CAPÍTULO III GENERALIDADES DEL ISR, IETU, INIF 8
4. Cuota del impuesto
3.24 GENERALIDADES DEL IETU
Chapter 18: Lesson Learnt
Jessica opened her eyes in a painfully slow manner when Sooyoung had stopped the kiss. It was then that her mind had started working. She just kissed Sooyoung.
With wide eyes, she quickly got off and backed away from Sooyoung who was also standing up.
“Jessica,” she called out softly and took a step forward.
“D–don’t.” Jessica said out shakily as she took another step back.
Sooyoung grew worried but she stopped nonetheless. “Why?” She tried taking another step but Jessica had a hand placed forward, telling her not to go any further. “Look, if it’s about the kiss, then I’m sorry, alright?” She ruffled her hair in frustration. She expected at least a slap if Jessica had rejected her, but not this. Not her avoiding her. “Do you have to avoid me? Can I not get close to you anymore?” Sooyoung asked, she was hurting inside.
“S–stop.”
“Let me speak first? Please?” She was panicking by now.
Jessica shook her head, “this is wrong.” She said out softly but Sooyoung still caught what she said.
She quickly went forward to Jessica before she could even react. She placed both of her hands beside Jessica’s head so that she couldn’t escape. “This isn’t wrong. Love isn’t wrong.” She whispered.
Jessica didn’t want to look at Sooyoung so she turned her head away. “You’re a vampire...”
“So? What’s wrong with that?” She raised her voice.
Jessica closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. “You’re a vampire.”
“Are you... afraid of me? Are you afraid that I might hurt you because I’m a vampire?”
Sooyoung felt her arms starting to get heavy. It dropped down and she looked at the ground. “I will never hurt you. I love you too much to ever hurt you.”
Jessica gasped softly at what Sooyoung said, but she still couldn’t bear to look into those hurtful eyes.
“Jessica, I may have loved others before. But, you’re the first that made me smile without any reason.” She smiled albeit a little sadly.
At those words, Jessica then couldn’t help but to look at Sooyoung. Those eyes. So warming and so... hurtful. It looked so hurtful too her right now and she felt like beating herself up because she’s the cause of it.
“I... I love you, Sica, and I...” She gathered her courage and grasped both of Jessica’s hand in hers. She looked her deeply in her eyes. “I want you... to be my girlfriend. Will you?”
She waited for an answer but all the waiting was making her anxious. Nothing, no answer came from Jessica and her hopes were vanishing slowly but firmly. So, in the end, she reluctantly let go of her hands. Those hands that she thought she wouldn’t have another chance to hold onto.
She forced out a smile and tears were threatening to spill out of her eyes so she turned around so that Jessica wouldn’t see it. “It’s okay. I understand. We can still he friends, right?
I’ll see you around.” She said everything out in a rush and was in a hurry to get out of the room.
As soon as her hand had touched the doorknob, a pair of arms came around her waist and embraced her as she stayed frozen on the spot. “I haven’t answered you yet, why are you in a hurry to go?”
Jessica said out shyly. She breathed in before saying, “y–yes...”
Thinking that she might have heard wrongly, her hand slowly left the doorknob. “P–
pardon?”
“I said yes, silly.” Jessica let go of Sooyoung and used both of her hands to cover her face in embarrassment and mostly to hide her red face.
“You’re answering my question from earlier, right?” Sooyoung asked.
Jessica deadpanned behind her hands before she brought down her hands to show a dark face. “Why are you so dense?”
“You haven’t answered me yet!” Sooyoung started to whine and stomp her feet around like a kid.
“You’re not supposed to be the whiny one in this relationship.”
She stopped and looked at Jessica with a grin that kept on becoming bigger. “Relationship?”
Jessica blushed. “Y–yeah, you asked me, didn’t you?”
“So you’re agreeing with me?”
“I’m not gonna repeat what I said because I’ve already answe–”
Sooyoung suddenly leant down and plant a kiss onto Jessica’s lips. “Thank you.” She smiled before enveloping her in a hug. “Girlfriend.”
Jessica smiled as she snuggled into Sooyoung.
---“Meet me in the kitchen after you’re done.”
Those were the words that TaeYeon had said to Tiffany when she went to her bedroom door still half awake. She walked out the room and was out to climb down the stairs when she heard some chattering behind her. She turned her head and saw Jessica and Sooyoung laughing while talking.
“Hey,” she called out and watched as the two got surprised. At first, she had thought that she saw the both of them holding hands but decided to shake away those thoughts by thinking that she might have seen wrongly.
“H–hey, Fany.” Sooyoung smiled awkwardly before she pointed at the kitchen. “I’ll be there first,” and then she went away in a hurry.
