Chapter Text
FIVE DAYS
For the first day, Mizi was almost annoyingly confident.
She sat alone in the back of the car on the way to her schedule, one leg crossed over the other, phone loosely balanced against her thigh as she reread Sua's stupid little challenge for what was probably the fifth time.
A week of ignoring. That was all it was. Seven days. One hundred and sixty-eight hours of not giving in, and Mizi had enough pride to survive that easily.
If Sua wanted to challenge her self-control, then fine—Mizi would give her exactly what she asked for, and she would do it properly.
Besides, Sua always came back.
Mizi knew that as surely as she knew the streets outside her window, the shape of her own apartment, the familiar weight of a cigarette between her fingers.
Sua could get upset, offended, hurt, even furious enough to leave the room and slam the door behind her, but eventually she always returned.
She would appear with some ridiculous excuse, perhaps a quiet "Are you still mad at me?" accompanied by that sheepish little smile that made Mizi's irritation impossible to maintain.
So, naturally, Mizi expected her to break first.
Maybe tomorrow.
Maybe the day after that.
She certainly didn't expect the second day to pass without a single message.
Nor the third.
By then, Mizi had stopped finding the situation funny.
She was sitting beneath the harsh white lights of a photoshoot studio when her phone vibrated faintly against the table.
Her head turned immediately, almost instinctively, before she remembered that the notification wasn't even hers.
One of the stylists had received a message nearby, the tiny sound disappearing beneath the chatter of staff and the constant clicking of cameras.
Mizi stared at her own phone anyway, screen dark and completely silent. For a few seconds, she simply watched it as though she could somehow force it to light up through sheer irritation.
Nothing.
"Chin up, Mizi." the photographer called.
She lifted her head.
The flash went off.
"Beautiful. Again."
Another flash.
Mizi smiled exactly when she was supposed to, tilting her face toward the camera with the practiced ease that had been drilled into her so many times that she barely needed to think about it anymore.
Her body knew what to do even when her mind was somewhere else entirely.
Between shots, while someone adjusted the collar of her outfit, her fingers slipped beneath the edge of the table and reached for her phone.
She unlocked it.
Nothing.
She opened the messaging app.
Nothing.
She pulled down to refresh.
Nothing.
Mizi frowned.
She closed the application, waited a few seconds, then opened it again as though the first refresh had somehow been defective. Still nothing.
Her thumb hovered over Sua's name, lingering there just long enough for the small profile picture to make something unpleasant twist beneath her ribs.
She stared at it before locking the screen again and placing the phone facedown.
Ridiculous.
She wasn't waiting for Sua.
She was simply checking.
There was a difference!
At least, that was what Mizi told herself.
By the fourth day, she had developed the embarrassing habit of checking whenever she had even a moment alone.
In elevators, she checked. In the dressing room while someone was fixing the pins in her hair, she checked.
While waiting for the photographer to change lenses, she checked.
Even when she woke up in the middle of the night and reached blindly toward the bedside table, her first thought was not the time, not the schedule waiting for her in the morning, but whether there might finally be something from Sua.
There never was.
The silence began to feel different.
At first, it had been amusing—Sua being stubborn, trying to prove some ridiculous point. Then it became irritating.
Now, Mizi couldn't quite explain what it was anymore. Every time she opened their conversation and found nothing new, she felt a strange little drop in her stomach, followed almost immediately by anger at herself for feeling it.
She hated that.
She hated how easily Sua could still do this to her without even being there.
Mizi would stare at the screen, jaw tight, then scoff quietly and toss the phone onto whatever surface was closest.
"She's seriously doing this?" she muttered one evening, sinking into the corner of her couch.
Her apartment was enormous enough that her voice seemed to disappear into it, swallowed by high ceilings, expensive furniture, and rooms that always felt too quiet when she was alone.
She picked up her phone again.
Checked.
Nothing.
Her thumb hovered over the keyboard.
Are you seriously still doing this?
She typed it.
Stared at it.
