He wants me to deliver a cup of coffee to the principal.

He wants ME to deliver a freaking cup of coffee to the principal.

I mean, really, Jiyong?! Really?!

No way! No freaking way!

But, as much as I didn’t want to, I found myself standing before the principal’s office’s door with a cup of coffee on my hand. I can see myself now. The moment I’ll enter the office, my face will be tomato red and I’ll be shaking all over. I mean, I don’t deliver coffee to anyone but Jaejoong. I don’t even make coffee for Sajang-nim.

Aish!

I raised my fist to knock but before my knuckles made contact with the door, it opened.

“Oh, Miss Park, do you need something?” the principal asked. His eyes then darted to the coffee on my hand.

“G-Good morning, Sir,” I said and reached the coffee out to him.

He accepted it and gazed at me, as if scrutinizing me.

“Are you sick?” he asked.

I would have cracked up, but right now, I’m far from laughing. I was too embarrass even to turn my back on all the people who were throwing stares towards me. Their stares were as sharp as daggers on my back.

I shook my head and turned to leave at once with my head bowed in embarrassment.

“Thank you, Miss Park,” the principal said, making me stop from my tracks. “And good morning too.”

I continued walking towards my desk with my head still bowed. Gaaah! That was so embarrassing!

I dropped myself on the chair behind my desk. Embarrassing! Embarrassing!

In this school, I’m very well-known for being the teacher who doesn’t have friends, who you can’t approach anytime, who you can’t expect giving you a greeting or a smile, and the list goes on and on. But since Jiyong came, all of these labels tagged on me, they were all erased.

Now, I’m the teacher who tries to be friendly, who wants to trust people around her, who acts all timid and embarrassed with just simple acts and gestures, and the list also goes on and on.

“Good job, baby girl,” Jiyong said patting my head like I’m kind of a dog who just learned a new trick.

I looked up at him and he smiled down at me. He flashed his two fingers in front of my face signaling the second phase of Level two of his Trust Mission.

I lightly dropped my head on the desk. “What is it now?”

“Greet everyone in this office a good morning,” he instructed.

I stood up and went towards a certain teacher’s desk. She looked up at me obviously surprised and anticipating. Wait, anticipating? Why is she even anticipating?

I flashed her my sweetest smile. “Good morning, Miss Gong.”

She wasn’t able to respond at once. I was about to leave and go to the next table when she greeted me back. “Good morning, too.”

And on and on it went.

The moment I finished, it seemed like the whole office had its own rainbow and sunshine. They were all talking in happy voices to each other. I even heard some of them talking about how I’ve changed. Then I heard Jiyong’s name being mentioned too.

And of course, I was also talking to other teachers too, practically about anything under the sun.

While conversing, I got lost on thoughts. I never knew that simple greetings could make someone’s day. How about if I greet everyone every day from now on, eh?

“You made friends,” Jiyong noticed the moment I returned to my desk.

“You won’t believe how much things they said about me, ranging from weird to being an alien. Can you believe that? They believed that I was an alien because I don’t interact with them. How ridiculous could that get?”

He chuckled. “I’m glad.”

“Yeah,” I said, nodding. “You must be so proud and glad that your mission looks like it’s going to be successful. Anyway, what do delivering a cup of coffee and greeting everyone a part of this mission?”

“Well, you can trust someone easily, but it will be hard for others to trust you.”

I folded my arms across my chest. “And why is that?”

“There are many reasons for that. One, you’re rude to other people. Two, you’re mean. Three, you’re-“

“Fine! I get it!” I said and stood. “I have classes to attend to.”

I was laughing along with the other teachers on the cafeteria table when someone slammed his hand on the space on my right. Everyone became silent and I looked up. Jiyong was smiling at my companions.

“Can I borrow my baby girl for a sec?” he asked them.

They nodded awkwardly. Jiyong entangled his fingers with me and pulled me away from the teachers.

“Why did you call me baby girl in front of them?” I asked him the moment we arrived at the faculty room.

“What do you want me to call you then? The Great Grumpy Teacher?”

“Ya!”

He laughed. “Kidding,” he said as he got something from the drawer of his desk. “The final level is this.”

I stared at the plastic bag full of God-knows-what while he was holding it up.

“And that is?” I urged.

He opened the bag to reveal some rubber bracelets. I picked one up and inspected it. There were some writings on it.

“I trust you, My Friend,” I read it and then scrunched my nose. “Eew.”

“What’s wrong with it?” he asked, eyebrow raised.

“That’s too cheesy. How about we change ‘my friend’ to ‘dude’?”

Unexpectedly, he laughed. “You’re such a joker,” he said as he messed with my hair. “Now go and give those to the teachers.”

