Predestined - JENSOO - ENGLISH VERSION

Chapter 2

"How's it going at work, Chichu?" the new zealander with blonde hair says as soon as I walk through the door and let out a loud sigh of frustration.

"Being a journalist will still end up killing me, squirrel." I throw my backpack on the corner of the sofa and throw myself on it, sitting next to her.

"A lot of work, huh?" She caresses my shoulder while switching between TV channels.

"Also, but now we are going back with the hybrid model and I had gotten another job." I pout.

"Part-time too?"

"No, all day, but it's a home office."

"Why do you want so many jobs? Are you saving money to marry with Bohyun?" She lets out a low laugh and my eyes widen.

"Marriage??? With Bohyun??? WHAT?!" just thinking about getting married gives me an anxiety attack. The word marriage just reminds me of my parents and their relationship dynamic is something I don't want in my life.

"Hey, calm down, I was joking" Rosé hurries to say and squeezes my shoulder firmly, signaling me to take a deep breath and calm down.

"I just wanted to have some extra money to spend on my shit." I shrug as I start to calm down, trying to push the panic to the back of my mind.

"I read your article on the site, it was very good."

"Thanks" I feel my cheeks blush, I've never been good at receiving compliments "It was difficult, but after almost going crazy, I managed it."

"You've gone crazy." Lisa says as she comes walking down the hall and drying her short hair with a towel.

"It wasn't quite like that." I shrug my shoulders.

"You drank a bottle of coffee during the night, you were freaked out." Lisa says in a reproachful tone.

"Are you going to start annoying me again?" I pout "Rosie, protect me from this annoying girl."

"What did you do to her, Liz?" the blonde next to me hugs me and pats me while I stick my tongue out at Lisa.

"I told her that it wasn't right for her to be flirting with her friends on Twitter because she was cheating." Lisa shrugs and falls onto the sofa next to Rosé.

"Wait, do you this?" I feel Rosé's judgmental tone and just remain silent.

"I told you." from Lisa's tone, they must have already talked about this.

"I didn't consider cheating, for me it was just a joke that friends play among themselves, because if one of them took it seriously, I would never stay with them." I say after a few minutes of staring at the TV and thinking about Bohyun's words from a few days ago.

"If you try to flirt with Rosé, I don't even know what I'm capable of doing." Lisa says in an altered tone of voice.

"I only playfully flirt with my single friends." I say when trying to defend myself.

"Wait, friends? Do you flirt with women?" Lisa almost jumps off the couch when she hears me and I just shrug.

"Like I said, it's just a joke."

"Soo, do you still consider yourself straight?" Rosé says and I raise one of my eyebrows as I look at her.

"What question is that?"

"It's just that it's not very common for straight women to flirt for fun with other women." Lisa says as if it were obvious and I close my mouth, because I can't think of anything to answer.

After a few minutes of watching an episode of Modern Family, I start receiving several notifications from Soojoo on my phone. She is another virtual friend I made who lives a few hours away from where I live.

Soojoo is a little clingy and controlling, seeming like a possessive girlfriend, but I understand that it's her way of showing her concern and consideration for me. A curious thing about her is that she is 'friends' with Jen and I don't even know why I'm thinking about that.

"You know, Chichu, that bottle of coffee you drank during the night was worth it, your journalistic article was really good. Some of my colleagues who read it were very complimentary of yours skills." Lisa says and I look away from my phone to look at her.

"Rosie also praised, you're not saying that just because you're my friends, right?" I pout and Lisa slaps me on the forehead "Ouch!!"

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I'm eating ice cream while Bohyun finishes his run in the park. The day is so sunny and hot that I don't understand why he is doing physical activity of his own free will.

Each crazy man with his own madness.

"Jichu, what are you doing? Can we call each other?"

Soojoo's message makes my phone screen light up and I frown. I can't stop going out with my boyfriend to have a call with her, because it usually lasts hours and is rarely about something important.

"We can't, my friend, I'm in the park with my boyfriend and I still don't know what time I'll be home so we can talk. Did something happen?"

"No, I have some free time and I wanted to talk to you a little, but it's okay, have a nice date with your boyfriend :)"

Strange. Soojoo doesn't usually act like this, but I decide not to care when I see Bohyun approaching me, all sweaty and panting.

"You look like you're going to faint at any moment." I smile when he sits next to me and starts drinking water.

"It's hot, I think I could faint." He laughs and stares at me.

"What it was? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"You've been different for a while now." he shrugs.

"How different?"

"I don't know how to explain."

"This is good or bad?"

"I don't know either, Soo." the man looks at me again and I furrow my eyebrows. I let out a sigh and go back to eating my ice cream "Yesterday I had dinner with my mother and she asked if we were already thinking about marriage." Bohyun says so naturally that I start coughing when I choke on the ice cream. He gets scared and pats my back until I can breathe normally.

"What did you answer?"

"That you have an anxiety attack every time you hear the word marriage because of your parents and that we're not thinking about it yet." he gives a half smile "I don't know if she believed it."

"But it's the truth." I say after a while "Everywhere we go, people ask if we are married." I roll my eyes "I don't like the imposition that society makes on couples to get married, why can't people just enjoy life and share it with someone?" my voice comes out more altered than I would like and Bohyun stares at me.

"Calm down, everything's okay." He takes the ice cream cone from my hand and finishes eating it. I put my sunglasses on my face at the same time as a girl wearing only shorts and a sports bra passes by, making my gaze fall on her thighs and I quickly look away.

Yeah, I've been feeling really different lately and I have no idea what's going on.