Deleted it.
A minute later, she typed again.
You know you can stop now.
Deleted.
Then—
Where are you?
Mizi froze.
Her eyes remained fixed on the words.
That one was dangerous.
She deleted it immediately.
"No." she whispered, leaning her head against the couch. "Absolutely not."
Because that was exactly what Sua wanted, wasn't it?
Another opportunity to pull Mizi back into her arms. Another excuse to make Mizi seek her out first, to make her apologize, to make her worry, to make her feel like that same little girl Sua had always fussed over.
Mizi could practically hear her teasing voice already, calling her good girl with that unbearably affectionate tone, as though Mizi were something precious that needed to be watched over.
It annoyed her.
It annoyed her so much.
And the worst part was that it worked.
It had always worked.
Mizi pressed her fingers against her forehead and exhaled slowly, trying to push the strange pressure building inside her chest back down where it belonged.
She didn't know what she was feeling anymore. It wasn't exactly sadness, because she refused to call it that. It wasn't worry either—at least, she wouldn't allow herself to name it that.
It was simply an irritation that wouldn't leave, an uncomfortable instinct telling her that something was wrong while another, louder part of her insisted that she was being stupid.
Sua was probably fine.
Sua was probably just being stubborn.
Sua would come back.
She always came back.
Mizi clung to that thought because the alternative made her stomach turn.
On the fifth day, she caught herself looking toward the front door when she heard footsteps in the hallway.
Her heart jumped.
Then the sound passed.
Nobody knocked.
Mizi remained still for several seconds, staring at the door like she was waiting for it to change its mind. Eventually, she laughed quietly at herself, though there wasn't much humor in it.
"Pathetic." she murmured.
She reached for her phone.
No message.
Her chest tightened again.
Mizi immediately turned the screen off.
Fine.
If Sua wanted to play, then Mizi would play.
She would make it through the entire week without breaking. She would not chase after her. She would not send another message. She would not let herself become that pathetic person who needed someone else just to feel steady.
Her pride was the only thing keeping her upright now, and Mizi would rather suffocate beneath it than admit she was beginning to miss someone who wasn't even there.
So she waited.
And waited.
And waited.
Completely unaware that Sua wasn't counting down the days until she could come back.
Sua had already left the country.
NEW LIFE
Sua sat quietly at the edge of the bed in her new apartment, her feet barely touching the cold wooden floor.
For a few minutes, she simply remained there, elbows resting against her knees, hands loosely clasped together as she stared at the unfamiliar room around her.
Everything still looked untouched—the furniture, the neatly folded clothes in the closet, the unopened boxes stacked against the wall—and yet this place already belonged to her in a way that felt strangely frightening.
Well.
Having wealthy parents certainly had its advantages. She has received enough money to survive for 6 months. While her parents promise to send her more every month of her stay.
Sua couldn't help but feel a little embarrassed thinking about it.
She had no job, no real career of her own outside of the things she had done alongside Mizi, and yet somehow she had managed to leave Korea within days simply because her parents had enough money to make something like that possible.
The apartment was comfortable, spacious, and far more expensive than anything she could have reasonably afforded herself, which only made the guilt sit heavier in her stomach.
At twenty-three, shouldn't she be able to do things on her own?
Shouldn't she be able to leave without calling her parents for money?
She rubbed her face tiredly.
She hated depending on them.
But perhaps she hated depending on Mizi even more.
France had seemed like the safest choice.
Far enough from Korea that she wouldn't accidentally run into anyone familiar, far enough that Mizi would hopefully never think to look for her, and unfamiliar enough that Sua could disappear into the crowd before anyone realized she was gone.
Paris, especially, felt impossibly distant from everything she had known.
She had spent five days here now, slowly learning the streets surrounding her apartment, figuring out which shops she could enter without embarrassing herself, and memorizing which metro lines actually went where.
The language was another problem.
Sua knew English, technically.
