I didn't know how things got to where they are now. I couldn't even understand why I always talked in a hushed tone when I was around him, yet it always happened.

My voice never failed to lose its confidence when he was near. Denying my feelings would have been my first choice if it weren't also for the fact that we were always thrown into situations too unavoidable.

He's always around. Everywhere my head turned or where my eyes landed, he was always there. His adorably innocent smile that held my heart still freezes me where I stand. Just like now.

"Hi," his simple greeting and his simple smile, holding me down.

"Hey," my words seemed like they didn't have any impact on him at all.

Today, I'm not quite sure why I'm seeing his face. I just know, I wanted to run the other way around.

He looks at me with those kind and different eyes of his. I look back lost and broken. When did things turn out this way? I tried to recall, but nothing comes to mind at the moment. I can only hear my heart ready to burst and fly off my chest.

"What do you know, we're working together again..." he awkwardly tried to laugh.

I laugh with him as to not throw his efforts away.

Does it matter if he looks like an idiot, right now? Does it matter to me that he'll look like an idiot in front of the girl he's gone off with?

I don't hate him. I don't hate her. I'm just... I'm simply heart broken. Don't I have the right to love him...?

She looks my way with a big grin on her face. She waves without delay and I find the strength to wave back. He turns his head to where my eyes had luckily wandered off. He smiles at her with that same smile I'd fallen in love with. Shaking my head vigorously, I turn back my attention to him.

"-" I stop myself.

What do I call him? TOP? Seunghyun... love? Where was the line he had drawn? I didn't know and I didn't quite understand.

"San- uh Dara," with just a pause I knew just where this would end, "can I-" and so I cut him off.

Hearing him out isn't something I had in mind. I don't even want to be here. December is just a month. Why celebrate so many things? Did I have to be here? Couldn't I just lie down somewhere and rot?

"Please take care of me today!" I say in my most cheerful voice and walk away.

"Dara!" His voice echoes in my head, but he too has been talking in a hushed tone.

I flinch as his fingers wrap around my skinny arm.

His grip proved too strong for my puny arms. He's got muscles I can't even imagine to battle off, so I turn in defeat.

"Yeah?" I answer. I make sure to avoid his name since I was still unsure as to what to call him. "Have I done something wrong?"

Love... is such a cruel thing, you know? They push and pull as if I was some toy.

He didn't know. He doesn't know and neither does she.

I am the only one who knows that my heart beats for him while his beats for her. Could I hate him for that? Could I hate her for that? No... I know it's unfair. I understand, but is it so simple to just pretend?

"How long?" I whisper.

"What?" He asks.

"Nothing, you haven't done anything, nothing at all," I emphasize.

"You always..." his long pause enters, "look mad nowadays".

So you've noticed, noticed something that no one else has. What's wrong with you? "It's nothing," I lie, of course.

Unrequited love, I know, is something that happens. It wasn't simple, it never was.

author's note.

2017: It's been forever since I've reread this. I first wrote this back in 2011 and only did very minor edits when posting it here. I still find the idea very lovely and sweet. I mean, love is such an "argh" kind of thing for me. So, writing this at the time was like taking out my frustrations. Lol. It's my complaints about the complications of love. ><