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When Shuhua walked into the dorm after a long day, she expected to hear a variety of things. Like yesterday, it was Yuqi and Soyeon arguing about who got to be the thimble in Monopoly, and another day it was Minnie and Miyeon convincing each other that the sun was actually green.
But today, as she opened the door, she saw a steaming hot pot of some sort of soup. The wafts coming from above the pot make the aroma spread into the air. It’s really satisfying. Shuhua almost can’t help herself as she walks toward the kitchen, almost instinctually.
She took a deep breath in. Satisfying.
The other members are already seated around the table, talking about their individual schedules and such. Everyone had been really busy that day, so it was a surprise that anyone had the willpower to make any food at all, let alone something that smelled good. Shuhua heard Miyeon murmuring about how she was just going to make a plate of instant ramen.
As Shuhua narrowed her eyes to survey the area around her, she found all the members were seated but one. Of course.
Out of everyone in the group, Soojin was the undisputable best chef. Even when the fridge was empty, she somehow had an ability to create delectable meals from what seemed to be nothing.
Soojin stirred the ladle around, making sure everything was mixed as it should be. She caught Shuhua’s eyes and smiled.
“Sit down before the food gets cold.” Shuhua obliged, spinning a chair beside the couch and pushing it, almost cartoonishly, to the counter where the pot was now held. She did have to squeeze in on the edge, though, because Yuqi and Soyeon had to be arguing for some reason and decided to take up three-quarters of the table area.
Even they snapped out of their food-driven haze when they saw Soojin nearing with bowls from the cabinet. She laid them down, one by one, but she only brought four. Minnie noticed this, but quickly shifted her attention to the noodles Soojin had brought to eat with the soup.
While to an outsider this may look confusing, to Shuhua it wasn’t at all. She just waited, patiently, because she knew what was going to happen. And, as expected, it did. Soojin brought a larger bowl with more flourishes. This one had wavy blue patterning all over it that had faded a bit over time. She put it down in front of Shuhua, carefully ladled what seemed to be the perfect amount of soup, and brought a whole extra plate of noodles and toppings and put it down as well.
She then went back to pull out a smaller bowl, and ladled a small amount of soup, before sitting down beside Shuhua and taking her soup as well.
It was quiet. The only thing you could hear was the hum of the refrigerator and a subtle woosh from the vents to get rid of the faint smell of something burning. It was nice, until two people said something at the same time.
First, it was Soyeon. “Soojin? Why is there cucumber in the soup?”
There was Minnie, too. She had been more observant, looking carefully at the way Soojin served Shuhua. “Where’s everyone else’s plate of toppings, Soojin? Why does only Shuhua get one?”
Soojin heard both questions at the same time, and took a second to think before responding accordingly. “Soyeon, there’s supposed to be cucumbers. I told you five times in the morning that you would need to pick them out, and besides, they’re good for you.” She turned her head to meet Minnie’s waiting eyes. “Minnie, you don’t like noodles in your soup. We ate the whole bag of barbeque chips together less than thirty minutes ago, so I didn’t think you’d need them.”
Yuqi picked up on the conversation, stopping for a moment after trying to feed Soyeon the slice of seasoned cucumber she had tried to discreetly flick into the trash can. “I do? Soojin, you know how I like to eat. It’s like you do all these special meals for Shuhua, but the rest of us get none of it!”
Miyeon, ever the peacekeeper, chimed in. “Not that we don’t appreciate what you make for us! We do, just that if you like Shuhua more you should just mention it.” Everyone at the table thought nothing of it before they looked back at Soojin again, who was tightly gripping the spoon as if it owed her money.
Minnie, Soojin, Yuqi, and Soyeon glanced between each other rapidly, before nodding at the same time.
This is probably none of our business, let’s just eat.
Shuhua, however, heard basically none of what the rest of the members were discussing. After finishing her soup and noodles in record time, she turned to Soojin and looked her in the eyes. “Ah, thank you for another amazing meal, Jin-jin!” She threw her hands around Soojin and crushed her in a bear hug.
Soojin’s face went red. Whether it was from lack of oxygen or a blush, nobody could really tell.
The sun shone between the clouds. Soft shades of pink and orange shine through Shuhua’s window. One of them lands directly on her face, startling her and waking her up.