Or at least, she knew the kind of English that Korean schools taught—the kind that was perfectly acceptable on paper but became completely useless the moment someone spoke it too quickly in real life. French was worse, although she had at least been forced to learn some basics because of her mother's insistence when she was younger.
You never know when you'll need another language.
Sua had hated those lessons back then.
Now, she was almost grateful.
She could recognize simple phrases, stumble through basic sentences, and understand enough to survive without looking completely helpless.
Still, whenever someone spoke to her too quickly, her mind would go blank and her ears would burn with embarrassment as she struggled to piece together what they were saying.
Maybe she should ask her mother for another tutor.
The thought immediately made her grimace.
No.
She had already asked her parents for enough.
She had told them she was leaving, asked them to help arrange things, accepted the money they offered, and then lied about where she was actually going. Asking for even more help after all of that felt humiliating.
She was twenty-three.
She was too old to keep running back to her parents every time life became difficult.
Sua slowly stood and walked toward the balcony doors.
When she pulled them open, cool morning air slipped into the apartment and brushed against her face.
The city stretched endlessly beyond the railing, enormous and unfamiliar, filled with old buildings pressed closely together, pale stone facades catching the early sunlight, distant rooftops disappearing into the hazy morning sky.
Somewhere below, cars moved along the streets while pedestrians hurried toward whatever lives they were already busy living.
Paris was beautiful.
Almost painfully so.
Sua rested both hands against the balcony railing, staring at the city for a long moment.
She imagined what it would be like at night.
The streets glowing beneath the lamps. The buildings illuminated against the darkness. The city quieter, perhaps, with only the distant sound of traffic and voices drifting upward.
For one stupid second, she imagined Mizi standing beside her.
Mizi leaning against the railing with a cigarette between her fingers.
Mizi complaining about the cold.
Mizi looking around with that quiet expression she got whenever something genuinely caught her attention.
Maybe they would laugh.
Maybe Sua would take a picture.
Maybe—
Sua's smile disappeared.
No.
Her fingers tightened around the railing.
She had promised herself.
No more.
She couldn't keep bringing Mizi into every beautiful thing she saw.
That was precisely how she had ended up hurting herself for years—seeing something beautiful and immediately imagining Mizi standing beside her, as though every good moment in her life needed to have her in it to become real.
She turned away from the balcony.
"Stop thinking about her. Goddammit."
Her voice sounded painfully small in the empty apartment.
Sua reached for her phone instead.
7:00 a.m.
She stared at the time for a moment before remembering that Korea was several hours ahead. Two in the afternoon, perhaps? She wasn't completely sure, and strangely, she didn't feel like checking.
She didn't want to know.
Knowing meant thinking about what Mizi might be doing.
Maybe she was at a photoshoot.
Maybe she was sleeping.
Maybe she was smoking on the balcony.
Maybe she was—
Sua locked the phone.
Enough!
She had only told her parents that she was leaving Korea. She hadn't told them the truth about France, either. She had simply claimed she was going to New Zealand, a place far enough away that they wouldn't immediately question her decision.
Hia was another matter.
Sua trusted her sister enough to know that she loved her, but not enough to trust her with a secret this fragile.
Hia talked too much.
Not maliciously. She simply had a habit of letting things slip, especially when she became excited or worried. One wrong conversation, one careless mention of France, and somehow the information could make its way back to someone else.
And Sua couldn't risk that.
Not yet.
She had enough money from her parents, along with her own savings, to stay here for quite some time without needing to return. For now, that was enough.
She could learn the language properly, find something to occupy herself with, explore the city, and perhaps—eventually—figure out what she was supposed to do with a life that no longer revolved around Mizi.
It sounded almost peaceful when she put it that way.
Almost.
Sua looked back toward the balcony.
The sunlight had grown brighter now, spilling across the floor through the open doors.
She took a slow breath.
Maybe she really could start over here.
Maybe she could become someone who didn't constantly look over her shoulder for Mizi.
