"Graduation is approaching this year," Hoseok says with a sigh.

"We're going to be free."

"What will we do?"

She shrugs. "I don't know. It just feels so good."

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

"This does not feel right," Kim Miya mutters, taking her cup of hot chocolate back to her table. Well, not just Kim Miya—senior-year Kim Miya, from the graduating batch of this year.

Jeon Jungkook, her dongsaeng who recently graduated from middle school, smiles up at her. He hands Miya his school jacket to cover her legs when she sits across him.

"You look tense, noona. Everything okay?" he asks.

Miya looks at him. Just really, only looks. Jungkook has always been an awkward but good-looking kid. He has pretty features, which look tired now because of school and training. His eyes are puffy but happy, and he keeps sniffing and crinkling his nose, a habit that Miya found annoying until only recently.

"I feel queasy about my graduation next week," she finally says. "I don't want to do it."

"Noona~" Jungkook sings, poking her knee. "Don't you want to be free?"

She smiles at him. "Not when I feel like this. I don't want to grow up just yet."

The younger one purses his lips. "Where is Hoseok hyung?"

"Training, with that other kid."

Jungkook thinks hard for a moment, wrinkling his small forehead, before offering his noona a pinky finger.

Miya looks at his hand in amusement, and he only shakes it, encouraging her to wrap her finger around his.

"After you graduate—and after I graduate—we won't shed a tear. And from this moment on, we are free from school, but that does not mean we will forget each other."

He stretches his hand to lightly touch his thumb to hers, sealing the promise.

"I won't forget you after graduation," Miya begins, "but what if you forget me after you debut?"

Jungkook only ducks his head and softly says a, "No."

Later, Hoseok joins them and they spend the rest of the day at the little café.

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

"It's over."

"For you."

"For me."

"Now what?"

She only blankly stares ahead at the school grounds; at the younger boys running around, and the younger girls talking together. At everyone before her but the little boy next to her.

Miya's strangely happy right now. The ceremony was a success and Miya got more recognition and awards than she deserved. Everyone cheered for her and there wasn't a single dull moment. After it ended, a lot of her friends cried, but somehow Miya held it together. She'd made a promise after all.

But now that she had said goodbye to her friends and left their side for now, she felt strange. Happy but sad. Excited but bored. Energetic but tired.

She didn't want to go back home just yet (or at all) but she knew Jungkook had to go back to his class.

"I don't know," Miya mumbles, finally looking at him. "Like you said, I'm free."

Jungkook reaches out and lightly tugs at her sleeve, feeling the material of the robe between his fingers. "I like this robe. You look nice."

She playfully swats his hand away. "You'll get your own."

Jungkook chuckles.

"Go back to class. I'll see you later."

"Where are you gonna go?"

Miya shrugs. "Anywhere I want to. I'm free~"

Dropping her dongsaeng to his class, Miya finally walks out the school campus, looking back with a peculiar weight in the pit of her stomach. She hasn't called her mom yet, even though she called Miya at least four times during the ceremony.

She takes off her robe an