Shuhua blinks, once, then twice. The world has come to life now, hasn’t it? She sighs. Nothing I can do about it now. She can’t go back to bed again, but there isn’t a schedule or anything that she needs to worry about. Half of her wants to continue to laze and not really do anything, but the other says that she should probably be productive before she regrets it later.
What eventually encourages her to get out of her bed is the smell of pancakes. Not the frozen ones Shuhua normally microwaves and shoves in her mouth like nobody’s watching. These ones smell radiant, so of course she runs into the hallway to see if she can get a bite.
She puts on some socks and slides through the recently mopped wood that she knows Minnie will kill her for getting streaks on, but stops abruptly in front of the kitchen island.
Soojin’s the only one awake. She’s also the one making pancakes, whisking extra batter in a plastic bowl to serve everyone else. The only thing is that they’re all pink, and everyone knows pink means strawberry . Her mortal enemy.
A bit dejected, she moves forward groggily to sit down. For the first time in a while, she gets to choose her chair. But the sound that the chair makes when you pull it out causes Soojin to raise her head and smile at Shuhua.
She cocks her head. “You’re awake early. It’s eight o’clock.”
“What do you mean, early?”
“There’s a schedule everyone takes on these days, you know? Soyeon wakes up the earliest, eight-fifteen. Then Miyeon and Minnie around the same time, I’d like to say eight-thirty? Yuqi comes out of her room at eight-fifty even though we all know she’s been awake since seven scrolling on her phone, and you’re awake at nine.”
Shuhua frowns in thought, scrunching her face and looking back through all the times that this may or may not have happened. And it did. “Jin-jin, you’re so thoughtful. Even I didn’t know we did that.”
Soojin scratches her head, shrugging slightly. “Not really… but thanks. I appreciate it. Just give me a second, okay?” And she turns back and does something Shuhua can’t even describe, juggling eggs and cutting something dark, and grabbing a whisk out of nowhere. At one point, Shuhua swears she saw Soojin throw the bowl in the air.
It’s a bit addicting to watch, but soon enough the sequence ends. Shuhua hears a murmured ‘ Close your eyes…’, so she does. When she opens them, she squints for a few seconds. The light after a while can blind you. But she looks down, and there is a plate in front of her with a humongous pancake. It radiates warmth, and when Shuhua eventually cuts it open there’s soft batter, and a gooey chocolate center. It looks so nice Shuhua sticks her finger in the chocolate, although she has to quickly yank it out due to the heat.
Soojin’s by the fridge, getting the customary toppings like chocolate syrup and honey, but sees Shuhua fervently blowing on her finger like a birthday candle that refuses to go out and grabs a small ice pack from the freezer. “Shuhua… I know my food is good. But is it really that good?”
Shuhua pouts in response. “Haven’t you looked at the gooey center? As if you wouldn’t have done the same in my position, it looks great. Like the chocolate fountain from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. ”
Soojin furrows her brows. “I’ve never watched it before, so I’d have no idea whether you’re right or wrong with that guess. It doesn’t matter, anyways. Just eat and enjoy, okay? I made it for you.”
Shuhua smiles. “Of course. I’ll eat it just for you, Jin-jin!” Shuhua throws both her hands out to make a thumbs-up gesture, before picking up her fork and knife and tearing into the plate of food like a rabid dog.
She does end up with more than a bit of chocolate around her mouth, but by the time anyone really notices it’s nine o’clock and everyone’s awake and eating. Except Soojin, really. She just sits there and watches. To an outsider it might look a bit weird, but it’s just a normal Tuesday.
It’s eagle-eyed Soyeon who notices the mess around Shuhua’s mouth first. Shuhua remembers it vividly. Soojin had just made her a second pancake, and she was eating it with the same ferocity she did the first, when she looked around to take her surroundings in. Of course, for no given reason, but she met Soyeon’s eyes. They held contact for what? One, two, seconds, before Soyeon burst out into laughter.
“You guys, look at Shuhua! Her face is so full of chocolate, it’s like if Haku and Mata ate the pancakes.”
“Dogs can’t eat chocolate.” It was a bad rebuttal, and they both knew it.
