An Early Morning Dream | KSJ

1: The Running Boy

~[29/08/2022]

"Please... please don't kill him... Someone save him please..."

General Commander in chief - Mr. Kim Dae Jung woke up hearing his wife Mrs. Kim Myung Hee - crying and whining in her sleep. Tears slipped down her cheeks and clenching the blankets, she kept begging someone to save his life. Whose life? No one knows that.

"Yeobo! Yeobo wake up, what's wrong?"

Dae Jung got worried for his wife when he noticed that she was crying and already had gotten a mild fever. He tried waking her up and when she woke up, she tightly hugged him.

"Was it a nightmare?" he asked softly, patting her head.

"Hmm. I saw someone stabbing..." Myung Hee murmured while sniffing and wiping her tears. She pulled back from the hug and added further, "I saw someone stabbing our son. He would be okay, right?"

Dae Jung held her hands and looked into her eyes. With his lips tightened in a straight line, he responded to his scared wife, "Wherever he is, Seokjin will be alright. Don't worry. It was just a nightmare yeobo!"

Nodding to him, she pleaded, "Find my Seokjin soon. Please!"

---

14th April 1980 - Incheon

Tring Tring...

As the alarm starts ringing, I wake up rubbing my eyes. Not yet ready to open them in front of the Monday morning sunlight, I reach out to the nightstand beside my bed to turn it off. Aishhhh. But I got the bad side of my luck. I ended up making it fall on the floor and breaking it into pieces.

"Ae Rinaa! What's that sound?" my mom yelled from the kitchen, probably preparing the breakfast which I won't be able to dig into, as I am already late.

"N-nothing Omma!" I struggle to respond with my dry throat and whatever. I am used to her scolding anyways.

But why do I have to break it in the first place? Now I need to get it fixed. Aishhh.

I stretch my arms up and squeeze my whole body back on the bed to get rid of all the laziness because, you know, I AM LATE!!!

Quickly cleaning up the mess lying on the floor, which could probably make some holes in my feet, I finish my morning routine, putting on some boyish yet expensive clothes. But wait. Just to let you know, I am not a tomboy. I also like to dress up prettily when I have time. I said WHEN I HAVE TIME! 

Getting ready for college, I quickly grab the toast from the dining table when my mom again slapped some angry yells at me.

"Can't you wake up early? Alway sleeping like a buffalo and getting late."

Well, yeah! I am that buffalo - Lee Ae Rin (Y/n) - to be more precise, the laziest girl you would ever find on this earth, who is late for her classes and always ends up getting minus points from her professors. But that never bothered me. Ask why. Because my goal is just to pass. Whether I get A+ or C+, it doesn't matter.

And tell me honestly, can a single piece of paper really decide your future? Well, for me, it doesn't. Especially when you are living in the 1980s and you barely manage to convince your parents to join a college and not get married right after you pop out of school.

"Don't talk like that to my daughter!" A middle-aged man eating his breakfast joyfully, exclaimed at my mom, aka his wife. 

Lee Jae Jung - one of the most famous businessmen in Incheon was a rich guy and my not-so-lovely dad who loved me but will never hesitate to marry me off the day I agree to it. Too rich to have a printing press for newspapers, he indeed had a huge palace-like bungalow where I rest my tired ass every night.