Maybe she could finally learn how to exist without needing to know where Mizi was, what she was doing, whether she was happy, whether she was angry, whether she missed her.
Maybe.
Sua picked up her phone again.
Her thumb hovered over the screen.
She stared at Mizi's old contact for several seconds before quietly locking the phone.
She had deleted the number.
She had changed her SIM.
She had left the country.
She had done everything she could to make herself unreachable.
And yet, somehow, she still knew exactly who she wanted to call.
Sua lowered her gaze, a faint, bitter smile touching her lips.
"I wonder…"
Her voice almost disappeared beneath the distant sounds of Paris waking up.
"What are you thinking right now, Mizi?"
CERISE
Sua finally found the courage to step outside her apartment.
She had spent an embarrassingly long time standing in front of the mirror that morning, adjusting the collar of her long-sleeved turtleneck and smoothing out the wrinkles of her jeans, only to end up looking exactly as she had ten minutes ago.
Her bob brushed gently against her shoulders whenever she moved her head, the ends occasionally catching against the fabric of her shirt.
After checking that her wallet, passport, and phone were safely tucked inside her handbag, she gripped its strap and stepped into the bustling streets of Paris, her heart beating a little too quickly for someone who was supposedly just going for a walk.
God, she was nervous.
The moment she stepped outside, she became painfully aware of how little she knew about this place.
The buildings rose along the streets in a manner so different from the modern structures she had grown accustomed to in Korea, their pale facades, ornate balconies, and tall windows carrying a kind of old-world elegance she had previously seen only in photographs.
There was something almost unreal about it, something that made her want to stop and stare at every corner like a tourist who had never seen a proper city before.
She had to remind herself that she lived here now, that these streets would eventually become ordinary to her, that she couldn't spend the rest of her life gawking at buildings instead of figuring out how to survive.
She was in Butte-Montmartre, a neighborhood she had heard was relatively quiet compared to the busier parts of Paris.
At least, that was what she had gathered from the little research she managed to do before leaving Korea, and she desperately hoped the information was accurate.
She hadn't come all this way just to surround herself with more noise, more people, and more things demanding her attention.
For once, she wanted somewhere she could breathe without feeling like she was waiting for something terrible to happen, somewhere she could walk down a street without instinctively searching every passing face for someone she knew.
Someone she knew.
Sua's grip tightened around her handbag.
No.
She wasn't doing that today.
She had promised herself that she would stop looking for Mizi in places where Mizi had never been, stop imagining her beside her whenever she encountered something beautiful, and stop turning every unfamiliar experience into a reminder of the person she had left behind.
It was exhausting enough trying to build a life in a foreign country without dragging the ghost of her old one along with her.
So, with a small shake of her head, Sua forced her attention back to the matter that had brought her outside in the first place.
She needed a job.
That was the sensible thing to focus on, anyway.
Thankfully, Sua wasn't entirely helpless.
She had always been a good student, the sort who could solve complicated mental arithmetic without reaching for a calculator and remember information after reading it only a few times.
Writing came naturally to her, too, and she had always been particularly good in the kitchen, where she could follow a recipe precisely or adjust it by instinct when something didn't taste quite right.
Back in school, she had been praised for being capable, intelligent, and dependable, though she had never really thought much about what she wanted to do with those qualities.
At the time, she had other priorities.
Mizi had always been one of them.
Sua pressed her lips together, her gaze briefly dropping to the pavement beneath her shoes.
She really needed to stop thinking like that.
Mizi wasn't here, and whether she was doing well or terribly back in Korea was no longer something Sua could fix by worrying herself sick. If she wanted this move to mean anything, she needed to start making decisions that had absolutely nothing to do with her.
And a job seemed like a decent place to start.
France was famous for its bakeries, wasn't it? Even someone with Sua's limited knowledge of the country knew that much.
She could already picture the little shops she had seen online, their windows displaying rows of golden croissants, delicate pastries, and freshly baked bread, the warm smell of butter and sugar escaping whenever someone opened the door.