Yuqi turned around as well, stifling a laugh after looking at Shuhua’s face getting madder by the minute. “No, no! It’s really not that bad. Just get a paper towel to clean it or something.”
Miyeon and Minnie were too engrossed in their own conversation to truly pay attention to what everyone else was saying, so Shuhua saw there was no point in arguing. “Jin-jin. The towels are there, please pass me one?” To convince her, Shuhua tried to pull off her patented toothy smile, but her teeth were also covered in chocolate, so really it looked more like a deep void than a smile.
It made Soojin laugh a bit, though, so she tore off some paper towels from the roll by the stove and went over to where Shuhua was sitting. Instead of handing it to her, though, she walked up to the table, sat down beside Shuhua, and wiped it off herself.
This is what got Minnie and Miyeon’s attention, because of all people Soojin shouldn’t be the one doing this. But she was. Nobody could believe their eyes. But Shuhua was leaning in, and they were murmuring things in each other's ears nobody else could hear.
The remaining four members, one by one, slowly snuck into the balcony, the only place in the dorm that was guaranteed to bring no arguments over dirty messes or decorations.
The first person to speak was the one who had started it, Soyeon. “So, I don’t really know if I missed anything, but since when was that ,” She gestured wildly towards the sliding glass door. “A thing? Because it wasn’t a thing last I remember.”
Miyeon spoke up next. “I wouldn’t say it’s a thing . But you haven’t really noticed how Soojin favors Shuhua? She keeps making these elaborate meals for her. Like she made her chocolate pancakes because we all ate strawberry ones! I like chocolate more than strawberry. She knows it, too!”
Minnie held Miyeon’s shoulders tightly to prevent her from falling down. “Miyeon, it’s alright. I can buy you some chocolates tomorrow if you want. There’s no need to be too aggressive about it.” Miyeon relaxed, rolling her shoulders in the sort of way someone does when they’re trying to simulate better posture.
“Everyone knows Soojin favors Shuhua. But do we really need to meddle in their business? I’m sure it’ll be fine if we let it play out or something, I wouldn’t worry too much about it.”
That was something they could all agree on. But they all looked back through the glass, and Soojin and Shuhua were still in their own little world.
“Let’s play cards?” Minnie suggested.
It was fun, for a while. But explaining to a passerby how thirty-two cards dropped on his head and why Yuqi had purposely fallen into the dumpster after a loss in Go Fish were a bit more difficult.
“Hey, at least we only live on the third floor! And I’m barely bruised!”
Miyeon, Minnie, and Soyeon yelled in unison. “You shouldn’t have done it anyway!”
Shuhua smiled.
She had created what Miyeon called ‘a concoction’, Minnie called ‘some sort of mixture’, and what Soyeon and Yuqi had called ‘move away from the T.V’. To be fair, they were in the middle of the sixth episode of Blue Period, but still.
It wasn’t even that bad! But even Shuhua didn’t know what to call it. A stew might work? Really, it looked bad, but tasted pretty good. At least Shuhua thought so. All she really did was slice some beef and fry it in a pan, seasoning with random things she found in the cabinet. Then chopped up some vegetables, and found a soup recipe online. Even if Shuhua insisted it tasted heavenly , it was a struggle to get her members to eat it. First, she walked by the television again to block Yuqi and Soyeon’s view.
“Yuqi! Soyeon! Come and take some of Shuhua’s splendiferous stew!” The two looked at the tray Shuhua was holding, with three bowls, then at each other, and then started cackling like witches who had finally patented a brew. Yuqi peered into one bowl and gagged. “Okay, it smells good, but that look? It looks like Haku or Mata’s litter boxes. Speaking of which, you should clean that soon.”
“I will, actually. And seriously, it’s great! Soyeon, try it!” Shuhua set down the tray on the small coffee table in front of the television. She took one bowl, and rushed to the couch to try and forcefully spoon her stew into Yuqi’s mouth. Somehow, Yuqi was too fixated on her show to notice Shuhua, who had switched tactics and went behind her instead. Shuhua grabbed Yuqi’s head and shoved a large spoonful of stew into her open mouth. Yuqi’s face contorted into one of anger, to curiosity, to resigned acceptance.
