It was early the next morning when I woke up to the alarm going off. My train home was at 7:30am and it would take me a while to get to the station. I simply got myself ready to leave, not forgetting to grab my small bag filled with the things I’d need for the weekend and presents for my younger siblings. It was a long weekend and I wasn’t coming home until Monday evening, so I had a bit more stuff than usual making my bag pretty heavy, but I was able to carry it.

The train ride was mostly quiet, I plugged in my headphones and let heavy bass lines carry me towards sleep, but I was woken up when my phone started to vibrate frantically in my pocket and my ringtone interrupted my music. I looked at the caller ID and realised it was Whee In, I hesitantly picked up the call- she would be very hung over right now or maybe still a little drunk. “H-hello? What’s up, Wheenie? Everything okay?”

“Morning, Byul. I just wanted to call to say thank you for looking after me last night. I don’t really remember much from last night, but Hyejin told me that you looked after me when things started getting a bit much and then helped her to get me home… back to her place anyway. So yeah, thanks” there was a certain awkwardness to her voice which made me think that Hyejin had told her what had happened, but based on how vague her description was I found it unlikely. I smiled, even though I know she couldn’t see me. “I was wondering… do you want to come over later so I can take you out? You know, so I can thank you properly…” her voice was shy and her words came slowly, I could tell she was blushing as she was talking, which made me bite my lip before a grin could break out on my face

“I’d love to, Whee In, but I’m going home for a couple of days. I’m actually sat on the train right now.” She sighed audibly, so I tried to offer a solution “If I get home early enough on Monday evening, you can take me for ice cream to show your gratitude, how does that sound?” I could nearly feel her grinning over the phone at my solution.

“That sounds just perfect. If not, I’m going to show you how grateful I am at school on Tuesday, and I don’t know if you could handle that level of gratitude in public”

“Don’t you mean embarrassment?” I laughed. The other girl feigned offence at my comment

“Embarrass you? I’d never do such a thing!” she said, also laughing. We were chatting mindlessly and it was comforting.

The train slowed to a stop and I realised that I was at the familiar station of my hometown. I almost dropped my phone three times trying to carry my stuff off the train so I decided I’d need to call Whee In later if I wanted to make it off this train here.

“I’ve just arrived home, I’ll give you a call once I’m all settled at my parents’ place, okay?”

“You’re leaving me already?! You better remember to call me back, or when you get back here you’re going to be sorry, Moon Byuli.” She chuckled down the phone.

“I will. I’ll call you later pup! Try not to miss me too much!” with that I ended the call and staggered off the train. I glimpsed at the call duration and realised we’d been on the phone for 35 minutes. My next phone bill is gonna get me in loads of trouble at this rate! Maybe I’d Skype Whee In later instead. It was a short bus ride back to my old home, but I had just spent the last hour and a half sat down so decided it was acceptable to walk to the old house. With my headphones still in and my music turned right up I made my way down the familiar streets.

When I got to my parents’ house, I was flooded with memories from my childhood and I felt myself smiling. I eased the key out of my pocket and opened the door as quietly as possible; my parents were expecting me, but probably not before noon. I left my things in the small porch by the door and crept through the hall, I could hear my parents talking in the kitchen so headed that way. When I walked in the doorway, my father looked up and I saw his eyes light up, but my younger sister had her back to me at the breakfast table and my mother was looking the other way. I put my finger to my lips to hint at my father to stay quiet while nodding towards my sister, he understood my action and simply cleared his throat. I crept up behind my sister and put my hands over her eyes she tensed up at my touch, but broke into a fit of laughter when I whispered ‘BOO!’ into her ear. I don’t think I’d ever seen her quite so excited. She jumped out of her seat and threw herself at me, arms wrapped around my neck and legs around my waist.

“BYULI!! Unnie! Appa told me you weren’t coming home until this afternoon! I can’t believe you’re really home! It’s been ages since you last came home! I missed you so much!” she continued talking and I just held her to me, while I made my way around the room to greet my parents. I hugged my father who gave me a kiss on the top of my head while my mother came over and grabbed my face in both hands before pulling me in to a bone-crunching hug. My sister, stuck in the middle, gasped while struggling for air, so my father took her from my arms and let me continue my reunion. It had been months since I’d last come home, and I’d missed my family so much, but now that I was here it felt like I’d never been away. My parents ushered me to take a seat and raced around to make me coffee and breakfast, while I insisted I was fine.

