The school week passed in a blur. I became really good friends with Eunji and BAP, excluding this ‘Youngjae’ person. I kept having the same dreams of that strange guy every single day. It never finished, something would interrupt it, like a maid knocking on the door. B.A.P was really kind and a great bunch of guys.

Yongguk was a natural leader that he could actually be a father to the boys. He seemed to be strict on the outside, but was a nice person on the in. Himchan was like the mom of the group and Yongguk’s best friend. He was clingy to me a lot and called me ‘his baby’, but he was actually a little bit sensitive. Daehyun was quiet at first, but now he’s a chatterbox 24/7 that’s crazy for cheesecake. Jongup is awkward and shy, but he has the perfect sunny smile that’s innocent and makes everything bright. Zelo is hyper (perfect for being a maknae) and loves to skateboard and eat cherry tomatoes. I promised him I would give him cherry tomatoes every Monday and he was so happy, he squealed, “Thank you noona! Thank you noona!”

The last bell had finally rung and Eunji asked me a very important question, “Sunmi, do you want to go shopping with me this weekend!?”

Oh wait, I was supposed to go shopping with Eunji anyways to get some Korean fashions! I suppose destiny made that day this weekend.

“Sure Eunji! I would love too! Maybe you can help me get some new East fashions!” I smiled.

Eunji gladly put her hands together, “Okay, why don’t we go to the mall at 1 tomorrow?” I saw my driver coming closer to me and nodded, “Alright, that’s okay with me. I’ll see you tomorrow then?” Eunji said, “Yep! See you tomorrow Sunmi! Bye!”

I waved and got into the car. The driver asked, “Miss, home?” I said, “Ne, please?” The driver saluted, “Yes, Miss Sunmi.”

He always asked me this because he passed this beautiful park and I told him sometimes to stop. Then I would get out and have like 5 minutes of peace to myself (Of course, my driver is also a guard so he watches me). Then my mother would call him asking where we were and we would get back.

My mother… I wish she would try and teach singing and dancing to other people again. The only person she teaches now is me, after I do my homework. She’s always strict like, “Oh! You are so off tune! Get it right!” and “No! No! No! You are off a beat! Do it again!” so my voice and body are so tired afterwards. She used to teach American celebrities, so I guess this is how they felt. Being famous must in some ways.

When we got home, I finished homework and went to practice singing with my mom. My mom scolded, “Sunmi-ah, you are late.”

“Sorry, I was – “

“Ah, ah, ah! No excuses! Start your warm ups!” She sternly instructed. I pouted, but she didn’t see. I sighed and did my warm ups.

After my ‘alone’ training, she was about to leave the room when I shouted, “Umma! Wait! I have something to tell you!”

She turned around and muttered sourly, “What?”

I smiled and told her, “My new friend I made last week asked me to go shopping with her tomorrow. Can I go?”

She pondered and asked suspiciously, “Is she the same friend from Monday?” I nodded.

Mom stood there, still thinking. She was so quiet for so long that I was about to leave, until she spoke, “Fine.”

I jumped up and hugged her. I didn’t have lots of chances like this. I was lucky I went on Monday too with Eunji and BAP.

Then, she added, “But,” I froze, ‘but’ was a very dangerous word. My chances were probably gone already…

“I will have a guard watch you at all times at an angle. So, you better not do bad things because you know the guards always have a report to me. And, what is your friend’s name?”

Wait, is she just talking about Eunji or BAP? Um,

“Kim Eunji.” I stated. Mom nodded, “Ah, I believe her parents work at a nearby restaurant?”

“Yes.” Then, my stomach slightly grumbled at the sound of food.

Mom has very good ears, and so does dad, which makes me have the BEST hearing out of both of them. Still, mom heard my stomach.

“Yah Sunmi! Tell me why your stomach is like that!” she ordered.

“I was a bit busy talking with Eunji so I didn’t eat too much at lunch today.” I admitted.

My mom frowned, “I don’t want you to do that anymore. You need all the strength you can get. I will assign a guard your age to go to school with you so he can watch you. He will have the same classes as you and will watch you carefully.”

I gasped, “No! Please!”

She included, “And, you will have to call him your cousin and be friends with him too so he can watch you better. You will have him socialize and eat with you and your friends. If you don’t do what I say, he will tell me and I will think of a punishment for you.”

I shuddered, her punishments are the worst. One time, for a whole month, I had to wake up with a bucket of ice cold water in my face.

I sadly mumbled, “Fine…”

“Good. I command you to go to the dining hall and get yourself some food. Goodbye.” She walked away.

I went to the dining hall like she said and ate some red jello in sadness. Then I remembered, she allowed me to go shopping! I called Eunji when I made it back to my room and we had our conversation.

“Eunji! It’s Sunmi! I can go!” I shouted.

Her voice said, “Oww… You hurt my ear. But yay! Um, do you want me to pick you up at your house?”