I went back to the cafeteria and distributed the bracelets to the teachers. They were shocked as expected. But they willingly accepted them and immediately wore them on their wrists even though they don’t really go well with their outfits today. However, if I expected them to be shocked the moment they received the bracelet, I didn’t expect them to be this happy about it to the extent of hugging me.

While I was trapped in between their tight hugs, that was the moment I had a realization.

I realized how much things I have been missing out in life because of sticking too much with the past. I never listened to Sajang-nim and Jaejoong. And I must say, I regret not listening to them. And I may add, I’m pretty impressed with Jiyong for unraveling this side of me, which I think have been hiding inside of me and just waiting to be woken up. I’m amazed with Jiyong. Not even Jaejoong was able to do this.

“Thank you so much!”

“Thank you…”

“This really means so much!”

And on and on it went.

Jiyong’s chest was heaving up and down as he was breathing evenly. I was tracing patterns on his bare chest as I was staring at nothing in particular. I was just like that for minutes now. And I thought he already fell asleep.

I felt him kissing my hair. I looked up and he kissed my forehead, then the tip of my nose, and then he stopped a few centimeters from my lips. I pouted. And he smiled.

“Why’d you stopped?” I asked.

“No reason,” he said in a teasing tone. “Let’s sleep?”

“I won’t sleep until I receive something,” I said and then puckered my lips.

“Why? You’re hungry? Do you want food? Do you want me to feed you?”

“No!” I said, wiggling my legs.

“What then? Probably…” he said his finger on his chin. Then he stared back at me with confusion. “We just did ‘that’,” he said.

“You erted alien, I’m not referring to ‘that’,” I said.

He laughed. And then he kissed my lips lightly. Then he pulled away.

But I reached for his lips again. I kissed his lips passionately this time, hungry for more. His muscled arms circled my waist. He drew me to him, and I could feel the clean line of our two bodies connecting – legs tangled up in legs, hips pressed into hips, chests heaving in time with each other.

“Thank you,” I said as I pulled away a little and then kissed him again.

“For what?” he asked, pulling away for real this time.

I smiled up at him. “For everything.”

He smiled too.

I sat up and reached for something in the bag which was resting on the floor. I turned to him and slipped something on his wrist.

“What is this?” he asked, since it was dark.

“I trust you…” I said. “…baby boy.”

He stared at it, then back at me. “Thank you,” he said and then brushed his lips lightly against mine. “Now sleep, baby girl. We have a long day awaiting for us tomorrow.”

“Really?” I asked. “Isn’t it a Saturday tomorrow? It’s a day-off. We could just stay like this until tomorrow.”

Even though it was dark, I can tell that his face fell. “Just… sleep.”

Did I miss something? I pouted and thought. He kissed my hair again.

“Good night, baby girl.”

I hate the sound of persistent ringing of phones. Well, I only hate it when I’m having a good night sleep, which I may add happens so rarely but was happening recently.

So, I was cuddling on Jiyong’s chest when my phone kept on ringing. I originally didn’t want to pick it up. Heck, why are you even disturbing me while I’m being cuddled by baby boy?

Eh? Who could that be? Why isn’t it stopping?

Almost growling in frustration, I groggily reached for my phone.

“Hmmm?” I answered.

“Why are you not in your room?!” Jaejoong’s voice came at once.

“You know where I am,” I said lazily, almost falling asleep again.

“Well, you need to come to the headquarters. Something came up,” he said and hung up the phone.

I stared at the phone on my hand. Eh? What’s with the temper?

I was about to slid under the covers once again when what Jaejoong said sunk in.

Something came up? Omo, another mission?!

I jumped on my feet and went to the bathroom to quickly take a shower. I got dressed at once.

“Baby girl?” Jiyong called with his hoarse voice while I was on the process of buttoning my blouse.

“Oh, you’re awake?” I asked as I quickly combed my hair after being fully dressed.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

I turned to him. He was rubbing his eyes while sitting at the edge of the bed. He was only wearing his boxers and his hair was disheveled. Nevertheless, I found him really adorable. He looked like a cute little kid.

“The company called,” I said. I felt really bad lying to him. “I have to go there and fix some things. Sajang-nim isn’t feeling well so I’ll replace him in the moment… as usual. It sounded urgent so I have to leave now.”

“At this hour? Five in the morning? Are they serious?” he asked.

Oops. Bad move, Dara.

“It sounded urgent,” I said, voice turning into a whisper.

“Will you stay there for the whole day?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said truthfully. “Probably.”

He dropped himself to the bed once again. “Fine, it sounded urgent anyway.”

“Why? Is something wrong?”

“Nothing.  Just… when you have time, I want to have dinner with you. Let’s meet up in front of the school,” he said.

“Why?” I asked again.

“Just… go,” he asked as he crawled back to sleep. “Call me when you’re not busy anymore.”

Strange. What’s up with him?

---

poster credits to anjellie_ka