Chapter 16

Everyone was seated for dinner that night. Taeyeon and Joohyun had to almost beg Jude to stay for dinner. He dreaded the dinner knowing full well that he might get indigestion, that is, if he gets to eat anything. They had to add another chair to accommodate seven to the 6 seater dining table. Jude was seated in between Taeyeon and Joohyun who was sitting at the corner of the table. On her right was Yonghwa who was at the center of the table. On his right was Minhyuk then Jungshin and at the center at the other end is Jonghyun who was on the left of Taeyeon.

Minhyuk opened the conversation with a light topic “Jude what year are you on your graduate studies?”

“My fourth year actually, I am just finishing up some course this semester” to which everyone nodded

“Are you planning to become a diplomat like your dad?” Taeyeon asked

“No not really, I will be entering law school after this, I was supposed to head to law school right after college but decided otherwise just to widen my knowledge, I am still young so I guess it’s okay” he smiled at her to which Taeyeon blushed and of course retaliated a dagger look from Jonghyun.

“Wow your planning on being a lawyer? That’s so awesome I mean lawyer do get paid a lot” Junshin added

Jude smiled while trying to swallow what he had been chewing for the past 2 minutes. 

“I think you can say that but I wanted to be a lawyer because I wanted to help out. There are not many pro-bono lawyers around anymore and given that I have the capacity to do it might as well do it right, you can only help so much within the community”

Joohyun and Taeyeon looked at him like a proud mother. If only they can stand up and clapped for the dude they would instead both tapped his shoulder and smiled which earned them a gruff from the people sitting at both ends of the table.

“your not planning on running for any political positions here are you?” Yonghwa asked with a slight tone of annoyance

“Oh no, I’ll be going back to the states after this and continue my studies there, I am already enrolled in Harvard for the next semester then I’ll practice in my home country”

“Give me your contact number when you get back home we’ll hire you as one of our lawyers don’t charge me with any acceptance fee or anything okay?” Joohyun chuckled

The four guys seemed to dish the life out of the poor boy, who as expected wasn’t able to eat properly. Taeyeon knows whats going down but Joohyun being the person that she is doesn’t even have a clue. She took it the Jude was just shy reason he wasn’t able to eat.

After dinner they had dessert to which Jude already begged off.

“Seohyun, I’ll be heading home it’s getting late, let’s just continue this tomorrow.” He smiled at her while gathering his things

He bid farewell to the people inside the house and Joohyun with who else but Yonghwa walked him to the door.

“Thanks for dinner, it was, eventful” he smiled at the couple

“Thanks for coming I’ll see you tomorrow” she smiled back

“Yeah see you”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The two continued to see each other because of the paper and Yonghwa continued to start loosing focus because of this. He thought long and hard on why but there was a pang in his heart when he realized the answer.

“Hon I’m sorry I can’t pick you up, we are still in a meeting.”

“But you said we’re going to eat late dinner together?” Joohyun replied sadly over the phone

“I know I’m sorry just grab a cab and asked to be drop off here let’s just eat in the pantry”

“No it’s okay I’ll just head home” then ended the call, she was very upset, it was the first time since they have been together that they are planning to eat out just the two of them but then this happened.

She sat in front of the universities pavement watching a few students who are about to go home walk by. She then saw a couple holding hands and laughing with their backs to her. The guys whispered something to the girl to which the girl laughed and slightly slapped the guys arms. She sadly smiled.  She then saw another couple where the girls arms is hooked on the guys arms, the guy was carrying her things because her other hand is carrying a bouquet of roses to which she held to her chest both looking at each other without a care in the world.

She heaved a deep sighed ‘young love’ she thought

“Why so serious?” she heard a man’s voice sat beside her. He removed his cap and smiled

“Jude!! I thought you left?” for some reason she was happy to see him.

“Not yet I finished my day report from my class earlier”

“Oh yeah your teaching I forgot! So how was it?”

“It was crazy, I forgot how rowdy college students can be! “ he laughed and fished something from his bag then took out three boxes of different kinds of chocolate

“here, got many candidates for teachers pet” he winked at her. Joohyun picked out the heartshaped dark mint chocolate.

“I’ll just take one, so students give chocolates to teachers now? Whatever happened to apple?!”

“I guess they stopped eating apple cause if they do, they won’t get sick and then they won’t have any reason not to come to school!”

Joohyun was laughing so hard getting the old saying “ yeah because it keeps the doctors away!”

“Exactly! What are you doing here? Isn’t Yonghwa picking you up?” he asked while putting the rest of the chocolates back in his bag

Her face fell, try as she might to hide her disappointment “he got caught with something so he somehow begged off, he wanted me to just go to his office then grab dinner at their pantry”

“Why don’t you go? I mean dinner date is still open you just have to settle for cafeteria like food I guess”

“I know but I’m still a girl and I know his situation and it’s not as if we can go out on dates, so when we planned this dinner it will be like our first date. I thought that I can be  different from other girls but seeing couples walk by holding each other’s hand, laughing and such, I envy them! I somehow wanted that too. I know I’m too old for this I even have grown kids, but can’t a girl dream?” she looked at him with tears at the corner of her eyes. It was the first time she’s voicing out her frustration from their relationship.

Jude not knowing what to say next to his sad friend “well you’re situation is a double edge sword”

“What do you mean?” Joohyun looked at him

“I mean it’s a win-lose situation, You are together