In My World epilogue
She went out again and drank a glass of water. After fixing Dara and Minzy's pillows on the floor, she laid down next to Young Bae who's sleeping on the carpet.
As Ash was getting closer to him, the camera died and did not record what happened after.
"Aigoo, my Sol." She scooted further until her face was right in front of his. "Is it possible .. to like you this much after all these years?" She whispered with a croaky voice. She felt her head spinning even after hours of drinking and laid down on her back.
2001; Yongsan-gu Park, Seoul, South Korea
"Ji-oppa!" The 13-year-old Bae Choon-he called towards her neighborhood best friend, Kwon Ji Yong. "Ji-oppa!"
A mandu-faced boy turned his head around and looked for the voice. After a while, he saw his friend running while still calling his name.
"I'm here, stop yelling! Mom will know I'm not home again."
She reached him and panted. "Where are we going? I just told my dad that I was with you."
Ji Yong hit her head with a knuckle. "Why did you do that?" He frowned. "Let's just hope that samchon does not speak to omma soon. Girls are just trouble, really."
She puckered her face but the other ignored her and started to walk away. She caught up with him again and held onto his arm casually.
"What are you doing?" He shook his arm off and paused. "What if Young Bae sees us? He's going to tease me and he'll also tell others in the agency."
Choon-he's eyebrows furrowed. "Who's Young Bae? Is he from SM, too?"
"I'm in YG now, how many times do I have to tell you that?" The boy sighed. "Have you heard of Jinusean?"
"Not really." She bit her lip.
Ji Yong shook his head. "They're a hip hop duo from YG Entertainment and I'm going to debut like them with Young Bae." He beamed.
"I thought you're not interested in music anymore?" Choon-he reminded him. "Just join me in my hapkido classes. I did Little Roora for you, so do this one for me."
He rolled his eyes at her. "We we're kids then but this time, I have higher chances. Young Bae's a really good singer plus he's also —"
"Who's this Young Bae?" She asked seethingly. "Does he live in our neighborhood?"
"Well, no —"
"Is he your best friend now?"
"He can be, I mean —"
Bae Choon-he opened her mouth in shock. "Where is he?" She demanded.
Seeming insensitive with her feelings, Ji Yong brightened up with what he thought was finally interest from his best friend. "We're actually meeting him by the playground."
She snorted sarcastically. "Of course we are."
He grabbed her wrist and dragged her where they're supposed to meet up with Ji Yong's new friend. After looking around for a while, they can't seem to find him anywhere.
Ji Yong reached for his flip phone and typed a message. Choon-he on the other hand sat on one of the benches and blew a raspberry. "You're just showing off your new cellphone." She commented. "I get it, I get it your phone is cool so let's just go to ahjumma's store and treat me ice cream."
The other then looked up and smiled past her. "Ani, we don't need to go to the store anymore."
Choon-he turned back and saw a tanned, short kid carrying a plastic bag approaching them shyly. As he got closer to them, she glared at him shamelessly and looked at him up and down. He wore baggy clothes that were definitely five times bigger than his size and his wardrobe choice definitely didn't help him look any taller. He also had a wide smile and super small eyes that she's not even sure if he's seeing things right.
"Young Bae-ya! Where have you been?" Ji Yong called out and did a 'hip-hop' handshake with his other friend. "We've been waiting for you here. And oh, is that ice cream?"
The boy nodded. "You told me to buy them —"
"How thoughtful!" The other interrupted and gestured to the frowning girl beside him. "My best friend here likes sweet things more than anything. Her name's Bae Choon-he." Ji Yong grinned and pushed his friend towards Young Bae making her stumble.
The short kid caught her but also let go immediately as if he touched a hot iron.
Choon-he didn't hesistate to get back at Ji Yong and slapped his forehead hard. "I wonder why I stuck with you." She said as she watched him exclaim in pain.
Young Bae admitted to himself that she was pretty but he was taken aback by her strong personality which left a somewhat bad first impression of her. He looked at the girl curiously until their eyes met.
"What?" Choon-he snapped. "You want to get hit, too?"
"N-no." He stuttered out of shyness and fear.
"Yah Choom! What's wrong with you? I just want you to get close with Young Bae because you're my bestest friend. Don't you get that?" Kwon Ji Yong intervened. "And don't tell me that we don't need other friends, I'll seriously tell your mother that you kissed a random fat boy last time we went to Songpa District."
