He’s here. Dammit. Of course, he’s here. They already told me he’s coming.What am I gonna do? Natural. Act natural. No. That’s not right. Act like you don’t care. Of course, I don’t care but I have to get that point across.Why is he here? If he even approached our table, I’m gonna kill him.

Dara is standing rigidly in her seat with a rigid smile while pretending to listen to her classmate in high school drone on about something her mind is not fully equipped to comprehend yet as she is too busy having an internal monologue as soon as she caught sight of her ex-boyfriend. Kwon Jiyong.

“So I told them that they they need to lower the price they are offering if they wanted this project…” Her classmate—or former classmate—continued.

“Hey! There’s Jiyong!” The guy on her left said and Dara turned to give him the evil eye which, unfortunately, gone unnoticed by the recipient as he was too busy waving at the guy she Is planning to to do everything she can to avoid. She didn’t turn to watch him stride towards them with his arrogant gait even if the people on their table had gone silent.

Silently watching her and Jiyong since they all knew what transpired in their history.

And it wasn’t pretty.

“Hey, ‘sup?” She heard Jiyong greeted Taeyang with a fist bump, the guy who had waved at him. He sounded so jovial and cheery it made Dara feel slightly at a disadvantage. “I see everyone’s here.”

Dara forced a nonchalant smile on her face as she looked at Jiyong’s direction while everybody on the table greeted him. “Hi,” she forced herself to say when Jiyong’s eyes fell on her.

He grinned widely. One she used to really love to see him with. Now she just wanted to smack him for looking like he was taunting her.

“Hey,” Jiyong told her. “I didn’t know you would come.”

Dara smile was still in place but her eyes turned scathing at they pierced  Jiyong. “Oh, that’s funny. I thought you wouldn’t considering how successful you must be now.”

“Are you keeping tabs on me?” Jiyong asked at the mention of his successful career, his wide grin getting even more wide if that is even possible.

Dara just couldn’t understand how Jiyong still have the power to really annoy the hell out of her but she didn’t lose her cool. “Sorry, I’ve been too busy to even waste my time on minute and insignificant information.” She delivered the response as what a pampered princess should say to a lowly peasant.

Dara thought she saw Jiyong’s jaw ticked but it must’ve been his imagination as he had chuckled. “Right, of course.”

It was only then that Dara realized that the table had gone silent and they were just watching their exchange. CL, the one seated closest to her, looked like she was fighting off a smile and the others looked a little awkward.

Hell, this wasn’t her fault! She returned her smile at Jiyong to prove to everyone she’s cool about this. She definitely doesn’t want to look she was still bitter. “Why don’t you sit down? Let’s all catch up. After all, it’s been, what? 20 years since we got together like this? Our school didn’t host our high school reunion just for us to be awkward with each other.” She gave everyone her most winning smile like she always give even when they were in high school. Exactly the smile of the well mannered princess she was brought up to be.

“Hey, there’s Jiyong!”

Dara immediately shoved the photo she was ogling for an hour now inside her bag as she returned in sitting primly by the bench by the school’s  courtyard pretending to be busy watching the birds in the trees and the leaves falling on the ground during their lunch period. She wasn’t really interested—who would?— but she had another reason for being here. CL, her best friend, kept on nudging her like she hadn’t heard her exclamation of Jiyong being present in the vicinity.

“Would you stop it?!” Dara hissed as she glared at CL when her elbow went in contact with her ribs.

CL snickered then pursed her lips when Jiyong passed by with his group of friends on their way to the auditorium to practice their dance presentation for the school’s anniversary.

“Hey,” one of Jiyong’s friends, Daesung, greeted when he spotted them.

CL waved her hands in a hello and Dara just smiled daintily but her eyes caught Jiyong’s. Her heart almost stopped when he gave her a grin. “Hey, happy birthday.”

And then she didn’t know what happened after that. It suddenly became just a fuzz inside  her brain until CL  gave a silent shriek as they watched them walk away.

“Oh my god!” CL said putting her hands on her shoulders, shaking her. “He greeted you!”

