Archive of Our Own

“Yeojin get the fuck up right now I swear or I’m going to —”

Yeojin groans loudly, and smacks the alarm on her side table, immediately hissing in pain and withdrawing her hand to rub tentatively at the now red skin. 

She blinks blearily at the sun glaring into her eyes through the blinds, and almost pulls her duvet over her head and lets herself fall back asleep, but the idea of the actual Heejin coming into her room, seeing the mess of what it is, and not only yelling at her to get up but also about practicing proper hygiene, is not entirely appealing.

And as such, she sits up, now fully awake.

Yes, the pre-recorded alarm of her voice was certainly a good idea.

She pulls her phone from where it’s tucked beneath the pillow, and frowns as the time blinks back at her.

7:29am.

As warm and soft as her bed currently is, she recalls fondly with one last glance thrown towards it, Yeojin simply cannot afford to be late today. Not when they’re sorting the bunks for the 11 and 12th years’ ski trip. Yeojin cannot dorm with someone like Yizhuo or Chaehyun, or god forbid... her.

Yeojin swallows thickly and pushes the thought of her out of her mind. She’s not interested in ruining today already, not when she has a she-who-will-not-be-named-free ski trip to look forward to and the first chocolate in the advent calendar to eat.

She hops around the piles of clothes on the floor to her closet and shrugs on her uniform, frowning slightly at the blouse, which appears to have a chocolate stain on the front pocket. Today’s weather suits the school’s woollen jumper anyway, but she can’t imagine her mom being all that happy to cold wash it when she’d already done so only two days ago.

Whatever, she huffs, and plucks her empty water bottle from the ground.

Five minutes later and she’s fully dressed and in the kitchen, cooking eggo waffles. Heejin and Jinsol are watching some documentary about the ocean on television, and DAY6 is blasting in Yeojin’s earphones — admittedly, probably loud enough to warrant the kind of warnings her mother tells her about going deaf by 25 — but that’s neither here nor there. 

Yeojin reaches up for the advent calender, and her thumb finds itself in an empty hole, paper already ripped — no chocolate.

Yeojin exhales slowly through her nose, pausing her music, “Heejin!”

Heejin jolts from her spot on the couch, and Jinsol raises a brow, apparently intrigued, “What?”

“You ate today’s chocolate!” Yeojin fumes, “It’s the first day!”

“So?” Heejin huffs, pouting, “They’re not just for you.”

“But Mom bought it for me! You can buy your own chocolate —”

“— Why don’t you get a job then and buy one yourself —”

“— But you’re in university —”

“Yeojin?” Jinsol announces, an amused smile playing on her lips despite the noise. Yeojin winces, apologetic. “How about we drop by the store on the way to school and I’ll buy you another chocolate advent calendar?”

Yeojin considers, “Can it be that expensive brand? The one with the gold wrappers?”

Jinsol grins, “Sure, as long as it’s there.”

“Jinsol unnie..." Heejin pouts, “What about me?”

Jinsol laughs, “Sure, babe. You can get one too,” And she plants a kiss right on Heejin’s lips.

Heejin grins, satisfied, and Yeojin almost barfs right then and there. 

Yeojin, after about 20 minutes of debate, decides on the advent calendar she’d like, and also worms Jinsol into buying her a lollipop, before she’s alerted to the very real possibility of being late for school — the very thing she’d sought most to avoid — by a smug looking Heejin, and almost sprints through the checkout, very nearly being stopped by an exhausted looking cashier who seems to be under the notion her efforts to leave quickly are in anyway related to shoplifting. As if Yeojin would rush so frantically and obviously for something like that. Yeojin is no shoplifter, but even she knows that's the most obvious way of being caught out. 

Once they finally checkout, they are held up in traffic, because of course they are, and Yeojin is on the edge of her seat the entire time.

She ends up convincing Jinsol to let her out at a red light, and the rest of her commute to school is spent sprinting down the streets with her hair falling out of the ribbons she’d carefully tied them into and her lungs very nearly bursting due to her her considerate lack of stamina.

She finds herself at the gate eventually which thankfully, for some reason, isn’t closed, and practically forces herself those last few steps to the assembly hall.

Normally, Yeojin would be a little apprehensive about making her way into a room when there’s already a good 300 students in there, but she’d much rather lingering stares from her peers than to room with the girl she’s been avoiding, and as such, she simply brushes down her skirt and jumper, runs a hand gingerly through her ponytails once she’s readjusted it, and opens the door as quietly as she can.

She’s quick to spot Hyeju though, and scoots over to the 12th year.

“Hey —” She whispers, staring wide eyed up at the stand where there’s three adults and two students — one of which is her — in conversation. There’s a checklist held in Yeojin’s biology teacher’s hand, and she scribbles something down when she glances at Yeojin.

Hyeju simply chuckles, “Oh, you’re not going to like what I’m about to tell you.”

Yeojin is immediately set off. No.

No.

There’s no way.

“What’s that?” Yeojin all but subtly croaks out, and Hyeju almost looks like she’s about to burst into laughter with the petrified look Yeojin’s sure is painted across her features.

“All I’m going to say,” Hyeju smiles, “Is that if you wanted someone in your dorm, or,” she continues, with a not-so-subtle glance towards the front of the room where she stands, “Someone not in your dorm, you should’ve gotten here earlier rather than buying chocolate advent calendars.”

“How did you even know that?” Yeojin shrieks, and at this point whether she draws attention to herself or not is the least of her concerns.

“Heejin texted me.” Hyeju grins wickedly, and laughs harder when Yeojin whips out her phone to send several angry emojis to her older sister.

“This is a disaster!” Yeojin fumes, dropping her school bag right down next to the door, only to turn around and stub her toe right on the doorstop, yelping in pain as she reaches for her foot, stumbling over onto the floor and bumping her head on the wooden ladder. 

“Yeojin,” Heejin clicks her tongue from the kitchen, “Stop it with the theatrics. It’s unbecoming.” 

Nothing is going well for Yeojin today. 

Heejin ate the first advent calendar chocolate. Yeojin was late for school. The lollipop Jinsol bought her was confiscated when she began to eat it at break. Her feet are freezing cold from walking to and from school without two layers of socks. Hyeju made fun of her multiple times.

She has bumped both her toe and her head in the span of less than a minute.

And worst of all, she is rooming with Choi Yerim on what was supposed to be the most exciting trip of her high school career, five days at Jisan ski resort! 

She hardly believes reacting in accordance with whatever it is the universe has out for her can be ruled off as simply theatrics, and she tells Heejin as such, though she spares her the details of her very unfortunate day. Heejin just rolls her eyes.

“I hope Jinsol unnie dumps you,” Yeojin says unkindly, and Heejin scoffs, affronted. 

“She’d only dump me if she was tired of dating a girl with a younger sister who still sleeps with a unicorn plush at the age of seventeen.”  

Yeojin gasps at this, prepares to yell something about a thousand times worse than what she’d said before, but Heejin doesn’t give her the chance, just steps into the front door’s threshold and smarts, “Mom said you have to shovel the snow today. And by the way, grow up!”

