Chapter Text
“I’m never drinking again,” is the first sentence a person who got smashed at a party the previous night would say. If not that, it’s the usual “what happened last night?”
But no, “I’m never drinking again,” is what Nayeon whispers to herself while walking the street to her apartment. She squints her eyes as the seven-in-the-morning sun radiates her way.
It’s so bright, what the fuck? Is it already eleven?
She needs that clear liquid to satisfy her quench of thirst and it’s not vodka. That evil taste is still on her tongue and it needs to be washed away along with the bile burning her stomach and oh, it’s coming up. She can really feel it come up.
“Jesus, I’m never ever drinking again,” she absent-mindedly wipes the embarrassing bile hanging on the side of her lips with the collar of her shirt.
That honk from the bus that was at least fifty meters away from her felt like it was being blown directly into her eardrums, drilling every bit of her sanity, and she has no other wish on this year’s Christmas but to bang her head against the wall to stop the pain.
Nayeon’s just overreacting. She doesn’t really want that for Christmas. What she wants, though, is to represent her university in the Model UN in the States. That’s the credential she wants to stamp on her college resume.
Anyway, back to where Nayeon is. That bus, she walks past it and into a street. Just a few more steps and she’s home.
All she thinks of is water. A bottle of fresh, cold water from her fridge. A cold long shower, too.
She could almost imagine herself sitting under the running cold water of her shower, possibly falling asleep because she can already feel her body slowly shut down with the touch of the water, and thank God, the elevator ride up her apartment wasn’t a sore.
Ding, the jarring elevator sound wakes her. She heads out and almost trips on a box in front of her.
The wall saves her from planting her face on the ground and that was close. She was glad her hands were still useful that she manages to get a hold of herself.
“Mom, yes, I am already moving my stuff in,” a girl walks down the hall, back to the elevators to pick up a box.
Nayeon tries her very best to be on her best behavior despite wanting to take her head off for a break because fuck, this headache is draining her patience real well. There is a stranger in front of her and she needs to show that she’s at least decent, not one to throw a tantrum.
She observes the girl make a round back to her stuff and pocket her phone after a long and tiring sigh, and it’s only thirty minutes past seven in the morning. Her mom must be onto her neck about moving in.
“Hey, do you need help with your stuff?”
“Yes,” the girl with gorgeous dark hair says without a second thought, whipping her head to face her, batting her lashes. She did bat those lashes at her, right? Wrong, just Nayeon’s vision that’s blurring, close to giving up, or was it really?
Nayeon picks up two small boxes with a groan that she tried holding in and the itch to release it through gritted teeth was resisted. The walk to the stranger’s apartment felt like forever, and she luckily managed to slip in three sentences in the span of their conversation.
“Rough night?”
“Why?”
The girl chuckles, gripping the box in her hands tightly, bouncing it a little. “I asked you a question and you answered me with a question, how nice.”
Please, I just want to sleep.
“There’s a little orange over…” the girl trails, pointing at a spot on her shirt with a somewhat disgusted look.
She looks at where she was pointing and her eyes widen, tilting her head to the side to avoid the girl's judging eyes.
Just what I need. A stranger pointing at the puke on my shirt. Good morning indeed, Im Nayeon.
“Where do you want this?”
“Just here by the door. Thanks.”
“If you happen to see a spot of orange on the side of the street, just look away.”
The girl chuckles silently but her smile is big and bright and yes, it’s too bright that Nayeon squints her eyes, looking at her. She’s hungover and she’s sensitive to light. And it’s not because she thinks her new neighbor is cute.
“I definitely will not be thinking of you when I see a mess outside, specifically one that’s orange in color.”
She fishes for her keys and fumbles with her apartment door. She hears another long sigh come from her neighbor as she walks back to the elevators to pick up the last box.
“Yes, mom. I already told you I—“
Finally, some peace and sleep.
—
Summers are meant to be spent at the beach with your friends and family, away from school. It’s the only time of the year when people can have a fresh start, a reset button before going back to their mundane daily lives in the city.
It’s also a great opportunity to be a step ahead of your batch mates in school by taking summer classes. That means you’d graduate earlier than the rest if you pass.
Nayeon sacrificed her Jeju trip with her friends for this because for the next two months, she’ll be studying hard to pass the qualifying exam for their school’s delegation to the Model UN in DC in the fall. For now, the goal is to study and pass the exam.
