Chương 5: Hatred of the hometown
I became active on social media again, however, this time, it wasn't for friends. It was for myself; I would scroll edits and laugh at memes. My feed went from having cute fantasy costumes, cakes, and miniatures to BTS and BTS only.
Reels were not introduced at that time; my option was only IGTV. I liked it a lot. Learning about BTS and discovering more music. I was alive and active but did not text him.
One day he again posted a picture of himself having milk tea, and he wrote the caption.
'Tea is life and my everything
#Tealovers
'It's another good day for a good cup of milk tea
I liked it without any thoughts and commented, "You are obsessed with tea"
He replied in the comments, "Yeah, I like the tea you make."
My cheeks turned crimson, I pursed a smile, and with hormones racing in my heart, I replied, "You can come on vacation to have some."
This time, I had an ulterior motive of reminding him of the promise he had made.
"I remember you don't drink tea, you prefer coffee," he commented again.
This time the ground beneath my feet started shaking and it slipped away as my ears turned red. How did he remember it? Why would he?"
I slide into his direct message and asked.
[You remember that?]
[I don't recall telling you that I don't like tea]
[Or I prefer coffee] -me
[You did, I guess you don't have a recollection of it, I can tell it's true]-Zaid
[Well, you guessed it]-Me
[I don't know, I just know it]-Zaid.
I was thrilled, and so excited that I clenched my pillow and laughed crazily, blushing and shying. I thought maybe I had a chance.
The next day, I again mentioned it to him.
[When will you come?]
[Your vacation already began, and so is mine, we aren't in a lockdown now]-Me
[Well, I don't I can come, I have to take care of the business]
[How about you come?]
[You haven't visited Z city ever since you left, it has been six years]-Zaid
It was true, my father visited our hometown often and my mother went back once for a short visit, but I never did.
I visited my father's village twice to attend weddings, and I never stepped out of the venue. The thought of going to Z city never crossed my mind.
His sister and he had complained to me a lot of times, and I had to tell the truth. A long while later, we had a conversation on the same topic and I decided to muster up the courage to tell him the truth.
[I have nobody I should visit in Z city]- Me
[I hate the people of Z city, not you all, but the majority, I hate everything.]-Me
[What about us?]
[You can visit us at least and can stay with us while you are here]-Zaid
I smiled at the text and replied.
[When we were moving to L City, I took an oath, that I won't come back until I stay here for at least 10 years. If possible, even after 10 years, I would avoid coming back for any reason.] -Me
It sounded as cruel as I was typing it, I was determined to fulfill my promise and oath. That was the acme of my hatred for the people and place that outcasted me.
I had told my father, though we live in a good leased apartment, even though we are broke and have nothing and the situation forces us to return, I won't go back.
I am willing to do menial labor or become homeless, I will never go back whatever the case may be. My father praised me though he did not promote my hate.
However, Zaid seemed to have felt extremely bad after I told him, we talked less and less.
It was the end of the year, and it happened to be the birthday of my good male friend on 29th December and the next day it was Kim Taehyung's birthday.
As the custom goes, one must post a picture and countdown of a friend's birthday, I did the same thing. It was my first time posting a male friend's photo on the story and wishing him a happy birthday with a sentimental paragraph.
Nothing out of the ordinary happened.
However, the next day I repeated the same custom for V's birthday and wrote a good long paragraph in his praise. My only army friend even replied to me wishing me 'Happy V day.'
I was thrilled and even bought a pastry to celebrate, and the way it goes. I opened Instagram to post the photo of the pastry.
Once I was done, my eyes fell upon the red dot which had 18 written inside it, I was flabbergasted, I never once received so many messages.
I wondered what could it be, and I clicked on it to find a message from two recent chats.
One was from my crush and another was from my good friend who lived in another city.
What on earth was going on?
I clicked on my friend's chat. There was a reply to each of my seven stories and some others followed it.
~picture of V with his iconic pose~
[This?]
~picture of V in prince costume~
[Really?]
~picture of V with another member ~
[You like him?]
~picture of V edit~
[Seriously?]
~clip of V's iconic line in JUMP mv~
[I can't believe it]
~edit of V dancing~
[This girl like clean smooth-faced boys]
~picture of V with Yeontan ~
[Is he even a man]- The good friend.
[I am more handsome than him]- The good friend
Typing.....
What the hell? I was so stunned to read what he wrote that it sent chills to my bones, why would he hate them so much? What on earth happened?
What?
Handsome than V?
Is he dreaming? How can one even have a dream that he is better than V in any way? That may sound toxic but isn't it true? V is a person himself, like an angel, imperfectly perfect.
Why would he compare himself with him? Was he insecure or what? My brain went into the processing stage.
[He is so girly]- the good friend, he was still typing.