And with that, she slams the door shut. Yeojin winces as the wood creaks a little with the impact, and curses to herself a few times, before pulling her school shoes off and stepping into her snow boots.

While it was something of a chore, Yeojin did have to admit she enjoyed the rewarding feeling of clearing the driveway and footpath to the gate of snow.

Though it is mildly annoying to sweep it free and have a few more snowflakes litter the ground, once she’s finished, the entire front garden is significantly less muddy and blocked up than it had been, grass and path entirely clean save for a few flakes of white here and there.

Yeojin steps back to admire her work after depositing the shovel back in the backyard, getting so lost in the hesitant yet gradual downfall of the snowflakes that when the gate jostles, she almost jumps a few feet in the air.

She turns around, and if there was a moment where her entire life flashed past her eyes, she thinks this might be it. 

Because Yerim stands at the gate, a polite smile on her lips, drops something in the mail box and bows once before running off to where she’d come from.

Yeojin steps up to her mailbox, hand quivering as she pulls a lilac envelope out. She hates the fact that when she lifts it to her nose it smells just like her, black cherry. Hates the fact she needs it more than she needs air.

Invigorating and intoxicating and never enough.

Never enough, not like the real thing.

She remembers the first time she’d smelt it, nine years old when Yerim invited her and Hyeju over for a sleepover. When Yerim had tucked herself into Yeojin’s side as they watched Finding Nemo and the smell had overcome her and it felt like home. 

Remembers being twelve and holding Yerim’s hand as they snuck her into their high school campus, Hyeju teasing her for being scared and Yeojin sticking her tongue out at her, remembers that familiar scent with Yerim giggling as she leant into Yeojin to press her cheek against her head as they stood at the gate, waiting for Hyeju to climb over the fence and unlock it from the inside.

Remembers the fallout and the aftermath, and how the unicorn plush still smelt like Yerim no matter how many times she ran it through the washing machine. 

Jinsol sometimes says some things never change, and Yeojin thinks, unfortunately, she knows this all too well.

The letter was just a formality, and Yeojin chastises herself for getting her hopes up. Yerim is the student council leader, it’s hardly a surprise she’d decided to go above and beyond for her roommates. Yeojin finds out they’re rooming with Hyeju and some 19 year old called Hyunjin, who apparently didn’t pass the 12th grade the first time and gets to go on the trip again.

(Yeojin inquires Heejin about this, who ends up in a laughing fit for a solid minute, only for Yeojin to find out Hyunjin flunked both Math and English — a very likely outcome for Yeojin, Heejin tells her, if she doesn’t improve her studying habits, which earns her a kick to the shin — so Yeojin supposes she’ll have something to talk with this Hyunjin about at least.)

It reads as a basic list of all the essentials, a note welcoming everyone, and a reminder of not to bring phones or alcohol.

Hah, screw that, Yeojin mutters to herself, only to quickly reassure an incredulous Heejin who was totally snooping over her shoulder that she was talking about the phone rule, not the alcohol one.

5th of December. Two days until they leave for the trip.

A week until the winter holidays! Yeojin’s mind supplies unhelpfully. 

Yeah, a week if she can actually survive this one, she shoots back.

Hyeju, oddly enough, is nowhere to be found, and so Yeojin is left without a partner for her seat in the morning’s math class.

It’s not often she wishes that their school was big enough for grades to be separated until a taller girl with large eyes and larger earrings takes the seat next to her, pulling out a laptop decorated with tacky cat stickers.

“Who are you?” Yeojin deadpans, scooting away a little.

“I’m Hyunjin,” Hyunjin announces, “You’re Yeojin, right?”

Yeojin just nods, scrunching her nose. Perhaps this is the Hyunjin who she’ll be rooming with. Yeojin decides to let her face fall neutral rather than the expression of distaste she’d worn, if nothing else but to keep up niceties, particularly considering they’ll be rooming with one another for the next week. Maybe Yeojin could even convince Hyunjin to —

“Alright,” She nods, pulls out a bag of twizzlers and points one at Yeojin, though it flops down and it looks more like Hyunjin’s offering her the sweet. If Hyunjin minds, she doesn’t say anything, and the assertion with which she says her next statement almost has Yeojin forgetting it’s the exact opposite of what she’d wanted, “You and Yerim are sharing a bunk bed then, kay? Hyeju’s my guy, and Yerim snores much too loud for me to sleep less than a few meters away from her.”

Yeojin’s jaw drops, and she’s quick to begin protesting, but Hyunjin simply grins, interrupting her with an “it’s already decided, Hyeju agreed as well.”

Yeojin is horrified.

“But Mom,” Yeojin states, “I’m really sick. Like, actually sick. Seriously. Look!” 

Yeojin coughs a few times, loudly, and for what it’s worth, her efforts are somewhat convincing. 

Perhaps Nayeon would be more inclined to let her take the trip off if she wasn’t dead set on getting more than one use out of Heejin’s old skiing gear she used for her trip. Yeojin, frankly, is insulted. It’s all far too big for her, and she looks ridiculous, which does nothing to convince her this trip is worth it at all.

“Yeojin-ah,” Nayeon just smiles, not looking away from the road, “It’s going to be fun, there’s no use in letting nerves win over when you’ve been looking forward to this since 7th grade.”

“It’s not nerves!” She insists, “I’m really sick! Can’t you see?”

Nayeon clicks her tongue in that frustrating way mothers do, grinning widely, “Nope, I’m driving. Don’t distract me!”

Yeojin, unsurprisingly, has no luck in convincing her mother to let her off sick from the skiing trip, and reluctantly drags both her suitcase (literally) and her feet (metaphorically) to the area they were supposed to meet. None of her efforts in getting there too late were successful either, Nayeon quite literally getting her up incredibly prematurely so even after delaying it to the absolute maximum left her with a little over half an hour when she was dropped off at school.

At this point, she’s somewhat tempted to run off, but the last time someone pulled a stunt like that they’d had the police called on them, and frankly, Yeojin isn’t interested in the entire senior grade giving her death glares for attempting to make an escape and delaying the bus leaving.

Plus, she has a suspicion Nayeon wouldn’t let her get too far anyway.

But now, she stands right on the oval in the meeting place, legs shaking, and she regrets not taking that plan into action, because as it turns out, no one is here except for her and Yerim.

Yeojin thinks the situation is almost suspiciously predictable, laughably so even, and if she wasn’t the one who was suffering the brunt of whatever rage the universe had decided to take out on some poor soul she thinks she’d be chuckling. She’s surprised she hasn’t been struck with a meteor and had that awful photo of her dressed up for halloween in second grade broadcast all over national television with her name displayed in bright lettering yet, but it’s only 7am, so who’s to say what the rest of the day has in store for her?

Thankfully for Yeojin, Yerim makes no attempts to step anywhere closer to her. Thankfully, yes.

She repeats it like a mantra, doesn’t understand why now they’re in close proximity with one another it’s become ten times as difficult to believe it as it had been the last three years.

Regrettably, she sneaks a glance towards Yerim, and in the briefest of moments before Yerim glances away, the apologetic glint in her eyes she’d been gazing at Yeojin with chills her to the core, the frosty morning glaring summer sun in comparison.