“Hey, wait. This is really good! Are you sure you made this?” Soyeon was also curious, so she also got up from the coffee table and grimaced before eating a spoonful.
“You’re right, Yuqi… Shuhua, is there any extra?” Shuhua raised an eyebrow. “I thought you wouldn’t like it that much. There’s cucumber, carrot, and pepper in it.” With every vegetable mentioned, Soyeon’s face wore an expression of increased desperation, before she flopped back down on the couch beside Yuqi holding her bowl.
“Just leave me alone… Who knew vegetables could taste alright…”
Soyeon seems to be in the midst of her own realizations, so Shuhua goes to the kitchen to eat at the island. Minnie and Miyeon emerge from Miyeon’s room. Miyeon has pristine makeup on, and a tiara to match, while Minnie’s holding a camera and just looks tired.
Shuhua nods her head toward them. “Photoshoot again?”
Minnie sighs, almost dejectedly. “Yeah… thousands of pictures and only three were good enough.” Miyeon scoffed in response.
“Barely! Maybe I should sign you up for those photography classes you’ve been begging for.”
“I don’t know how you expected me to be good at taking pictures at all when you never gave me time to develop my skills!” Minnie counters.
Shuhua tries to approach them with a bowl of stew, but gets interrupted in her movement by Miyeon’s expressive arms. They sweep a bowl clean off the tray and cause it to stain Miyeon’s pristine white shirt. She even gets some vegetables in her hair.
In the moment, Shuhua is stunned. Miyeon is gobsmacked. And Minnie is… giddy? She picks up her camera and starts snapping pictures of Miyeon. Front, back, bird’s eye view. Miyeon just has a frown on her face, feeling around to see what exactly was ruined.
“Aish, Shuhua, it’s all over me! At this point, I should attack you!” Miyeon is never one to say things she doesn’t mean, so Shuhua starts preparing to dodge an uppercut. But it comes to a stop when Minnie dips her finger into Miyeon’s hair and licks the stew off.
“It’s really nice, Shuhua. Who would have thought miss ‘burn-a-pot-of-rice’ could make something good to eat?” After the words leave Minnie’s mouth, Miyeon suddenly looks intrigued. She looks at the tray of stews Shuhua had freshly restocked and takes a spoonful. Instantly, her face melts. “Hey, you’re right! Have you tried to give some to Soyeon and Yuqi?”
Shuhua’s gaze goes to the couch where the two were last spotted, but instead they’re at the table. Yuqi’s still wearing gloves, probably from lifting the metal handles of the pot where the stew was cooked. It’s halfway finished already. Minnie and Miyeon lock eyes on the pot and run to it as fast as possible.
Shuhua just smiles, glad to have not burnt something for once. Surely it won’t happen again.
They all hyperfocus on the stew for a while until it’s finished, the pot scraped clean.
“Wow, that was really good.” Miyeon says. She grabs a paper towel to daintily clean the sides of her mouth.
“I don’t even need dinner.” Yuqi, on the other hand, has stained her shirt beyond recognition. And she borrowed it from Shuhua too!
“Can we watch Blue Period? It’s almost finished.” Soyeon cuts in. Her bowl has all the vegetables remaining, untouched.
“Soyeon! Appreciate the meal!” Minnie almost shrieks, before stopping. “I don’t really know why I did that. Sorry.”
They all share a laugh, until the door clicks open. Soojin comes in, looking tired. She’s holding a bag of groceries, probably from the corner store down the block.
She looks around, surveying her surroundings. She takes in Yuqi with her shirt, Minnie who’s just abruptly stopped laughing, Miyeon who’s taken off her tiara, and Soyeon who’s frozen in the middle of reaching for the remote.
And then there’s Shuhua, whose smile was wiped clean off as soon as Soojin stepped in.
She frowns immediately. “Okay, what’s going on? Why does it seem like the apocalypse just hit? Why is everyone frozen? To reiterate: what is going on?”
Soyeon blinks rapidly. “Alright, wow, I have no idea why we all froze like we did something wrong.” The other occupants of the table look around frantically, sharing a common thought. Did we do something wrong? Why does it feel like we did?
Soyeon continues. “Shuhua tried cooking. She made a stew that looked ugly, but tasted surprisingly good. We all sat around the table and ate it.”