Right after her morning classes, she stays at the library to read all about the UN’s structure, the different committees, the process of the conference, and such. This puts her in the mood that she sometimes daydreams about herself standing on the podium with her impromptu speech in her head, speaking with so much conviction, and wearing her best corporate attire.
Damn, I look good.
She resumes reading on her tablet when a palm on her shoulder makes her pause.
“Im Nayeon, let’s go. My shift’s finished,” says Jihyo, one of their school’s part-time librarians and also her friend. She packs her stuff and they both go to the bar their friend group frequents that is a few blocks from campus.
As soon as they enter, the security greets them and the bartender acknowledges their presence.
“Hey, Jihyo, Nayeon. The usual?” he asks and when the girls nod, he whips up their drinks and delivers them to their table.
Nayeon lets out a groan of satisfaction when she feels the alcohol slide down her throat, hitting her in the right spots, and tingling sensations throughout her body.
She has no idea why she even does it but she would always get drunk whenever she’s in a good mood. Her excuse? “I don’t do this on purpose! I just had a good day and it deserves to be celebrated. And what better way, right? The next round’s on me!” she said, walking out of the library with Jihyo in tow.
They decide to call it a night past eight in the evening after their eighth cocktail—what a coincidence—and Jihyo books herself a cab back to her apartment that’s a twenty-minute ride from the university while Nayeon walks in a zigzag pattern back to hers.
Living near the school has a lot of pros but it also has its own set of cons. One of them is what’s happening to her now.
Riding a cab back to her apartment would be such a waste of money when she lives less than a kilometer away so she just has no other choice but to endure the walk because she chose to get drunk and damn it, her throat is drying up.
She heads into the convenience store near her place to refresh herself and maybe for some late-night snacks to satisfy her hunger before she sleeps. It’s bad, she knows but a girl has to listen to what her body is telling her to do and that is to munch on some crunchy noodle snacks.
On the line to the cashier, she falls behind a very good-looking girl. Just by looking at her back, she knows she’s pretty. Perfect figure and long black hair—just her type. Well, she did date one of the prettiest girls in her major with the same description but that’s another story.
This girl, standing in front of her, gives off a familiar vibe. She’s seen that back somewhere but her alcohol-induced brain is too exhausted to even think about it.
That’s one good-looking ass, she thinks, eyes trailing down the girl’s back to her bottom.
“Next!” the cashier calls, shaking her head when she realizes that she’s the one next in line.
She exits the store and immediately gulps the drink she bought. It was a bad move because she feels the water slide back up, burning her throat with the vomit she tried her best to swallow earlier at the bar’s restroom. With no other choice, she runs across the store, planting her palms on the wall, and lets her head down, preparing herself for the worst as she feels the burning feeling reach the end of her tongue.
“Are you going to vomit again, neighbor?”
Fuck, not again.
She forces herself to swallow again the liquid—fucking gross—to save herself from another embarrassment and looks up to the owner of that voice. Yup, it’s her new neighbor.
“I felt it go up but I’m really trying not to.”
“Are you drunk drunk or just-the-right-kind-of-drunk-but-feel-like-vomiting-because-you-drank-on-an-empty-stomach kind of drunk?”
“The second one,” she tries to stand firmly and follows her neighbor walk back to their apartment building.
Nayeon’s drunk, yes, but she’s still in her right mind to ask significant questions. “Have you already settled in?”
The girl presses the elevator button in the lobby. “Actually, yeah. I recently transferred to the school nearby and I’m just taking a break before the fall semester starts.”
So she goes to the same school as me? Interesting.
“Yonsei? I go to Yonsei,” she sways back and forth in the elevator until the girl pushes her shoulders back to lean on the wall, thinking she might puke in the elevator for moving too much. “What’s your major?”
“Dance. What about you?”
“I major in International Relations.”
A smirk spreads across the girl’s face and she takes a few seconds to observe her features under the white light of the elevator.
Moles on her face, cute. Those brown eyes, divine.
They exit the elevator and walk down the hall together. Nayeon begins fumbling with her keys in her purse and she hears her new neighbor snickering at her difficulty.
“I’m glad you’re enjoying my suffering.”
“You’re drunk and having a hard time inserting your key through your door,” her neighbor leans her side on the wall, watching her with a big smile on her face. “What’s not to enjoy?”