Chills her like it had that day, the fallout, when it’d all gone to shit.

She thinks back to it.

Summer break, late July, three years ago. When heat sinks into your bones and watermelon seeds would get stuck in your teeth. Sweet and syrupy and hot and dry. If there was one thing Yeojin was grateful for, it was that that summer lacked its usual humidity.

Hyeju and her family left for some holiday, leaving behind Yeojin and Yerim over the three month break. Freedom for Yeojin, from her second year of high school, and for Yerim, a reluctantly received but well-needed break from her study. Needless to say, they’d coerced their parents into letting them spend the better half of it together before Yeojin went off to camp, and Yeojin had packed on the first day and gleefully bid both Nayeon and Heejin farewell, skipping down the street and a few more until she’d stood at the front gate of Yerim’s house.

Summer break, late July, and they sit together, knees knocking against one another as the sun beams down on them. It’s the evening, nearing quarter past eight just as the sun’s beginning to set and Yeojin is licking delicately at a cup of frozen yogurt.

They’re not even supposed to be out here, Yerim’s window lead out onto a little ledge on the roof she’d lay a picnic blanket down on, and both girls had been scolded many a time lest they stumble and fall from the height, Yerim’s room being on the second floor, rendering the fall quite a significant one.

They hadn’t listened, of course. Yeojin doesn’t blame this on what happened. None of it could’ve been prevented, not really. Not when all she’s ever known is Yerim, Yerim who’d been tied to the other end of the red string at her pinky finger, Yerim who was all smiles and cherries and impossible not to fall for. 

Therein lies the issue — Yeojin had long fallen for her, and trying to fall out of love with someone like Yerim when you had a heart like Yeojin’s was like trying to climb out of a well about 150 meters deep.

Dark, daunting, and nigh impossible. No, scratch that. Incredibly impossible. Undeniably impossible.

Impossible, period.

It was wrong, but the simple fact was nothing could be done about it. Not from her side, at least. She could leave Yerim but she knows that’d never do it.

But I am leaving, Yeojin thinks. But it could only be you.

“You’re leaving,” Yerim says, quietly, as if she had read Yeojin’s mind, “tomorrow.”

Yeojin startles, almost proving Yerim’s mom right when she’d explicitly warned them not to come out here. But Yerim grips her forearm, pulls her back from the drop. 

It’s true, Yerim’s statement. She is leaving. But not for long. 

She tells Yerim as such.

Yerim sips thoughtfully at the cherry soda, fizzy red drink distorted by the green of the straw that protrudes from the can. Yeojin catches herself watching a little too long, the way it falls from her mouth and the way the remnants of her lip gloss remain where her lips had been moments ago.

“Still,” Yerim points out, “I’ll be all alone.”

Yeojin shifts, dips her head, “Hyeju unnie will be back in a few days,” she points out.

“It won’t be the same.”

Something selfish in her wants to believe Yerim means it like Yeojin is her favorite. Yerim had always been hers, after all. 

“Sure it will,” she insists, ignoring the familiar feeling bubbling in her chest in favor of fumbling blindly for her ipod sat just behind her to change the music. 

Yerim raises a brow as that familiar intro plays out, “This is more of a winter song, no?”

“I’d like to think music can be enjoyed all year round.”

The older girl hums, considers. Yeojin runs an apprehensive hand over her forearm, a strange sort of tension in the air now. 

Yeojin feels like she should do something. An impulse that runs through her blood, spreading like a drop of ink in clear water: Kiss Yerim.

Yeojin physically feels her cheeks redden. But it’s all too easy to push it back down. She’s long become used to it.

She tests Yerim’s name out on her lips, imagines saying those words that bounce around in her head but leave her tongue tied.

Yerim, I —

Yerim unnie, I think you’re really cool —

Yerim unnie, will you be mine?

A shudder of a breath. The night is approaching fast, and yet Yeojin doesn’t think she’s ever felt so hot.

She sneaks a glance at Yerim, not knowing it would be one of her last when she still has her like this.

Yerim unnie, you look so pretty.

You looked pretty when we met, you look pretty with a clay mask on your face and when your skin breaks out and when you’re sweaty from track and field.

You don’t think so, but I do.

Yerim, I —

Yerim quirks her head, glances at Yeojin. Yeojin flushes, had she just said that out loud?

Yeojin fumbles for her words. Ends up shaking her head to herself. 

No, no, no. She can’t, she —

“Yerim unnie, I —”

The words come without command from her mind, mouth working before her mind has time to catch up.

Yerim just blinks curiously, quiet, waits for Yeojin to continue.

“I, um,” she falters, “Sorry.”

Yerim smiles, but Yeojin watches, and it doesn’t quite reach her eyes, “That’s fine.”

Yeojin nods slowly in response, dips her head once more to queue another song, but when she lifts her head up again, Yerim surges forward, pressing their lips together.

Yeojin lets out a sort of surprised sound, eyes widening, before she melts easily into the kiss. Any reservations she’d had about this happening are swallowed as the subtle sweetness of Yerim’s lips draws her in further, closer.

It’s a stark contrast to the dizzying cherry scent, the way Yerim cants her head, adjusts her lips, leaving it overflowing, attacking all of Yeojin’s stimuli. 

Her heart stutters, and so does her breath, the slightest of shudders falling from her lips and into Yerim’s. It’s enough, though, and Yerim pulls away, searching Yeojin’s face, even now, sweet and quiet and anxious.

And Yeojin flees.

Something about Yerim acting for the both of them made it all too real, and for the first time in Yeojin’s 14 years of living, she was afraid. 

Not of the monsters underneath her bed or of algebra or of her dog dying, nothing that could be soothed with a few comforting words from her mother or brutally honest and quite frankly insulting remarks Heejin dubs as ‘reality checks’, no. It was something inside of her, rather.

And Yeojin was terrified.

“Yeojin — hey, earth to Yeojin!”

Hyeju flaps her hand aimlessly in front of Yeojin’s face, and only when her hand flies within mere millimeters of Yeojin’s eyes, almost smacking her in the nose, is she drawn from her thoughts.

Yeojin blinks, “ ... huh?”

Hyeju rolls her eyes, “The bus is boarding, dummy. Let’s go.”

Yeojin nods slowly.

A look cast to where Yerim had been standing sends a chill across her skin when she’s nowhere to be found and Yeojin is hit with the fact she’s going to be in close proximity with the older girl for the next five days.

Five days until the winter holidays, Yeojin tries to tell herself. The sickening feeling bubbling in the pit of her stomach is indication enough of how ineffective her self-affirmation was.

“For what it’s worth,” Hyeju presses as they’re seated next to one another, “I didn’t sign up to any cabins until you got there.”

“I know,” Yeojin huffs.

“Yerim was going to be in the last cabin anyway, she’s selfless like that.”

“Ugh.” Yeojin scowls, “I know, okay? That doesn’t make it any better.” 

Hyeju rolls her eyes, “Whatever. I don’t get why you hate her. I feel like a child of divorce.”