Soojin looks satisfied with that answer, and visibly relaxes. She picks up the bag of groceries and places it on the kitchen counter. “That’s nice. Yeah, can I try some?”
Everyone freezes again. Minnie speaks up, this time. “So… it’s all finished. We ate it all.”
Soojin’s face falters. Just for a moment, but Shuhua picks up on it, choosing not to say anything. “Ah, no problem. I hope you’ll make it again sometime. Anyway, what do you guys want for dinner?”
“There was a lot of stew, so we didn’t think we’d be hungry for dinner.” Soojin nods along to what Miyeon is saying.
“Makes sense. Hey, do you guys want to watch the Blue Period finale? I caught up on it on the ride home from my schedule today.” Everyone cheers and runs to the living room, but Shuhua stays behind.
“Jin-jin, are you alright? I saw your face stop a bit when you saw there was no stew left. I know you’re the main cook of the house and all, so maybe you wanted to try my stew and see how I’ve improved!”
Soojin cracks the first real smile she’s had all day. “Of course not. Go to the kitchen! I’ll boil myself some rice to eat so that I don’t miss out too much.”
Shuhua runs to the living room, leaving Soojin alone.
When she thinks about it, Soojin doesn’t even really know why she’s mad. Of course she cooks, but maybe it hurts a bit to be left out of the stew debacle. And she always makes special meals for Shuhua, especially. Not even a bit of the stew was left? But she keeps quiet, finishes boiling her rice, and eats it quietly as Yatora paints in reflections nobody but he can truly understand.
Soojin’s decided to make something new today. Italian cuisine. She doesn’t really know what that fully entails, though, so she’ll make some pasta, sauce, and meatballs and be done with it. As the water boils, she clicks a timer to life and waits, scrolling her phone in the meanwhile. When you’re waiting for things to get done it can be kinda boring.
She looks at the alarm. Two minutes. She gets the pasta, grabs the cans of crushed tomatoes she’d gotten the day prior and empties them into another pan, stirring every ten seconds to avoid burning on the bottom. She tosses it around for a minute and a half before removing the wooden spoon she had been using to stir and placing it on the counter.
The alarm, again. Ten seconds. Can she get to the spice cabinet or not? She decides not to go for it, and instead grabs the plastic bag where the pasta is held and dumps it into the freshly boiled water.
Two seconds. Right before the alarm rings, Soojin reaches it and turns it off before the unsavory beeps ring in her head for too long. She sighs.
She’s alone in the house. Everyone else wanted to go to what? A gaming cafe or something? She didn’t really pay attention, Soojin isn’t the biggest fan of games. She could say so herself. That wasn’t what was bothering her; it was the stew incident from the day prior.
Even if it’s a bit irrelevant, she feels it has some importance. From what she understands, Shuhua tried cooking. It ended up tasting nice, and everyone finished it and had no room for dinner by the time Soojin had come back from that day’s schedule.
Soojin got up to start stirring the pasta. It had started to become more limp, if you could call it that. She bit into a piece, but it was still hard on the inside, so she threw it out and put the lid back on. There was also the matter of the sauce, so she finally built up the resolve to grab the stool from the top of the fridge, and stand on it in order to grab what she needed. Basil, oregano, rosemary, thyme… It was surprising how much thought went into these meals.
She measured them in portions and added them to the sauce, as well as some cream she had found in the fridge. Then Soojin went to the freezer to defrost the meatball meat she had prepared the day prior, because she felt like she’d be too tired to do it today. And she was right, so there was something to be thankful for.
But as she took the sauce off simmer and started shaping the meatballs to cook in it, she fell deep into thought again. She knew she was upset about something, so she should think logically about it.
First: Shuhua cooked. In any other situation, Soojin would have rejoiced. Another person to cook with makes it nicer, but Shuhua had promised that they would cook that night together. She thinks it hurts her feelings to be left out.
Two: It tasted nice. Now she’s just torturing herself. The sauce smelled nice. No, like it was burning. So she walked over and stirred it a bit, then took the saucepan off the heat for a bit.
