Chapter 24: October 22, Friday– Distant (Chapter .18)

The first gathering of the English club with the added number of Sae did not go how he thought it would.

The language lab was on the first floor, not too far from the humanities classroom. Sae arrived there with Minke.

Pan Rita, the club’s supervising teacher, opened the door. She told the kids, “Go in and take a seat. I’ll be back in a bit.”

Pan Rita hurried off somewhere, her shoes click-clacking on the floor as she left. She looked a bit harried, like there was a lot on her mind. Soon after, others started to trickle in.

The lab had moderate space, divided into two columns with an aisle in the middle. Instead of desks, there were cubicles of twos. The school planned to install a Digital Language Lab, but that had not come around yet. Minke sat in the left column, and Sae plopped down next to her.

The students that came in found their seats in an easy manner. Sae hardly knew anyone, the ones he recognised were mostly first years. Minke helped out with comments when she felt like it. “That’s the senior girl I was talking about,” she said softly as a girl with bleached stripes in her hair entered.

A few kids greeted Minke personally. She said hello to a male student and turned to Sae, “That boy is in his second year. He stayed in Australia for the summer…”

Sae nodded, watching as the upperclassman took a seat near the windows.

Minke was right. Besides the two of them, at least ten other students turned up before three o’clock.

At four past three, Shum Deil plummeted through the doors. Sae was on his way to go outside and almost collided with Deil. The boy stopped at the last possible second, pulling on the brakes. His body slanted backwards to avoid crashing into Sae.

The room of students did not care. Not many paid attention to these happenings.

Sae reached out a hand to steady Shum Deil before he tilted all the way to the floor.

“What’s going on? Why aren’t you inside?” asked Pan Rita from the hallway. Sae said, nothing, and pulled Deil inside. He turned around and returned to his seat.

Pan Rita put her things down at the teacher’s desk on the right side of the door. “Shum Deil, how thoughtful of you to grace us!” A smile reached her eyes as she continued, “Is everyone here? Sit down, sit down.”

Sae turned to Minke. “Shum Deil is in the club?”

“Uh, yea,” she replied. “Why?”

Sae shook his head. He followed Shum Deil with his eyes to the other side of the room without turning his head.

“Welcome to every old and newly joined member.” Pan Rita pulled a handful of papers from her bag. “For today, I planned listening exercises and a mock test. Up until now, we mainly conversed, right?”

She walked to the back of the room, trailing her eyes over every member. “Last time, we talked about some reading materials. I compiled a list of books to read every other month and films to watch in between.” Pan Rita made her way back to the teacher’s desk and gave out a stack of papers to the head of each column to pass along. “This is the list as of now. Read it through. If you have suggestions, know that I’m always open to new ideas.”

Sae looked down at the list in his hands. He knew of some titles but never heard of others.

“Teach,” an older girl spoke up, “Is the length of a book limited?”

Sae looked up. Pan Rita walked to the whiteboard and wrote down a few numbers. “These are generally the page numbers of the books that made it into the list. Do you think your recommendation is within this boundary?” she asked and let out a breath. “I don’t want to force anyone. Not everyone likes to read that much. After all, this is an extracurricular activity.”

The girl put her hand down.

Pan Rita immediately offered, “You can still recommend it. If anyone wants to, they can read it. The next time we meet, those who read it can discuss it. This brings us to three very important things.”

The whiteboard was on the front wall of the class. Every other row, however, was facing the back wall, much like in a library. Four students could share a common space, sitting at its four corners. When needed, they turned to the student terminals to listen to or view materials. Otherwise, they formed little groups for discussions.
Students who sat facing the other side, including Sae, turned sideways in their seats to see the board. Some boys straddled their chairs backwards.

Pan Rita wrote three big numbers. “One. During the last week of every month, there will be a discussion of the studied material, be it a film or book.” She wrote discussions next to the first point on the board.