The thought alone made her stomach rumble, and she found herself smiling faintly at the ridiculousness of it all.
She had crossed an entire country to escape a relationship that had consumed her life, and here she was, thinking about bread.
Honestly, it wasn't the worst thing she could be thinking about.
She had some experience, too. Before everything became so complicated, she had applied to several cafés and bakeries, eventually getting accepted at one where she had spent a short time learning the routine of professional baking.
She remembered the early mornings, the flour dusting her sleeves, the warmth of the ovens against her face, and the quiet satisfaction of arranging freshly made pastries behind the glass display.
It had been tiring work, but she had liked it more than she expected because she want to bake perfectly for her lover.
Then she quit.
Not because she disliked the job, nor because she couldn't handle the hours, but because she kept putting everything else aside to look after Mizi.
Whenever something happened, whenever Mizi was struggling or needed someone beside her, Sua would find a reason to leave her own responsibilities unfinished.
She had convinced herself that she was being a good partner, that love meant being available whenever the other person needed you, even if it meant gradually abandoning the life you were supposed to be building for yourself.
Looking back, she wasn't sure whether to laugh at her younger self or shake her by the shoulders.
What a stupid thing to do.
No, that wasn't entirely fair. She had loved Mizi, and she still did, regardless of how much she wished she didn't.
But loving someone shouldn't have meant making yourself smaller until there was barely anything left of you outside the relationship.
She had spent so many years treating Mizi's problems as her own responsibility that she had forgotten what it felt like to have a goal and pursue it simply because she wanted it.
Well, she had no one to abandon her plans for now.
The realization brought a strange feeling of relief, followed almost immediately by guilt.
Sua hated that part of herself, the part that could feel free in Mizi's absence and then punish herself for enjoying even a second of it.
She was allowed to have a life, wasn't she?
She was allowed to find something she liked, meet people who didn't know her history, and spend an afternoon doing something that had nothing to do with the girl she had loved for over a decade.
She was allowed to be more than someone's devoted companion.
Sua lifted her head and began examining the storefronts more carefully, searching for signs advertising vacancies.
Whenever she spotted a café, she slowed down to peer through the windows, studying the display counters and the people moving behind them.
A few times, she nearly worked up the courage to enter, only to hesitate at the door when she remembered how little French she could speak.
What if they asked her something she couldn't understand? What if she embarrassed herself? What if she stood there looking stupid while the employees exchanged confused glances?
She exhaled through her nose.
She was never going to get anywhere if she kept doing this.
Besides, she had managed to leave Korea alone, arrange an apartment, and navigate her way through a foreign airport without falling apart. Surely asking a bakery whether it was hiring couldn't possibly be worse than that.
Sua adjusted the strap of her handbag and approached the next shop.
Through the window, she could see trays of pastries arranged in neat rows, their golden surfaces catching the warm light from inside. A baker moved behind the counter, disappearing briefly through a doorway before returning with another tray.
The smell of freshly baked bread drifted out when a customer entered, and Sua found herself lingering just outside, watching with an expression she hadn't worn in a long time.
Interest.
Not worry. Not guilt. Not the familiar, exhausting need to check whether Mizi was all right.
Just interest.
For a moment, she allowed herself to imagine working somewhere like this, waking up early to prepare dough, learning new recipes, and gradually becoming comfortable enough with French to hold an actual conversation without mentally translating every word.
Perhaps she could make friends.
Perhaps she could discover things she liked that she had never bothered trying before. Perhaps, one day, she could look back on this decision without feeling as though she had abandoned something precious.
Perhaps she could finally become her own person.
Sua reached for the door handle, then paused to take one last steadying breath.
"Okay," she whispered to herself. "Let's try."
And for the first time in a very long while, she stepped toward a future she had chosen for herself.
"Bonjour ! Que puis-je faire pour vous ?" (Hello! What can I do for you?)
The greeting caught Sua just as she was trying to rehearse her opening sentence for the third time.
