OH MY VENUS | JEON JUNGKOOK

THREE :: 세

     A haze, some sort of blurry haze, meets my eyes as they open slowly. It's morning, I can tell, and I'm being rudely awoken by the sound of vibrating against the glass. I groan as my limbs stretch and my eyes look over to my little table in my living room. My phone is ringing. Who on earth rings someone at five in the morning?

    I pick up the device and look at the name. Lone behold, my best friend is ringing.

    "Hi, Hyeon-u..." I say, my voice croaky and my throat dry.

    "Are you at the airport yet? Do you still have time?" Hyeon asks innocently enough as I recall the sound of shouting coming from the background. "If you do, can you stop by duty-free--"

     My breath hitches. "I'm dead," I utter leaping up and looking at the clock mounted on my wall. My flight leaves in an hour. I'm dead.

    Hyeon sighs and I can almost see her shaking her head in disappointment. "You overslept, didn't you? Anyway, can you get me some eye-cream from duty-free? It's eye-cream, not ice-cream, that's what you like--"

     "-- Bye!" I yell into the speaker as I tap the screen and turn off the call. I'm actually going to be slaughtered.

     I arrive a the airport half an hour later as my boss' words ring in my head. Miss Kim, we need you to go to the states on business. It's over the weekend, so it shouldn't be a problem.

    Well, it's definitely a problem now.

•••

     I surprisingly made it to the gate around ten minutes from the initial departure. I was just lucky I guess. I arrived at the hotel I was supposed to be staying at around seven o'clock and everything seemed to be going well. I had unpacked all of my things and I was just about to get ready for bed. Then there was a ping from my phone before my ringtone blurred out in the quiet.

     It was Mr Lee.

     "Good Evening, Mr Lee," I say, in the most formal tone I could. He only responds with the same sentence only with my name instead of his. "Is everything okay?"

     "No. It's not." He complains, sounding more vexed than usual.

      I tilt my head and frown. "What's wrong?"

      "You need to come straight back to Korea. No questions. I have had Soo-young book a flight for you in three hours, leaving at LAX. You should arrive here, in Seoul, at around nine pm." He said, sternly.

     What? Is he being serious? However, I don't show that I am at all fazed and reply with a simple 'Yes, of course, Mr Lee' and bid my farewell. This is ridiculous. Honestly, could this week get any worse? As soon as I hang up, I flop onto my bed and groan.

     Something's up. Not with the world, but with my stomach. But I'm pretty sure it is not because of my weight. It gurgles and grumbles for a few seconds then stops. What happened? Maybe it was the plane food I ate?

     Nevertheless, I get up and begin to pack as I ring up Hyeon-u and complain about my boss. We continue to talk for a further ten minutes and I complain about how I'm feeling a bit sick and she goes on about her eye-cream and the medicine she told me to use. I hang up and walk over to the small desk in the room, picking up my laptop.