“You’re literally older than me, Hyeju unnie.”

“Still!” Hyeju protests, “I have to split my time between the two of you —”

“... Just drop it, please,” Yeojin frowns, crossing her arms over her legs against her chest and staring out the window at dreary patches of fields, gray and desolate. She doesn’t know how long they’ve been driving now, but the idea of staying in this cramped up bus for the next few hours while Hyeju pesters her with questions about their roommate for the next five nights is not appealing even in the slightest.

Hyeju shuts up for a bit and Yeojin plugs her headphones in, the opening of Mr.Mr. lulling her mind away from where it had been, stewing about the miserable five days that awaits.

The bus ride is uneventful and long, and Hyeju falls asleep on Yeojin’s shoulder, drooling onto her raincoat because Nayeon had insisted the forecast read as rain, and Yeojin sniggers, decides to tell her mom she’d been right in her prediction — just not the way she’d expected — if she survives this week. Heavy on the if. 

They arrive in the evening with all of the students piling into their cabins and then being dragged out of them prematurely for supper in the dining hall. A quick glance around the entire room tells Yeojin it’s likely this part of the ski resort was designated for school trips, what with the cafeteria-style tables. 

Hyeju kicks at Yeojin’s shin a few times, a not so subtle tell there’s someone looking at her. Yeojin doesn’t want to entertain the hope that it's Yerim, and she doesn’t want to disappoint herself either. So she focuses entirely on the kimchi jjigae in the bowl on the table in front of her, sliding the stew around with her spoon. Hyeju lets up after a while.

But she can’t stop thinking about it — a mind left to wander is a mind destined to fall upon dangerous paths, and Yeojin thinks. Yerim, her soft smile, directed at Yeojin. 

Yerim, her heart of gold, full of Yeojin like Yeojin’s remains, even still, Yerim-full. Where Hyeju had kicked Yeojin in the shin hurts, but what hurts more is the idea of allowing Yerim back in, so close, but not close enough — never how she really wants her.

The idea of the thing Yeojin refuses to face head on being a fluke is something that won’t pass Yeojin by, no matter how much she tries to hope. She doesn’t feel all that hungry anymore, and stands as soon as she’s permitted, trudging back to her cabin despite Hyeju’s curious look.

Admittedly, Yeojin did not think the first time she would drink alcohol would be in the final week of her junior year of high school with her long time crush Choi Yerim meters away and a high school flunkee pouring her a cup of fruit flavored soju, but life has its surprises, she supposes.

When Hyunjin pulls the bottle out of her bag, to no surprise, Yerim is quick to protest.

“Hyunjin unnie!” Yerim gasps, aghast, “I literally told you yesterday not to bring alcohol!”

“Must’ve missed the memo I guess,” Hyunjin shrugs, and even Yeojin can tell she was absolutely aware of Yerim’s intolerance for alcohol. 

Yerim eyes her warily, but if Hyunjin takes notice of it, it’s not obvious from the neutral expression she wears. She unscrews the cap of the bottle, orange flavor, it reads, and pours it into a bright red plastic cup.

“Yeojin?” She offers, and Yeojin considers. 

There’s nothing to lose, not if they aren’t caught, and considering Hyunjin’s been on this trip before, she’s willing to take her chances. Especially if it’ll make this first night with Yerim easier, bring the tension down — though she hadn’t shared with Hyunjin her disdain toward the older girl, she’s sure she’s noticed the way Yeojin flinches when Yerim’s near, the way she’d been reluctant to bunk with her.

She just has to be sure she doesn’t drink enough to say anything embarrassing.

“Sure. Pour me a cup.”

She ignores the prickling feeling of Yerim’s soft eyes boring holes into the back of her neck.

“Come on Yerim, don’t be a loser!” Hyunjin complains, “Just have one cup.”

Yeojin eyes Hyunjin, nose scrunched in distaste. This girl is really strange. 

“Fine,” Yerim sighs, and Yeojin suspects it may be more to shut Hyunjin up rather than relenting, and she takes the plastic cup that she’s eagerly handed, sipping delicately at the drink. 

Yeojin, to absolutely no surprise, is a lightweight. After the first cup she’d greedily chugged in earnest after not having drunk anything for a few hours at least, Hyunjin had poured her another, and now she cradles it, feeling quite sorry for herself whenever she tries to move more than a meter from the floor, back pressed against the bed frame she’d claimed as her own as soon as she’d stepped into the cabin.

Her mind feels fuzzy and all over the place and Yerim’s dazzling smile whenever Hyunjin cracks a dumb joke or stumbles over is of absolutely no help. She decides just to sit still, chewing thoughtfully on pastel colored marshmallows, courtesy of Hyeju who’d opted to sneak a jumbo pack in her own bag.

“Please?”

“No.”

Hyeju purses her lips after Yeojin declines for the fifth time in a row in the span of a few minutes, and looks over at Yerim, “You’ll play, right?”

Yerim shrugs, cheeks flushed, Yeojin guesses from the soju, “Sure. I guess.”

Yeojin’s jaw falls open, momentarily a sense of betrayal rushing through her body. It’s only in hindsight that she realizes she doesn’t have the right to feel betrayed over Yerim not taking her side anymore.

“Fine,” Yeojin says — grumbles, really, and Hyeju looks over with a satisfied grin, “I’ll play.”

Hyeju explains the rules with an air of flair, and Yeojin tries not to snort when she almost falls flat on her face when she leans forward a little too far and apparently forgets how to use her arms. 

Thankfully for Hyeju — not so thankfully for Hyunjin, who’d been filming the entire thing on her phone and whines when Hyeju doesn’t faceplant the floor — Yerim grabs her by the collar before her face makes contact with the old wooden planks, motor skills apparently not forgotten. 

“Okay,” Hyeju finishes lamely, once they’ve all sworn by blood that they’ll obey the rules of the game — literally, Hyeju has a Japanese pocket knife for some reason and makes them cut their hands and smear the blood on a spare piece of paper, “You go first, Yerim.”

Yerim considers, presses a finger against cherry lips momentarily. Then she looks at Yeojin.

If Yerim’s gaze upon her when Yeojin is sober was dizzying, now that she’s tipsy — at least, drunk at most — it’s like riding a carnival ride, thrown every which way with no promise of when you could leave.

And then she looks away.

It was brief, minute, not even worth to note. Not worth noting, if you weren’t Yeojin, that is. 

It runs through Yeojin’s mind the entire time as Hyeju and Hyunjin ask each other dumb questions and Yerim is dared to carve her name into the wooden floor beneath Yeojin’s bunk — incredibly scandalous — and Yeojin is, for the most part, given throwaway dares. She wonders if it’s because of the far away look she wears.

Yerim is asked if she likes someone — like, like-like, to which she says yes, and that is when Yeojin begins paying attention. Hyeju apparently notices this, because her next question after she’s dared to text Chaewon the Spotify link to Arctic Monkey’s “I Wanna Be Yours” is directed towards Yeojin.

“Truth or dare, Yeojin?” Hyeju drawls, lips curling when Yeojin shoots her with a blank stare.

“Dare.”

