Chapter 10.

It was already evening when hunger made Lisa come out of her room and head to the kitchen. She was just snooping around the fridge when her mom came in.

"Lisa, honey, I'm worried about you..." The tone of her voice made Lisa freeze in place. "Do you even realize the state you came back in last night? You were barely conscious! Tell me the truth, did you... did you take drugs?"

"Mom, stop." Lisa rolled her eyes. "We've had this discussion many times already. I'm not doing drugs, I just drank a bit too much."

Ms. Manoban bit her lip and said nothing. As much as she didn't approve of Lisa's partying and drinking, it was the direct result of the divorce. And the way they handled with her ex-husband was very bad, they made suffer Lisa a lot in the process. In a sense it was her own fault that Lisa started using alcohol as a coping mechanism. So she knew she didn't have the moral right to forbid Lisa anything, especially that for a short time after the divorce, she was drinking too much herself.

"You haven't eaten anything all day, maybe I could prepare something warm for you?" she suggested and felt a relief when Lisa nodded and sat down at the table. Ms. Manoban swiftly took out a pan and put it on the stove.

"Mom? Can I ask you something important?"

"No." Ms. Manoban teased and Lisa smiled. Her mom sometimes liked to joke like that.

"What would you do if you wanted to apologize to a good friend because you made her really, really disappointed with something you did?"

"That's a very general question honey, can't you give me at least some details? Who did you disappoint? Jisoo? Rosé?"

"Neither."

"Is it Jennie then?" Lisa's awkward silence was basically a confirmation. "And what exactly did you do? Was it really that serious?"

"I guess it was. But I can't tell you anything more."

"Well, in my opinion apologizing with words is never enough, honey. Because words are just that, words. So you have to show Jennie that you won't let her down again. With actions. I know it will be hard, but I'm sure you can find a way to do it."

"Thanks mom." Lisa said while her gaze was lingering pensively somewhere in the distance.

"And if you want my advice about Jennie..." Ms. Manoban paused. "She seems like such a troubled girl, so troubled that you should always remember to be very compassionate and forgiving towards her. Because there may come a time when she'll really need that."

Lisa nodded although she didn't fully understood her mother's mysterious words. After a moment of silence, Ms. Manoban skillfully dropped a pancake from the pan on Lisa's plate.

"Eat up because more is coming in a minute-" she was interrupted by the ringing sound of Lisa's phone.

"Yeah, what's up?" Lisa answered the call.

"We're just going to the pub for a couple of beers, we'll pick you up on our way, what do you say?" Nayeon's voice sounded cheerful and encouraging. Lisa anxiously tucked her hair behind her ear. She looked up and saw her mom, her gaze fixed intently on her daughter's face, clearly she heard everything and was aware of the important battle that Lisa was fighting with herself right at that very moment.

"Liz? Are you there?" Nayeon asked impatiently.

"I..." Lisa was surprised how weak and squeaky her voice came out. She cleared her throat. "I can't, I have other plans." she added more firmly.

"What? Really?"

"Yeah. Have fun." Lisa ended the call and took a bite of the pancake, pretending not to notice the enormous relief on her mom's face.

***

Lisa's mom got her first surprise when her daughter declined the offer of going to the pub with her friends on Saturday evening, but on Sunday morning the second shock was awaiting her. She almost dropped the plate she was holding when she saw Lisa sitting at the kitchen table. Because her daughter was eating breakfast while being completely absorbed by reading. White sheets of paper full of chemistry formulas were lying on the table in front of her. Lisa studying on a Sunday never happened before, not even before the divorce.

"What are you reading?" she asked, trying to sound nonchalant, while her heart was beating in her chest much more strongly than usual. For the first time since the divorce she saw a glimmer of hope that Lisa might actually regain her interest in studying.

"I printed a chemistry book. I'm really bad at it, so I thought I might give it a try and get a better grade." Lisa didn't want to tell her mom about medical college and Jennie's plan. No, there was definitely no need to get her mom's hopes up, the medical college thing wasn't probably going to work out anyway.

"I'm going to study in my room, I need to use a computer." Lisa excused herself, pleased with the stunning effect the book had on her mom. "It's been some time since I saw her so pleasantly surprised." she thought, smiling inside.

Her inner smile didn't last long. The second chapter of the book was even harder than the first and Lisa just couldn't understand it well enough to be able to solve the exercises. After three hours, she was ready to give up: she furiously threw the book away and dropped on the bed, resigned. But then an idea occurred to her. She googled up a forum where students helped each other in studies and posted a question in the "chemistry" section. To her surprise, after five minutes someone posted an explanation which already made her understand things more. Three more people posted helpful hints within the next hour and suddenly the entire chapter seemed more clear to her. Happy and encouraged that her idea worked, Lisa tried solving the exercises again and this time she succeeded.

"Wow, it's not that difficult. I really can do it." she caught herself thinking. "Why haven't I realized this before?"