"Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love." 

What makes you smile? 

If you were to pose this question to Jisoo throughout the multiple phases in her twenty-two years of life, her answer would inevitably vary. 

Five-year old Jisoo would cry out with a toothy, chocolate-covered grin, “Ice cream, crayons, and Pokémon!” before cackling and running off to god knows where, the straps of her Pikachu-printed backpack trailing behind her. 

Fast forward eleven years later, and she’d replace the crayons and Pokémon with sleep and food (of course, ice cream still had to be included.) That didn’t mean the sole purpose of her life was to achieve the lowest level of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. It was only the answer she’d  simply give without going into too much details.

Return back to the present day, and you’d see that she certainly wouldn’t mind telling you all about what - or who - could make her smile so brightly. 

Soonyoung meant much more to her than anything she ever took pleasure in, and anybody could see how she dearly loved him from the kind of smile she’d give to him and nobody else. 

It was the smile that would find its way across her lips when he’d slip his firm arms around her slender waist, rocking them gently to a tune that could only be heard between the two of them, accompanied by the sweet nothings he’d whisper into her ear. It was also the smile that comes along with her laughter as he breaks out into his silly stories or antics, finding great comfort in how they’d always fall along the same wavelength in their sense of humor. They were soulmates, people always told them. Destined to be together and meant-to-be. And of course, Jisoo couldn’t ever help but to find truth in their words and agree with them. 

As she listens to the light splitter-splatter of the raindrops against the cemented roads, a faint but nearby voice causes her to turn her head towards the direction of where it’s coming from. Realizing that the approaching figure had called her name, it doesn’t even take a second for her to know that it was him, whose presence  comes along with the rain and her smiles. 

No longer caring about getting soaked from the rain, she straightens herself from the wall and breaks out into a run towards him, not feeling a single inch of regret as the tears of heaven starts to land on her shoulders and back. 'After all,' Jisoo thinks, permitting her feet to carry itself across the sidewalk, 'any place out there can already be heaven itself, as long as we can be together.' Letting her smile grow wider and wider as she nears him, she makes a bound for his arms, enveloping him into the warm hug that she had longed to give him for the entire day. 

Safe and sound.