No. She can’t. Then she would see that I’m rich and then she would probably stay away from me and our friendship would be over. I told her, “No, it’s okay. I can pick YOU up and you can tell me the directions to the mall.”

“Oh, okay. That works too. You know the way to go to my house right?”

Yep, she welcomed me into her home last time and it wasn’t as big as mine, but much, much more welcome.

“Um, yes. I’ll come get you at 12:30?”

“Yeah, it only takes about 10 minutes to the mall, but we can have an extra 20 minutes to talk or something. We can leave the mall at 4?”

“I think so, I’ll tell my mom later so she’ll know. I’ll call you again if something changes.”

“Alright. Maybe we can find you a hot guy for you to date, hmm?” Eunji teased.

“Eww… but who knows? Haha, I just might!”

“I heard that American kpop fans say there’s a plentiful supply of cute boys in South Korea. Is it true?”

“Well, there were a few kpop fans at my school. I think they said something like that one time when I overheard them talking so loud.”

“Oh my gosh, that’s so funny! I guess it’s not entirely wrong, haha… Um, I have to go now, Sunmi. I’m so sorry. Somebody else is trying to call me. See you tomorrow!”

“I understand. See you!” I hung up. I was bored so I chose my outfit for tomorrow. This voice inside my head told me to buy Eunji a secret gift tomorrow for being such a great friend. She doesn’t like anything too fancy, but there’s no way I’m giving her trash. I’ll wait for tomorrow at the mall to pick something.

At dinner, Mom and Dad were already there. I bowed and gracefully glided to my seat. While eating, I told mom, “I called my friend and she said we might be done at four o’ clock. Is that fine appa and umma?”

They nodded and said, “Ne.”

Yay! Freedom~

My mom said, “But do not forget. I am still assigning the guard to watch you.” Ah, who cares about the guard! Nothing wrong has happened to me the last times.

I replied, “Okay…” and continued eating. After that, I got ready for bed. Hopefully my brain will let me continue the dream so I can just grab that rose…

EUNJI’S POV

After my call with Sunmi, I murmered on my phone, “Hello Yongguk.”

“Hi Eunji. She said she was allowed to go?” his deep voice asked.

“Yeah, but you know I’m only taking her out to the mall JUST to hang out like a normal person. Sunmi needs to know what the outside world for a normal person is like,” I frowned. “She needs freedom.”

“Well, okay. Make sure you watch her.”

“Of course. And this is a girl-to-girl date. Don’t you BAP decide to come and crash it.”

Yongguk said slyly, “We’ll see about that.” “Yongguk!”

“Just kidding. We’ll let you have your buddy time alone.”

“Thanks. I feel so bad keeping this away from her…”

“I know how you feel. Sunmi is a great person who deserves to know the truth. But we have to keep her safe.” Then I heard a bang at the other line and Himchan’s voice. “Yah Zelo! What did I tell you about randomly dancing in the kitchen!”

I laughed, “What was that Yongguk?”

There was a sigh, “Zelo. Have to go help them out. Bye Eunji.”

“Bye! See you soon!” He hung up.

I heavily sighed, I don’t like keeping this away from Sunmi, but I have to… to keep her safe… from… something.

It was getting late, so I decided to go to sleep so tomorrow I would have my rest for lots of walking.

SUNMI’S POV

As usual, a dumb maid made a dumb knock on the dumb door that ruined my dumb dream. My face scrunched in frustration of not finishing it. I punched my pillow. Why can’t the guy just walk towards ME and just shove the rose into my hand so we could speed things up!

I sat up straight and ‘like a lady’, I said, “Come in…”

The maid gave a bow and she told me, “Miss Sunmi,” I used to hate it when they called me that, but then you learn to ignore because there’s no way the maids and butlers are going to stop, “your parents sent me to aid you in getting ready for the, um, shopping experience.”

My head perked up, oh yeah… Eunji was going to take me to the mall! I wasn’t so disappointed anymore and said to the maid, “Yes, I suppose we may get ready.”

So, once we were done, I went to eat breakfast with my parents. They were already there and they mumbled, “Good morning, Sunmi-ah.”

Teasingly, I slowly mumbled back, “Good morning appa and umma.”

They didn’t do anything. I shook my head in disappointment and strolled down to my seat.

I silently ate my extravagant ‘healthy’ food, why couldn’t I just have some pancakes, eggs, and bacon? It’s not fair… I want to be normal… They say if you have money, you have happiness. Well, that could be true for some people, but not for me. If only I had a twin somewhere in Korea so we could switch places like the prince and the pauper or something. That’s probably not going to happen.

After eating one of those many extremely quiet breakfasts, the maids helped me finish cleaning up so I was ready for my ‘shopping experience’.

Afterwards, I got into my white car and drove to Eunji’s house.