“Two; there are blank weeks on the list, right? Those are up to all of you. I know kids don’t like to do what they’re told. Hence, you can choose what to read or watch on the weeks left blank; one novel or two films per month. You can watch a new film at the cinema or choose a classic. The point is, you will all write about it afterwards. There won’t be group discussions for those times.”

The kids listened attentively. This bit of freedom piqued their interest.

“Three,” Pan Rita went on, “There will be a club group chat. I’m going to invite everyone who is a member. There, we can talk about anything related to the club. Recommendations of various topics are welcomed.”

All three points were filled out on the board: discussions, personal choice, and group chat. The class was quiet, trying to ascertain all the new information.

“One more thing before the start of today’s listening,” said Pan Rita. “From today onwards, there’ll be assignments for every week. At the start of each lesson, we’re going to check them first. Anyone who’s preparing for exams,” she paused for a second, “Test takers, please come to me before the end of each lesson. I’ll work out separate schedules with mock tests and topic revisions for you. Any questions?”

Since no one spoke up, Pan Rita handed out a set of mock tests and advised them about what to look out for before pressing play on the listening material. After the listening section, they checked for answers. It was better than a regular class because they could learn at a faster pace with fewer but more insightful explanations.

In a blink of an eye, the lesson came close to its end. Pan Rita distributed their weekly assignments. She told everyone to pair up and converse until the end of class. During that time, the few winter test takers could gather around her table for a discussion.

In Sae’s cubicle, instead of four, only three people sat. Minke paired up with the girl sitting at her back. Truth be told, she felt a bit awkward. Sae knew she felt like that, like it was her responsibility to accompany him as this was his first time in the club. But he waved it off before Minke could say anything.

The girl who became Minke’s partner was in her second year, one of those people in the club who already seemed close to Minke. Before the start of class, she greeted them both with a smile as she took her seat. And now, she asked to pair up first.

Next to Sae, the two girls pushed their chairs together and started speaking in soft voices. He did not actually mind; it wasn’t like he joined to follow anyone. But then, he wasn’t sure who else to approach. Everyone seemed to have already found their pair. Sae kept to himself and tidied his desk.

Pan Rita looked over the class. “Everyone has a pair, right?”

Sae kept quiet, but Pan Rita was more observant than that. Out of the blue, she invited Shum Deil to be Sae’s conversational partner.

“Shum Deil, what are you doing? Come over here.” Pan Rita approached Sae. “You two can be a pair, right?”

Sae, “...”

Pan Rita raised her voice to say, “I only want to hear the murmurings of English, alright people?”

The kids mostly said yes.

Shum Deil lumbered over, then sank into the chair opposite Sae. The two boys did not turn around; they sat back to back. After a few seconds, Sae turned to the side and supported his back on the wall. Shum Deil did the same.

“Wouldn’t guess you’re a club person,” said Sae. Although they should have talked in English, he didn’t switch over. “Quite unexpected.”

“Am not. I got threatened.”

Sae looked to the side. Although his face did not show much reaction, he was a bit surprised.
You say you’re not a club person, but you’re in the football team.

Out loud, he did not say a thing, although he wanted to know, Threatened by whom and with what?

He cleared his throat, and for the sake of completing their task, asked, “Should we try to say something in English?”

“No!” Shum Deil blurted without thinking about it.

Minke and the girl paused their conversation at the loud noise and glanced at them. Just now, Deil’s voice was a bit forceful. Sae retracted his gaze. Well, it certainly seemed like Shum Deil wasn’t here on his own accord, but because he did, in fact, get threatened.

“What!?” There was light colour on Shum Deil’s ears. Maybe he was angry.

The girls looked at each other, then turned back to whisper amongst themselves. Minke eyed Sae with confusion, but Sae shook his head at her.

---

 

The rest of the class resumed its uneventfulness.

Deil wanted to say something, but his slight embarrassment fuelled anger stopped him.

“Is your problem with English or me?” asked Saering.

Deil inclined his head. “Why would I have a problem with you?”

“Then,” Saering nodded, “you have a problem with English.”

