I'm so sorry for the wait! Life tends to start throwing lemons at me, but I'm back! After some deliberation, I decided to change up the summary and story, so please hang in there with me! I am not familiar with dance, ao I am going to try my best. For the song, it is Yumeji's theme if you want to listen to it while you read the chapter!

I do not Playful Kiss or Yumeji's Theme or the Seoul Performing Arts Center.


I sighed through my teeth as I looked around my room. I couldn't help but eye my rose-colored walls in disdain. I never thought it would get to a point where I would dislike the color pink, or anything related to pink. It just reminded me of her. Everything she stood for and what she was. I hated it, but I didn't have the heart to tell Auntie that I hated pink after all the work she put into this room for me. I can remember the pink spandex fabric that chafed against my thighs annoyingly. I couldn't do anything about it without her clawing at my ears and mind. I don't want to see or remember her. However, Dad wants me to visit her this year. I would tell him that he is crazy and never in a million years would I go out to see her. But, he's expecting to see to her this year even though I didn't bother to ever since she died. I heard a hard knock on my door.

"Hani, we need to go before it starts to rain."

"I'm not going." and I meant it. I don't why he even tries. I could hear him shuffle and sigh outside of my door.

"Please, can't you imagine how lonely she must feel without you coming to visit her?"

"How lonely she must feel? That's gold, now she knows how I feel!" I didn't mean for that to fly out my mouth.

"Hani! How could you say that? Your mother did everything in her power to care for you and bring you up before she left this world!" I can't believe he said that. She was never a mother to me and would be. I bounced up from my bed and raced towards the door. I opened it and saw him with his long-sleeved white button-up shirt and midnight colored dress pants. He was dressed up, ready to go unlike me. He had a perplexed and frustrated look on his face. I couldn't understand why he looked that way. I scoffed and tilted my head in false confusion.

"You mean to make me feel like I was a worthless shadow of her greatness? She never treated me like daughter, I was one of her dolls that she tore apart, until I was nothing!" I shouted. At an instant, my view was turned to the door frame. I felt a sharp sting on my right cheek and I heard a surprised gasp. I could hear him huffing from the adrenaline running through him. But, I couldn't feel anything. I looked up and his face burning like fireworks. He was glaring at me and I glared right back. Slightly to my right, I saw Auntie at the staircase with her hands covering her mouth in shock.

"Don't you ever talk about her like that again! She was your flesh and blood! Your mother!"

"She was only my flesh and blood! Nothing else! I will never acknowledge her as my mother!" I could visible see his blood pressure rise. When I looked at him, all I could see was her. His hand was raised in the position to hit again and I continued to glare venomously at him, mentally daring him to do it. Before he could do so much as reclining his hand back, Auntie rushed forward and grasped his forearm from thrashing me.

"Gidong, please calm down! I'm positive that Hani did not mean what she said! Don't hit her!" she pleaded desperately to him. Oh, how I wished that Auntie was my biological mother. I don't want to be in the space as him. It was always this day that caused us disharmony, but the slap was new. Last year, all he did was ask. So, what now? I get a slap in response to refusing to see her? I can't escape her even in death. I can't even pretend to be a happy idiot without her soul breathing down my neck. I brusquely brushed past them both and marched down the stairs. I heard the front door open, but I didn't dare to see who enter. I continued to brush past them and forcefully slip my shoes on to exit the door.

As soon as I step out, I felt torrent raindrops pelting against me. It progressively through my periwinkle turtleneck and black A-line skirt. I stopped and painfully groan. I don't want to cry. I refuse to cry, but I kept feeling the discomforting ball in my throat asking for a reprieve. I pushed forward to the gate and kicked it open. I could care less if it was an expensive, cast iron gate. The hot tears ran down my face without my permission. Why can't anything work out for me? Why can't I have a normal life without thinking of anything associated with her? How could she do this to me?

"I hate you," I whispered to the air as if her soul was walking right alongside me. I walked where ever my feet took me. I had already walked past dad's restaurant. My feet began to ache in my thick-heeled ankle boots. I started to notice my surrounding and I immediately had the need to hurl. All I saw were posters for dance. I knew exactly where I was. There were groups of people with thick winter jackets and umbrellas with half of their dance attire still on. I can't believe I walked myself all the way here. I felt the fervent shivers crawl up my back as I kept looking around. If the Seoul Arts Center was four streets down, then I knew what building was beside me. I turned to my left and saw enormous glass doors. As I looked up, I saw the tall and sophisticated infrastructure standing proudly as it read, Inhye's Dance Company.

"I truly hate you." Before I knew what I was doing, I was already walking the glass doors and into the building. It was different from what I remember. I remember when there was a wooden and somewhat homey theme. Back then, it was half the size of this current building with only five rooms. Now, I see a building with multiple floors and magnificent stairs and elevators. Everything was pristinely clean, pearl white, and marble. It was mostly vacant for a Sunday for its size. I ventured up two flights of stairs that went straight up and ended up on the second level. As I walked down the floor, I found a set of cherry wood doors. I pulled the doors open and a swish of cold, air-conditioned hair blasted towards. I started to shiver heavily when my body suddenly remembered it was soaked with rainwater. I stepped in and examined the room. It was a typical practice room. To my right was a wall mirror that extended to both corners of the wall. In the left corner was a hauntingly beautiful coal-black grand piano with a phone and Bluetooth speaker sitting on the bench. To my left was the barre* standing close to the wall.

Straighten your back!

I flinched when I heard her voice reverberate in my head. I ran my hand through my stringy wet hair and sighed. I shakily collapsed to the polished wooden floor and yanked my shoes off my feet. I got up and walked over to the barre. I could hear the drops of water fall to the ground as I walked over. I grabbed the barre and faced towards the grand piano.

First position.

Plie.

Again!

I could hear her voice again. It was as clear as day. I got into first position and did a plie. My skirt began to resist against my movements, so I unbuttoned it from the front and shimmied it off legs. My thick winter tights clung onto me like a second skin, but it was more comfortable than my skirt. I repeated my initial movements and moved onto the second position and did another pile. Then I shifted into the movements for the grand battement en rond. My muscles started to ache in protest. I haven't done this much in such a long time and my muscles began to suffer but they remembered all of the movements.

Bend your leg more!

Again!

I went through all of the warm-ups exercises and walked to the bench where the phone and Bluetooth speaker was. The phone was unlocked and had a music track that hadn't been played yet. I pressed the play button without looking at the title of the song. I heard a family of strings come in with the double basses playing the beginning quarter note. My body moved before my mind could catch up. My right hand raised above my head and my back bent as it went around in a half-circle. I felt the movements of ballet flow through my blood.

You are moving too slow in the pirouette, stop acting like a brat, and do it right!

Smile like you want it all! You need it all!

You can never get on their level performing like this!

I can see her standing in front of me with her steel-like eyes. She had a thick, wooden stick and was jestingly slapping it against her left hand. Her hair was done up in a perfect bun with no stray hair sight. She had a sheer black kimono jacket that partially covered her leotard and loose pants on, just like I remembered her. I felt myself slip into more contemporary moves as she stared down. She started to splutter in rage.

Sloppy!

"You're dead, what else can you do?" as I continued to dance, I began to laugh. All the pain commenced and the rest tears flowed. Her apparition can yell, scream, and curse me all it wants, but in the end, she's dead! A pile of damn ashes. I collapsed to the ground in a heap of mess. Tears and sardonic laughter flew out of me to the point where I couldn't contain it.

"Are you done?" I looked up through the cloudy mess of my tears and saw a tall man leaning against the door.