“Jisoo honey, come here,” I remember my mother calling me with such a sweet voice.

“Yes, mama?” I replied as I quickly ran over to her, my small feet echoing throughout the spacious house.

“Do you want to move to a nice new house?” She asked me with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“No, I like this one mama,” I said with a pout.

“Really? You don’t want a house with a bigger yard or a bigger room?”

I shook my head adamantly side to side.

“Okay baby,” She said simply as she patted my hair down.

As a child, I was oblivious to a lot of things, but thinking back now I could have sworn her eyes were watery.

Jisoo woke up abruptly with tears soaking her dark brown hair.

She hated those types of dreams. She would go through and analyze memories that she had long ago buried deep within herself. The dreams used to happen occasionally, but now they happened more often and it made her never want to sleep again.

She looked toward her night stand and read the time that brightly shone in large white numbers. “6:23 am,” She whispered and looked up towards her ceiling. Maybe if she got ready for school now and dashed out the front door, she wouldn’t have to deal with her mother. With this in mind, she got up and quickly brushed her teeth and put on her uniform. Just as she was making her way down the stairs, she heard a noise come from behind her.

“Good morning,” her mother’s slightly accented voice filled her ears.

“Crap,” she exhaled and quickly responded, “Good morning, ma,” as she continued her way down the stairs. She crept up to the fridge and stuck her face inside it, hoping it would somehow get her out of what she knew was coming. “Come and sit down. I said we would talk and now we have plenty of time to,” Her mother said in a stern tone. When Jisoo stayed glued to the fridge she heard her mother sigh.

“Moon Jisoo.”

“Yes?” She stuck her head out with her hand still on the refrigerator handle, but saw the frustrated expression on her mother’s face and quickly stopped her antics and sat down.

“Why have you been so distracted lately? Your teachers keep calling me saying you fall asleep and don’t pay attention in class. You don’t try and help me around the house. You’re always coming home late or missing your stops. It’s barely the start of your senior year and you’re already failing classes!”

Jisoo listened to her mother drone on and on of how bad of a daughter she was as she fiddled with her fingers. “You guys just don’t appreciate me. Sometimes, I wish I could leave and never come back. I wonder how you and your father would live then.”

Jisoo looked up, lips set into a hard line as tears threatened to spill from her eyes because of the anger she felt. Her mother had always said various things to her before about them not appreciating her enough, but she had never threatened to leave them. How could she leave her with him?

Jisoo inhaled a breath of stabbing pain, her heart feeling heavy in her chest.

How could her mother just blurt that out to her, as if it wouldn’t tear her apart to see her leave?

“I’m going to be late for class,” Jisoo stated as she got up and stormed out of the house, running all the way to her bus stop with tears flowing down her face for the second time that day.

Jisoo tried to hide her puffy eyes from her nosy classmates by crossing her arms on her desk and burying her face in them. She took calming breaths in order to not cry again, the seriousness of her mother’s words still ringing in her ears. Would she really just leave them; leave her?

Despite their rocky relationship, her mother was all she had.

“Hey, lazy !” A familiar voice spoke, happiness evident in their tone of voice.

Jisoo didn’t dare look up.

“Mu?”

Her heart sped up at how softly he said her nickname. He always said it with such care and love.

“What do you want, Hyungwon?” She responded to the nickname Hyungwon had given her when they were kids. He had always made fun of her last name and would make random cow noises whenever she would come over to hang out.

“You know what? I’ll just call you Mu,” Hyungwon had told her one day as he laughed hysterically at her immediate reaction. “What?! Why?!” She had whined with her brows pinched together in confusion. “Well, if you’re going to call me Mu, I’m calling you turtle!” Jisoo had triumphantly cooed. “Wait, I’m calling you Mu because of MOO…N,” He extended her last name, sounding out the N by itself. “What’s the reason behind yours?!” He had exclaimed, beyond amused.

“You look like a turtle. Simple as that,” Jisoo had responded smugly. “No, I don’t!” He had shouted in offense. “You totally do,” She had screamed as she backed away from him, laughing uncontrollably. “You’re so dead. You better run, Jisoo!” Hyungwon had pointed a scrawny finger in her direction menacingly. “I thought it was Mu!”

Jisoo unconsciously smiled at the memory as she heard Hyungwon whisper something to somebody, no doubt Jihye, and heard footsteps walk away.

She mentally prepared herself and slapped a huge smile on her face as she looked up at him. “What’s up?” She asked nonchalantly. Jisoo watched as all the color drained from Hyungwon’s face, his smile falling into a frown. She felt her stomach drop all the way to the floor.

“What’s wrong- your eyes are so red.” He said with frantic eyes scanning every inch of her face. “Jisoo?” Hyungwon bent down and gripped the edge of her desk with his hands, staring her down. Their faces were so close she had to take a breath to stabilize her senses that were running wild. She looked into his lovely brown eyes and felt the world fall away. He was so beautiful it hurt.

“Class, turn your books to page 148,” Their literature teacher Mr. Kim announced as he walked into the class room. She moved to take her book out when she felt Hyungwon’s presence still at her side. She looked over at him, puzzled as to why he wasn’t moving to his own seat.

“Chae Hyungwon, move it along unless you want detention,” Mr. Kim scolded.

“You’re telling me later,” he mumbled out before his tall figure stalked off.

Jisoo itched to spill everything that had been going on with her lately, but since he started dating Jihye they didn’t get to spend that much time together alone. Therefore, she’d it up a