True, True, Lie (part.II)
Part II
The night before...
The world seemed to be distorted in weird ways. The lights were too bright. The sounds all mashed together and seemed to have been clogged. Everything was swaying like they were on a boat.
For the umpteenth time that night, Lee Chaerin cursed herself for getting herself into this situation. Her mind was slightly blurred and hazy, her throat felt dry, her stomach burned a little and she knew she was going to have a very bad migraine in the morning. What’s worse was she was in a room reek of alcohol and smoke, with a group of rowdy, tipsy friends and a bottle of soju in hand.
Why was she so stupid and vulnerable to have let herself into this?
With no answer to her own question, Chaerin took another swig from her bottle and examined her surroundings once more. She was seated on the floor of Big Bang’s living room, in a circle with Big Bang and her beloved members of 2NE1.
Most of them were out cold from the excessive alcohol.
Dara was lying on the sofa in her slumber land.
Bom and her boyfriend of two years Seunghyun, also known as TOP, were huddled in the corner of the room, sleeping.
Minji who had very low alcohol tolerance knocked out after her first bottle.
Daesung couldn’t make it that night because he was instructed by Mr.YG himself to rest more.
Now, the ones that were left were Chaerin herself, Youngbae, Seungri and... someone she wished he never came...
...Jiyong.
Worry began to engulf her as she mentally counted the number of bottles he consumed.
6 bottles of soju.
He always starts acting funny after 6 bottles. Chaerin thought.
However, he seemed to be different that night. Jiyong was at his 7th bottle and he was as sober as he was when they first started the game.
They were playing a game of ‘True, True, Lie’ and Chaerin mentally smacked Dara for suggesting the horrid game.
‘True, True, Lie’ was a party game where all secrets of oneself are revealed. It was a game where one is required to spin a bottle and make three statements about his or her self; two statements being true and one was a lie. Whoever the bottle pointed to, that person will then be assigned to guess which of the three statements was a lie. If that person managed to get it right, the person who made the statements will have to answer a quick question of ‘Truth or Dare’; ‘Truth’ where he or she will have to answer an honest question or the other option, ‘Dare’ where he or she will be dared to do something one will never dream of.
Chaerin didn’t know why she agreed to play the game with them. Perhaps it was because Dara persuaded her to, or maybe it was because Minji never played it before and she felt the need to protect her little maknae from her crazy friends, or maybe it was simply because he was playing.
She turned her eyes towards him and immediately, she regretted it.
His eyes were fixed on hers and the dark clearness of it all stunned her, rendering her absolutely speechless. Their eyes never ceased to lose contact. His dark eyes held hers and continued to bore into them, making her all jittery and nervous. Her stomach felt as if it was in a butterfly-frenzy.
Chaerin didn’t know if it was the alcohol in her system that was doing all the hallucinating but she could have sworn that Jiyong had been staring at her for the past hour.
“Chaerin, it’s your turn. Spin the bottle...” someone mumbled.
Chaerin quickly turned away from Jiyong’s eyes and to the source of the voice.
With his eyes closed, Youngbae tried to sit upright but failed, no matter how hard he tried. He seemed to have lost his sense of balance as his body swayed from side to side. “Chaerin, come on... we have to-” he never got to finish his sentence as he plopped softly sideways onto the cushion next to him.
Loud laughter erupted from Seungri. “HAHAHA! I won!! WHOOO! I’m better than Youngbae hyung!” he laughed. “Now all I have to do is beat Jiyong hyung and I’ll be the ultimate winner of the night!!” he said, hugging his bottle as a giggle slipped past his lips.
Chaerin cringed.
Okay, that was disturbing. She thought.
With half-closed eyes, Seungri flashed her a wide grin and said, “Okay! Chaerin! You’re next! Spin the bottle!!”
Chaerin sighed and spun it hard.
One spin... two spins... three spins...
The heat in the room intensified as she watched the bottle spin. Finally it stopped and she waited before seeing who it had landed on. For a second, she thought it was Seungri, immediately putting her into slight ease but when she looked up, the bottle landed on…
Jiyong.
How very ironic.
“OHHH!! This is going to be interesting! Jiyong hyung knows practically everything about you!!” Seungri shouted, clapping excitedly.
Taking another swig of soju, Chaerin plucked up her courage and stared into Jiyong’s eyes, hoping that her poker-face will mask her lie. “Okay. Statement 1: I lost my first kiss when I was 15. Statement 2: The place I’ve always wanted to visit is Greece. Statement 3: I lost 3pounds in the past month.”