Three: Nobody wanted to eat dinner. This also irked her a bit. Soojin knew that she didn’t show the most emotion someone could ever show, so she preferred to show it in ways people would appreciate, like cooking.
There it was. The pinpointed issue was that Shuhua had cooked without her, so she hadn’t had a chance to show how much she cared about her that day.
It seemed she had even more to think about. But she had finished rolling the meatballs, so she put the sauce back on the heat and plopped the meatballs in, while draining the pasta and letting it rest in the pot.
She sighs. Let’s just wait until everyone else gets back. Maybe then I can figure out what I should do.
Minnie, Miyeon, Soyeon, Yuqi, and Shuhua are all chaotically yelling when they come through the door, barging in without a care in the world. When Soojin hears them, she swears that with a little more force they would have run the door down and scratched the back of their heads apologizing like little kids.
“You guys are back? What did you play, fishbowl?” Soojin asks, trying to lighten the mood some. She sees Minnie and Yuqi dejected, as if they’d lost something. But Soyeon, Miyeon, and Shuhua all have grins on their faces that look straight out of a Pixar movie, so something must be up.
Minnie’s the first to speak. “No, we weren’t really going for prizes, you know? It was more of a feeling.” Soyeon scoffs.
“That’s because we played in the booth for Zombie Killers: Ultimate Brain K.O and we beat you at a score of one to–” Yuqi cuts her off.
“Tut-tut, not a word out of you. We didn’t lose that badly anyway.”
Now Shuhua speaks up. “You lost one to ninety-eight. And you still kept trying. If anything, Yuqi, Minnie was the only one really trying at the game. I don’t know what you were doing when you tried to shoot at those trees.” Yuqi yelped.
The group continued to reminisce about their time in the arcade, but stopped after smelling something from the kitchen. It was Miyeon, really.
“You guys, is that pasta?”
Shuhua furrows her nose. “Yeah, I smell it too.”
While Miyeon and Shuhua were thinking, Yuqi, Soyeon, and Minnie ran to the table as fast as possible. They were all hungry, to be fair.
At the table, Minnie, Yuqi, and Soyeon were already digging in. The only thing that surprised Shuhua was Soyeon fitting her meatballs into her mouth all at once. It seemed Soyeon noticed the staring, though. “If I can fit my fist in my mouth, why can’t I fit a meatball?” That must have been the gist, because all Shuhua heard was an “Om-nom-nom-om-chom”.
But the table was peaceful, even as Shuhua sat down. Everyone else had served themselves, so logically her plate would arrive next. Right? Because Shuhua waited. One minute, two, then five had passed and she had no meal in sight. So she called out to Soojin.
“Soojin? Where’s my food?” Soojin frowned in response, only slightly.
“Get it yourself like everyone else. Can’t you?”
This surprised everyone at the table. Minnie’s fork clinked on her ceramic plate. Yuqi actually dabbed the sides of her mouth with a napkin. Soyeon stopped chewing her meatball, and Miyeon stopped eating with her pinky extended. And Shuhua?
Her jaw had dropped wide open. But she didn’t want to argue with Soojin, she never did. So she got up and served herself a meal. Whilst in the process, Soojin spoke up. “I’m a bit tired, so I’ll go to my room now. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Everyone left at the table waved tentatively, and as Soojin went into her room they looked between each other, curious and scared. Mostly scared, though.
Soyeon, ever perceptive, raises an eyebrow. “Shuhua, what did you do?”
Shuhua raises her hands in a mock defense. “I don’t know! Really, this came out of nowhere. I would have done something differently if I knew.”
Minnie says something now. “Knew what? Just last week you were acting like a married couple, and now it’s like you’re having a divorce or something.”
“A divorce? I’m honored you thought we were married, but really, my guess is as good as yours to what happened.” Shuhua gets up and starts serving herself a plate of pasta, but as she scoops the sauce afterwards a fair bit drips onto the floor. She sighs.
Yuqi loudly slurps her noodles before pointing out the mess. “Shuhua! You need to clean that soon.”
Now Shuhua’s a bit annoyed. First she accidentally causes Soojin to get mad enough that she goes back to her room in the middle of dinner, then she accidentally drips some sauce on the ground, and now Yuqi just has to point out that she hadn’t cleaned it yet?