“Maybe I have a problem with chatting.”

Now Saering raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. “Do you have a problem with chatting?”

“Since when were you so fond of chatting?”

“Since whenever,” Saering said, “It’s not like we’re close for you to know me so well...”

“Oh.” Deil gave a breathless little laugh. Because Saering was a person whose voice rang out everywhere he went. Right.

Deil was out of his element with a Saering so talkative. Never did he have to deal with the boy saying so many things at once, and all of them directed at him. His pulse was still a bit quick, but he tried to move on from his discomfort.

It was true that they were not friends, but it wasn’t like they did not know of each other. Some things were kind of obvious, easy to pick out upon a certain amount of interaction. Deil drawled, “Sorry to assume wrongly.”

“It’s nothing.” Saering did not get stuck on such trivialities. He shrugged his shoulder, saying, “Don’t beat yourself up over it.”

Hearing that, Deil was a bit speechless. “I didn’t say that to... I wasn’t––” He took a breath, sorting out his speech. “I just said that to be polite.”

“I know,” replied Saering. He looked askew at Deil and smirked. “…and sarcastic.”

Only now did it draw on Deil that the other was tricking him. True to his sarcastic little brat self, he immediately fired back. “It’s not wise to measure others by using yourself. If I say it was to be polite, then it was said to be polite.”

---

 

Sae did not persist to talk exclusively in English. Some sentences were uttered in English, some not, but the ones that were – all of them came out of his mouth. Shum Deil understood them; he understood a lot. But the boy’s mental gymnastics were a bit too much for Sae. He would rather change the topic; this line of thought process could hurt his brain.

Honestly, who knew what they were trifling about?

No matter how composed and cold-headed he seemed from the outside, Sae was still a teenage boy. The temptation to not let the other get the last remark sparked his childishness. He failed to abide by his wish of moving on. “Same here,” he rebutted. “No one said it can’t be seemingly polite while it is very much sarcastic.”

Sae thought Shum Deil might be the top test taker with the highest score on the high school entrance exam, but in a verbal challenge, he could not win. Sae wasn’t in humanities for nothing.

His reply induced a laugh from Shum Deil. This laugh wasn’t as strained now. Most importantly, it wasn’t even a little bit mocking. “Fuck, you really won’t let me off, will you?”

Sae did not say anything, but the corners of his mouth lifted a bit.

Minke sneaked a glance at them again, but she only appeared to become more confused. What was happening? Sae was actually smiling. Question marks crowded Minke’s mind for a moment.

“How long do you have to come to the club?” asked Sae. He flicked the cap of his pen off and then pushed it back on. Flicked it again, on and off.

“Dunno, ask your head teacher,” said Deil, looking at Sae’s hand as if the movement was hypnotic. He forced his eyes away. “She dragged me here, so she decides when I can leave.”

“Won’t it affect your grades?”

“Pfft, like this could make a hitch in my academic career.” The way Deil said academic career sounded so boisterous, so cocky. Like he wasn’t sitting at school right now, forced to partake in club activity but rather on the way to invent a new wonder of the world.

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“You sure know how to boast,” said Sae. “Why not boast in English?” He raised his eyebrows, a bit teasing.

Shum Deil gazed at him but did not say anything. He didn’t seem angry per se, but his facial expression was somewhat unnatural. He maintained his gaze with slightly squinted eyes. They looked at each other without breaking eye contact.

“Good job, everyone!” Pan Rita concluded their lesson.

Shum Deil and Sae looked away at the same time. The class was in the middle of packing up.

“Don’t forget your assignments. I’ll add everyone to the group chat, so if anybody has questions, you can contact me. Work hard until next Tuesday, and have a great weekend!”

The kids filed out with goodbyes on their mouths. Sae left with Minke as part of the last ones still in the classroom. Shum Deil left the fastest. He was the first one out of the door. Almost as if someone was chasing him.

