[ON HOLD till March, 2022] Ms.Hammurabi Lee Ji Eun

160 days before (seventh day)

Saturday /mission day#7/

It's very quiet. I feel my head aching, but I feel comfortable, warm, and safe at the same time. Warm blankets, warm breaths... What? Breath? Wait a moment!
Fractured memories of the previous night come slowly back to haunt me. The baseball game-the karaoke thing-the club- the drinking - the drinking-oh no. I cringe inwardly.
But a more terrifying thing than these memories is that I'm feeling breaths on my face now! Like what?
I glance at the source that's sending me warm breaths. And I meet his eyes. Credulous, splendid, doe eyes.
I take a deep breath and close my eyes in slow-motion, not believing what I'm seeing now.

"What -"

"Good morning, Jieun. Did you sleep well?"

"Good morning... but I don't quite understand what you're doing here. Particularly, in my bed"

I glance at him again. Maybe in this situation, most girls would still feel shocked after waking up in someone's arm but I'm not anymore. I guess I recover quickly. I feel comfortable, and it feels oddly familiar and intimate to be in his arms. Like we've been married for 10 years. And as usual, he's staring at me with those smiling doe eyes.

"I'll tell you why I'm here after you say your answer"

"What answer?"

"It's the seventh day"

Oh.

"Is it already?"

"Yeah, it's already" he mumbles while stretching his arms out, and I sit up.

"Ouch-"

"Headache?"

"Sadly yeah"

He sits up too and eventually stands up.

"I'm gonna go to the market to buy you some noodles, do you have anything you wanna eat now?"

"Umm... chocolate will be okay"

"Anything else?"

"No..."

"Ookay"

"...Won't you tell me what happened?"

"You can wait for me till I come back or... you can go downstairs and ask your parents"

"My parents?" Oh god. The worst.

"I'm fucked up"

"No, you're not. Why do you think so" he sits back next to me on the bed.

"What girl on earth wants her parents to see her drunk?"

"... okay they might feel disappointed. But it's nothing compared to the happiness they are feeling now!"

"Why would they feel happy?"

"Come on! You're becoming more and more active, you stopped paying all your attentions to academic things, you're smiling more frequently, and you're happy. It's making your parents happy, babe"

"Are you sure" tears threatened to fall. But I managed not to cry.

"Yeah, I'm sure! Now, get out of bed and get changed, have your breakfast, my darling"

"Arasso" I take a deep breath to start my day even though I have this splitting headache.

During breakfast, my parents don't seem to be disappointed in me, so Jungkook told me the truth. Although drinking is a bad thing, it's a new way for me <who obviously avoids new challenges, new people, new things> to feel variety of different feelings. To try something new. They are happy because I'm starting to live a life. I knew they weren't paying much attention to what I did, but why I'm doing these. I'm becoming happier, aren't I?