By the end of the day, Sarang had expectedly failed to make any new friends. Nobody in her classes seemed especially interested in offering a girl as timid as her a place in their social circles. The only people who bothered speaking to her were the teachers, and Sarang had an inkling that they only did it out of pity.

But there was a plus side to it all.

Sarang found herself constantly wishing to see the cute eighth grader who’d been so helpful and caring on the first day of school. However, much to her dismay, she only caught a couple glimpses of him in the hallway between classes, and only for about three seconds each time.

She had to admit that she was slightly disappointed that she didn’t get to exchange a single word of conversation with him after that.

To add the cherry on top of her mundane day, she’d been loaded down with homework for each of the subjects she was taking. Mentally drained, she’d tried to finish as much of it as possible during study hall since she and her mother would be moving into their new apartment tonight.

They’d moved so often that Sarang almost began thinking it was odd if a large moving truck wasn’t parked in front of their apartment building to carry their things to their new location until her mom got another job transfer, and they’d have to move again. Sarang was used to it, but it was still tiring. She’d long forgotten how it felt to just settle down and call one place home.

So, without much anticipation for her new home, she boarded Bus 3428 to the shoebox of an apartment she and her mom had lived in during her brief period of unemployment. It was a full twenty-three stops away, which led up to a fat chunk of time. Add onto that another twenty minutes of walking and Sarang’s journey was complete.

Her mother was already packing up the last of their belongings when Sarang walked through the door of the small apartment suite. She loved and admired her mother more than any other human being in this world; she’d been married off to the son of a well-to-do family and had lived comfortably…for the first two months of their life together.

After that, Sarang’s dad had proven how incompetent he was in matters that required serious decision-making and maturity. Unable to take it, Sarang’s mother had filed for divorce and took half of their belongings, also having won custody over their only daughter. Thankfully, Sarang was allowed to visit her dad, but with all the hectic scrambling her mom had to do for a job that could keep the both of them afloat, she never really had time.

Or so she thought.

The nearer she got to the back of the apartment, the louder the arguing became:

“—oving to a new apartment much nearer to her school and my office. I don’t want her taking hour-long commutes just to get to and from school. Anything could happen during that time.”

“Just consider it: she could spend some more time with her cousins and her grandparents. She could visit you on the way home, an—”

“Are you forgetting that I won custody over Sarang? I don’t want her to learn from your laziness. She has enough on her plate already.”

Sarang appeared in the doorway of the small bedroom that she and her mom had shared for the past two and a half weeks, and her parents blinked at her in surprise. “Sarang! I wasn’t expecting you for another fifteen minutes,” her mom said with a weary smile. “We’re almost done. Can you just take one last sweep through the apartment and make sure we’re not leaving anything behind?”

She nodded quietly and glanced at her dad before waving awkwardly and turning away.

“See? She isn’t comfortable with you.”

“That’s because we haven’t been given an opportunity to spend much time together. We could change that.”

“She’s coming with me, and that’s final.”

Sarang sighed; her parents had been arguing about thi