A woman stood behind the counter, smiling at her with the kind of welcoming expression that somehow made Sua even more nervous, and for a moment, she forgot every single French word she had memorized on the walk over.
Instead, she found herself studying the stranger's appearance, desperately searching for something to occupy her mind while her thoughts scrambled to put themselves together.
The woman had purplish-red hair, a rich shade somewhere between burgundy and violet, and bright green eyes that seemed particularly striking beneath the warm lights of the bakery.
It was unusual seeing such features up close, especially for someone who had spent most of her life surrounded by people with dark hair and dark eyes, with the occasional exception of those whose appearances were distinctive enough to attract attention.
Sua wondered whether staring was rude, then realized she had probably been doing it for several seconds already.
"Oh… um." She straightened her back, tightening her fingers around the strap of her handbag. "Bonjour… je… je voudrais postuler pour le travail…" "(Oh um... bounjor.. i.. want to apply for the job..)
The words came out slowly, each syllable sounding more uncertain than the last.
She knew what she wanted to say; she had practiced the sentence repeatedly in front of her bathroom mirror that morning, even managing to convince herself that she could do this without embarrassing herself.
Yet now that she was actually standing in front of someone, her carefully rehearsed French had abandoned her entirely, leaving her with nothing but a painfully obvious accent and ears that were growing warmer by the second.
Oh, for God's sake.
She wanted to disappear into the floor.
"Ah ? Vous êtes étrangère, peut-être ?" the woman asked, her expression shifting into mild curiosity. (Oh, are you a foreigner perhaps?)
She stepped out from behind the counter and approached Sua, apparently deciding that speaking from a distance wasn't particularly helpful.
Fortunately, the bakery wasn't crowded at this hour; only a handful of customers occupied the tables, and the soft clinking of cups and quiet conversations provided a little background noise without making the place overwhelming.
It was an unusually peaceful morning, and Sua was grateful for that much, because she wasn't entirely sure she could have handled an audience while making a complete fool of herself.
"Mhm. ah, yes." Sua abandoned French almost immediately, switching to English with a hesitant little nod. "I'm… I'm only here looking for a job."
Even saying that felt like an accomplishment.
Her English wasn't terrible, but she had never been particularly confident about speaking it aloud.
The language she had learned at school seemed so much easier when it existed on a worksheet, neatly arranged into sentences with clear answers, rather than coming out of her mouth in front of a stranger who might ask her something she couldn't understand.
She could already feel the familiar frustration gathering behind her forehead, and she hadn't even reached the part where she needed to explain her qualifications.
I seriously need to study.
Not just French, either. Apparently, she needed to relearn how to communicate with the rest of the world.
"Oh!" The woman's entire expression brightened. "Well, you're in luck! We're actually looking for a pastry chef!"
Sua blinked.
For a moment, the words registered without their meaning quite settling into her mind.
Then she caught the important part—looking for a pastry chef—and her eyes widened ever so slightly, the tension in her shoulders easing before she could stop herself.
Was she serious? Had Sua really managed to find a potential job on her first proper outing, after spending the morning worrying about how she would even approach a bakery?
Perhaps the universe was taking pity on her.
The woman folded her arms, tilting her head as she examined Sua more carefully. "You don't seem very fluent in English or French, though..." she murmured, seemingly thinking aloud.
Sua's smile faltered.
There it was.
She had known this would be a problem, of course, but hearing it pointed out so plainly made her want to curl into herself.
Her gaze briefly dropped to the floor as she tried to decide whether she should explain that she was willing to learn, that she could work hard, that she wasn't nearly as helpless as her broken sentences might suggest.
Before she could gather the courage to say any of it, however, the woman waved a hand dismissively.
"Never mind that. I'm assuming you're from… uh…" She paused, studying Sua's face, then abruptly shook her head. "Okay, never mind! That might sound rude."
Sua stared at her.
She understood the part about the job. She understood that her language skills were a problem.
