pressure of always having to play better than perfectly. this time it was different though due to much harsher circumstances. she felt silly then, having attracted the attention of a complete stranger. her hands were trembling and she gripped them together tightly, hoping the other wouldn’t notice. 

every instinct in her body told her to run. she told herself constantly while on the way to the island to never trust anyone. but, perhaps, for maybe just a moment she could allow herself to breathe, relax, and pray to god that the face she often saw coming and going on the bus every night had no ill will with only letting the faintest of truth be revealed.

“hey beautiful!”

he doesn’t mean me, no way.

“why don’t you come over here?”

it can’t be me–

“come and play me some pretty music!”

oh god.

SEND ME A “WHOOPS” AND MY MUSE WILL…8. Walk in on your muse in the shower.

soft humming filled the locker room while jiae undressed, tossing her things into her locker. night number.. something. she was too tired to think and craved nothing but hot, hot water down her shoulder blades. she kept telling herself that she’d give herself the night off the following night, but kept going out to perform and rack up the money. she didn’t mind the sauna but she wanted to get a place, settle, a bed to go home to at the end of the day.

she’s running from herself, trying to mold a new version in a new city. she couldn’t change her past self, but the world knew nothing of moon jiae.

old or new, jiae was still shy and modest, raised to be prim and proper. she preferred the private showers rather than communal options. it sounded like everyone had left for the night or at least had caught the place during a slow period. wrapped in a towel, she carried a small shower caddy over to one of the stalls and opened the curtain.

“OH MY GOSH–”

just as quick as she had opened the curtain, jiae yanked it shut and turned her back to it. 

“i-i’m so sorry! i didn’t know you were in there a-and i thought everyone was gone– i’m so sorry!!”

they have a washing machine at home, but sometimes the fee to use the washers here is the price she’s willing to pay to get out of that stifling environment. even when her parents aren’t home, their faces are staring at her from every angle in their familiar ornaments, in family photographs dotted around the house and that god awful wallpaper they still haven’t replaced. when they are present, it’s ten times worse, their actual eyes offering her worried glances at the dinner table and glasses of water from behind her bedroom door every hour or so. it’s as if she’s still sixteen, still incapable of surviving completely on her own — like she hadn’t already made it through four years of hell alone, now getting a drink when she’s thirsty is too much effort, existing such a difficulty that she needs her hand held every step of the way.

but, as much as she hates them coddling her ( she is twenty-eight, for fuck’s sake ), there’s one thing she could do with some help conquering — technology.

it’s incredible how much development can advance in four years; how many different models of her current phone had come before it, how big televisions had gotten. hell, she didn’t even seea television while she was gone. all she had was a record player.

she jumps ever so slightly when the voice reaches her, the world around her forgotten in favour of her frustration at the device in her hands. “u-uh, yeah, if you— don’t mind. I… don’t even know what I’m doing. I just wanted to— check twitter or something. I just wanted to find something to pass the time, but now I have— so many things happening and something’s—playing music, even. how do I turn the music off?”

jiae also flinched in the slightest manner when the stranger beside her did, not expecting the reaction. she spoke so nervously, confused. jiae felt so surprised just by her few words and couldn’t help but wonder, is that how i sounded when i fumbled with my train ticket in seoul?.. no, don’t.

“may i?” after a moment, she moved a few seats closer to the woman, taking a look at her screen. wow, she had everything on. she couldn’t help but raise her eyebrows slightly and hoped it wasn’t too noticeable. to help put her at ease she kept her smile and laughed a bit. “i did this often when i got my phone. you’ve got spotify on, it’s the app with the green circle. pull down the home bar, yeah like that. hit the pause, in the center yeah. now swipe it away– and there you go!”

jiae figured maybe she’d used a different form of streaming before and didn’t think too much of it. but then she noticed that her face was still confused, even if the music issue was conquered. she had some time to kill, the laundry had only started and would take at least an hour.

jiae practically fell into her seat once she got on the bus at the end of the night. just a couple more nights of this and she’d have enough for a cheap place. she’d been living on gimbap and vending machine snacks ever since she got to the island. everything was such a whirlwind when she left seoul and her mother behind. the events she had created, or more like ended, with her own hands had started to sink in. she’d been living on nothing but pure adrenaline and shock, it was beginning to end. 

SEND ME AN “OUCH” AND MY MUSE WILL…10. Fall from a lifted surface (chair, table, counter top, etc).

damn it.. i think i’m lost.

after an hour or so of wandering around the same alleys, corners, and streets, jiae was ready to accept defeat. she was lost, in a strange city, with no map because she had a dead phone. it was either pride or stubbornness that kept her from asking the next person that passed her by for directions. either way, it was only getting later and she was growing more and more tired. 

however the idea came to her mind, at the time she thought it was the smartest thing she’d ever thought up. there were some chairs and tables left out at a long closed coffee shop, so she trucked herself over and climbed up. chair, table, ah, that’s better! 

now she could finally see where she was and saw the sauna in the distance. it looked like she had made a left one street earlier than she meant to several times. jiae laughed at herself and shook her head. it was going to take some getting used to and the learning of street smarts before she could live here comfortably. 

one foot before the other– oops.

