Just a short update...

Please excuse some typos again, there's always some since I'm always lazy to proofread after typing  ^-^

Chapter Sixteen:

The Promise

A few moment of silence ensues between Taeyeon and Tiffany once again but no one dared to break it as they only stared at each other’s eyes silently. Their stillness got interrupted when Taeyeon suddenly jolted on her seat and went to run to the cabinet behind them and took out her overnight backpack before rushing back to sit on the couch just beside Tiffany again.

Taeyeon took out her palm sized plushy of her smiling Dookoong stuffed toy that somehow resembles a stress ball and showed it to Tiffany while trying to copy the grinning ball but failed in mimicking the eye parts.

“Do you remember this toy?”

Taeyeon seriously asked Tiffany, she saw how Tiffany took a deep breath before slowly nodding at her which only made Taeyeon smile a little bit.

She was about to say something again to Tiffany but it was the latter’s turn to stop from standing and walking to the other side of the hospital room. She watched Tiffany as the woman took her bag and took a small wallet that resembles a key holder.

“This marbles… do you recognized these?”

Taeyeon run her thumb and fore finger to the three pieces of blue and pink marbles that was carefully crafted to be turned into key chain. Taeyeon gave Tiffany a small smile before silently nodding at the still quiet woman beside her.

Taeyeon took a deep breath as she think about what she want to tell Tiffany right this very moment and when she can’t think of one, she just let out a sigh and silently played at her dookoong ball.

“I think I was only seven years old when I first got my first dookoong. All I remember is a young girl gave it to me. And because I was still so young everything during that time is really not so clear in my memory, hence I forgot the name and the face of that girl who gave me my dookoong. But non-the less, this pea stuffed toy left a deep mark into my young mind that I really don’t understand until now that I even somehow I ended up collecting this stuffed toy over the years until now. I kept the first one, safe and carefully hidden and I always take it with me wherever go…”

Taeyeon took a deep breath as she remembered how she never wanted to be parted with her little pea stuffed toy when she was still a small girl, the toy had never failed to calm her down whenever she have to get on an airplane before and it had also been her sleeping companion while growing up in a foreign country.

During those hard time on that stuffed toy had been her friend and she valued it more than anything. She might have forgotten the face of the person to whom it came from but she surely never forgotten how precious that stuffed is and how she promised that she’ll cherish forever.

‘Promise…’

That particular word kept on ringing in Taeyeon’s head as she keeps on trying to remember much more about her childhood, her childhood with Tiffany. And that one word still keeps on playing on her mind over and over again. Taeyeon felt like a huge bucket of ice cold water had been splashed all over her body as her mind suddenly played a broken piece of her childhood memory back again.

“Promise me, Miyoung… that you’ll take care of them and that you won’t forget me! Never ever!”

“I promise, Taetae! You can count on me!”

“And I promise to you that when I grow older I’ll go look for you! And when I find you, I will never let you go out of my sight! Never ever! I will marry you and they can never separate us! Never ever again! I promise!”

‘I promised… but…’

Taeyeon let out a deep sigh her eyes unconsciously wandered towards the sleeping figure of a very pale looking girl on the hospital bed before returning her eyes back to Tiffany’s side but purposely avoided looking into the younger woman’s face and specially her eyes.

“You know, I also never forgotten about these marbles. Although I must apologize to you because I lost the jar you’ve given me… these three, were the last from that.”

“You lost it?!”

Taeyeon unknowingly raised her voice a little bit to Tiffany and had also sounded a bit accusingly. She felt a bit hurt knowing that Tiffany lost the last thing she gave her when she had taken good care of what she had left her many years ago. Taeyeon thinks she might sound childish but she just can’t help it.

But when she saw the sad look on Tiffany’s face she almost wanted to scold herself from reacting this much to the younger woman without even asking what might have happen.

“I’m sorry. We also left Jeonju a couple of months