“Dare you to go out and kiss the first person you see.”

“Truth,” Yeojin immediately says, and Hyeju grins, as if she’d expected it. Of course she had.

“Why do you hate Yerim?”

Perhaps the question had been precluded by Hyeju’s rapid increase of insistence on and questions about Yeojin’s disdain towards the 12th year, but the question still strikes Yeojin with a punch to the gut nonetheless.

The words register in Yeojin’s mind and before she realizes it she’s grimacing, eyes dropping to the floor. Hyeju looks expectantly between the two girls, and even Hyunjin appears interested.

Yeojin feels her mouth dry up, feels her throat close, can’t stop the one thought that’s forefronting her mind. 

Because as far as everyone knows, as far as she’s led everyone to believe, she does hate Yerim, but...

But.

It’s answer, kiss the first person you see, or another drink, Yeojin, she tells herself, and as much as she hates to admit it, confessing is the most appealing of these options.

She looks up, catches Yerim’s eye. It’s almost like it had been that night, but this time there’s liquid courage coursing through her veins, beckoning her forward, sending the next words spilling from her lips:

“I don’t hate Yerim,” Yeojin answers quietly, and looks away, but not before she catches Yerim’s face registering mild surprise, the pink tint in her cheeks from the alcohol reddening ever so slightly more with her words.

If Hyeju is fazed by Yeojin’s vulnerability, she doesn’t show it, just nods towards Yeojin after taking another sip and tells her it’s her turn. 

Yeojin wakes up with a headache, which is not surprising in the slightest. She doesn’t look at Yerim, not as she slips her shoes on, not as they walk to the cafeteria, and not as she almost dips her elbow in her cereal when she’d meant to lean on the hardwood of the table and she asks if she’s alright.

The day is spent split off into groups where the basics of skiing are laid down, and at about half past three, Yeojin feels like she might as well never walk again. Her shins ache, her arms ache, and she’s pretty sure she’s seen enough snow to last a lifetime. 

Count her out for the number of people wishing for a White Christmas, though with the forecast Nayeon had read out to her the morning of the bus ride to the ski resort, she doesn’t think the chances of missing the snow on Christmas day is all that likely.

The class gathers around for marshmallows in front of the bonfire after dinner, and Yeojin’s knees knock together even under knitted wool stocking and thick ski pants. It’s not her legs that are cold, rather her arms, because she’d left her jacket in the cabin, but she’s much too tired to be bothered to ask the supervisor if she could go back. 

When the cold prickles at her skin, though, she finds herself regretting her forgetfulness, because it’s certainly quite embarrassing to have to lift a shaking hand up to hold her jaw still when her teeth come to a loud rhythm of chattering again.

She settles for curling in on herself on the wooden plank she’s seated at, but only after a few minutes of this, huddling into her legs in a weak attempt at conservation of body warmth, does she realize she’s no longer shivering, and her eyes open quickly, catching sight of a familiar looking thick puffer nursed around her shoulders. If she could place it...

Yeojin, struck with the unknown stranger’s kindness, looks around, wide eyed, but there’s no one smiling at her or near her at all, save for Hyunjin and Hyeju playing some crude version of naughts and crosses, though Yeojin knows neither of them have spared her a glance in quite a while, and they both appear quite invested in their... game.

Only when she wipes her nose after where it had been running does she catch that familiar scent, and it’s then she feels like laughing at herself for not realizing who’d bestowed upon her the gift of surviving Korea’s harsh cold yet another day. The scent of black cherries certainly is soothing, but she’ll pretend not to notice it, if nothing else but to feign nonchalance just a little longer.

To herself or to those around her, Yeojin isn’t sure. 

(She leaves the coat to dry on the wooden notch of her bed, and when she wakes up the next morning, it’s gone. Just like she’d expected it would be.)

Skiing, Yeojin thinks, is far more trouble than it’s worth.

She stares enviously after the person ahead of her on the ski lift as they slide gracefully off on their snowboard. 

The day before had been spent learning how to properly ski — or, it had been designated for that purpose, but much to Yeojin’s chagrin, she was not blessed with the ability to flawlessly traverse blankets of soft white on nothing but laminated hardwood flat runners, evident in the way she almost falls face first into the snow and is forced to scramble out of the way so as not to hold up the lift when she makes an attempt at sliding off gracefully like the person before her had.

Unsurprisingly, Yerim is absolutely perfect at it. Yeojin watches with wonder as she whizzes down the hill and stops just shy of a few of the supervisors, not falling over or sending a heap of snow flying in their faces, ending gracefully and definitely professionally.

Yerim clears the course a few times before Yeojin even manages to stand up properly on her skis. Each time she shoots Yeojin a hesitant smile before performing the most flawless run she’s ever seen, and if Yeojin didn’t know better, she’d most definitely guess Yerim did this for a living.

And each time, the words she wants so desperately to say lie on the tip of her tongue, and they’d so easily fall from quivering lips with a huff, breath vapor.

But one glance at the older girl and she’s tongue tied, not to mention the way her breath is stolen to the frosty wind when Yerim flicks her hair back out of her face, cheeks puffed and brows focused as she readies her position. As if it were just routine, being that absolutely, heart-wrenchingly, painstakingly, effortlessly beautiful.

Damn it, Yeojin, she fumes to herself, kicking grumpily at one particularly deserving looking pile of snow, only to topple over and land face first into the snow. Again.

Yeojin falls midway through the intermediate trail, because of course she does.

She’d fallen a few times now, and though she’d been warned by the instructor not to take it to heart, she feels particularly sour when her left ski gets caught in what she deems an easily avoidable twig and she’s sent catapulting into an area in the snow just out of view of the trail.

Yerim spots her despite all odds, because of fucking course she does. As if Yeojin didn’t feel awkward enough around her as it is what with the night before the last’s admission. And, of course, everything before that.

But, she scowls, that confession in particular certainly is one she will regret for a long time. 

Just another reminder not to drink. Like, ever again. Definitely.

Stupid Hyeju. 

Stupid Hyunjin. 

Stupid peer pressure or whatever it was the social workers who would come in for presentations in grade school warn them not to fall victim to. Yeojin should have been listening instead of playing footsies with Yerim.

Yerim...

Yerim who’s smiling awkwardly at Yeojin, hand held out. An offer for Yeojin to take it.

And she does.

And this simple contact, not even skin on skin what with their thick gloves in between to combat the cold, should not be sending sparks down Yeojin’s arm and a shudder down her spine like it is. 

But oh, it is.

Yerim pulls Yeojin up and despite Yeojin’s complete incompetence in any motor skills when one Choi Yerim is involved, she stands once more on her feet.

And oh, Yerim is close. Closer than she’s been to Yeojin in years. Yeojin feels more inebriated right now than when she had been with alcohol clouding her mind. Yerim’s affect, something she’s well used to.

Used to be well used to, something bitter bites.

But everytime it hits her so much harder.

Yeojin is entranced as Yerim steadies herself, watches as she inhales ever so subtly, before staring Yeojin dead on, determined.

“Did you mean what you said?”

Yeojin falters, this isn’t how this was supposed to go.

