A second chance.
That was what I wished for.
The one thing I prayed for every night before I sleep. The one thing I prayed for, at the very night before I woke up in an entirely different life.
A new life.
My second chance.
❈❈❈
I was 30 years old wh...
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—Present life, year 2016—
It was one late Friday night when I joined Taehyung for a ride away from the campus vicinity.
I looked out through the taxi window to see us going further away from all the familiar streets and buildings and started to enter an entirely different area of the city. I had agreed to let Taehyung to take me away that night to celebrate the end of exam week, which was also about to be the last day before we started our lives as sophomores.
We arrived one hour later at one small pub on the far side of the city.
It looked so simple and the building seemed pretty old, a typical old pub that looked nothing like any regular hangout place we used to see around campus. But as I stepped inside, I immediately fell in love with it.
It was far from what I had imagined. It was not packed with as many crowds as I had expected. There was no loud music that required you to shout out just to have a conversation nor a dancing crowd grinding each other's hips. Instead, I was welcomed by a fancy looking bar, an empty stage at its corner which had a grand piano and a few strings instruments already set up, a few people dancing lightly at the center while they were being accompanied by the music playing from a jukebox nearby.
"Why did you take me here?" I asked Taehyung as I looked around, scanning the interior with an awe. "How did you find this place?"
I could feel Taehyung shrugging next to me. "You always avoid parties and you said it yourself how you can't enjoy being in clubs without feeling worried about what might happen. I found out about this place from a classmate and instantly thought of taking you here."
I turned to face him, partly nervous while excited at the same time. We were still standing at the pub's entrance, glancing around to enjoy the new vibe happening around us. "Well, this place certainly is refreshing and new. But, why—"
"We're here to celebrate." He cut me off, grinning right after he saw my face looking so lost.
"Celebrate, what?" I looked ahead once more, glancing around at the unfamiliar faces around us. I could only see a few younger faces among the adult ones, but I still didn't feel out of place at all. "We could've just celebrated by joining some college parties for after exams."
"No. Nope—" he shook his head. "We are not only here for that simple reason. Besides, you always say no for college parties."
"So?" I raised my eyebrows, questioning him. Yet he only wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me in towards the bar.
"Let's have a drink first and chat, shall we?"
I let him find a seat for us and order my drinks for me since it would be the first time I had drinks outside of dorms. I took a sip of the liquor and sighed. "This is really nice," I said mostly to myself as I took in the sight of the pub, the people that were enjoying their time there without creating any ruckus. I could never understand how anyone was able to enjoy being in parties with extremely loud music when such a calm vibe was much more comfortable to be in.
