Celestine

nine // célestine

I've decided to be grateful for the award. The role in Oil Painting Is Fading was important to me, and I am proud of it. I'm glad it was appreciated. Especially if I am to, perhaps, quit acting. It would be a gratifying way to wrap all those years up.

As much as I'm grateful for it, other things are becoming more important to me. I could have said 'yes' to the Oscars and I'd have Alvin off my back. But above everything else, I wanted to be with Jungkook. Not only because I wanted to apologize. Stuck in my bedroom, I could almost feel how nervous he must have been with the whole party. I couldn't stay in bed.

Yesterday, after our own little party of cooking and eating all the food we dreamed up, I went home at six. From a phone call later I know we both slept until 2 p.m. A day without him now feels incomplete, but we were both too lazy to go out, so we face timed for the first time.

And we face timed for five hours. Talking or doing our own things, but on face time. It was much nicer, in this huge apartment, than to be all by myself. Silence or music don't feel quite as nice as Jungkook chatting me up on the other side of the phone.

Jungkook has been fueling my dream of a more spontaneous life on a daily basis.

And all I do for him is enjoy his food. We're lacking balance. I don't have to do anything, but I want to.

The way he talks about the things he wants is as dreamy as when he does the things he loves. One day on a phone call, he spent almost half an hour describing the house he dreams of. When he asked why I didn't tell him he's been talking for that long, I said I had no idea it's been so long. Time disappeared in a blink of an eye.

"Where are we going?" Jungkook asks, when we finally meet today.

"I thought of a cool place," I say. My arm is locked around his as I lean into him. I blamed it on my legs tired after a pilates class. The truth is far from that. I felt hungry, to feel him closer. That hug two days ago unlocked something insatiable in me.

"Am I gonna like it?" He chuckles.

"Hopefully," I say. As we stop at the red light, I straighten up, freeing his arm. I don't wanna overdo it too early.

Jungkook loves dogs – I want to have a big one, maybe a Golden Retriever – but doesn't have time and place for one. My apartment is too small for an animal like that. And I'm at work most of the time. I looked for a shelter we could visit, but nothing close would let us in at this hour.

But shelters are not my last lifeline. By sheer luck, scrolling through Twitter in a desperate attempt to find a place full of dogs, I came across heaven. 'Pawesome'. A dog café.

We are halfway down the street when Jungkook stops walking, his eyes on the bushes on our right.

"What?" I ask.

He holds my wrist, pulling me to stand next to him, and points under the bush. "Do you see a giant strawberry, too?"

As weird as his question is, I am seeing a giant white and fluffy strawberry. A moving one, on top of that. With a small step forward, I crouch to see better. I look up at Jungkook. "It's a bunny."

"A bunny?" His eyes grow. "Here? Alone? Dressed as a strawberry?"

A dog café must wait, because I am not leaving this poor, trembling baby in the middle of nowhere. "Can we help him, please?"

"Of course we're gonna help him," Jungkook says and crouches next to me. "Oh my God, it is a bunny. And it looks terrified."

"How do you help a stray bunny?"