The Falling Petals...🌺

To-the-States....

All day i waited for the confirmation of news which would have been good, if it had been at another time. Unfortunately, i got the confirmation and I had to tell her and my family too. I wondered if she would be happy when she found out, or sad.

Still, without thinking any further, I called her up to tell her. When she did not pick her phone. I got back to my studies. Five minutes later, I heard my cell phone ringing. I could see her name flashing the screen. 

I picked up the phone and said, "Hi, Honeyyyyy," very romantically, with a smile.

"Uh....hi."

Damn! It was Nari, her younger sister. What a blunder. What should i say now? Should i talk or should I just disconnect? I was panicking. With the kind of image I had projected to her family, that first line would have been a shock for sure.

"How are you?" Nari asked me, breaking the silence.

"Un....I am fine. How are you? and how come you called up from her cell," I asked, scratching my head and wondering whether she hadn't heard my previous line because of some magic or due to some fault in the phone or the network.

"I am fine. Actually, Dae was in the washroom and I was about to take your call when the ring stopped. So I dialed the missed-call number. Well, here she is, back in this room. And now she is struggling with me to snatch her cell phone..." and her voice faded into the background.

Finally, Dae said, "Haa....Hello," defending herself from her sister's punches. Anri wanted to talk to me, and it was probably the only time when I felt uncomfortable talking to her, just because of the way the call started.

"Hey, thank god you came," I said to her."

"Shillang, jamkkan gidalyeo," she paused with that sentence to hear something which Nari was trying to tell her at the other end. That "Jamkkan gidalyeo" lasted for ten minutes and I realized how wrong I was to think of any magic.

"what?" Dae shouted, amused, and laughed crazily.

"Hi, honeyyyy!" Nari shouted from behind and joined her sister's laughter.

"OH MY GOD!" I thought, feeling very embarrassed.

But Dae didn't come to my defense. Rather, she joined her sister in celebrating that moment.

"Damn!" I thought. "Her littler sister talked to me as if she didn't hear anything and look at her now. Girls!" I now remembered what a chameleon was, and thought the analogy suited girls even better- they change colors so fast.

So that was how I became a joke for the two sisters.

I almost forgot the reason i had called her, when Dae came back at last, taking a break form her laughter.

"Yeah.... Tell me now. She's gone to another room."

"Your sister is so cunning. She behaved as if she did not hear anything."

"After all, she's my sister."

"Now I wont be able to face her for the next few days."

"Oh come in! After all you are her brother-in-law, and such things keep happening between Hyeongbu (brother-in-law) and cheoje (sister-in-law)."

"But, the next time, I wont begin with the romantic lines, unless I make sure it's you on phone."

"Okay, now tell me. What were you going to say?"

After a small pause, I said in a single go, "I need to go to the US for five weeks, for my project."

"What?" Actually it was more like, "W-H-A-T???" A single word with a thousand thoughts running through it, all in different directions.

"Yes."

"Why so suddenly?" she asked impatiently.

"I knew that this thing was in the pipeline. But i was trying to avert it for the CAT in November. There isn't any escape from this now."

"But.....you can make any high priority excuse, right?"

"Hmm....But it's going to matter for my career too, dear. Listen. Please don't get angry. At this point, I am a little confused about how I will do this. I mean, leaving the KMS classes, the mock-tests. I need your support."

"KMS, mock-tests, career....You remember everything, but what about me? Busy in office, career, KMS classes, we have not even seen each other yet. Ours is such a different story...And now you're saying you are going to the states...."she was about to cry.

"Hey....But i have something to cheer you up."

"What is it?"

"I will be heading my plane from Busan. I will take a day's leave so that i can spend an entire day with you. We'll finally be seeing each other! Isn't that something to cheer you up about?"

Even I knew that it wasn't the perfect way to cheer her up- spending an entire day with her and then leaving the country for more than a month. But the fact that we would get to spend an entire day with each other gave some comfort to our hearts. It was not as if we had any option bout than eagerly waiting for that day to arrive and then trying to make it last as long as  a year.

What was surprising, though, was that an official, om-site trip was giving us the opportunity to see each other for the very first time. At times, we wondered how busy our life was: running from office to KMS, from career to family, but with no time to see the person with whom we were going to spend the rest of our lives.

Every passing day was marked. And as time passed, our feelings got stronger. The excitement was increasing, both, in the mind and in the heart. And finally, the day arrived when we met each other for the very first time.

A/N:

KMS is nothing but an organization which helps in educating people and preparing them for CAT exams. It is actually IMS but i have changed it to KMS as the story is taking place in South Korea.

Enjoy the chapter, and leave a like!

With love,

Castleye..🖤🖤