Yerim was supposed to —

“Ah,” Yeojin coughs, “Which time?”

“The night before the last —” Yerim’s gaze falls to her feet as she chews on her lip, “When you said you — you didn’t hate me. Don’t hate me ... Anymore?”

Yeojin is quiet for a few moments, though she already knows what she’s going to say.

“I did mean it. And I, uh. Didn’t hate you. Ever.”

Yerim nods, rubs her nose a little. It’s red. Yeojin thinks it’s cute.

“Ok,” Her breath fogs up the air, and she nods to herself, “Good luck with the rest of the trail, then.”

Yeojin smiles, tightlipped, and watches as Yerim trudges off, before picking up the pace and skiing down the rest of the way effortlessly.

It’s not long before Yeojin manages to maneuver herself into a similar position she’d been in before she’d fallen victim to her subpar skiing skills. She bends her knees, shins resting on the edge of her boots, stabs her skiing poles a little too violently into the snow, and shoves. 

Yeojin is sent immediately propelling down the hill, and almost feels herself lean back before remembering the instructor telling them not to do this so as not to lose control, and instead, she jolts sideways, skis catching friction in the snow, the movement slowing her down substantially and letting her relax a little as she lets out a shaky breath, the air millimeters before her fogging up.

She presses her lips together, settles deeper into her coat and licks her lips, immediately regretting this when they’re quick to turn frosty. 

A few people pass her by, and suddenly Yeojin feels a little self conscious at the way she’d struggled with what really should be such an easy task. 

She tries to imagine the absolute best way this could go. 

Yeojin glides gracefully down the hill, exactly as Yerim had done before, perhaps does a double flip when she catches airtime, and totally wows all of her teachers and Yerim.

No, Yeojin shakes her head, slaps her face, not that.

She grits her teeth and decides just to finish the course and if worst comes to worst sit the rest of the day out or slide down the kiddie trails. Gathers up the courage to grip her poles tightly and push once more, the momentum picking up as she leaves a splatter of snow in her wake.

You stopped easily before, she reminds herself, and despite the growing urge to fall into a more protective position, she just bends her knees a little further, pushes a little harder, and it ... doesn’t get easier, but she certainly feels more in control, even when the speed picks up.

Much to her surprise, she doesn’t fall over, finishing with a smooth stop a decent ways away from the end of the trail — just to be safe — and while it’s not nearly as flawless as Yerim’s had been, it’s definitely a start, and she stops just forth of an impressed looking teacher who gives her a thumbs up, Yeojin offering an awkward smile back.

“Hey,” Hyeju greets Yeojin as Yeojin fiddles with her ski poles, “What were you and Yerim talking about?”

Yeojin startles, shoots a tentative glance towards the mentioned girl, who’s sat sipping at a cup of hot chocolate and talking with Hyunjin, giggling. Yeojin feels a pang of jealousy, lips curling down unkindly.

How foolish she’d been to assume Yerim must maintain her feelings — it’s been years. 

“Nothing,” She shuts down, ignores the pointed look Hyeju drills into the back of her neck as she stumbles out of her skis, stomping back to the lockers. 

Yeojin, on the last day of the trip, after multiple spent falling over, face first into the snow, suffering many a cloud of snow flying into her face and many a snowball thrown her way courtesy of Hyeju, manages to finally master the art of skiing. Sort of. And it’s nothing if not worth it for the way Hyeju eyes her enviously, the way even Hyunjin admits she totally aced the ending. 

She ignores the nagging reminder that it’s nice, but not so nice as to how Yerim’s hand had felt in her own, not so nice as the faint scent of cherries that seems to find Yeojin wherever she goes, try as she might to escape it.

She imagines waking up that fateful day and being just a little quicker to get to school, imagines not picking a fight with Heejin about the advent chocolate. Imagines what would have happened.

Yeojin isn’t sure whether she’d go back and tell herself to be a little quicker or not. She opts not to think about it, jumping onto the ski lift so eagerly she almost falls off. 

Yeojin sits quietly in her bed, bored out of her mind — she’d exhausted all of her phone games with the limited connection to the internet her phone manages to hold — and looks around as a last resort, eventually spotting the glint of the leftover orange soju in the glass bottle sitting inches away from the bunk opposite to her and Yerim’s. 

Hyunjin is dead asleep, Hyeju is flat on her stomach in her bunk paging through a worn copy from the school library of Anne of Green Gables under the excuse she’s practicing her English — Yeojin knows this is not true, not when she’d seen Chaewon’s instagram story from hours earlier of the girl holding an original copy mid pose — and Yerim is sitting in the bunk above Yeojin, oddly quiet.

Yeojin decides — when is it she’ll be able to drink again? Why not do it now on this last night when she wasn’t having much fun anyway?

She shuffles quietly out of bed and pours herself a cup, greedily chugging half of it down and filling it back up before climbing quietly back onto the mattress and sipping lightly at the sweet and tangy drink. 

Yeojin reaches down to her backpack, fumbling idly through it for her phone, when her hand brushes against something solid. Curious, she grips at its edge and pulls it out, her phone forgotten.

A diary! Why did Yeojin pack this? She doesn’t even remember packing it in the first place.

She flicks the cover open and sits down onto the bed, immediately realizing her phone had been on the mattress the entire time. With the aid of her flashlight, she reads the first page, but she can’t quite make it past the first few lines without cringing.

dear diary, does it ever get easier?

i miss Y —

No! 

She fake retches at the dramatic angst of her younger self, then realizes she might be bothering Yerim who sits in bed above her, still not talking. The thought makes her sad.

Why is Yerim being so quiet?

Yeojin almost wants to say something, ask her if something’s wrong. She wonders if they’re on speaking terms after their brief conversation in the snow.

The rosy look Yerim had given her the first night still twinges at her heart, gives her hope that maybe they are.

Yeojin balks, How had she kept this under wraps for so long?

How was it possible Yeojin had ignored the way Yerim sends her heart fluttering at a single glance?

Was it perhaps because Yerim had the goodness of heart not to look her way, not once, not since that day? 

Yeojin is struck with the awful feeling that Yerim was so complacent in Yeojin letting things snap away because she felt guilty. Felt. Past tense. Not dissimilar to the way she felt for Yeojin, she’s sure.

It hurts, sort of. The idea Yerim’s gotten over her. Though Yeojin can’t imagine her reaction gave her the impression that anything could happen — between them, that is.

How exactly must she have felt when she’d kissed Yeojin on the rooftop that summer night and Yeojin had done nothing but flee?

Yeojin can almost imagine the piercing hurt if Yerim had done that to her, the blackness making way for pain making way for blackness and so on. It frightens her how easily Yerim’s flames have become ignited again in her chest, frightens her how easily it is to miss her. 

Frightens her how much she probably, no, definitely gave up without even thinking.

Frightens her how she might have lost the chance at the one thing she’s sure she wants all because she’d been scared.

She considers, finger ghosting across the paper. Swipes to a new page, stares at the blank paper.

Is this a chance to make it right?

Is there still something to be made right?

