Concerning You

Hello.

I am a being inside you. Since you don’t know me, and I get to know everything through you, I don’t know what I am. Still, I am slowly finding out my name. Although right now, it’s just a being inside you, period.

I wanted to talk about you. Through you I will get to know the world bit by bit, but right now the thing that I know even better than myself is you. I knew you before I got to know me, and I knew you before you knew yourself. I haven’t realized my being that long, but you were the only shining thing I could know. To the edge of my cognition, there was only you.

Independent thinking, it’s still new to me. When I gather all the things I want to tell you who can’t hear me, I’ll talk to you again. What world will you show me until then.

Hello.

While I was gathering my thoughts you showed me new terms. Amongst those, I liked the term ‘shadow’ best. Something that resembles another but is not that another, something that is independent from another but cannot exist without that another. Shadow, this is not my name. I don’t know exactly what a shadow is, but it is just not. However, calling myself a being inside you may be correct, but it doesn’t show anything. So I will call myself your shadow until I find my name. Me and shadow, these two are not same, but they are similar.

You showed me the term shadow like this. You felt that the sun was in your eyes and you looked down. Under your feet there were numerous white flowers. Seeing those flowers you thought about the word clover. That was the flower’s name. Upon the name clover you remembered you of the past. A child who loved the lilac dress with frills on the shoulders and hem. That was you of the past. Remembering that you remembered a day of the past. Sunlight streamed down through the thick foliage and clovers were blossoming under the trees. You of that day cheered upon that sight. There was a child near you. He had short hair and smiled shyly with his eyes. He made a ring with the flower and slid it on your finger. You, who were enjoying yourself, felt anger when the ring touched your skin. The wetness that seeped out of the ring was unpleasant to you. When you realized you were angry, you frowned at the child who was watching you with uncertain eyebrows. After that day you never got to play shadow treading with him, you thought. On that you thought about shadow treading, and thought about shadows. I was following you on your long journey, and at that moment I took the term shadow and placed it under my thoughts.

You of now don’t know well about you of the past. You loved playing with the child of shy eye-smiles. He always listened to you without interrupting, and he liked the things you liked. When you played tag with that child, he always became ‘it’ because you didn’t like being ‘it’, and you of the past had guessed it. But your thoughts were too naïve for you to be sure. On that day you remembered, you smiled when you saw the flower on your finger. You were annoyed at the wetness, but when the sun dried your finger you soon forgot about the whole thing. You of now can’t remember anymore, but on that day you had that ring on your right index finger until you had to get undressed and take a bath.

Sometimes you feel a sense of loss so deep you can’t even express into words. You stop working for a moment, stop inhaling for a moment, stop thinking for a moment and look into the abyss. You, thinking you are an adult, consider that moment a lapse. You have a lot of work to do and a busy schedule, and you don’t have the time for meaningless moments, you mutter to yourself. I wanted to tell you that’s not true. The void you see is a place where you of the past stand wearing that lilac dress and holding hands with that child with shy eyes. You search for you of the past without realizing it. That is not bad nor good, and that is not meaningless nor meaningful. It’s just you.

That was the one of the many thoughts I organized. I am confused among all the new terms and unfamiliar names you tell me. When I have embraced them all, I’ll talk to you again. What will you be seeing now.

Hello.

Your shadow, that is not my name but I call myself that. You have your name but you don’t call yourself by your name. The names others call and constrict you by their standards are what you call yourself. You do not like those names. Despite that you call yourself by those names because you think those names have more meaning than your name. A graduate of some school, a worker of some profession, somebody, you consider those names as names that shows your hard-working, competent, diligent sides. On the other hand, you consider your name as the name that only reveals your faults like tossing aside urgent work when being tired, eating snacks in bed instead of doing something worthwhile, and always sleeping in late during Sunday mornings and not going jogging as promised.

I saw you being addressed by the names someone else gave you, calling yourself by the names someone called you, and being called by your name. Your judgement isn’t wrong, that even I who knows the word through you can know. However, your judgement isn’t right, either. Your name shows your hard-working, competent, diligent sides as well, and you know that. But you want to be recognized by others and be useful to them, and since you think your name is not a name for that person, you look away from the things you know.

The things you regard important is inside the names others call you. That is a fact you absolutely agree and I don’t disagree. But you always dismiss the thoughts that come to you with a grimace. Is the sides that others like really the sides you like, is the sides that others dislike really the sides you dislike, is the sides you think others like really the sides others like, is the sides others would dislike really bad, you ponder on these questions time to time, but you deny pondering them. And I feel that you don’t want to deny it. The things the world call bad can be good, and the things the world call good can be bad, this you always want to shout out to the world. I think you don’t have to suppress this. You carry the weight of your suppressed thoughts on your shoulders, and I wanted to tell you that you carry such a weight.

I had a lot of thoughts, but as I talk they disappear one by one. I want to talk to you for a long time, but I don’t have much time left. When thoughts join time, I’ll talk to you again. What will you of the future think about you of now.

Hello.

You told me that when night comes, the shadow recedes. I am not your shadow, but I am gradually receding. Inside you, it becomes more vague and darker. Maybe night is coming to you as well. Your lips hold a sigh and your eyes hold tears. You are showing me what feelings are but I am not understanding it. Something you don’t fully understand can’t reach me, who understands it through you. What will you of the future who understands feelings express them as. I can’t believe that it is something that can be expressed when I think about the fragments you show me.

You often think you are lonely. No one understands you, no one can be understood, no one is with you, you often say. Hugging yourself, bending your knees, lowering your head you murmur that you’re alone in this whole wide world. I often watched you like that. So I gathered all the thoughts, experiences, terms, and names and decided what I wanted to say to you last. I’m going to fall into a deep sleep after this. Will I wake, will I see the world you show me again, that I don’t know.

I love you. You I knew are a being that deserves to be loved by all the world. I don’t know the world and I didn’t fully know you, but that doesn’t make you less lovely. You can’t hear me, but I hope you will remember this.

I’m going to sleep now. I’ll really stop after this. I finally found out my name. My name is-

#sarahyoon #fiction