I really liked her house because unlike my house, hers was warm with welcome and happiness. Her mom and dad were really nice and she had a more normal teenaged life unlike me. Her life is pretty much the opposite of mine. Eunji is so lucky.

As I drove away from my mansion, I looked behind me and there was a guard following me. I’m pretty sure there’s a guard already at the mall already. So much protection. I groaned in pitying myself. Well, at least I’m not like those idols where they have like twenty guards surrounding them 24/7. I shuddered at the thought.

Eunji was already waiting for me outside. She smiled and waved as I drove next to her. I parked and opened the door.

Eunji said, “Exactly right on time! I like people like you~” I laughed, even though Eunji may look like and be a nerd, but she’s really funny. It’s probably one of the reasons she became my friend.

I said to Eunji, “So, are you ready?” She nodded and got in. Eunji told me the directions perfectly and we made it.

I joked, “You have officially survived Sunmi’s bad driving. Congratulations!”

Eunji giggled, “Haha, yay!”

We walked into the mall and it was gorgeous. There were pretty windows and lots of cute little shops.

I almost jumped of excitement, this would be the second time I’ve been in a mall. The first was when I was a little kid and one of the nicer maids took me shopping for fun. She was my favorite maid, but then my dad fired her thinking she wasn’t doing her job correctly. I cried so hard back then. But that was a long time ago. Her name was Ms. Woo, though, I don’t remember her first name.

Back in the present, I searched for my guard(s). I saw one sitting in a nearby bench with a pair of shades.

Eunji asked me, “So, where do you want to go first, Sunshine?” We called each other nicknames, I was Sunshine as in sun in Sunmi, while Eunji was Jiji. Eunji wanted to call me Mimi, but I thought that sounded kind of corny. So I was left off as Sunshine.

“Hmm, Jiji, it doesn’t matter. You can show me around so I’ll know the place.”

She chirped, “Okay! We’ll go to the clothes department stores first!” I smiled brightly. Yay, finally clothes after a whole week!

Eunji revealed her favorite stores and she recommended a few styles for me. I chose the ones that I liked that was more ‘Sunmi styled’ which were mostly-

“Jeans.” I muttered breathlessly.

“What?” Eunji asked. “Oh, uh, I really like these jeans.” I told her. That was the half truth, I did like them, more than she could ever think. Finally, I will own a pair of JEANS. Wow, my parents keep me so cooped up like a bird in a cage.

She blinked, “Um, okay. They are nice I guess. Let’s go get it for you then.”

We went to the cashier and I was about to give him my credit card, but then Eunji’s hand stopped it. “No, I will do it, Sunshine!” she exclaimed as she got hers out.

“No! I’ll do it, Jiji!” I shouted as I tried to hand my card to the guy cashier, he looked confused, but amused at our little fight that probably lasted like 5 minutes.

We pulled each other as far as we possibly could to reach the guy cashier first and with my ninja skills I learned from a private tutor my dad got me, I told the guy, “Catch Mister!”

“No!” Eunji wailed. I aimed and amazingly, he caught it. Eunji ran as fast as she could to the desk, but I told the man, “Slice it!”

I think he might have been scared of me or something, so he did what I commanded him to. Then he said, “Thank you for shopping.” I said, “Yep!”

Next, he added slyly, “And please, come again very soon. It made my job entertaining.” The three of us laughed and we left.

When we exited, Eunji pouted, “Sunmi! You should have let me paid!” I smirked, “No, never!” We giggled endlessly.

We strolled to an ice cream shop and both ordered chocolate.

“Mmm… chocolate is my favorite.” I cooed. “Mine is strawberry. But I just decided to copy you.” Eunji said.

As we ate, Eunji asked me, “Sunshine, do you have any questions for me?” I gave a confused face. “What?” She said, “Well, you’ve been in Korea for about only a week so you can ask me anything you want, so we get to know each other better.”

I told Eunji, “Oh… hmm, let’s see. Um, what’s your favorite color?” “Purple. More like indigo. You?” “I like yellow. Like sunshine~” I said with a smirk.

Eunji smiled and nodded her head.

I said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you earlier. My mom told me my cousin from… America is coming to our school. He’s around my age.” She squealed, “Is he cute?” Actually, I have no idea, so I cleverly said, “You’ll see~”

Eunji pouted, “Fine. What’s his name?” I don’t know so I said the same thing, “You’ll see.” She pouted again.

I then questioned her to change the awkward subject, “Do you have a crush on one of the B.A.P members?”

Her eyes widened, “H-h-how did you know?” My mouth opened, “I-I just had a random guess. Do you?” There was silence from her. I told her, “I’m taking that as a yes,” I put my arm around Eunji’s shoulder, “so, who’s the lucky guy?”

Eunji took a deep breath and whispered, “Don’t tell anybody else okay?” I nodded my head, hiding my excitement.

She put her face in my ear, “I like… Jung Daehyun.”