Yeojin decides — there’s nothing to lose. Literally nothing. Other than a few pages from her diary.

And so she writes to Yerim.

And she writes some more.

She writes until her hand hurts, until all the words left unsaid have spilled from the weapon that is her hand onto the body of paper, the ink the blood, the fire her altar, her prayer Yerim’s name.

If Yerim deserves one thing, it’s this. The truth.

Yerim.

Yerim, who’s standing in front of her, ghostly pale and trembling and eyes red and lips bitten.

“Yeojin,” her voice quivers, and if the stammer that falls from her lips is anything to go by, words are failing her.

Yeojin’s eyes widen to accommodate Yerim and the way her eyes are caught on Yeojin’s bag, immediately asks, “Are you okay?”

Yerim decidedly shakes her head, lips pressed tight together. Yeojin is unsure of what to say, unsure of how one goes about comforting someone they’d shut out for the better part of three years, but Yerim takes the lead for her.

“I — ugh, this is so embarrassing,” She tries for a laugh, Yeojin assumes, though a wet, strangled sound is what comes out instead, “Um, can I use your phone to call my mom?”

Her... phone?

Yeojin thinks back to the letter. Don’t bring your phones. Of course, Yerim hadn’t brought hers. 

“Of course,” Yeojin nods quickly without thinking, unlocking the mobile and clicking into the phone app, passing it to Yerim.

She’d be more afraid of snooping if it were Hyeju instead, but even now, Yeojin knows it’s not something that’s passed Yerim’s mind. So she stays silent and still as Yeojin thanks her quietly.

Yeojin watches after Yerim as she quickly dials in a number, stepping out of the dorm quietly. The ghost of her lingers just inches from Yeojin’s touch, and it’s this that surges her forward to scribble down the final following words:

but most of all, I want your happiness, because if nothing else, that’s what I owe you and I doubt I can contribute to much of that other than telling you this: I did love you. I do love you. I was just scared, but I don’t regret you being my first kiss. All I regret is not telling you any of this, and that I can’t even call you a friend anymore. 

I’m sorry

from Im Yeojin

Yeojin pulls the pages out of the diary, folds them up carefully, and slips the note into Yerim’s bag just as the girl steps back into the room, not quite smiling, but certainly less upset than she’d been ten minutes ago. If Yerim noticed Yeojin’s hand quickly disappearing from inside her bag, she doesn’t show it.

Yerim passes Yeojin back her phone, and by now Yeojin has the sense not to delude herself into thinking the effect the older girl has on her is entirely owed to the alcohol coursing through her, so when her breath hitches with the briefest of touches of their skin, she knows it’s just par for the course, knows it’s only going to be all the more difficult to get over it. 

The bus drive back the following morning after a rushed breakfast is as it had been the way up, which is to say it’s entirely uneventful. Yeojin doesn’t sleep, again, and instead stares out of the window with her earphones plugged in to tune out the noise of Hyeju and Hyunjin’s — who sits in the seat behind Hyeju — conversation about some new game that’s coming out this spring. 

Yerim, therefore, sits in the seat just behind Yeojin. Something in the back of Yeojin’s mind as it ticks along tells her Yerim might be looking at her when Yeojin meets her eyes in the window’s reflection, but she looks away far too quickly and the glass is much too foggy for her to really be able to tell. 

Yeojin steps out of the bus and dusts her skirt off. Hyeju steps out after, only to immediately keel over and begin retching on the sidewalk.

Yeojin eyes her warily for a few more moments before Hyeju wipes her mouth and stands up.

“Uh,” Yeojin says, “You ok?”

“Yeah,” Hyeju grimaces, “It’s just..." she pauses to retch again, though Yeojin notes it’s exaggerated, “Chaewon posted a photo with a guy on her instagram story.”

“... You are so lame.”

Yeojin suffers a lighthearted slap to the shoulder before the two part ways and she bids an awkward goodbye to Hyunjin, before booking it to her house — well, as fast as she can lugging along a backpack and a suitcase that’s likely big enough for her to fit in — before Yerim gets the chance to see the note Yeojin had slipped into her bag and talk to her about it. 

It’s bittersweet knowing her chances of seeing her again are low, that Yerim and Hyeju and Hyunjin — who’ll hopefully pass this time — are all going to go off to a bigger academy to take their final exams for the rest of the year after the winter holidays, but if nothing else, the letter is a sort of closure. A confession. She imagines kissing Yerim and her running off, and the idea of dealing with that sounds as equally horrifying as it does thrilling.

Jinsol also sometimes says, not all endings are happy, but that doesn’t mean the ones that aren’t need to be sad, and Yeojin thinks, hopefully, that’s the case here.

Still, she can’t help it that when she finally steps into the quiet of her room — that looks, by the way, suspiciously like Heejin has come in and rifled through it while Yeojin has been gone — she immediately goes to flop onto her bed, face pressed into the pillow. 

She reaches blindly for the plush, though she knows it will do naught to relieve the desolate sickly feeling rising in her chest, and rolls over, raising it to her nose, the familiar smell earning a sigh.

Heejin yells something indistinguishable but it doesn’t register in Yeojin’s mind as her eyes burn. She squeezes them shut. How stupid. She’d promised she wouldn’t do this, not when there’s nothing else to be done.

It’s so stupid she still —

Heejin yells again, and Yeojin scrunches her nose, flopping over onto her stomach and plugging her earphones in. 

Seriously, who would’ve thought a girl like Heejin would be so loud? Yeojin’s long become used to it over the years, but it still frustrates her to no end when she’s trying to have her sad movie moment and the atmosphere is ruined every few seconds. 

She presses play on the first song that comes up without thinking, but it’d most certainly been a mistake. Because the first few chords play out and Yeojin can already feel herself spending her night crying into her pillow and spooning matcha ice cream out of the tub into her mouth, permanently formed in a triangle shape. Cry and eat, yes. That’s all she’ll do for the rest of her life. 

What I’m saying right now / Doesn’t mean that we’re starting up again

I’m just bringing back the remaining memories of you

This is so stupid. This is so so stupid. How long had she felt like this? How long has Yerim, sweet, kind, wonderful Yerim had this effect on her? How did she shut it off for so long? How did she see her face in the night, feel her hand in her own without shriveling up and dying? 

How did she —

“Yeojin!” Heejin screeches, and Yeojin realizes she’s opened her door now which brings a sour taste to her mouth — the idea of facing Heejin while she’s crying over a girl is one she’s not particularly keen on, “Your friend is asking for you.”

Yeojin groans loudly, “Just tell them to go away.”

In her melancholy state she hasn’t quite spent the time deciphering what friend would be asking for her at this time apart from Hyeju, and Heejin most certainly would’ve just said Hyeju. And both girls would probably be playing on the switch rather than Heejin bothering Yeojin in her well deserved moping time. Especially when she’d ignored her twice already and told her to go away.

“Uh, I can’t. She’s standing right next to me?”

Yeojin pulls her earphones out and sits up, looking bleary eyed at Heejin who stands in the door with none other than Choi Yerim standing by her side. She does a double take, blinks twice, but no, her eyes are not deceiving her. Yerim stands in her bedroom door for the first time in years.

