My Brightest Star || Park Jongseong

9 💫

The next day, I woke up early for 2 reasons. First, because I wanted to go for a morning run with my mom, and second because I couldn't stop thinking about Jay and I's conversation last night. Why is he so busy all the time?

"Ave, come on. You're distracted, focus. We got this!" My mom says as we were running.

Catching our breaths, we ran and ran as we finally reached home, and just like that our morning run is done.

My mom high-fives me and gives me a pat on the back for a great morning run. With deep breaths, I sat down on our front porch to calm myself down, now reaching for my water jug and chugging it down.

"What's with the sudden morning run? I was planning to do some work today." My mom asks.

I drank water and started to wipe my face with a face towel. "Nothing much, I just wanted to go for a good run. Thanks for coming with me."

She sat down beside me and started to hug me "Mom no, we're both so sweaty" I say as I try to escape from her hug.

"I know you Avery, you go on runs when you have a lot in mind" she lets go of me and now cups my face, she looks at me right at me, worried.

"Is everything okay darling?"

I genuinely smile at her "I really am mom. Thank you."

After our conversation, we just stayed where we were and took deep breaths to calm ourselves. As we were about to go inside, a car passed by and parked right in front of the house beside us.

I stared at the car, waiting for someone to hop off. The car door opens and a tired Jay gets out.

The moment I saw him, I could feel how my heart was beating fast. He's here, he's finally back. I looked away from the car and instead looked down.

My mom noticed my reaction then spoke to tease me.

"Hey, Jay! Welcome home, hon!" she calls out and I looked at her in surprise.

Jay looks in our direction, smiles, waves, and walks towards us.

"Mom, why would you call him?" I whispered to her.

"Why wouldn't I?" she asks back.

"Mom, I'm a sweating mess" I sigh and try to make myself look presentable.

Before, I never get conscious of what I'm wearing around Jay, but now I somehow do. My mom looked at how I try to make myself look less sweaty (which by the way was not working) and she smirks at how hard I was trying.

She laughs teasingly and before I can say anything Jay was already in front of us. Great, just great.

"Good morning Mrs. Jung. How are you this morning?" Jay asks his backpack on his shoulder.

I looked at Jay with worry. He looked really tired since he's been traveling back and forth, it must be hard for him.

"I'm doing great hon. Wait right here, I'm going to get you something." My mom gets up and goes back in to get Jay some food he can bring home.

I could feel Jay's eyes on me and so I looked at him.

"Hi" he says as he sits beside me.

"Hey. You look tired." I say, worried.

I expected him to say something but instead, he rested his head on my shoulder and takes a deep sigh.

"Jay you know you weigh a lot right" I say as I try to push him off my shoulder. I didn't want him to move away, but I said that because I was nervous about the distance between us and I didn't know what to do.

"Let's just stay like this for a while. I need.. someone". He sounded broken and it hurt me to hear him that way, and though I didn't know exactly why he's acting this way, yet instead of being stubborn I just let him rest on my shoulder, besides, I do miss him.

My mom then comes back, gives Jay some food in case he hasn't had breakfast. I then went inside and Jay went to his home.

I spent the rest of the afternoon reading a book. It's a romance book that Sunoo recommended to me. Sunoo enjoys romance a lot, and though it's not my favorite genre, I thought I'd give it a chance since Sunoo enjoys it. As I was reading, I hear my phone ringing.

I saw Jay's name and picked it up.

jay: hey, what are you up to?

ave: not much, why?

jay: i'm picking you up at 7 pm sharp.

I jolt up from my seat and answered back.

ave: what? where are we going?

jay: i said I'll make it up to you, remember?

I then remembered our conversation last night and started to get excited about his preparation. I was about to say my goodbyes but then he spoke.

"Also, wear something nice. Besides, you're beautiful no matter what you wear."

•
Lots of love :)
- ims