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Chapter 23: Minmin.

"Go out and do something. It isn't your room that's a prison, it's yourself."
Sylvia Plath-

Sometimes I feel homesick

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Sometimes I feel homesick.

Homesick of a home I never had.

It's weird, I know. There was a time when happy families disgusted me because I envied them, because they had all I ever wanted.

A home, a family, love.

I'm over it, though, and now I just feel nostalgia about what my childhood could have been. I like to call this feeling 'homesick'.

I feel homesick now, too, sitting on the couch of my living room and staring at the way Jisung plays with Hyerin and Soonbok. It looks like a family, but it's far from being one.

In fact, in barely 10 minutes Hyerin's mother will be here to pick up her little girl, and so will be Noona.

Then, this illusion of a happy family will vanish in front of my eyes once more and I'll be alone.

Felix is supposed to be coming back in an hour or so. He knows how emotional I can get when I spend so much time with Soonbok. I hope he doesn't take too long.

The sofa dips next to me and it takes me out of my dazed state. Jisung wraps an arm around my shoulders and forces me closer to him. I let him, because for some reason I need the closeness he provides right now. He feels like family, the kind I'm longing for, and I don't know why.

With a smile, he rubs my arm slowly. "It's silly to ask now, but are these kids your's?" he says. His voice is quiet, words directed to me solely.

I shake my head. "They're from the orphanage." Maybe a bit reluctantly, because I still hate looking slightly vulnerable in front of him, I shift closer to him in search for the comfort I used to feel as a child whenever he was around.

Jisung hums and then his hand moves to my head where he starts massaging my scalp in that hypnotizing way that I love. He tilts his head lightly, enough to look at me directly, and searches for any hint of what I'm feeling in the lines of my face, the glow of my eyes and the curves of my lips. "And why do they have you looking at them so sadly?"

His question comes by surprise because I didn't think he'd notice, I didn't think he'd be able to read me so precisely after all this years. I look away and feel the blush on my ears strong and a little embarrassing, I'll admit.

"They don't." I lie and watch as Jisung opens his mouth to pry, ask some more questions until he's satisfied with the answers he's received. A curious boy, that's always been him. "Was the woman at the restaurant your mom?" I ask, changing the subject so I'm not the object of our conversation, so he can't get any information out of me about how I feel or how I've been because I still refuse to allow him knowing about my past without him. There's a feeling of shame that comes with those memories, a bittersweet taste whenever I remember how much of I weakling I became over that time.

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