She finally inserts it and they enter their respective apartment units with a small good night.
The crunchy noodle snacks Nayeon was supposed to eat have been long forgotten.
The next week, Nayeon reads and studies different Resolutions, digesting and analyzing how different countries came to an agreement on specific issues and policies, and the P5 countries of the UN.
She successfully manages to skip a drinking session with Jihyo to avoid running into her cute neighbor in the convenience store late at night, fighting the urge to puke her guts out again and to save herself from another embarrassment.
A Taylor Swift song blasts from one of her neighbors, a few units down the hall, disturbing her peaceful night. She loses focus on what she’s reading because the song that plays is the one that she enjoys listening to. What a shame.
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland reiterates that the uhh…uhh…and I promise that nobody's gonna love you like me-e-e, ahh fuck this shit. She slams her fists onto her table and marches to her front door.
It’s been over two hours and this has got to stop. She needs to concentrate and get her mind back to where it needs to be. It needs to be on the Mine Ban Convention.
“That’s it,” she opens the door and glares down the hall, pinpointing to which apartment unit the sound is coming from.
Is it the one on the left or the one on the right?
The door across her opens, revealing her cute neighbor whose face is scrunched up, probably annoyed the same as her. She’s wearing a shirt and a decent length of shorts.
Mimicking the same position as her, she also looks for the loud sound, and Nayeon can’t help but tilt her head to the side to observe her neighbor’s ass. And she’s an ass for doing it indiscreetly. Her eyes move up to meet her neighbor’s.
“The noise?” she asks to divert her neighbor’s attention, hoping that she wasn’t caught staring.
“Yeah, I was in the middle of reading my notes.”
“Me too,” Nayeon steps out of her room and knocks repeatedly on the door she figured out where the music is coming from. “Hey! Could you tone it down? Kind of in the middle of studying,” the sound decreases. “Thank you!”
She walks back to her apartment.
“Thanks,” her neighbor turns around and Nayeon can’t help but stare. Again. Stare at where exactly? She will leave it up to your imagination.
What resolution paper does she need to read on again? Nayeon can’t seem to recall because her neighbor was quite distracting. In a good way, of course.
She finds herself smiling into space.
—
Who even allowed professors to post test results at nine in the evening? Who?! Things like this should be illegal. This productive day could’ve ended at the bar with Jihyo or Sana but this waiting game is consuming Nayeon’s night instead.
She spins her swivel chair, waiting for an update on the school’s website but fuck this, she’s not going to spend her precious time in her apartment. Grabbing a jacket, she heads out and takes a seat on the couch in front of the elevator to wait.
“Hi, neighbor.”
That oh so beautiful voice. She sees her cute neighbor stand in front of the elevator doors.
“Are you drunk again? A bit too early for that, don’t you think?”
Has this become the brand her neighbor’s come to know of her? That needs to be changed.
She isn’t a drunkard as she’s painted to be. In fact, she’s known as the loud and charming girl by everyone she knows.
Funny how she’s even assuming this.
“Hi, neighbor, and no, I am not drunk. I was just spacing out, that’s all.” She stretches her arms upward and her joints crack, freezing her arms mid-air before relaxing. “Oh, I’m still young, please.”
“I didn’t even say anything,” her cute neighbor defends.
Nayeon stands beside her and they enter the elevator. “You were giving me that look I know too well. You think I’m old. I’m in my sophomore year, for your information.”
“Stop assuming,” her cute neighbor leans on the wall and faces her, “jerk.”
“And so I’ve been told.”
The neighbors walk out of the apartment building together and were cautious when they both walk in the same direction.
Nayeon side-eyes her neighbor and walks past her, looking over her shoulder to see her cute neighbor squint at her. She enters the convenience store and she follows.
She walks immediately to the alcohol section to choose which lucky drink will get to accompany her for the night, whispering to herself, “Hmm…she already thinks I’m a drunk but here I am getting alcohol.”
Whatever.
She makes a round to the next aisle and that goddamn ass greets her. “I am not strong for this,” she groans under her breath.
“You’re not strong for what?”
Shit.
Her eyes shift to the soju bottles in her basket and lifts it. “These.”
Her cute neighbor squats a bit and Nayeon bites the cheek of her mouth, trying her best to keep another groan in.
That fucking ass is so…AH!