The rest, however, had become a tangled mess of unfamiliar words and expressions, and she wasn't entirely sure what the woman had almost said or why she had decided against it.
Still, Sua nodded as though she understood everything.
It was a survival instinct at this point.
The woman seemed satisfied with that response and extended her hand. "Nice to meet you! I'm Cerise. Miss…?"
Her voice trailed off expectantly.
Sua looked at the offered hand, then at Cerise's face, taking an embarrassingly long moment to realize what was expected of her.
She wasn't entirely certain whether she had missed a question or whether the woman was waiting for her to introduce herself, but the outstretched hand seemed like a safe enough clue. With a small, awkward smile, she finally reached forward and accepted it.
The difference in their height was immediately noticeable.
Cerise was taller by a few centimeters, enough that Sua had to tilt her chin upward slightly to meet her eyes.
Her grip was warm and firm, while Sua's own hand felt almost swallowed in hers, making the introduction feel oddly formal despite the woman's cheerful demeanor.
Sua couldn't help noticing the contrast, though she quickly pushed the thought aside before she started analyzing the woman's entire existence out of nervousness.
"Sua," she answered.
Then, realizing that her introduction had been rather abrupt, she added, "My name is… Sua."
Cerise's smile widened.
"Sua! Lovely to meet you."
Sua returned the smile, though hers was a little stiff around the edges.
She had no idea whether she had just made a good first impression or whether Cerise was simply a naturally friendly person.
She didn't know how the hiring process worked in France, what questions she would be asked, or whether her language skills would disqualify her before she even had a chance to demonstrate what she could do.
But Cerise hadn't asked her to leave.
And, for now, Sua decided that was enough.
...
Cerise led Sua farther into the bakery, her steps light and unhurried despite the fact that it was barely eight in the morning.
There was something almost unfair about how energetic the woman seemed at such an hour, especially when Sua could still feel the remnants of her anxiety weighing heavily on her shoulders.
As they passed through a narrow hallway, the comforting smell of freshly baked bread followed them, mingling with the faint sweetness of butter and vanilla that lingered in the air.
Sua couldn't help glancing toward the kitchen, where the occasional clatter of baking trays and the muffled voices of employees reminded her why she had come here in the first place.
"You know, we meet a lot of foreigners here, but it's rare to find someone who willingly wants to work with us!" Cerise chatted as she opened the staff room door, stepping aside and gesturing for Sua to enter first.
"Most people ask about the salary before anything else. Which, honestly, is fair, because the work can be exhausting." She laughed softly at her own remark.
Seemingly unaware that Sua was still trying to process the fact that a complete stranger had brought her into the staff room without so much as a second thought.
"Anyway, tell me! What's your experience? In baking, I mean."
Sua turned toward her, caught off guard by the sudden question.
"I'm… good. Like… baking. I've been in restaurants before," she answered, her voice growing quieter as she realized how unconvincing she sounded.
She had expected to explain her experience in a more organized manner, perhaps mention the bakery where she had previously worked and the different pastries she knew how to make.
But the moment she needed to put everything into words, her thoughts became hopelessly tangled.
She could practically hear how vague her answer had been, and the embarrassment made her want to press her lips together and try again.
Instead, Cerise's face lit up.
"I see! Then you're perfect!" The woman clasped her hands together, looking so genuinely pleased that Sua almost wondered whether she had heard her correctly.
"Well, we still need to do a trial, of course, and we'll need your résumé. Do you have it with you?"
She tilted her head expectantly, her green eyes bright with anticipation, while Sua's expression slowly fell as the question registered in her mind.
Oh.
Oh, no.
Sua's lips parted slightly before closing again, and she stared at Cerise with the miserable realization of someone who had just remembered an assignment five minutes before it was due.
She had spent so much time worrying about finding a job, learning her way around the neighborhood, and actually gathering the courage to enter a bakery that she had somehow forgotten the one thing she was supposed to bring when applying for one.
Her résumé. Of course. How could she possibly have forgotten her résumé?!