Tiffany raised her eyebrow, “what’s wrong with her?”
“Nothing. It’s just that she disturbed my sleep so she’s probably trying to escape from me.”
“Escape?” Tiffany repeated sceptically. “But you guys were laughing...” She couldn’t have heard wrongly. Even though there was a possibility of her seeing things wrongly, but there wasn’t any possibility of her hearing wrongly. She swore that she had heard that familiar high pitched laughter from Jessica.
A smirk started to grow on her face as she looked at Jessica. “You’re hiding something from me, Jess.”
“Pshh, h–hiding?” Jessica laughed it off. “You’re overthinking.” It’s not that she didn’t want to tell the truth to her best friend but it’s just that she finds the timing to be not right and besides that, they had only started their relationship not very long ago.
“I’m not. I swear that I heard your laughter.”
“You must have heard wrongly. Maybe you didn’t sleep well last night, or you didn’t have enough sleep, or...” Jessica trailed off. “Speaking of sleep... How was it last night at
TaeYeon’s room?” This time, it was Jessica’s turn to smirk at Tiffany.
Tiffany narrowed her eyes at her, “I was just showing concern towards her injuries. She did got hurt because of me.”
“Oh yeah? And you ended up sleeping at her room because you wanna kiss her boo-boos away?” Jessica looked at Tiffany with the most innocent look ever and blinked her eyes subtly at her.
Before Tiffany could even open her mouth to retaliate, Jessica had already had her hand face Tiffany. “It’s okay, I don’t need explanations. Besides, I wouldn’t want to know too much for my own sake.”
And now, before Tiffany could even flare at her, Jessica had already started walking towards the kitchen.
“I’m hungry,” she stated and took lazy steps.
Tiffany heaved a sigh and breathed in to calm down and stop herself from running forward to wrap her hands around her best friend’s neck and then choke her. She then followed behind Jessica.
A very very soft melody suddenly was heard by her as she stopped in her track. She tried hard to listen but there was nothing so she decided to ask her friend, “Jess. Did you hear anything?”
“Hear what?” Jessica stopped as well and strained her ear to hear for anything but the sounds she could hear was from the kitchen where the utensils could be heard clinking.
“It’s... Uhm...” And there, the sound started again. “Piano! Right, it’s piano. Someone’s playing the piano.”
“Oh... Why do you even care, anyway?”
Tiffany rolled her eyes. “Fine, you go right ahead first, alright? I’ll find you later.”
“What? Where are you going?”
“Uhm... somewhere. Just go.”
“Alright, alright, geez, I’ll go.”
Tiffany smiled when she saw Jessica becoming grumpy again. Once, her friend had left her alone, she started to look around, trying to source where the sound came from.
Since she wasn’t quite familiar with the palace yet, all she could do was to count on her luck and hearing and hopefully she would end up where she wants to be.
As she walked down, she realised that she had not come to this part of the palace before.
The walls around here were colourful, it was almost like a children’s area.
As she walked past rooms and rooms, she could hear that the sound of the piano was getting louder and she knew she had went the right way.
She finally stopped when she heard the sound of piano playing right next to her ear. She turned and slowly opened the door before looking in.
There was someone sitting by the piano, dancing her fingers on the keys elegantly and Tiffany knew that it was TaeYeon because of the blonde hair.
Tiffany watched in awe. She didn’t know that TaeYeon knew how to play the piano, and what more, her voice was beautiful. She didn’t even know that TaeYeon could sing so well.
The song TaeYeon was singing and playing was sad, very sad, and Taeyeon was pouring all her emotions to the song that Tiffany felt that what she was singing was real. The lyrics was real, her feelings was real, everything.
The song soon came to an end – much to Tiffany’s dismay since she wanted to hear more – and she watched as TaeYeon slowly got up from her seat. Before she could even turn around to hide herself, TaeYeon had already faced her and the two made eye contact.
Knowing that there was no way for her to run anymore, she then smiled awkwardly at the approaching person.
“What are you doing here?” TaeYeon asked as she closed the door behind her.
“Umm... I don’t really know?”
Taeyeon frowned. “How did you even end up here?”
“I heard the sound of piano, got curious and then ended up here.” Tiffany looked at TaeYeon who was still frowning. She thought that the girl must be angry with her so she looked down. “Please don’t be angry with me...”
TaeYeon raised her eyebrow at what Tiffany said before she chuckled, and that got
Tiffany’s attention as she lifted up her head. “Angry? Why would I be angry at something so small?”
“I... You’re really not angry with me?”
“I really am not,” TaeYeon smiled. “Have you eaten?”
“Umm, no.”
