***********************

Perhaps, Jessica truthfully knew why many, including boys feared her. She wasn’t that surprised, even though slightly annoyed, when people started calling her ‘Ice princess’ as her famous nickname. Famous for her icy glare, sharp tongue and nonchalant coldness. And you would never ever get her pissed off. No one would brave enough to piss her off, unless her parents, and... Tiffany.

The latter was just nervously fidgeting her fingers, but still managed to giggle at Jessica. Tiffany absolutely realized her depth of trespasses she had just committed towards her sister. She was ready to act apologetically towards Jessica, but the thought of her spontaneous matchmaking game between Jessica and the stranger boy, ahh the stranger..  what’s his name? was absolutely exhilarating for her. She just liked teasing Jessica.

But, at this point, Tiffany really needed to deal with the cold eyes from a certain brunette that kept glaring at her since they were walking back on the way back to the hotel. Taeng was feeling the shiver as well, so he excused himself to go to nearby grocery.

‘I’m sorry for teasing you, ok? Come on... don’t be mad at me. ‘Tiffany tried to utter her explanation apologetically.

Jessica rolled her eyes into the back of Tiffany’s skull, giving her another shot of deadpan. Urgg...this girl. Jessica was upset. But why? Tiffany actually pointed out her reason legitimately. She knew Tiffany was just teasing the grumpy boy with her. It’s all just joking, playing and having fun. Still, she was upset…. because she’s just upset and there is no valid reason! Since young, she’s never fond of something that was unplanned or spontaneous. She just didn’t like to be out of control. And that’s what made she and Tiffany exactly the opposite characters. It’s like a dog and cat. Water and oil. And that’s why they responded things differently.

Jessica huffed, still felt disgruntled and stomped her feet in frustration. Nonchalantly, she crept away towards the the front door of the room without saying any words.

‘Hey Jessi, where are you going?’ Tiffany seemed taken a back, her eyes looked worried.

‘Out for a walk.’ Jessica replied wrathfully and within seconds, she dashed out of the room.

‘Just don’t come too late, ok?’ Tiffany’s echoed voice could be vaguely heard from her room.

Whatever, Tiff.

**********************

Two hours had passed since the fair-skinned brunette had left the hotel, and Jessica was still not in the best mood of returning back to the 5-star hotel she’s currently staying at. Letting out a heavy sigh, she noticed a wisp of white vapor oozing out of her dainty lips. It was another freezing night in the city of Melbourne and she felt the chilly air sending her a shiver to her body system. Ohh..so cold! It just seemed the plushy leather jacket that was supposed to suppress the merciless cold was actually purposeless. Her shoulders were getting trembling heavily from the wintery effects and she could feel her body sending her a signal to find somewhere cold-free and covered. She increased her walking pace and for 10 minutes, hastily passing through the street filled up with hustle and bustle of tourists and locals alike before finally stopped, when she spotted bright neon signs mounted on the front of the old-white Victorian style building.

Jessica decided to walk into the building and as she stepped through the swinging doors and into the yellowish lit establishment, it turned out to be a pub. There was a bar sat to her right: a long countertop backed by countless shelves of alcohol that spanned the entire wall. On her left side, set a large number of wooden tables with high stools, few black leather-made couches accompanied with short glass dining tables and all of them were occupied by noisy patrons. At her front, the crowd of men and women were occupying the twinkling lights of the dance floor, dancing fluidly to the soulful R&B song performed by a local band. Jessica had never been visiting a pub or touching alcohol in Seoul before, due to her obvious underage identity and she would be in a big trouble if she was getting caught out to perform that act. But now, she’s miles away from Korea and no one, yes no one! Would be able to report her. She smirked to herself, and strode over to the counter and taking a seat on one of the high stools.

The bartender was in front of her right away.

‘G’day, what ya goin to order, mate?’ Greeted the tall, unshaven Caucasian man said cheerfully while cleaning a mug with a rag.

Jessica looked up at the man and immediately pointed out her finger on one of the black colored bottles, lined up neatly inside the refrigerator. The bartender turned around to Jessica and grinned.’Alesmith Old Numbskull. Ya choose good brand of beer, mate.’

He grabbed the bottle immediately, poured it out into the pint glass beer and placed it in front of Jessica. He then moved away to continue polishing the mug he had set down earlier.

Jessica smiled and eyed the drink in front of her for a moment. We’ll see how good it is. Closing her eyes, she picked the pint glass, sipped the contents into and swallowed it. Her eyes shot open and she could felt the effects of the mixture, burning her from the outside in as it made its way down. This tasted good, you’re right, Mr.Bartender.

Still feeling the firstly soothing sensation from the alcohol, Jessica heaved a satisfaction smile. She then decided to scan her eyes through the pub area.

“Is this how night life in Aussie?hmm…” She noticed on her front two tanned men were chatting noisily and followed by loud laughter. Then on her right, some well dressed young white girls were sitting and whispering with each other and their eyes were sneakily looking towards a certain object, then they stopped and continued their giggling between themselves. What are they looking at? Maybe there is a hot-handsome man? A little bit curious at the object the girls were eyeing at, Jessica lifted and moved her eyes at the pointed object ----- A tanned, short-haired and breathtakingly good looking Asian looking boy, sitting alone on the couch with a serious face looking down at her mobile phone ----

He looked familiar.

Jessica couldn’t believe what she was seeing. How..On..Earth..

Her eyes were widened and her body seemed stiffen and were unable to move around. Still unconsciously staring at the object, she couldn’t clearly rationale any logic reason on how the universe magically planned their second accidental encounter.

While her brain was still digesting the reasonable answer to their unplanned reunion, suddenly the boy lifted his eyes and unintentionally, meeting ---- Jessica’s eyes. Their gaze locked for what seemed like forever. Jessica could see his eyes were also bugged out and his lips forming a ‘half-o’ kind of shape. He must had been shocked by Jessica unwarned presence.

She abruptly broke their gaze, feeling embarrassed for getting ‘caught’ and turned around to pick up her Old Numbskull beer. She nervously swallowed almost half of the content, slammed the glass onto the counter and then covered her face with her palms. Gosh, I must had been looked so ridiculous! Jessica felt as if her surrounding became awkward. What the heck is he doing in here?Why is he here?Oh..what am I going to do? Jessica was mentally ranting lots of questions inside her head while intermittently taking gulp of the beer until it’s becoming empty. Like playing hide and seek, Jessica decided to re-check the boy, and hoping he wasn’t caught her for the second time, she slowly tilted her head and took a peek, only to find the couch had already been emptied. Great, he’s gone! Jessica heaved a huge relief from her previously intense breathing. Maybe I should just get going now!

After all, Jessica knew hide and seek could be an unpleasant game, especially when she didn’t want to be found.

While Jessica was trying to get her wallet to pay the beer, suddenly she heard a door burst open in a loud bang. Everyone in the bar, including the band, looked towards the front o the bar, where a group of five big, burly men had entered the pub area. Th