"Not… yet, at least. I'm… sorry."
A faint, awkward smile crept onto her face, accompanied by the uncomfortable sensation of heat rising toward her cheeks.
She was twenty-three years old, not a child wandering into a shop on a whim, and yet here she was, standing in front of a potential employer without the proper documents!
She mentally scolded herself for being so careless, already imagining how the conversation might end, but Cerise merely formed a small O with her mouth before nodding as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world.
"That's totally fine! No need to apologize." Cerise waved away her concern with an easy smile.
"We actually allow walk-in interviews, so you don't have to worry about that right now. I'll just get the manager in a second."
She gestured toward one of the couches farther inside, encouraging Sua to make herself comfortable before turning toward the hallway again.
"Just sit here for a bit, okay? I'll be right back!"
The staff room was surprisingly cozy, nothing like the sterile, intimidating workplace Sua had imagined while walking over.
A pair of couches sat opposite a polished wooden table, with small decorative pieces arranged neatly along the shelves and a few framed pictures hanging against the cream-colored walls.
There was even a little plant near the window, its leaves stretching toward the morning sunlight, making the room feel lived-in rather than merely functional.
Sua slowly settled onto the edge of the couch, placing her handbag beside her and smoothing down the fabric of her jeans as she took in her surroundings.
For the first time that morning, she had a moment to herself.
Her shoulders relaxed slightly as she listened to the distant sounds of the bakery operating beyond the door.
She could hear footsteps passing through the hallway, the soft scrape of something being moved across a counter, and the indistinct chatter of people who seemed to know exactly what they were doing.
It was comforting in a way she hadn't expected, reminding her of the brief period when she had worked in a bakery back in Korea.
She remembered the flour clinging to her clothes, the ache in her arms after preparing batches of dough, and the quiet satisfaction of seeing everything she had made displayed neatly for customers.
She had missed this.
Not necessarily the work itself, though she had enjoyed it, but the feeling of having something to do that belonged entirely to her.
Something she could improve at, something that could occupy her mind without requiring her to worry about whether another person was doing all right.
The thought was bittersweet, and Sua lowered her eyes toward her hands before the memories could wander somewhere she didn't want them to go.
"Also, hehe… I might bribe them for you, since you're my friend now! Right?"
Sua's head lifted.
Cerise had already turned halfway toward the door, grinning as though she had just announced something perfectly reasonable.
Before Sua could even figure out how to respond, the woman brought two fingers to her lips and blew her a playful kiss.
"Of course I'm right! See you!"
And just like that, she disappeared into the hallway.
Sua remained seated, staring at the doorway long after Cerise had left.
The entire interaction had happened so quickly that she wasn't entirely sure how she was supposed to react.
One moment, she had been a nervous stranger who could barely string together a sentence in French, and the next, a cheerful woman with striking green eyes had apparently decided they were friends.
"A friend…?" she whispered.
The words felt unfamiliar on her tongue.
Sua couldn't remember the last time someone had called her a friend without years of history behind it, without complicated expectations or the exhausting fear of eventually disappointing them.
Most of the relationships that mattered to her had become tangled in so many memories and unspoken obligations that she could barely remember what it was like to meet someone and simply enjoy their company.
With Cerise, there was no history to explain, no old argument waiting to resurface, no painful reminder of everything Sua had failed to do.
They had barely known each other for ten minutes.
And somehow, that woman had already decided she liked her.
Sua looked down at her hands, her fingers curling loosely against her knees.
A small smile began to form at the corners of her mouth, tentative and almost shy, as though she were embarrassed to feel happy about something so insignificant.
It wasn't much, really—just a friendly stranger being kind to someone who needed a little help—but perhaps that was precisely why it meant something to her.
For once, she didn't have to earn someone's affection by sacrificing pieces of herself.
She could simply sit there, wait for an interview, and let a stranger be nice to her.
"I guess it's not that bad…"
Her smile grew a little more genuine.
Maybe Paris wouldn't be so lonely after all.