Innocence // STRAY KIDS' Han Jisung

thirty-nine

Day-off and walk-off.

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If there was something that Choi Mirae had always avoided throughout her entire life, it certainly had to be confrontation.

She was incredibly bad at expressing what pissed her off without shedding a tear—that was why she always avoided fighting with her parents: she knew she would only end up crying helplessly.

And when Jisung proposed the idea on confronting Mrs. Wang about her insolent decision about the Artistic Gala, Mirae didn't need to even listen the full sentence before refusing completely.

"No way in this universe, dude," she denied as her eyes became wide as she imagined how the scenario would turn out. "I suck at confronting people, especially adults. I always end up crying like a baby and looking weak as hell."

"But you have to let her know she can't just do what she wants!"

"Well, boo-hoo, I'm not doing it. I'd like to keep the little bit of dignity and self-respect I have rather than to lose it over that woman."

"Oh, come on love," Jisung sighed, pulling up a side of his lip in a crooked smile. "So you're going to let that woman go with what she wants? You're going to let everything you've done just banish away 'cause she says so?"

She felt a pain in her throat as she nodded her head, "Yeah. She's a bitch, I don't want anything to do with her."

He stopped her by pulling her hand and stood in front of her, his hands finding their way up to her cheeks, cutely cupping them as he stared right into her eyes. "You know you don't want that, Mirae."

"But I don't want to fight that woman. Look, I understand why you want me to confront her, but that's not what I want right now."

"Then what do you want to do?"

She took a deep breath, pursing her lips as she shrugged her shoulders, "I don't know, maybe leave this place."

"Okay, we can do that."

"No, we can't," she corrected, pointing at him. "I might have been removed from the contemporary, but I still have to rehearse the other dances, and you have to rehearse yours too."

"No, we don't," he smiled and lowered one arm to her waist, pulling her a step closer to him. "We can leave and go somewhere fun. Somewhere where you don't have to see Mrs. Wang's face at all, so we can have fun after this horrible morning. What do you say?"

"I—I'd love to," she stuttered, pushing herself back. "But we have to go."

Please say no please say no please say no, she begged mentally as she watched him, pouting as he considered her words. Don't listen to me, I don't want to go either I'm just being stubborn. Don't listen to me!

"You're right."

No I'm not, she wanted to say. But she had been raised her whole life to do what was good even if it wasn't what she wanted, hence why she was feeling conflicted at the moment. "Yeah, we should get going," she nodded her head, spinning around before walking towards the classroom.

But then something pulled her back on her tracks. She turned her head to the side, watching Jisung's hand wrapped around hers, pulling her back as he raised his eyebrow at her, a smirk on his lips.

"That's right, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to do it."

"What do you mean? We have to go back otherwise Mrs. Wang's going to kick us off."