“He really did that?” Dara said still in suspension. “I thought it was my imagination.” She turned to CL and shook her shoulders  in return trying to control her joy of being greeted by her long time crush, Kwon Jiyong. He has been her crush since freshman year and he had never gave her any attention before. Not even a smile or hello. There was never any interaction between them, ever! She even had to resort into stealing an ID photo of him in the council room and hanging out in places she knew he would walk by Just a simple glance from him is enough for her. This is the first time he had actually paid any attention to her.And greeted her!  Is this God’s gift to her for turning 17?

The best gift ever!

“He is so arrogant!” Dara dodged the people walking in the opposite direction as she talked on the phone while balancing her coffee in her other hand as she trekked her way to WinKon Network, the broadcasting company she is working at as a Program Researcher, that early Monday morning. “Just because he found luck in earning millions for being a producer in YG Entertainment, he thinks the world is at already at his feet.”

“Well… he does,” CL said sounding like she had just woke up. “YG Entertainment is one of the biggest music companies in this country and he’s really very influential in the music world.”

“I know that,” she snapped. “But he’s acting like he’s already in the next line to be the President of YG or something. What an .” She entered the swinging door of the building.

“Aren’t you reacting way too strongly about this? I thought you said you were over him?”

Dara scoffed as she stopped to wait for the elevator. “Of course! No one in her right mind would cling to that jerk.”

“Uh huh.” She sounded skeptical. “Let’s see... From the time you guys broke up, you have been a certified nun for two and a half years years then you went to being a party wild girl for 4 months— i think that’s a sign of rebellion to cope with your heartbreak, by the way—and then you started dating different guys and never had any serious boyfriends, you kept on finding flaws on every guy you meet and the only serious boyfriend you had after Jiyong was Jaejoong but you broke up with him after a year because you said he wasn’t serious with you when you were the one who wasn’t serious with him and then you never gone on a date again. It has already been 10 years after Jiyong. You have really got to move on, Dara.”

“I have moved on!” She practically yelled making the other people turn their heads to look at her and she cleared slightly embarassed. She lowered her voice to her normal pitch not wanting to get into an argument with CL over the phone. She’ll start this again when they meet up so she just told her the easiest example of her showing that she’s way over Kwon Jiyong. “In fact, I have a date tonight.”

“Who?”

“Jung Il Woo. He asked me last week.” The elevator opened and she got in and pressed her floor.

“That trainee?”

“He was already accepted in the company as the music director. He’s officially a part of the company now.  He asked me to celebrate with him.”

“Well, good for you. I think he’s a nice guy. I know how hard it was for you when you broke up with Jiyong so I think dating would really help you get over him again.”

She really can’t believe CL sometimes. “I am already over him. It’s you who can’t get over it.”

“Hate override feelings of fondness. You really can’t get over him if you keep on hating him.”

Dara rolled her eyes. “Can’t I just hate him because I hate him? Should there really be an ulterior reason for my feelings of enmity?”

CL sighed audibly. “I can’t blame you for hating him. He really broke your heart and what he did was unforgivable but the first step of getting over someone is admitting that you are still not over him. It’s part of the healing process.”

“Are you listening to me, CL?” Dara said incredulously.

She heard CL yawn. “I spent all night reading this book of love psychology. It was really interesting and everything I’ve read makes me think of you. Do you want to borrow it?”

Dara scowled and pressed the end button hanging up on her best friend without saying goodbye. Typical of her to lecture her about break up and healing when she had never really been in a serious relationship. And besides, there is really nothing to lecture as Dara is completely over Kwon Jiyong. She couldn’t even figure out what she had liked about him apart from his face.

Okay, he was also incredibly talented but that’s it!

Dara felt hang open and heart stopping when Jiyong suddenly appeared in front of her inside the library with a beautifully designed paper rose.

“Hello. My friend is...” He started then cleared his throat. “Well… he asked me to give this to you and uh… greet you a good morning.”

Okay, that was disappointing. Actually, her hope shattered that second it came out of his mouth. She hesitatingly took the flower with a forced smile not even bothering to ask who that friend is. “Thank you.” If she could look down, she would probably see her heart broken and in pieces on the floor. First time she would interact with Jiyong since freshman year and this is him talking to her because of a friend.

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