... Taking that first step is always the hardest and requires the most faith, but you must take it before you can travel great distances ...
“We're really going, aren't we?” Tiffany asked while watching the streaks of lights pass by on her side window. It was a clear night, and the road was inordinately empty. Bright dots of light lay splattered across the darkened sapphire sky – stars that made a trail overhead in humble opulence. Gracing the heavenly vision were dark stratus clouds that clung to the azure troposphere like Velcro. Tiffany opened the window slightly and breathed in the scent of the boundless night.
“To Gyeonju?” Taeyeon rhetorically asked, her eyes firmly fixed on the road before her, “Yes, we really are.”
With a baffled expression, Tiffany glanced at her best friend and said, “Why?... I mean, I know we're looking for angels... but why the sudden urgency? Why Gyeonju? And why now after so many years of abandoning that idea?”
“I saw Mr.Lee-”
“Mr.Lee? You saw Mr.Lee?” the girl cut in, eyes wide with surprise until it gradually drooped down once their honeyed memories started to drip into her mind. “Gosh, it feels like it was just yesterday we were trespassing in his backyard.” Tiffany voiced before following it with a soft and warm chuckle, “How is he?”
Taeyeon smiled at that as she turned left at an intersection. “He seemed to be doing quite well when I talked to him. A strong one, that.” Heaving a sigh that spoke volumes, the girl turned to look at Tiffany for a brief second before shifting her eyes back on the road. “He told me that there are angels in Gyeonju. I thought he was insane at first, but there was something in his eyes that told me otherwise. You might think I'm crazy, but I believe him.”
Tiffany snorted in response to her words. Shaking her head, she lightly replied “I've always thought you were crazy TaeTae. And no, it's not because you believe that there are angels.... I just think you're crazy in general, but that's what I like about you.”
Taeyeon flashed her a smile that bore all the feelings that were contained in her heart. Feelings of acceptance, gratefulness, hope, and love. “So how about it Fany, you, me, doing this one last quest together?”
“Last huh? I guess this really is it....” the sick girl responded with a reminiscing smile, “our last shot to look for angels.”
“Think of it as a roadtrip, a journey, an adventure.”
Eighteen year old Tiffany stood behind a panel of various people, all dressed in full black, staring down at an engraved concrete plate. The words written upon the stone were the initials of Tiffany's grandmother: Hwang MinSook. Unlike the movies, the sky wasn't crying with her, and dreariness hadn't hovered over the ceremony. No, it was like any typical spring day. The birds chirped their morning song, flowers bloomed in full radiance, and the wind whispered words of renewal.
“Fany, are you alright?” Taeyeon asked from behind her as she placed a hand kindly on her shoulder. She wore a sentimental look, perfectly displaying her aching heart for the poor girl who now had no one but her.
“Yeah TaeTae, I'll be alright” Tiffany weakly replied before wrapping her arms around her best friend as she sought for some form of comfort and strength by the radiating warmth she gave. “...You know, she's the only family I have, and now that she's gone...” Unable to restrain her deep grief over the loss of her grandmother, she let it all out in tears.
“That's not true, you have me” the shorter girl reassured while patting her best friend on the back consolingly. “And my family has always loved you, so you have them as well.”
“I know... it's just that, she's gone and-”
“You shouldn't worry about her. She's off to a better place now. She gets to start over, have a new journey, a new adventure. Grandma Hwang is just taking a very long roadtrip somewhere and she... she can't come back because the trip doesn't allow U-turns. I'm sure she'll miss you, but this is a new quest for her. What if she hears you right now, won't you feel bad? Wanting a stop in her new adventure, now you're just being a kill joy” Taeyeon said, following it with a chuckle. She had hoped her small joke would lift the girl's broken spirit.
