to mom and dad

Click click.

The lights to all the apartments I remember us living in turned off and on in pairs.

A cultural thing, maybe. Or just a habit. Korean apartments, rooms with two lights on at all times. Even in the living room, where we have the light switches in three groups of two, always, always. Click click. 

These days, I’m usually the one turning the final lights off.

Schoolwork, college applications, and just plain spending time on my own has kept me awake in the darkest hours of the night – or dawn, really – that both of you would scold me for staying up until. It’s tranquil, really. We live in the city, though not as much in the city as we used to, and there’s a certain beauty that the many red, white and yellow lights strewn across the Han river have at night. 

I spend the nights all to myself – since both of you are sleeping by these late times. And once I’m finally ready to retire into my messy bed, I turn off all my desk lights with quick taps. Pulling my hair tie out of the convenient bun I always wear, I yawn, insert the charging cables to all my different devices, and drag my feet over to the white rectangle attached to the walls of my room.

I start with the top switch first with my index, then my middle finger and entire palm slap across the bottom one.

Click click.

I sleep in in the mornings most (if not all) of the time, so I’m never the one turning on the lights to my room these days in those drowsy moments before getting ready for school. The mornings are packed with the annoyance of having to separate from my bed and the frenzy of an unprepared day ahead. You both worry about how I’ll manage waking up on time on my own once I get to college, and I agree. I don’t know what I’ll do alone. In the midst of these feelings, the usual 

Click click.

Is muted and obscured.