“Which ramyeon flavor do you think is better?” her cute neighbor, in almost a full squat position, points to two ramyeon packs on the bottom shelf.
“The spicier, the better.”
“I can’t handle spicy.”
“Oh?” Nayeon smiles at the info and exposes her two front teeth. Her cute neighbor’s lips curve a little and she’s thinking it has something to do with her dashing smile. “Then, we can settle for the original flavor.”
“We? Do you think I’m gonna cook this for us? I just asked for your opinion, thanks,” her cute neighbor picks up her basket and walks to the cashier.
Nayeon likes the sass of this girl and of course, she won’t give up without a fight. She’s one competitive cookie.
“Okay, so do you want to have a drink with me then? I won’t take no for an answer.”
“Jerk.”
“I’ve heard that word come out of your mouth twice already.”
She gets ignored and gets lost again in her thoughts—her thoughts that consist of her cute neighbor’s ass because here she is staring at it, even tilting her head to take a closer look. She thinks out loud, “That is really one good looking—“ her cute neighbor turns to her and her eyes dart at the crispy chicken on display at the counter “—piece of chicken! Excuse me, did the chickens arrive a few minutes ago? They look superb,” giving a nod and okay sign to the cashier.
He got weirded out by her. You can also include her cute neighbor in that who probably got weirded out, too.
The fried chickens on display really do look superb—golden and crispy.
After paying, she grabs her bag and exits the convenience store to find her cute neighbor on the side waiting for her. She has no idea why but she gets this strange, tingling feeling like an adrenaline rush within her. It’s not a foreign feeling but she likes it.
“You were waiting for me?”
“You asked me to drink with you and you said that you wouldn’t take no for an answer, right?”
She bites her bottom lip and gives her a small nod. That line worked and she can’t wait to brag that one to Jihyo.
As an International Relations major, she’s already got quite a skill in persuasion. One more reason to have her in the delegation.
They begin their walk back to the apartment and Nayeon thinks back to the little banter they had a while ago. That playfulness within her is back from the undead.
“Wow, you remembered and you took that seriously? Damn, I’m good.”
“You’re such a jerk.” Her cute neighbor rushes and she jogs after her, carefully holding her bag full of soju bottles.
“Hey, I’m kidding, I’m kidding! But you’ll be cooking ramyeon, right?”
“Obviously, you jerk,” says her cute neighbor, and with that fucking smirk? Too cute.
They get to her cute neighbor’s apartment and Nayeon notices the place looking much better than the first time she saw it, although, there are still a few boxes laying around. It still looked better than before.
She goes in for a teasing remark, “Your place looks inhabitable now. Awesome job!”
Her cute neighbor scoffs, “Inhabitable? Not even ‘great’ as a compliment? Gee, I’m starting to really think that you’re an alcoholic and a jerk. What a combo. You must get a lot of girls.”
Nayeon is at a loss for words, observing her cute neighbor place the pot filled with water on the stove. She found amusement in all of the things sarcastically said about her, enticing her to get to know this girl even more. Her personality’s quite intriguing and fuck, that ass is totally distracting her again.
Tilting her head with her mouth slightly agape, her eyes are glued to the perky bottom in front of her, thinking out loud once more. “You really have such a nice ass.”
“A nice what?” her cute neighbor turns to her with a shocked and charming expression on her face. “Were you just checking me out?”
Ah shit, she never thought she’d ever get caught but here we are. Might as well tell her the truth.
“As a matter of fact, yes. Yes, I was checking you out,” she truthfully and shamelessly admits. She can feel the warmth spread on her cheeks with another embarrassment that is not in the form of alcohol. “I’m sorry, that was creepy of me.”
“Thank you for apologizing. What else have you been checking out on me?”
This girl is unbelievable. Nayeon hasn’t had a drop of alcohol in her system yet and she’s already getting bombarded with questions like this. Questions like this should only be done with the presence of alcohol to give her that little push to answer.
She inhales through her nose and exhales. She’s cornered and there is no other way out of this.
“Just your…ass?”
Her cute neighbor stirs the noodles in the pot and brings it to the dining table, grabbing two shot glasses from her cupboard. Nayeon takes her bottles and pulls out a chair. She was honestly expecting to be thrown out but what happened was the opposite.
“You know what’s funny?” her cute neighbor hands her a pair of wooden chopsticks. “I never really got to know your name. I just call you ‘neighbor’ and that was it. Oh, and also a ‘jerk’ and a 'drunk'.”