“Ah, come on then. Let’s get you something to eat!” TaeYeon walked away with Tiffany following her from behind with a small smile on.
---After having their breakfast, Taeyeon immediately brought Tiffany down to the field behind the palace.
She pulled Tiffany towards the middle of the field.
“You still haven't told me what we are here for!” Tiffany protested and pulled her hand away from TaeYeon’s grip.
TaeYeon grinned and then turned to her. “We’re here for training.”
“What training?”
“I’m going to teach you some defence moves.”
“Eh?!” Tiffany was shocked and she backed away from TaeYeon. She didn't like anything that is related to sports since she wasn’t one that was gifted in that particular area. “I’m not doing it.” She shook her head.
“You have to,” said TaeYeon. “And I didn’t say you have a choice.” She shrugged and went forward to Tiffany before grabbing her and throwing her onto her shoulders.
“Y–yah! Put me down!” She squealed and kept on moving around.
“Keep on moving and we’ll see how you will fall.”
Tiffany did as told and glared at TaeYeon.
“By the way, I’m not going to let you go unless you agree to learning those defence moves.”
Tiffany was about to retort back that TaeYeon would eventually put her down when her arms are sore but TaeYeon was quicker, “you don’t have to worry about me being tired because I won’t. You’re light.”
Tiffany had her jaw dropped. For a moment there, she had forgotten that Taeyeon wasn’t exactly human like her to get tired easily.
“Close your mouth and agree to the lesson.”
Tiffany shook her head and closed her mouth. “No!”
“Yes,” TaeYeon said and walked to a nearby pond.
Tiffany looked behind and saw it before she frowned at what TaeYeon was going to do next.
“What are you up to?”
“I’m going to throw you in if you still resist.”
“You wouldn’t,” she glared.
“Try me,” TaeYeon shrugged and pretended that she was going to throw the girl into the water by loosening her hold.
“Y–yah!” Tiffany locked her arms around TaeYeon’s neck.
“Now be a good girl and stop resisting. Learn those moves and then we’ll be done. It will be quick.”
“You sure that it’ll be quick? It won’t be strenuous?”
“I’m sure.”
Tiffany hesitated before finally nodding, “alright then.”
Taeyeon smiled to herself and placed Tiffany back onto the ground gently. She laughed when Tiffany quickly ran to somewhere that isn’t near the pond.
“So what are we gonna do? What am I learning?”
“What you can do when a vampire catches you.”
“Pardon?” She raised her eyebrow.
“You have to learn it, just in case something happens to you again.” TaeYeon said out softly.
She cleared her throat and went nearer to Tiffany, “there’s basically only one thing that you need to know.”
“And that is?”
TaeYeon grabbed her hair at the back and pulled it upwards, showing Tiffany the back of her neck. “This,” she pointing at the spot at the middle of her nape. “Is the vital, weak– or whatever you call it– point of a vampire. Just hit it hard and the vampire will be weakened.”
She put down her hair and looked at Tiffany.
“That’s... it?”
“Yeah,” she nodded. “Now, try it on me.”
“W–what? Won’t you be hurt, then?”
“I’ll be fine. The effect would only be a few seconds, anyway. Come on, try it.” Taeyeon urged her. “Remember that the most effective way is to hit it hard. And when I say hard, just don’t hold back.”
Tiffany hesitated before she did what she was told, albeit a little too gently.
“Didn’t you eat earlier? Why don’t you have any strength?”
Tiffany rolled her eyes at the complaint before she hit using more strength which actually made TaeYeon’s nape sting a little, but it still wasn’t enough.
“Harder, Fany. Use more strength.”
Tiffany huffed before she hit down hard. It was so strong that TaeYeon immediately fell onto her knees with her hand holding onto her neck.
“Oh gosh!” Tiffany quickly bent down to help TaeYeon up. “Are you alright? I’m sorry.”
TaeYeon nodded and moved her head left and right. “I’m fine.” A crack sound was heard from her neck. “So, this is all you have to do when you encounter a vampire. But remember that it will also last for a few seconds, so you will have to run as fast as you can.”
Tiffany nodded.
“There. Lesson’s over. It went pretty okay, right?” Taeyeon chuckled.
“Then what about killing a vampire?”
“Oh, that. Just stab down the spot where you hit earlier or use a gun. The heart would also do.”
“Okay, that sounds simple.”
“Why? You wanna try killing me?” She joked.
“Hmm... if you keep forcing me to do stuff, threaten me or annoy me.”
“Oh yeah? I don’t think you would bear to kill me.”
“Try. Me.” Tiffany gave her coldest look to Taeyeon.
“Ohh, scary.”
Tiffany smirked. “You should be.”