A smile formed on Chaerin’s lips. She made sure all her statements sounded convincing and was confident that he will never be able to guess which one was the lie.
“Statement 3 is a lie.” Jiyong simply said before he averted his eyes away from hers and gulped down the remaining soju in his bottle.
Her smile faded as she inhaled in slight shock.
How did he know? She was sure that she never told him about it.
As if he heard her question, Jiyong turned back to her and answered, “You definitely lost more than that. You haven’t been eating much lately and you’ve been practicing a lot.”
He was right. She actually lost 5pounds.
Seungri started to howl with laughter. “SEE! I WAS RIGHT! HAHAHHA!”
Although she couldn’t understand why Seungri found it so funny, she was still in shock that Jiyong managed to pick out her lie. She started to ponder how Jiyong knew. He shouldn’t know all these things about her. She never told him or anyone for that matter. And, no one realized it either, not even the girls.
Could it be that…
As realization dawned at her, she felt blood rushing to her cheeks and she started to feel hot all over her body.
Wait… does this mean that Jiyong had been keeping a close eye on her? That he had been watching her all along?
“So, Chaerin! Truth or Dare??” Seungri asked as he wiggled his eyebrows in mischief.
Slightly embarrassed, she grabbed her bottle and gulped down its contents before answering, “Truth.”
It was then Seungri started whining, obviously drunk. “Hyunggg! She said truth! It’s no fair!! She’s so boring! Make her choose Dare! MAKE HER, MAKE HERRRR!” he said with a pout. “HYUNGGG~ You must make her do the Dare! It’s more FUN! FUN! FUNNN! Fun… fun…” he yelled loudly before his voice trailed off at the very end. The alcohol in his system must have taken effect as his eyes closed and he finally dropped his head onto Jiyong’s shoulder.
Silence filled the air for a while before Jiyong and Chaerin started laughing.
“Did you see the look on his face?” Jiyong asked her between laughs.
Chaerin laughed louder. “Yeah! It was like this,” she said before reenacting Seungri’s last facial expression before he knocked out.
Jiyong chuckled. “You know, you look really cute when you do that.”
Still laughing, she asked, “When I do what?”
He smiled. “When you laugh.”
The tone he used was so serious that it stopped her from laughing and Chaerin could feel the butterflies again in the pit of her stomach.
It soon got awkward and Chaerin had no idea what to say. Jiyong must have caught onto it for he tried to brighten the atmosphere with a smile as he finally broke the deafening silence between them. “So, you picked Truth right?”
With flushed cheeks, Chaerin glugged the remaining of her bottle and replied, “Right.”
“Then answer me honestly… Are you in love with someone in this room right now?”
Chaerin coughed as she began to panic. He didn’t know of her feelings, did he?
As Jiyong looked deeply into her eyes, his stare was serious and domineering, demanding for an answer.
She wasn’t ready for this. She needed to get out, NOW.
Avoiding his question, Chaerin faked a yawn. She then stretched her arms and stood up from the floor. “I’m tired, Jiyong. I’m going home. I’ll see you in the morning.” Determined to escape, she quickly walk out of the room and made her way towards the main entrance.
As she closed the main apartment door behind her, she heard thundering footsteps following closely behind her. She knew that Jiyong would soon be bursting through that door and will catch up with her if she didn’t hurry.
She sprinted towards the fire exit and started running down the stairs to her apartment floor.
“Chaerin! Stop!”
Adrenaline pumped through her veins as she increased her speed. Pushing past the exit door of her floor, she bolted for her apartment door and quickly keyed in the password.
Unfortunately, she wasn’t fast enough.
Before she got to shut her door close, Jiyong managed to force his way into her apartment, causing the door to slam against the wall.
With the door left ajar, Chaerin and Jiyong stood at 2NE1’s apartment entrance, panting.
Chaerin couldn’t bring herself to look at him in the eye. She was afraid. “What do you want, Jiyong? I’m tired. Whatever it is, we’ll talk tomorrow okay?” she said as she tried pushing Jiyong out her door.
He didn’t budge.
“We won’t be able to talk about this tomorrow. You’ll find ways and excuses to avoid me.”
Silence.
“Look at me, Chaerin. LOOK AT ME!” Jiyong shouted.
Bottled up anger and frustration burst and filled the air with Jiyong’s uncontrollable emotions. It caught Chaerin off-guard. She has never seen him acting this way before.