Nayeon nods at the realization, she’s right. She either refers to the girl as ‘neighbor’ or ‘cute neighbor’, and that was it as well. They didn’t really get to have a formal introduction because of how peculiar they always ran into each other in the past weeks.
“I’m Im Nayeon, an International Relations major in my second year, and you are?”
“I’m Myoi Mina, a transferee, and a Dance major, and I’m in my second year too.” Mina fills their shot glasses and raises hers for a clink, a toast for finally having that introduction.
Nayeon raises her glass, clinking it with Mina’s and she smiles, feeling the alcohol flow down her pipe. The relief she needs to feel while waiting for her gr—fuck! Her eyes widen and she scrambles to get her phone on top of the counter. She opens the school’s website to check on her grade and she screams.
“Are you okay?” Mina drops her chopsticks and plants both palms on the table, ready to help her out. “Did anything happen?”
“No, no!” she clasps her hands together and raises them above to thank the heavens for having her back. Her grade finally turned up and she received high remarks from her professor. “I got a ninety-three on my Political Economy class, holy shit. Let me just,” she pours soju in their shot glasses again, “this needs another toast. To fucking passing!”
They clink their glasses and they drink in one go before finally digging into the ramyeon Mina cooked.
“Congrats, Nayeon!”
The night went on with the neighbors talking about school and Mina’s personal background because Nayeon found her last name unusual. It was the last name that she never thought a typical Korean would have but then again, Mina doesn’t look like a Korean too.
“I was actually born in Japan but I grew up here in Seoul,” Mina explains.
“So you know how to speak Japanese?”
“No,” Mina shows her gummy smile that Nayeon’s only come to notice now.
“You’re like the first Japanese I know who doesn’t know how to speak Japanese.”
Mina huffs and playfully kicks her shin under the table. She lets out a fake and painful groan.
“I told you, I was only born in Japan but I grew up here so I never really got the chance to learn the language!”
They transfer to the couch in the living room to watch an Avengers movie as highly suggested by Mina, says that the recently released one is a tear-jerker. Nayeon doesn’t really like action films but for Avengers, maybe she’s willing to make an exception.
“Which Avenger character do you think resembles you the most?” Mina asks.
Nayeon hums with a hand under her chin and takes a shot of soju before answering. “I think Iron Man because I’m cool like him.”
Mina snickers and leans a bit closer to her. It’s to get the soju from her hold and nothing else—shut up! There’s nothing more.
“You mean like a jerk just like Tony Stark?”
“Hey, hey! He was a jerk at the beginning of the movie but look,” she points at the screen where Pepper is talking to Tony Stark about her concerns regarding his life as a superhero, “he found the love of his life and saving people is something he does wholeheartedly. He isn’t a jerk anymore. That's some character development.”
“Do you think my perspective about you will change?”
“Is this still related to Iron Man or are you asking about me per se? Are you the Pepper to my Tony Stark?”
Mina’s warm presence makes her feel at ease. The twinkling in her eyes when she makes even the smallest smile is sweet.
“However you want to think about it.”
“Then yes,” Nayeon gulps, placing an arm at the back of the couch behind Mina. “I think you’ll enjoy being around me once you get to know me more.”
That statement was a challenge—at least, she takes it as a challenge—and her eyes automatically pan to where Mina’s lips are. Like on autopilot, she leans in closer until she can feel Mina’s breath hit her lips but why is Mina still not stopping her from leaning in? Is it the alcohol or her vision’s blurring but if her eyes aren’t playing tricks on her, she thinks that Mina is also leaning in.
“I think I should go. I still have class in the morning.” Before the distance of their lips hit less than an inch away, she pushes herself to stand and grabs her stuff on the floor. “I had a great night hanging with you, Mina.”
“Me, too. I enjoyed tonight. Thanks, you jerk.”
Nayeon stands by the door and laughs silently, not her usual laugh but the shy and timid one.
“I will make sure you don’t see me as a jerk anymore. Good night.”
“Good night, Nayeon.”
She gets into her apartment and closes the door immediately, leaning on the wooden door, and holding a hand to her chest.
Did she just almost kiss Mina? And Mina was sort of anticipating it so she leaned in? All of it wasn’t a dream, right? Mina and her totally almost kissed.
She wonders when she can have the real thing then.