"Shhh! Shhh! Don't cry! We'll all be ok~" 

   One of the seven small girls cooed while trying to calm down the youngest of them. They all had grim faces on and were trying to their best hold back tears as they watched her cry her heart out. 

 "B-but!" The youngest started hiccupping. "What if we never see each other again? You guys are the only things that I have! I don't want to be separated from you!"

  After screaming that she started crying even harder, the one rubbing her back shared a sad look with the other girls. They too didn't want to be separated from each other. But that's the plan that the Orphanage directors had in mind. Because the one they all resided in was about to close down, they were being sent to other orphanages in hopes that someone will adopt them there instead. While the majority of the kids were happy about seeing new places, the seven girls were the only ones who would rather choose to not get adopted over splitting up. But, like always, they had no choice.

 "Hey~" One of them cooed as she knelled down. "It'll be ok. It's not like we'll never see each other again."

 That made the youngest look up at her and she glared. "Yeah, right! If you haven't forgotten, some of you are being moved to overseas orphanages! Heck, YOU'RE gonna be in America! AMERICA! Which Teacher said was on the other side of the World! Just HOW will we see each other again when you're that far AWAY?!"

 The older girl in front of her didn't say anything at first while the youngest buried her face back into her hands. After a few minutes of thinking, she reached out and put her hand on the younger's shoulder, making her look back up. The older girl gave her a faint smile.

  "How about we make a promise? We may only be kids now, but one day, we won't be kids. We'll be big adults someday, and when that day comes no one will be in control of us. Not the orphanage directors, not the teachers, not even our foster or adoptive parents; if we ever get any. When that day comes, I will immediately fly back here and find you." She looked around and took in every girl's face. 

"I promise I will find you. ALL of you." 

*11 years later*

    "Miss Kim.... MISS KIM!!!"

 The feeling of something slapping against the hard surface near my head made me snap my eyes open and bolt up, It took a few seconds for my eyes to focus and see all my classmates smirking at me like I had a frog on my head. And It for sure didn't take me long to pin-point the ruler that was hovering in front of my face and my teacher who was holding it. Uh oh, the look on her face did NOT look happy….

 "Are you fully awake now, Miss Kim?" She said through clenched teeth. My Math teacher was pretty decent and nice, but if she hated anything more than people being tardy for her class, it was people who disrupted her class by sleeping in it. 

  I immediately felt a bit guilty, but what could I tell her? I couldn't sleep last night because the orphanage just got a set of triplets who lost their parents in a house fire and it was my job as the oldest to help take care of them. And whenever I DID have the chance to sleep I would get visited by the same dream I’ve been having for the past three weeks. I never remember it, but it bothers me so much that I have trouble sleeping. 

   I gave her a sheepish grin. "Hehe... Sorry Ma'am. I promise not to do it again."

 "I sure do hope you won't!" She grumbled. "This is your second strike young lady. One more and it'll be detention!" 

She walked back to the front of the class to start her lesson again, but I still wasn't focused on it. Why can't I ever remember my dream? I knew that it was the SAME EXACT one every single time, but why can't I ever remember the details? 

   I sighed as the bell finally rang for lunch. I quickly gathered my things and headed straight for the usual spot where I always ate alone; the courtyard. Yeah, I'm the loner in our school. Actually, I’m more like the town's wallflower. No one here really talks to me except for the innocent kids at my orphanage.

  Speaking of the orphanage, none of the other kids there are the same age as me, I’m the only teenager. If you're wondering why an almost-19-year-old still has to live in an orphanage, then let me say that it's because of the rule. If the child is still in high school, they are still not allowed to be taken out of the system.

    For certain circumstances, I got held back and had to redo my third year of middle school. If only that incident didn't happen, then I would be long-gone by now after graduating last year, but oh well. You can't change the past, right?

  From what I knew, I was sent to America when I was eight and have been in-and-out of different orphanages and foster homes for the past 11 years. The place that I’m in now, Pam's dream home, has been the sixth one I’ve been in. It resides in a small town in the state of Washington. You know that town that took place in the movie 'Twilight'? Well, this town is sort of similar to that, just without all the vampires and werewolfs. But Man I wish there were; sure make life a lot more interesting. 

   The orphanage director told me that I came here from South Korea and that my parents had given me up because of money issues or something like that. That kind of information should hurt me, but it doesn't. I've been through so much here that I've forgotten anything that I SHOULD remember about my life in Korea. I don't remember any buildings, faces, I don't even remember the language even though I've been encouraged to learn it. But, when ever I was given one of those language books, I would purposly lose it. It was like something inside of me didn't want anything to do with that country or, better yet, it was like something was telling me not to for some unexplainable reason. 

 I took a bite out of my sandwich as I try and remember what happened in my dream which I had again when I was sleeping in Math class. I was surprised with it this time, I had actually remembered something.

The words “I promise.”

I know. It isn’t a lot. But it’s progress I guess.

      The lunch break was just about to end so I quickly gathered up my trash and threw it away just as my cell started to ring.

  It was the head caretaker of Pam's Dream Home. Now I'm even more confused, why in the world would they call me during the middle of school?

  “Yes, Ma’am?” I asked, answering the call.

"Baelynn, sweetie… I know this is a bit sudden, but I need you to cancel anything you have going on after school, and just come straight home, ok?"

"Why? Is there something wrong?" I walked into my next class which was History. The teacher hasn't come yet, so I had more time to talk.

"It's not that there's anything WRONG..." I could hear the hesitation in her voice. "Just, make sure to come back right away."

"Alright, I can do that." It's not like I had anything big to do after school anyway.

         We said our goodbyes and I hung up just as my History teacher came in.

       I was never prepared for what was going to happen next.

  It was right in the middle of our lesson about the Boston Tea Party that the classroom door slammed open and a high pitched screamed filled the whole room. We all turned to see a fairly old, Asian woman standing in the door way wearing a big, black sun hat, a white dress, black high heels, and some kind of black fur hugging her shoulders. She had this huge smile on her face as she looked around. Just as her eyes landed on me, she screamed again and ran towards me to envelop me into a bone crushing hug. Man was she strong for her age. 

    "Bae-Rinnie!!!! I finally found you!" She started to cry as she my hair. "Oh…my precious.  I'm so sorry! My little Bae-bae, I've finally found you...!"

I was speechless and didn't know what to do. Just, HUH?!

After a few minutes, my History teacher, who was also surprised, came over and started to talk really slowly. "Excuse me, Ma'am. But... can I ask WHY you are HERE? Can I HELP you with ANYTHING?”

     Ok, now that made me even more confused. Why was my teacher acting like she was speaking to a foreign exchange student?

    The strange woman calmed down and slowly let me go, but still had her arm around my shoulders. With no sign of her ever even crying left on her face, she politely smiled at my teacher.

    "My deepest apologies." she replied. "My name is Jeon Taeyeon. And I am Cho Baelynn's paternal Grandmother."  

     I would like to say that those words almost gave me a heart attack from shock. But I don’t know what shocked me more; the fact that this random woman just barges in here, announcing that she’s my long lost Grandmother OR the fact that she was speaking in a different language the whole time and I understood all of it….