ENIGMA

Enigma. The word rolls around in his head like a bullet through the glass and it shatters completely when his eyes open. He fixates his pupils onto the fan in the center of his ceiling and sighs in exhaustion. He wonders how he ended up where he was despite all the want not to be. A weird dull ache is present in his chest and it only grows stronger when he focuses on it. It seems weird how your mental troubles and hurt can transform into physical. How a broken heart can actually make your chest ache in pain, how it makes you feel a little void inside and like your insides twist with every bitter word your lover throws at you. Young-Jae always found life to be unpredictable. He could never guess something coming his way, it was as if on any coming day a life-changing surprise could be knocking at his front door in the morning and he wouldn't know what to do. Why? Well because he never did. Either way, he tried to embrace all of those changes, stuffing his protests and problems with them, deep down somewhere inside his chest where nobody could bother knocking, morning or evening. Now, though physically in his room, Young-Jae let his mind carry him back home, he didn't know which home he wanted to go back to but it was a feeling of a home being present that he reassured himself with, every now and then. He clenched his jaw, squeezing his eyes with curled-up toes as he tried to take his mind away from the want of being home and instead on what he was actually doing. Another minute and Jae's body spasmed in pleasure. The boy breathed heavily, a sheer layer of glistening sweat forming on his body. He lay sprawled out on his bed completely naked, the camera now turned off as he calmed down after the orgasm he just had. With much strength, he got up and turned off the speaker that was shuffling his 'two feet' playlist softly. Pulling his boxers up, he plopped down on the bed again and got under the covers again since it was a little chilly in his room. He unlocked his phone, his skin shining prettily against the pink lights of his room and the little light from his phone too. Young-Jae scrolled through the various comments on his Livestream, some complimenting his voice and some his body. He smiles weakly to himself. Somewhat bittersweet with his memories of her. The boy was so sure he couldn't love a person as crude and unpolished as her. He was so, so sure that he wouldn't have his heart broken by someone who he knew couldn't love anybody, ever. He was sure that she wouldn't be the one he'd feel love for and be loved by but perhaps life had other plans. She was somewhat an Enigma. He couldn't understand her. Couldn't wrap his mind around the fact that she had hurt him countless times but he couldn't bring himself to hate her. He laughed to himself in irony. He knew if she was to walk through the door, right now, he wouldn't hesitate to fall into her arms and be held. He knew he was far too gone to care about pride now. Min Young-Jae was twenty-four and he was pretty much unemployed if he didn't do the cam boy thing along with the waiting in the high maintenance cafe down the block. It wasn't just his financial problems it was also his 'thing', he liked doing it. He liked imagining the number of people who'd get off to his little actions and instructions every day, it made him feel loved. It made him feel pretty, seen, and most of all wanted. No matter how much he denied his loneliness in front of his other friends, scratch that, friend, Kim Seok-Min, Young-Jae still felt the need to be held through his bad days, nightmares, everything but with thousands of people praising him every day even if they were hollow and only s****l, he did feel a little less lonely. Plus, it was a win-win for him, the funds he'd get were kind of enough for him to carry on nicely with his little life. He jutted out his bottom lip when he didn't find anybody suitable and switched to Twitter instead. He opened his texts, two new girls had texted him so he one by one checked out their profiles before sighing and throwing the phone somewhere on the bed. It wasn't enough, the cam thing wasn't enough for him outside money. He wanted more, he wanted a real-life person to hold, to love, and to cherish like other people. Just a simple person who'd be with him happily. A simple love story with a simple ending was all he wanted so why did he end up like this? Why did he end up giving up all his dreams despite the fact that he had left his home behind for it? Why was he here? Why did he trust her to be any different? He sat back up and shuffled till his back was against the headboard and his head was adjacent to the wall. "Okay, let's wind back up a few months," Jae mutters to himself and squeezes his eyes shut to look for the memory of his first encounter with the girl that whirled his whole life around. 'It started with her eyes', he thinks. 'It ended with her words'. Where did it go so wrong? What had he done?