She stares blankly into Yuqi’s eyes for a few seconds. “Sorry, I’ll clean it now.” Her movements are almost robotic as she gets a paper towel to clean the stain, and drops it into the trash can fleetingly.
Even Yuqi can tell something is up, but she doesn’t say much afterwards looking at Shuhua’s reaction. She hums. It seems like it’ll be a bit of an awkward dinner today, huh?
Shuhua can’t sleep.
Not that she doesn’t want to, but she can’t. Maybe it’s the effect of a guilty conscience, maybe it’s her dry throat, but she can’t close her eyes tonight. Resigned, she pushes herself out of bed to try and force herself to do something productive. Or get a glass of water. To be honest, who’s to judge?
In the living room, she sees Miyeon. She’s squinting her eyes at the bright T.V, clearly trying to stay awake but not succeeding very well.
Shuhua joins her on the couch, resting her head against the couch cushions. Somehow it’s easier to fall asleep here; perhaps it’s the bright lights that make your eyes sore.
She’s about to fall asleep, when she hears Miyeon. “You don’t know why Soojin’s mad at you?”
Shuhua shakes her head, but Miyeon can’t see her. “No.”
Miyeon murmurs quietly in response, saying something Shuhua couldn’t quite catch. “What?”
“You really don’t notice? She makes elaborate, decorated meals for all of us, sure, but she puts in the most effort for you. First it was when she made those strawberry milkshakes, but made yours chocolate because you hate strawberries.”
Shuhua frowned. “But the rest of you guys would do that for me too.” A nod. “We would, sure, but it’s certainly not the only thing. Remember about a month ago, when Soojin promised she would cook for us if we got three music show wins?”
“Yeah. But she made all of us noodles. They weren’t equal, in case you remembered. Yours were plated, delectably, may I add, and ours were haphazardly plopped on the plate. She literally spent twenty minutes arranging your meal on a heated plate so it’d look nice and not get cold.”
“Really? I never noticed.”
Miyeon frowns. “I think it’s because you’ve started to accept these things as part of your life, not something that someone who loves you goes out of their way to do. Like when Soojin stopped cooking for you, you noticed it immediately. But I’m sure if she’d continued and we never had this conversation, then you would be none the wiser.” Miyeon hums, as if their conversation is over as quickly as it started.
“I don’t get why she stopped, though. What did I do?”
Miyeon blinks. Her eyes dart to the couch, to the clock on the wall, and to the television playing reruns of an old show nobody watches anymore.
“You really don’t know? At all?” Shuhua nods her head.
“It’s because you started cooking too.”
Shuhua’s eyebrows furrow, like she’s trying to solve complex mathematical equations instead of simple human reactions. “How would that be an issue? You guys hated that I was leeching off your meals.”
Miyeon tilts her head to the side from where she’s resting on the couch. “Yeah, Sherlock. But when you started cooking food, you always let all of us have some but Soojin. Like when you made those carrot fried noodle things.”
“I didn’t let Soyeon have any.”
“Do you really think Soyeon would fight for a bite of your carrot fried noodles? Just the word carrot is enough to scare her into running a mile away.”
Shuhua moves her head in agreement. “Touché.”
Miyeon continues her motivational talk/informative speech. “I don’t know what goes on in Soojin’s head, okay? Nobody does. But when you made your own and didn’t let her have any, maybe it hurt her feelings. All the food she’s made for you I couldn’t name if I had a thousand tongues, but you didn’t even let her have a bite of your instant noodles.”
“I didn’t want to disappoint her, okay?” Shuhua moves to sit criss-crossed on the couch, tapping the sides of her knees in a steady rhythm. “She makes all these cool things for us– for me– and I can barely make anything half-decent. My noodles were burnt, Miyeon! I care about Soojin enough to not torture her enough with that.”
“Did you ever stop to think that she may want to be tortured?”
“That makes zero sense.” Shuhua sighs. “It’s late. I’ll talk to you later?”
Miyeon smiles. “Always.”
Shuhua lays her head on Miyeon’s shoulder, and falls asleep.
The next day, Shuhua awakes, startled. Sure, she knows that she fell asleep yesterday on the couch, but there’s nobody beside her, and a piece of paper uncomfortably resting on her forehead. It’s stuck on with tape, like a pseudo sticky note.