---

 

Something odd occurred during the English club’s gatherings. Throughout the passing lessons, let it be Tuesday or Friday, as long as Shum Deil was in, Pan Rita would pair him up with Sae as conversation partners. Others quite frequently changed partners. Their teacher said a variation of people with differing levels of the same language helped and taught each other more efficiently.

So, why was it that Sae got stuck with Shum Deil making monosyllabic exchanges at best?

The thing was, with time, Sae realised that Deil’s communication skills were out of touch with his brilliance. He could understand pretty much everything after paying attention and hearing it once. But, for some reason, he could not speak up for the life of him. His accent was wonky. There was an inner strain in him, a kind of fright to express himself freely. He often forgot how to say things; terms of speech he used without a thought on paper escaped him once he had to voice them out loud.

Those times, Deil became embarrassed. What Sae first thought of as annoyance turned out to be indignation Deil directed at his own mistakes. Working together was not easy. Sae’s mood turned for the worse. One time, he straight up asked the teacher about the reason for this partnership.

Pan Rita told him with surprise, “Why? Is it a problem?”

Sae did not know whether to laugh or cry. What could he say when it was put like that?

“I mean,” the woman continued, “I only paired him up with you because you’re one of the best with the spoken language. You are both first years and boys. I thought it’d be easier for you two to overcome this hurdle. If I put him with a girl, he’d become embarrassed so fast.” The last sentence was spoken in soft tones, lest someone beside them heard it.

Sae really didn’t know how to react. Objectively, he understood what his teacher was saying. Subjectively, he thought, Would Shum Deil become any more embarrassed in front of a girl?

“Could you help him?” Pan Rita was saying, “Maybe sometime outside of class? I think the other members make him more clamped up. Or are you two distant?”

That was an excellent question. Sae let out a deep sigh. Their relationship, could it be called distant? He felt he wasn’t a good choice for having a light chat with Shum Deil in the first place. What would they talk about?

He admitted, “I don’t know how to talk to him.”

Pan Rita waved a dismissive hand. “It doesn’t have to be one of the conversation topics. Knowing how to form the perfect speech isn’t his problem. His vocabulary is abundant; construction and tense, it’s all there. It’s more like...” She shook her head. “He’s not accustomed to talking out loud in another language.”

Sae couldn’t help but say with some irony, “Because I am...”

Pan Rita’s eyes arched in delight. “Well, isn’t that true? You can talk without a problem.”

Sae opened his mouth but could not refute it.

“Everyday chit-chat, what you usually talk about with your friends is enough. I don’t need more for now,” the woman still very diligently tried to convince him. She shifted her hair back and cleared her throat. “I know this is selfish, but…there’s an upcoming competition in December. Your age groups fit the limit. I want to send both of you.” Here, Pan Rita made a face. “There’s an oral test after the first screening.”

What Sae felt was concern. Not deep concern, but he couldn’t say his heart was as clear as the sky without a sign of clouds.

Oddly enough, he was not against the idea of this competition. He could feel that his head teacher only wanted them to go and challenge themselves. See what they were capable of. There weren’t any ulterior motives. “I’ll think about it,” he said, not committing to anything just yet. It wasn’t clear if he meant the competition or talking with Shum Deil.

Pan Rita gazed at him with a warm smile. She took it upon herself and said, “Very well. So this means I can still put you into one lot.”

---

 

“We don’t have to do the conversation topics,” Sae told Shum Deil at the next club meeting. “Just talk about anything, as long as we’re talking.” He glanced towards the teacher’s desk. “We’re kind of being supervised...”

The two sat the same way as the first time, bodies facing outside. With a tilt of their heads, they could see each other without a problem.

Since Shum Deil usually had to move seats, he took to the habit of sitting near Sae. “Talk about what?” he asked and frowned. “And supervised? It’s more like stalking.”

Sae glanced at him from the corner of his eye. Deil’s uniform looked like he just rolled out of bed; even his hair was a mess. Pulling a leg up, Shum Deil rested his forearm on his knee. He was the definition of uncooperative, and this was a class. A class of choice, but still. Just now, he said he considered the teacher making sure her students participated in class as stalking. Okay…

“Teach said she’s going to keep an eye on you. And now on me too.” Sae could not help but ask, “Why are you here at all?”

