Serendipitously, You ✔

Epilogue: Serendipity

Tuesday, October 17th, 2000

                  "Sooyoung baby, be careful!"

The four-year-old girl simply waved her mother down as if saying everything would be fine. She was just too excited to just play on the playground. Being around other kids always made her giddy with anticipation of making new friends. She had just met a group of boys earlier—slightly scaring them with her bright smile and introduction of "I'm Park Joy! Want to be friends?"

Her mother knew what she was doing. She was trying to find her soulmate but even if she knew it wasn't really possible until she was 13, she still didn't want to make a bad first impression on her future. Besides, it meant making more friends for her to have. It was why what happened next was so devastating for her.

Park Sooyoung aka Joy, had climbed the highest peak of the playground and was preparing to slide down the longest slide there was. She fisted her hands and raised them in a "fighting" gesture. She was a little scared but she could do this. She told her new friends that she would, so she was. Granted when she looked back—the boys who were older than her chuckled at seeing her legs wobble. She was not backing down. She positioned herself and closed her eyes as she went down the rubber, blue tub. She let out a yell of half scared and half excitement.

The trip down ended a lot faster than she expected. It ended with her stumbling off the slide and falling right on top of an innocent passerby who was heading towards the swings. Joy scrambled off the wide-eyed boy and sat on the ground, covering her eyes as she burst into tears. The boy she fell on seemed to scramble but for other reasons—she was crying. He gently patted her head in a sloppy yet appreciated manner.

Sniffling she looked up to him, her mom calling out to her. He was smiling down to her. It was a unique smile, a sort of box. She blinked at him, drying her last tears and stood up right away to apologize to him.

"I'm sorry. I should have been more careful."

"It's okay. I didn't really get hurt and you're pretty small." he stuck his hand out and she took it, confused and watched him shake it.

"Tae-Tae," Joy watched as a little girl waddled towards them—she looked to have recently learned to walk, she was still a baby. The boy she figured was being called picked up the little girl. He gestured a bye and talked back to the one-year-old she figured he could understand.

~•~

Saturday, November 16th, 2002