That's where I blew up, and the magma of blood poured out of my mouth and I vented it through my fingers as they typed nonstop.
[Handsome than him?]
[Are you in your utopia?]
[Are you mad or what?]
~picture of V~
[You are comparing yourself with him?]
~video clip of V's iconic line~
[This sounds like a girl???????]
[Are you deaf? Are you blind?]-me
[Chill...Why are you being like a toxic army?]
[I don't why girls are mad at them, I guess their so-called angelic look, the clean white face]-The good friend.
[Look????]-me
That was my first time hearing such a comment, my blood started burning and it spread in my eyes like boiling oil that would fry him like fritters.
[Don't talk to me!]-me
I texted him and then restricted him from my profile. Never in my dreams, I could imagine him saying such words to me, I was offended. Though I don't easily get it, I was disgusted.
I moved to the chat which had the name 'Zaid' on it. I wondered what he had to say at the same time, both of them typing nonstop.
~picture of V with his iconic pose~
[Ye?]
~picture of V in prince costume~
[This?]
~picture of V with another member ~
[You like this too?]
~picture of V edit~
[Seriously? Do you like them?]
~clip of V's iconic line in JUMP mv~
[Unbelievable, how can you?]
~edit of V dancing~
[They are so girly.]
~picture of V with Yeontan ~
[Nonsense.....I did not know you had such a taste]-Zaid
I rolled my eyes, what a coincidence! Is it a coincidence? Are they the same person? It could have been the case if I didn't know them in real life.
Are they in Cahoots? What is going on? their reaction is so similar...is it because they are both boys? Why are they overreacting?
[What is wrong with you?] - me
[Nothing, but I don't know why you like them?]
[Is it because of their clean glassy look?]-Zaid
I read in disbelief, it was his first time being so rude to me, and he dared to pass comments regarding my taste in music. I no longer cared about any crush or whatever, all I knew was that he was insulting me.
I tried to explain it to him, but he continued being offensive to me.
[You don't even understand the language]-Zaid.
[As if you do, listening despacito...Don't judge me!]-Me
I was so furious that I chose to delete his chat. Maybe I would have not done that if I was the girl before, blinded by naive fantasy, and promises. The girl who was insecure about everything.
Even the new uniform of senior school made me insecure, my fat bulging out, I would stretch down my tunic every time to hide my body. I thought everyone was looking at me and talking about me.
I even consulted my teacher and she told me something valuable that till today I remember her sincere eyes and her trustworthy words.
"Do you remember what was I wearing in our last session?" she asked me, sitting across from me with her legs crossed elegantly. Her yellow suit gives her the perfect appearance of a counselor and teacher.
She had cat-like eyes and thin lips; her chubby rosy tinted lips were so pleasing to the eyes. Just looking at her calmed me fifty times.
"No, I don't," I replied, I used to have a sharp memory and was able to remember even the tiniest of things, however, at that moment, I could not recall it.
"Exactly, nobody has the time to pay attention to such trivial details, we, people can't even remember what I ate yesterday afternoon. I am sure you don't remember either," she spoke, her confident looks made my brain melt from the ice age.
I understood what she was trying to tell me.
"See, nobody has time to care about your looks, your clothes, your shoes, if anyone does pay extra attention, he is nothing less than a psycho.
It is always our mind creating ruckus over our insecurities, one may feel insecure among a group of people. It's natural, and believe me, they too have their problems," she explained.
"Like, let me give you an example, I had a t-shirt from my high school time, I was obsessed with it so much that I wore it until last month, it was ragged and stained, but I did not want to throw it away. My mother forcefully made a cleaning cloth out of it.
I am a grown-up but if I wear my pajamas to the neighborhood and shops nearby. I don't care what people think, I am just comfortable wearing those. However, there is a protocol for everything.
I cannot wear informal to school, can I? No, because it would not only violate the rules but also the code of conduct.
Society is very complex, more than you can imagine, in every step, you will find something you can never dream of," She explained everything, and at that time I thought it was another lecture from a therapy teacher.
But I was wrong, completely wrong, her words kept ringing in my ears, though I didn't end well that semester.
Since I have come a long way, I can tell from my experience that it impacted my life positively, I became confident and carefree. I became more and more shameless.
Being a little shameless saved me from a lot of mental breakdowns and setbacks. I don't know if it can be effective for other people. But it was for me.
SUY NGHĨ CỦA NGƯỜI SÁNG TẠO 
YSP_PW
YSP_PW Some bitter truth is hidden behind those flowery words. 'Appearance versus reality' shatters my heart even when I breathe. Full of hypocrisy and double standard! This world is not a place to live but to survive.
It always haunts me that I have to indulge such values to survive. Like, be evil to get rid of bad!
I just hope to survive this, to reach the ultimate goal of my existence.
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