Chaerin took a deep breath, closed her eyes and opened them again to be greeted with Jiyong’s intense ones. His dark eyes were like black holes, pulling all of her into them with intensity of a certain point where she was incapable of breaking away from the attraction of his gaze. His eyes were so clear and all she could see in his eyes was the reflection of herself.
For once, she felt that maybe, just maybe, that Jiyong really did love her.
But she knew it was too much of a dream and a fantasy to be real.
“Answer me,” he demanded.
Chaerin shook her head. “No. I’m going to bed. You’re drunk, Jiyong. Go back up there and sleep. Good night,” she said with finality, hoping he would take the bait and leave her alone.
But, as she tried to turn away from him, Jiyong grabbed her arm and pushed her against the wall behind her, cornering her. “Let’s play a game of True, True, Lie for one last time. Same rules apply. If you win, we’ll part ways and I’ll never bring this up again. Deal??”
Before Chaerin got to protest and say no, he interrupted, “Silence means consent. Deal.”
“What?? I-”
Jiyong interrupted again. “Statement 1: I love you. Statement 2: I love you. Statement 3: I love you. Go on, take your pick. Pick out my lie.”
Chaerin felt her whole world stop. Jiyong’s sudden confession rendered her speechless. There was a sudden rush of emotions within and she couldn’t quite decipher what it was. Shock, surprise, fear, happiness, bliss and everything else in between flooded her senses, sending her off the edge. Now she was falling, falling harder for this man who stood in front of her.
“You can’t pick, can you? Fine, if you can’t pick, it’ll be considered as forfeit. Since now it’s a forfeit, I win. So now, Truth or Dare? Oh? You can’t pick either? Okay, Dare for you then.”
Chaerin, still stunned with his confession, did not utter a word as he stepped closer towards her.
“Lee Chaerin, I, Kwon Jiyong dare you to kiss me if you share the same feelings as I do,” he said looking at her squarely in the eye, challenging her.
Chaerin didn’t know what came over her that made do what she did. It could have been the overflow of her emotions that were rushing through her head or the courage from the alcohol in her system. Either way, she didn’t care. At least not now.
Boldly, she put her arms around his neck and kissed him. The moment her lips met his, Chaerin knew she did the right thing, for she felt whole. It took a moment before she felt Jiyong starting to respond to her kiss. For this one brief moment, time seemed to mean nothing, and the trials of life faded to the background of her mind. Jiyong never said a word, but she could feel what his heart and mind felt.
Chaerin drew back slightly and looked deep into his eyes as she felt like she was spiralling away into the oblivion. Briefly, their lips brushed once more, a whispered hint of a touch like a butterfly’s fluttering caress. She felt his lips smile against hers, as if rejoicing at his victory and she couldn’t help but smile as well.
Bittersweet.
That was how their kiss tasted like.
The kiss was gentle, tentative, as if both were afraid of scaring off the other. The tingle of touching lips ran through them both, a shared sensation neither had expected. And yet, they both thrilled at the feeling, the longing for more building slowly.
A hand clenched at the fabric of a shirt, trying to resist the sudden temptation of lust. They both then reached for each other, the kiss suddenly becoming demanding, requiring control.
Suddenly, they broke away from each other at the same moment and Jiyong took a step back. Clothing was disarrayed, and breaths came in ragged gasps.
It was then Chaerin knew where this situation was going. She knew what was to follow if her lips were to brush against his again.
Jiyong who pulled away, had his eyes closed and his brow furrowed as he sought for a moment of control. He took a deep breath before looking into her eyes again. This time with desire pooling in his eyes. “Are you sure?”
Chaerin inhaled deeply as she looked at him through slightly lowered lids, and swallowed with a suddenly dry throat.
“Yes,” she breathed in a soft whisper.
And then Jiyong moved towards her, his own fear being pushed aside as he clutched at her clothing. Chaerin melted against him, against his lips and hands while he surrendered to the emotions that washed his soul clean of doubt. The moan came as both of their throats uttered the sounds of longing and desire.
Hands fumbled recklessly, simple caresses became demanding, as they reached for that pinnacle of existence, that sense of connection and bonding that no religion or philosophy can define. Lust, need, affection, companionship all disappeared into the haze of the sensations they both gave to each other.
Chaerin forgot how the door of her apartment closed or how she ended up on Dara’s bed with Jiyong on top of her.
All she could remember was how Jiyong took her breath away that night.