“Your head teacher threatened me. Said I missed too many classes. But she’d let it pass if I came here for more scrutiny.” Shum Deil spoke slowly with short sentences. There was no emotion in his voice – he told everything in a matter of fact tone.

Sae turned his body to the side. “Why weren’t you in class? How many classes could you even miss?”

Shum Deil let out a ha! “I don’t know. It’s not like I kept counting. Can we not talk about this?” He glanced at Sae and shook his head. “Go on. Let’s talk about you then if you wanna talk that much. Why are you here?”

Hearing his question fired back at him, Sae turned to face forward. He felt a bit agitated with himself. Why did he have to ask about such things? It wasn’t like he had anything to do with Shum Deil’s tardiness.

At Deil’s probing gaze, he said, “I wanted to join. What about it?” He unconsciously did that thing again, where his plain answer came off as a conversation stopper, cold like he was uninterested in the matter of verbal exchange.

And so, the two shut their mouths after that.

It was easy to order someone to go and chat about everyday trivial things, but it wasn’t like Sae shared any relation to Shum Deil. They were neither friends nor in the same class. It was awkward, akin to going out in the streets to chat up a stranger.

Up until this point, their whole conversation had been uttered in English. Shum Deil fared just fine, only a bit slower than his usual speech. Since this was their first club meeting after the midterms, the atmosphere became a bit lax. They could pair up by year and discuss the English test papers.

The exams were written tests made of two parts; reading and listening comprehension. Sae had not seen the other boy’s test paper, but they probably got similar marks. Thanks to Susu, Sae knew that Shum Deil ended up seventh in his class ranking. Exactly like him. In their case, it didn’t make sense to put their heads together and correct the mistakes. The test papers were marked with red only on occasion; nothing much to ponder about.

Actually, the atmosphere around the two was a bit awkward – stilted and cautious – no matter if they talked or didn’t.

Sae started to shift a few books around in his bag, looking for something. After a minute, he put all his notebooks on the desk, emptying his bag.

“You draw?” Shum Deil asked out of nowhere. He pointed to the bottom of the stack on Sae’s desk. More precisely, at the black, thread-stitched block with perforated sheets secured by a rubber band. It was a pocketbook, not much bigger than a smartphone. “That’s not a simple notebook.”

Sae followed the finger pointed at the stack, and pushed the books back into his bag. “It’s a sketchbook. I use it sometimes between classes.”

Shum Deil remarked, “Your hands don’t look it.”

“What?” Sae’s hand stilled for a second on the sketchbook. His friends knew not to comment on it when they saw it, like a kind of inhibition to mention. But this person did not know about that at all.

“Your hands,” Deil said, “They don’t look gentle enough, I guess. They’re really bony and knobby, though.”

Sae blinked. Never did he care about how his hands looked.

“Look,” Deil stretched out his hand next to Sae’s. They were just boy hands. Slender and a bit angular. The difference was that while Sae’s was well-kept with clean nails, Deil’s hand wore scabs like a second skin. His fingers were long, and his nails even longer. His thumb curved back in an extreme arc. Sae stared at it in a daze.

“Your bones are too big to be this slender. Look at my hand. It’s got mass.”

“Take it out of my face,” Sae said and turned away.

“Whatever.” Deil took his hand back. He shifted closer. “Anyway... humanities students are sure closer to arts. That’s a pretty good topic to talk about at your interview.” He meant the competitions that would come with the season.

Sae hid the sketchbook from sight with some force. He refused. “I won’t do that. It’s not something to talk about.”

Deil asked, a bit puzzled, “Why?”

“There’s not much to tell. It’s not like I want to pursue arts in the future,” said Sae. He put away the rest of his things.

“But I thought that’s why you’re in humanities...”

