a ticket to the sun ∙ myg ✓

22 ↝ green envelope

She has always had a knack for knowing when the day is going to be a bad one. Her eyes will peel open and her soul will feel... off, like rust has grown on the surface overnight. Rust that she is long-used to scraping away after too many bad days throughout her life.

Something about the way the sunlight will leak weak and watery into her room. Something about the way her skull will throb, like palms are clasped around it, pushing until her head is on the brink of bursting. Something about the unease of her stomach, as if it had been taken to with a wooden spoon and stirred into a restless sea. Something, and she will just know. Maybe it is her curse, for the sense only arrived after her mother passed.

After her father began blaming her.

Today is one of those days.

But rather than staring at her bedroom ceiling until the feeling has mostly subsided—as she usually does—she finds herself smiling into the bedsheets. Nothing can ruin her mood, not when the past week has been spent with her hand in Yoongi's hand, her lips on Yoongi's lips, her skin against Yoongi's skin. How it always should have been, yet how she had always been afraid of being, because there had always been consequences. Now, with the ballot dwindling down to its final months, there is hope.

Unlike with Jeongguk, who she knew could not be tainted by the tendrils of her curse.

Jeongguk, who was never, and could never be the one to keep her heart, as much as she has tried to convince herself so.

Jeongguk, who she is betraying, but can hardly find it in herself to care.

Maybe today wears a cloak of bad because it is the day she is finally going to answer his text messages, his calls, and tell him the truth. Maybe it is because she knows Yoongi has prior commitments, so she cannot see him until the evening.

"It's a family matter, it'll go for most of the day," he had told her last night, fingers tangled in her hair just as their bodies were upon her bed. There was something in his gaze that had urged the alarms to set off in her mind, but she kept them at bay, breathing deep.

"And since when have I not been considered family?" she had joked in return, trying to lighten the tone and smother the strange terror that was slithering at the bottom of her stomach like a serpent.

His eyes had screamed, since you left me—don't tell me that a few kisses have already made you forget? but he'd composed himself with a tired sigh and pressed his forehead to her own.

"You are family. I know it's a weird request, but it's... it's my parents. They just want to keep it personal, y'know? I'll see you tomorrow night though, I promise. We can watch that stupid movie you've been begging me to watch."

She slapped his chest at the comment. "Napoleon Dynamite isn't stupid."

"Yeah yeah," he murmured, smiling and kissing her until she was yawning against his cheek and the feeling of trepidation had returned to the safety of its burrow to wait out the night. Hidden from view. Preparing to strike.

Now she rolls over, checking the time on her phone. Almost midday. Yoongi must have left hours ago, but his scent is still wrapped in the sheets, lingering like fog over a lake. She presses her nose to their shared pillow, releasing a soft groan, inhaling pine and cinnamon and sweat, which revitalises her better than any cup of caffeine could.

There is a shatter that echoes from the other side of the house, followed by a gruff stream of cussing, tearing her from the tranquility like a stone hitting a windshield. A moment passes where her body goes still, an awfully natural reaction to that particular voice. Then her muscles loosen enough for her to tumble out of the bed, grabbing the first shirt and pair of shorts that she can find in her drawers.