“I can’t have my little star coming home and not eating! You need to take better care of yourself, Byul” my mother fussed

“Yes, we can’t have you going back to school on Tuesday and have people thinking we don’t feed you” my father joked, placing a hot cup of coffee in front of me and smiling. Meanwhile, my little sister came back into the room dragging my other sister with her.

“Look! I told you Byuli unnie was back! I told you we should have made those cookies last night!” followed by various other statements which were drowned out as my sleepy sister suddenly woke up at the sight of me and wrapped me in a warm hug.

“I missed you so so so much. I can’t believe you left me alone for two months with this brat and Minhyuk!” she said jokingly. I laughed while rubbing small circles on her back.

“Speaking of which, where is that lazy brother of ours?” I asked with a smile. I’d missed my brother more than I thought I would, he was like my best friend so not seeing him for a long time would be like separating me from Whee In and Hyejin for months. We told each other everything, so I’d told him about my feelings for Yongsun unnie, while he told me frequently about how stressed he was at college, things neither of us wanted to tell our parents out of fear of worrying them too much.

“He’s in the shower for now, but he’ll be down soon. He’s got to go to work later so he won’t be around for long, but he’ll be happy to see you. He’s missed you a lot unnie, more than you would believe” I grinned at the sentiment of the statement from the girl sat in my lap. With that, we heard a clattering down the stairs and my brother blundered into the room and enveloped me in the warmest hug

“Byul… you’re here. I wasn’t expecting to see you until after work. How’s school? How are things between you and Yongsun? Are Whee In and Hyejin alright?” I placed my hand on his chest to silence him, and smiled at him with the most sincerity I could.

“Oppa, I’m happy to see you too. Everything’s fine. How are you? What time are you leaving for work?” I broke the hug when I felt something warm circling my ankles. I looked down to see a small puppy. My eyes widened with delight “Why did no one tell me you got a puppy? Omo! Isn’t he the cutest thing?!” I picked up the little pup and he began to my cheeks. I heard my sisters laughing

“It looks like Daebakkie really likes you, unnie” my sister cooed. I gave the little dog a warm hug while smiling at my parents.

“He’s perfect. When did you get him?” I asked

“Only last week. We thought that the house felt a bit empty without you and Minhyuk around, and with the girls being at school most of the time we decided to get a puppy to make up for the emptiness. I think it was the best idea we ever had… after having you kids of course” my father chuckled at his own comment. My mother beamed at him and I noticed her roll her eyes. Conversation flowed between my family and we sat around the table while I continued to hold Daebakkie in my lap. After Minhyuk left for work I gave my sisters the presents I’d bought them- it wasn’t much, some new headphones each for their iPods, and some new coloured pens- I didn’t want to give them presents in front of him in case he got jealous or something XD.

After lunch, I excused myself from my family for a bit of down time- don’t get me wrong, I love spending time with them but I was tired after the past few days and needed to sleep. Just as I was about to close my eyes, I remembered that I promised Whee In I’d call her. I reached for my phone and laptop at the end of my bed. I sent her a text ‘go onto Skype and I’ll call you, I can’t afford to phone you. :P x’ when she hadn’t replied after 5 minutes and she still wasn’t online I text her again ‘Wheenie, I know you’re at home, you’re never busy on Saturdays. I don’t want to have to deal with your rage because you didn’t answer your phone! XD’ after a couple of minutes she text me back ‘busy atm. Won’t b 2 long, 10 mins tops xx’ it was weird for her not to put any emojis, but I didn’t think too much about it. After 5 minutes she text me again ‘Ok. Done. We need to talk. xx’ I read the message twice, three times and swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat- was this about last night? I was praying that it wasn’t, but the tone of the text was serious, so I could only hope that she’d heard from Hyejin what had happened.

Author's note: Hey my lovely readers. I'm really sorry that its been so long; I was struggling with writer's block for this chapter (I think it shows), but also I've been really busy. So yeah, HUUUGGEEE apologies to you all.

I still can't get over how amazing Mamamoo's comeback was. To be honest with you, I was worried about the concept from the teasers, but I think they've done an AMAZINGGG job. I'm so proud of all the success they're having as well. #proudtobeamoomoo

Anyway, I hope you've all been okay in my absence. I hope you all like this update, I know it probably isn't my best work but I promise I'll try to do better next time.

As always, thankyou thankyou thankyou for reading, commenting and subscribing, it means so much to me. If you have anything at all to say about this story, or anything in general, leave a comment or leave me a message- I promise I'm not scary.

I don't know when I'll be able to update next because I'm still really busy, but hopefully it'll be soon. Until then, take care of yourselves, stay happy, and keep showing your support for Mamamoo.

Love and hugs :) xoxo