“I wouldn’t come to a school that only offered liberal arts programs from the second year with no concrete syllabus for the first year. It’s mainly theoretical learning with a few courses held out of school at other facilities. You have to put in a lot of extra work if you want to learn art in a non-theoretical way. No universities like to hear about art programs with only outside workshops to show for practical pieces.” Sae said in a self-mocking way, “I’d be in an art school if I wanted to do it so much.”

At some unknown point in time they switched back from speaking in English, but at least from a distance they maintained the image of conversing. It was fine as long as the teacher did not come any closer and they continued talking at a low volume.

Sae said, “I guess you don’t know a lot about our school even though you’re attending it.”

“Huh,” Deil tried to take in all this information. In the end, all he said was, “No wonder even your pen’s like that.”

Sae gathered his brows. “Like what?”

“Like those needle-tipped pens. Last time I borrowed one, remember?”

“It’s a Fineliner pen.”

“Oh.” Deil gave a faint smile. “You really know a lot about this topic.”

That barely there smile kind of made Sae tick. He did not plan to share so much just now. Currently, he was frustrated with himself and wanted to end this little chat once and for all. On purpose, and out of being uncomfortable with this line of conversation, he asked, “And where else did you encounter Fineliner pens to know it’s an art supply? I never told you that, and I doubt there are a lot of them in places where you spend your free time.” Although Sae didn’t say anything outright bad, it wasn’t like he cussed Shum Deil out, but his tone made his sentences sound quite vicious.

Shum Deil wasn’t an idiot – it would be hard not to take the hint. He stared at Sae intently for a minute before scoffing. “Really fucking popular. Say, what kind of places d’you mean?”

But Sae brushed him off. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”

“No, I want to know now,” Shum Deil kept being pushy, anger evident in his voice, “What did you mean by that?”

Sae closed his eyes and pushed his head back into the wall a few times. Rationally, he knew this was akin to throwing a tantrum, attacking someone because they were ignorant of his mental state about particular issues. It wasn’t the other’s fault for not knowing things about him. And it wasn’t like Sae started conversations sharing his private matters. He did not want to willingly share anything about this subject, especially not with Shum Deil.

Neither of them said anything for a while. There wasn’t much time left from class. Sae could feel Shum Deil’s gaze on himself, even with his eyes closed. Then, the boy said under his breath, “Pretentious ass.”

Sae’s eyes sprang open with indignation.

“Did you write your reflection paper yet?” he asked, his tone mocking, “Do you want to borrow a pen, maybe? There’s a brush pen as well, real comfortable to hold.”

In the past weeks, more and more paper planes littered one side of the school’s yard. It started with the forecourt and expanded out to other areas. Once the teachers took notice, they tried to figure out which class was responsible. The problem was that at some point the planes started to surface from several hallways, making it hard to determine the culprit. Then one afternoon, going with the long-held suspicion of the chemistry teacher, the school surprised the first year science class by secret monitoring.

Since the principal was out of town, the director had all fourteen offenders of the class write reflection essays and submit them to the principal once she returned. In addition, they all had point deductions and had to stand outside the teachers’ office for two hours while all of their parents got notified via phone calls.

Sae gave a dig, but Shum Deil seemed to not even feel it. He pulled back and taunted, “Not yet. Care to help? Maybe you have ideas on how to sound repentant but not too… pitiful. Those not-quite-artist hands could’ve written numerous self-reflecting essays. They sure look suitable for throwing fists, and as I heard, they actually do.” Shum Deil was a fiery youth, full of hot air. The smallest provocation and he was ready to throw a punch. Now, his expression looked rather complicated as he laughed in frustration. It wasn’t like these measly comments actually hurt him, but he did not understand why he got thrown with rocks all of a sudden.

Sae didn’t reply. He only glanced at Shum Deil, his gaze cold enough to freeze, before looking away. After a moment, he said, “Don’t bother me.”

The two of them maintained their half turned postures, so the teacher thought they worked well together. In reality, they did not even breathe in the other’s direction.

Neither of them said another word until class got out.

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