She gasped and gestured towards the other kid. "Did you have to say that with him around? You're such a big mouth Kwon Ji Yong!" She hissed. "Plus that oppa's getting teased a lot, I just proved those ugly bullies wrong that just because he's chubby, he wouldn't be able to get a girl himself."
Ji Yong laughed. "Oh, so he's your 'oppa' now? You don't even know his name! In case you're wondering, it's Choi —"
"Shut up." Choon-he dismissed her friend and turned back to Young Bae. "What do you have for me?"
His thick eyebrows knit together. "I'm s-sorry?"
She scoffed mockingly. "Are you sure you're going to debut with this guy? He can't even speak clearly."
"Choon-he." Ji Yong spoke sternly.
The girl just rolled her eyes but surprisingly didn't walk away like Young Bae expected.
"I'm not going to back down on you, boy." She sneered. The short kid then noticed that she was speaking informally even though they just met for the first time. He didn't dare to comment on that because he was scared of the dimpled 13-year-old woman.
"No one's competing for nothing." The young Ji Yong sighed. "She's a pain in the ass but once you get to know her, she's actually okay."
Choon-he laughed. "Ji Yongie, I'm more than okay." She turned back to the small eyed kid and asked again. "What'd you have?"
Young Bae was confused at first until the girl nudged the plastic bag he was carrying. "Ah, I have chocolate, strawberry, and —"
"Strawberry's mine." She claimed.
"I guess you like pink." The kid mumbled and handed the ice cream to her with a smile.
"No." She answered. "And thank you."
Young Bae looked at her with a surprised face then gaped at Ji Yong.
"I told you she's decent. Must've somehow caught some manners from imo." The mandu kid told him and grabbed the vanilla ice cream.
Still glancing at her as she enjoyed the cold treat, Young Bae smiled with his eyes and ate the last one with his new friends.
It was a sunny day in Seoul. People gathered in parks to walk and play with their friends and families. A group of young boys were running around in a basketball court while the girls watched and cheered for them.
"Pass it here!" A short boy yelled.
Hesitation crossed the eyes of the kid who was holding the basketball. He eventually threw it to a different teammate, leaving Young Bae's hands empty even though he was the most free to take the shot. The ball didn't go in and bounced back when it hit the side of the ring, making Young Bae more frustrated.
When they decided to have a break, Ji Yong complained to the other boys. "Yah, just pass the ball to Young Bae. He has free shots because the other team's not even guarding him." He sighed. "We'll lose if this continues."
Meanwhile, Choon-he wandered by the flower fields near the court. She picked some up and put one behind her ear. After being satisfied with her 'mini bouquet', she went back to see how the boys were doing. It has been a month since she met Young Bae but they still haven't warmed up with each other yet due to the fact that she sees him as a competitor while he gets extremely awkward and frozen with girls.
She stopped by a drinking fountain first and heard two boys talking behind her.
" — don't know why does Ji Yong even let him play. He's not even from our neighborhood. He's short and here's the funny thing, he's way too nice. I even heard him mumble 'sorry' when he bumped into Mi Sook. He's a total disadvantage in our team."
The other boy laughed. "Ah jinja? Ji Yong hangs out with him because he has a good voice. I heard they want to be idols."
"Idols?" The older kid scoffed. "I would not even watch those munchkins run around on television. Aren't they lacking something important to be an artist?"
"What is that?"
"Visuals and height." He chortled. "I don't get why girls like those two so much. Since Ji Yong started bringing that shortie here, they started to ignore us more. I can't even shoot properly because of their screams."
The other nodded. "That's right, that's right. Should we trip that boy Young Bae so that he can't play anymore? We can't touch Ji Yong because his mother knows us well."
Choon-he theb turned around which surprised the boys because they knew she was Ji Yong's best friend.
"Ah Choon-he yah, I didn't see you there." The older nervously said.
"Sung Hoon-oppa, don't play in the next game." She replied with a sweet smile.
One of the boys chuckled. "Why? Are you afraid that I'll hurt your small friend?"
"No, it's because oppa's the one who's going to get hurt." She flatly said.
Sung Hoon laughed mockingly. "You're just a pretty face with a useless mouth. Move." He shoved Choon-he hard to the side.
"H-Hyung, that's a bit too much. She's still a girl." The other kid mumbled.
"It's fine." She sighed and looked up to the sky. "This is one of the reasons why I told those two to just learn hapkido with me." She then grabbed the back of Sung Hoon's shirt and things happened.