“.. coming up, renowned composer and tutor found dead, along with a parent of one of his pupils. connected? details at 10.”

missing persons posters of kang jiae turn up everywhere in the city. people assume the worst. that either she was kidnapped, murdered, or that she did it herself. the police are looking into her mother mainly, since jiae was pictured and described to be ‘so fragile, so soft hearted. she could barely hurt a fly!’ what a talented girl, gone too soon. but where did she go?

hopefully her sparkling image would work out in her favor, keep the police off her trail long enough to establish a new life and for the case to run cold. many of her classmates who rarely talked to her either mourn her for attention or speak harshly of her, framing her for the murders. 

SEND ME AN “OUCH” AND MY MUSE WILL…14. Have their hair pulled by your muse.

jiae was exhausted.

2pm to 11pm of playing on the street had earned her quite the monetarily reward but doing this for the whole last week had started to wear her out. tomorrow is a day off for sure, she thought. it was quite surprising to see that the streets were still so busy this late at night, but she was sure the interests of the crowds had changed to a much more darker taste. she wasn’t usually out this late but did take an interest in doing so. she had to eventually, and it wasn’t like she wasn’t old enough for anything. 22 was just months away. the responsible part of her just worried since she was only a week in living on the island.

she kept her head tilted down, watching her surroundings closely. when will i be able to relax again?

well, not tonight. jiae was about to break from the crowd but was suddenly stopped by her head being yanked to a stop. she took a step back and winced, quickly swiping away the hand on her head and turning on a dime to face whoever touched her.

it was mesmerizing to watch the washers spin colors around and around, easy to lose yourself in your own thoughts. it was early morning and jiae was sure she was still asleep, so the machines weren’t helping. she’d gone through the five outfits she’d packed in her bag and had to do some laundry. in the back of her mind she was imagining her own place, wondering how leases work. she was strangely sheltered in some aspects of her life and fiercely independent in the others. she still had a bit to go though before she could stop sleeping at the sauna’s. 

sounds of frustration caught her attention from next to her. she tilted her head down and took a small peek, hiding behind her bob as much as she could. a woman, not much older than her, sat fiddling with her phone. her brows knit together in frustration and jiae became a litttle amused. it was out of the ordinary to see someone so out of place with a phone, especially someone who looked like she could be jiae’s older sister. 

after fifth attempt at lord knows what, and seeing the frustration grow on the strangers face, she spoke up quietly and with something she hadn’t yet used in this city; a genuine smile. 

“no no no, it’s not spicy enough! more, more!”

giggles echoed against the glass of the storefront residing in jiae’s memory. oh kang jiae, i will miss being you. friendships were almost nonexistent growing up. competition was fierce during school and any extracurriculars that could harm jiae in anyway or take away from music was forbidden. what wasn’t forbidden was getting a snack on the way home at nights, which varied from gimbap to ramen. at first, it was little glances at each other as they shared a long table, four seats between them. he was rough around the edges, and her uniform was always impeccably clean, hands dainty and well polished. she was the one to speak up first, which came as naturally as breathing. she long had wanted a friend outside of her little bubble, and after two or three dinners together it wasn’t hard to let what she had been wanting out. 

it started with small things and grew to larger topics over time, the amount of seats between them diminishing. soon the bell to the door would ring and jiae would come in with a huge smile on her face, excited to tell her friend what happened to her that day. of course, it was watered down though. she wasn’t jiae, the violin prodigy as many had held her to. no, she was just jiae, a girl who gave her smile very easily and wished dearly for it to be reciprocated. 

but all good things must come to an end. someone caught her, maybe on purpose or by accident associating with ‘anyone outside of schooling.’ immediately she had all privileges revoked, and if she wanted a snack her father would run out to get it for her. jiae cried and cried for her friend, feeling like a princess stuck in a tower. 

fast forward two and a half, maybe three years later. kang jiae is gone, only moon jiae remains now. raven hair dyed platinum blonde, her bob still the same. she carried her bag and violin case close, it’s all she has with her on the island. she’s still sleeping at the sauna at nights while she racks up money to get a crappy apartment somewhere. constantly on edge, she only relaxes on the walk back at night after playing all of her emotions out into her music. it’s a release for her. she rounds a corner and realizes that letting her guard down was a crucial mistake. 

jiae, you’ll burn your tongue if you make it any spicier! 

his voice filled her ears, memories rushing back to her, weighing heavily on her heart. it felt as if someone had struck her in the chest. her secret friend, her partner-in-ramen, her convenience store savior–