The good in the bad // {Baewoo}

1. Pilot

Bae looked at herself one last time in the mirror.
She had to admit that she looked pretty that morning, even though she wasn't a fan of her physical appearance.

In truth, there were too many things she didn't like about her physionomy, but isn't that what happens to every teenager?
With a deep breath, she grabbed her backpack and threw it over her shoulder, ready to face another monotonous school day.

She had forgotten the last time she found herself with a free afternoon to do whatever she wanted, the pressure of studying was too much, and her pride even more so.

She would have preferred to spend whole nights studying books, as she actually did, rather than bring home a bad grade in her most hated subject.

She wasn't stupid, nor did she hate school.
On the contrary, she loved learning, more for personal culture than for the end-of-semester test.

She stole a cookie from the package sitting on the dining room table against the protests of her younger sister, Hyein, and then poked her head around the kitchen doorway to find her mother already cooking.
"Mom, I'm going" she announced to the woman busy in front of a pot.

"Hurry up, otherwise you'll miss the bus," her mother reminded her.

"It's about time you decided to give me a car... And maybe let me get my license" Bae snorted.

"When you will bring a good result to the end of the year" she repeated to her for the hundredth time.

"But I always bring excellent results" the girl was keen to point out.

"Go to school."

Bae rolled her eyes at her mother's obvious attempt to deflect the conversation.
"I understand, you and dad want me to rot until I graduate without a shred of a car" she sighed, and couldn't hear her mother's response because she was already outside the garden gate, her hands in her pockets to take out her headphones.

Tangled as always, she forced her patience to untangle them and then put them in her ears and blasted the morning playlist, assembled specifically to make her wake up.

The bus arrived no more than half an hour after she left home, and Bae immediately found her favorite seat next to the window, more or less in the third to last row.

She carefully placed her bag on the next seat, as she did every morning to save room for her best friend.

Just two stops later, the bus stopped near the girl's house, and she got on, giving the ticket to the driver and glancing in the direction of Bae, who motioned for her to come closer.

The girl approached with a zombie-like step, as was the routine every morning. In fact, having known her for four years now, she knew the basic rules for living together with Oh Haewon.

And the first was simple: don't speak to her as soon as she wakes up.
So after a brief greeting, the journey passed in religious silence, one with headphones on her ears and her temple pressed against the cold window of the vehicle, the other with her head resting on the seat, her eyes half-closed in a battle against the sleep that occasionally seemed to have the upper hand.

They arrived at school, as usual almost forty minutes before the bell rang for the start of lessons.

Bae loved that little bit of time, she used it to go to the theater. Being a member of the Drama Club, she was allowed to enter the auditorium whenever she pleased, which certainly played to her mood.
She didn't do anything, usually just sit on the stage and admire the seating, or the ceiling. Sometimes she sang, but when she was sure no one was around.

This morning was no different from the others. In fact, after dismissing Haewon, she immediately slipped away to the theater.
As she entered, she sighed.
Already feeling the dramatic atmosphere of that place made her feel at home.
Bae didn't believe there was anything that could make her as free as acting.