“Wow,” Heejin remarks, “You kinda look terrible. Who hurt you?”

Yeojin thinks she might just die right here and now. Or kill Heejin. Or both. But definitely kill Heejin first.

“Anyway,” Heejin announces, “I’ll leave you guys alone,” and then shoves Yerim into the room, shutting the door on both of them.

The room is quiet, and all of the sudden Yeojin remembers she’s cradling the unicorn plush Yerim reserved for herself whenever she’d have sleepovers with Yeojin. She chucks it about as subtly as one can in a desperate endeavor to hide it under her bed, folds her legs in on herself and shuffles across the mattress so there’s room for Yerim to sit.

“...Yeojin,” Yerim begins, voice soft, eyes kind, as she sits just far enough away from Yeojin that she can’t feel the warmth radiating off of her, and she hates that even now, she misses it more than ever, “I read your letter.”

Yeojin tries not to sniffle. Emphasis on tries.

She dabs at her eyes, lets out a shaky breath, “Yeah. I uh. Hoped you’d read it.”

Yerim laughs softly, quietly. Not in a mocking way, not like Hyeju does when she’s making fun of Yeojin, even if it’s just pretend. Yerim has a way of assuring people like that, in her little sounds and behaviors. Everything about her point blank reveals she doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. 

Admittedly, it’s another thing Yeojin had missed. Belatedly, she realizes there’s not a single thing about Yerim she doesn’t miss. It brings a mirthless laugh spilling from her lips.

Yerim breaks the silence, “I wanted to ask you something.”

Yeojin looks up slowly, observes the older girl next to her. In all of her soft features and dark eyes and hair tied up in a messy ponytail. 

She nods silently, because there’s nothing else to say or to do.

“Do you want to try again?”

Yeojin blinks, raises her hand and points aimlessly at her own tear blotchy face, surprise certainly evident in her expression if the goofy smile Yerim gives her is any indication, “Me? Try again?”

“Try being friends again,” Yerim smiles, “Or, I mean, more. I — I still..."

“...You still?” Yeojin flounders, still? As if she’s not understanding Yerim or dreaming and there is a universe she was for some god forsaken reason chosen to exist in in which the Choi Yerim liked her, no, scratch that, still likes her.

“I... Still.” Yerim nods, and her cheeks redden, like mere days ago when she’d been sipping at the orange soju, “I still.” She takes a breath, “Like you.”

Yeojin wants to drop her cheek to Yerim’s shoulder, because it feels right. She eyes the steady inhale-exhale of Yerim’s breathing, the way that even 

She takes Yerim’s hand in her own, “I still like you too — I mean, the letter, you read it obviously, but I — uh, I mean I never stopped liking you, in fact I think now I only like you more...” She rambles, and Yerim smiles shyly, and it’s only then that Yeojin realizes she’s stalling. Yerim doesn’t appear to mind.

“...But I — yes. I want to try again. With you,” Yeojin confirms, and maybe all of this was all worth it if she’ll be seeing more of the dazzling smile Yerim wears on her lips.

Yeojin frowns. Tilts her head. Squints her eyes. Raises her hand up to her hair, before Yerim brushes it away with a smile.

“Yeojin!” She chastises lightheartedly, “You look perfect. Come on. We’d better get going if you wanna have time to find the classroom.”

Yeojin flushes. Even after almost a year of dating, the slightest of compliments from Yerim can bring her complexion from ivory to rosy, can bring her still heart to a stutter in a matter of moments. The way Yerim’s hand lingers in Yeojin's own even after she’s pulled it away from her hair does nothing to diminish this effect.

Yerim seems to note Yeojin’s hesitance, eyes her wary expression with an empathetic one.

Yeojin expects her to say something like it’ll be alright, Yeojin, but instead, Yerim just smiles softly and tells her, “I was nervous in my first class too.”

Yeojin’s eyes widen, “You were? But you didn’t —”

“I didn’t say, right,” Yerim’s smile contorts to one of guilt, “I just didn’t want to worry you, I mean, I need to set a good example for your first year at college —”

“Hey,” Yeojin pouts, “You’re my girlfriend!” (girlfriend, oh my god, Yeojin thinks, Choi Yerim is really her girlfriend), “You’re supposed to rely on me for things. I want you to rely on me for things.”

Yerim relents, and presses a brief peck to Yeojin’s lips, which in itself doesn’t fail to bring back the fluttering in Yeojin’s chest.

“What ... was that for?”

Yerim smiles, that sweet, angelic smile, “Because you’re right. I am your girlfriend. And you’re mine.”

They walk to Yeojin’s classroom, hand in hand, and Yerim swings their arms a little bit a few times. Yeojin thinks her heart might just burst.

“Bye Yeojin,” Yerim says, for the fifth time now.

Yeojin pouts, her brows furrow. 

Yerim just giggles and kisses her on the cheek once more before waving.

“Yerim unnie..." Yeojin whines, reaching for her hand again, to which Yerim clicks her tongue.

“I have an online lecture, I’ll be late, Yeojin!”

Yeojin scrunches up her nose again, to which Yerim giggles, “Fine..."

Yeojin steps into the room, breath still at a rapidly inclining pace. A quick glance at the front of the room lets her know the lecturer isn’t quite here yet, and so she scans the room, immediately advancing for a seat that isn’t taken. 

The lecturer steps into the room, and Yeojin is only drawn from her focus when her phone beeps insistently twice, buzzing against her leg in her pocket.

She pulls it out — subtly, though she’s not sure that’s necessary with the way the people sitting next to her scroll idly through their own phones, and opens her messages.

cherryerim (09:59)

love you (๑╹っ╹๑)

have a good class, yeojin ah <3

“Bleurgh.” Hyeju retches, dramatically, as she takes a seat next to Yeojin, presumably at the face she makes in reaction to her girlfriend’s (!!!) well-wishes. 

Yeojin shoots her a glare, “Shut up, I’m happy.”

“Happy,” Hyeju rolls her eyes, “Never thought you’d get a girlfriend. And before me?”

“Yeah..." Yeojin hums, giddily, not really listening anymore, “I do have a girlfriend,” she punctuates this remark with the wide grin that forms on her face as she looks down at her phone again.

And if those two messages cause such a stutter in Yeojin’s heart and mind that she forgets to open her notebook before writing down her notes on the plastic cover of the book, well, that’s no one’s business but her own. And maybe Yerim’s, when she tells her after class.

(Yerim giggles and calls her cute, and Yeojin blushes again, the heat of her face certainly rivaling that of the sun.)

If there's nothing else to be made of it, Yeojin will acquiesce. She doesn't lead the most interesting of lives, and she isn't the greatest of people. It's a little pessimistic, but sometimes pessimism opens the gate to other opportunities. 

Because knowing there was a second chance to this, knowing redemption is possible, lightens her heart a little. The sun shines a little brighter, now. Sweat beads on her forehead, her muscles ache, but it's an ache that has her head raising a little. 

Yerim smiles, and Yeojin's heart beats a little quicker.

My looking is a little more forward because you look at me.