Temporals

6. Faces

"And, what's that, honey?" Her face did not look completely at ease, but she was willing to put aside her thoughts for now.

Dakota rose from her seat, a little shy and uneasy. Tae turned away from her, tucking one leg between his rear and the couch, looking up at her mother.

So many pairs of curious eyes - it made her horrifyingly uncomfortable, forcing Rae to fake a smile. She raised her eyebrows at Dakota, expecting her to speak soon.

"Mom," and she started, her fingers tying and untying wearily in front of her belly. "You remember our sport's meet?"

Rae nodded.

"The Dean from the University of Prakra was the Honorable Guest, right?" Dakota reminded.

She nodded again.

"I.. I mean, both Allison and I got emails from the University today.. that we can go there.. and take up any course.. and they'll give us 85% scholarship and we can continue focusing on archery. They have the best infrastructure, and their sports teams always rank in nationals, so they must have really good coaches. Mom.. mom.. can I please go there? I really wanna go there."

She spoke the last bit in such a hurry, the preparation that went into it was hard to ignore. Rae was too stunned by the flurry of information to speak for a couple of moments.

When she finally did, it was only a word, "wow!" She pursed her lips together, as 8 pairs of eyes kept staring back at her. Wales was the first and only to excuse himself.

"Do I not get the chance to research about your university, darling?" She breathed out a single laugh.

"Of course, mom," the younger pulled out her phone from her pocket and handed it to her.

On the illuminated screen was the brochure of the University. Rae put her purse down, and sifted through the headers. It did look like a pretty big deal, with a huge campus, classrooms with high-tech facilities, the perfect amount of security, sorority and fraternity houses within the campus.

They had listed the achievements of their recently passed out students, and that was a long and impressive list. The faculty looked top-rated, and Dakota was right, the sports area, teams and coaches were all the shiz.

"Kookie oppa went there too," Dakota chipped in. "He was telling me how good the place is."

"Hmm.." Rae replied, running a finger through the crook of her chin. "Honey, this looks very good. But this is so far away. I'd always be.."

"Mom, please."

She took a dry gulp. "Have you decided what you want to study?"

Dakota nodded. "Economics."

The room fell silent again, and nobody moved. Their eyes stuck on Rae, expectantly. She could hear Yoongi sighing beside her, although all others seemed to hold their breath. Looking up, she met eyes with her daughter and broke into a smile. Made up or not, it was hard to tell, but it succeeded in making Dakota smile back.

"Of course you'll go, baby. I'm very proud of your achievements. If this is somewhere you wanna be, okay!"

Dakota smiled back hugely, although the tears pooled in her lower eyelid didn't go unnoticed. She crossed the couch between them quickly, and grasped her mother in a hug. "Thank you, mom," she kept saying, "thank you."

"I'm happy if you are, honey. What say, tomorrow we celebrate this by going ice skating? Just the two of us? Just like old times?"

Dakota unwound herself from her, and looked back at Allison. "Actually, tomorrow Allison was hoping I could go over to her place after school for some work. Can we go now?"