The boys had their last game and fortunately, Ji Yong's team won. Young Bae was finally able to score a lot, contributing to their win.
"Too bad Sung Hoon-hyung couldn't continue the game. I bet he wouldn't be able to play for weeks." Ji Yong said while he walked home with his two best friends. "Was he fighting with the other kid?"
"I don't know." Choon-he replied innocently.
He looked at her. "Good thing you were there to put an improvised splint for his wrist. You have good intuition, maybe you could try to be a doctor someday. I think it'll suit you."
She shrugged her shoulders and looked the other way. The boys raved about their game until they finally reached Choon-he's house. Ji Yong immediately rushed in, leaving the two behind.
Young Bae politely grabbed her arm to hold the girl back. "Sorry, I-I uh I heard what really happened." He said shyly.
She raised an eyebrow. "Huh?"
"I heard from the other boys that you did that to Sung Hoon-hyung."
Choon-he laughed. "You make me sound like a gangster. I didn't do that to him. He did it to himself." She then walked back towards the house but Young Bae spoke again.
"Are you ... are you okay?"
The girl paused for a bit before nodding slightly. Upon seeing her answer, Young Bae exhaled. "Thank God and thank you, Bae Choon-he." He smiled with his eyes.
The young girl stared for a while before blushing completely red.
2004; Han River, Seoul, South Korea
Kwon Ji Yong caressed a crying Bae Choon-he in his arms. "Shh. It's okay, it's going to be okay."
"Ji Yong, you don't understand!" She sobbed. "M-my dad .. my dad left us with nothing. I don't know why he would do this to us. How are we supposed to get by now? My mom's going to be pestered by those loan sharks forever. I'm ... I'm not even sure if we can manage to live here anymore."
"Shh, your mom will find a way. She can find a way. She's one of the brightest people I've met, don't say things like that. Just believe."
The young woman just let her tears fall down while looking at the river hopelessly. Her dad got involved in a gambling scheme and left her and her mother alone after losing a big sum of money. When she witnessed the loan sharks raid their house when she got home, she ran away without any specific place in her mind. Her mother, Na Bi, then asked Ji Yong to look for her while she tended to the damages in their home.
After an hour, Ji Yong convinced Choon-he to go home. He wanted to go with her but she insisted that she and her mom needed to talk.
Upon arriving at their house, she was surprised to see how everything seemed to go back to normal even after the chaos the loan sharks brought to them. She came crying to her mother to apologize that she was not there to comfort and help her clean up but Na Bi pat her daughter's head lightly. "It's okay, your friend came by and helped me to clean faster. The shy kid with the adorable eye smile."
Choon-he wondered. "Young Bae?"
"Yeah, I think that's him." Her mother chuckled softly. "He didn't leave me alone until everything's done. He only left because he said that you're not going to like it if you see him here. Why hate such a reliable man?"
"He did what?" Her daughter asked, obviously surprised. "He was with you when I was thinking about myself .." She murmured.
"Young Bae said that Ji Yong told him about what happened and he rushed here. He also gave me a sunflower," Na Bi pointed to the vase in the corner "saying that he hopes it'll cheer me up 'cause he noticed that I liked flowers since you always bring me bouquets."
Choon-he was flustered by the revelation and felt her heart beat faster in her chest.
The actress then rolled to her side again and linked her fingers with Young Bae's secretly. "Thank you for being my eternal sunshine."
2023; Manila, Philippines
'Oppa, send me a picture' The woman typed and sent it while hiding her phone underneath the table.
There was instantly a reply but she could only see a gray, loading picture.
'I can't see it yet! Who are you with? And are you blonde again? Lookin' smexy'
'I'm not with them. Focus on your meeting!' The man texted back.
'I don't care about the others, I just miss you, that's all' She replied shortly.
She didn't get a reply for a few minutes but her phone buzzed again. 'Pfft I know you ㅋㅋㅋ but I miss you too. Really.'
The woman smiled from her seat and excitedly typed a reply. 'See u soon, oppa. Very soon.' As soon as she hit send, the picture loaded revealing two men in a selfie.
She gasped upon seeing it and typed another message before focusing back on her meeting. 'Sajangnim!!!!! Please take care of our Young Bae. Don't tire him out too much please. I still need his sunshine! 💛'
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My mind is scattered
How's everyone .. I realized how hard and complicated time skips are for written stories. If you guys have trouble understanding it, tell me so that I can edit properly
Vote and comment please, dear V.I.P's