She itches her forehead, yanking it off.
“Geez, what does this say?” Shuhua grimaces. “You’re kidding.”
The basic gist of the letter, obviously written a bit frantically, was that Yuqi and Soyeon, and Miyeon and Minnie, were going out early on a double date. So she’d be alone in the house with Soojin until much later in the evening. It seemed planned exactly so that Soojin and Shuhua would have to work out their issues, but what does Shuhua know?
She sat straight up on the couch, wiped her eyes of the crust that always developed in the mornings, and barrelled straight for the kitchen.
Honestly, she didn’t know what she was expecting. Maybe Soojin would be cooking again like she normally did, but it was empty. Nobody was there, and nobody would continue to be there, it seemed.
Shuhua sighed. “I’ll make myself something then.” She didn’t even know how to cook pancakes, or flip them, or make batter. So she goes into the dry ingredient cabinet (aptly named by Soojin) and takes out flour, sugar, and baking powder. Then she takes out her phone and looks for a recipe so she doesn’t screw things up.
A frenzy later, she’s come up with something that looks decent. Shuhua figured very quickly she can’t flip pancakes well, so she laid them out and scrambled them instead, drizzling some maple syrup and some chocolate chips from her hidden chocolate stash.
She sits down to eat. She chews slowly and procedurally, not really caring about the taste of the food. Shuhua realizes then; she’s bored. Painfully so. But she continues to chew, just so she can have a bit of energy for the day.
She’s so in her head that she doesn’t even realize that Soojin’s coming up behind her. The older one looked at the kitchen, where another plate had been put down beside Shuhua. But it looked so sad that even Soojin felt bad for her outburst the previous day. The lights were off, batter hadn’t been cleaned up, and some of the extra chocolate chips were partially melting in a bowl.
Soojin sat down beside Shuhua after a few seconds of lurking in the hallway. They pretend as if the other isn’t there, eating silently and trying to keep as much peace as possible. Soojin finishes first, and makes to go back to her room, but Shuhua extends a hand and stops her in her tracks.
She hums. “No, you’re not going back to your room. We have to talk first, right?” She says it in such a cheery way that Soojin knows she’s probably trying to overcompensate for how nervous she really feels. Soojin gulps, trying to remove Shuhua’s iron grip from around her wrist discreetly.
“I… is this really necessary? Everything’s fine and dandy!” Soojin even tries to accompany it with jazz hands to enhance her point. Does it work? Not at all. If anything, Shuhua holds on tighter, as if she’s about to lose her if she lets go.
“It is.” Shuhua states, simply. They’re in the living room now. Shuhua sits in the middle of the couch, and makes a broad gesture with her hand. “Sit wherever you like.”
Soojin sits in an armchair, looking obviously uncomfortable as to what is happening. She doesn’t say anything, and neither does Shuhua, for a long moment, so Shuhua does what she always does and takes the initiative to be the one who speaks first. “What happened yesterday?”
It’s a bit too pointed for Soojin’s liking, so she tries to deflect. “I was in a bad mood.” She pauses. “Did the food I made taste good? I tried adding different seasonings and–”
Shuhua raises a finger, almost robotically. “We both know you’re trying to change the subject. It won’t work, just so you know.” Soojin sighs.
“Like I asked, what happened yesterday? I wanted to know if I did something wrong, so maybe I can change it?” Shuhua looks hopeful, like everything would go back to normal.
“I was in a bad mood.” Soojin repeats. “I don’t really want to get angry, so I suggest you put the topic to rest.”
Shuhua shakes her head. “I don’t think you’d really get mad at me. And if something’s bothering you, I want to know, so I can make it better. I’m not happy if you’re not happy, okay?”
It’s a sweet gesture, but Soojin’s still cautious, so she stays silent. Shuhua watches, waiting. When she realizes Soojin won’t budge, she tries to say something to fill the silence. “You know, I was talking to Miyeon yesterday.”
Soojin quirks an eyebrow. “Really? What did you guys talk about?”
Shuhua raises her arms and places her hands behind her head, relaxing her posture. “Something about torturing, or whatever. I didn’t really understand it.”
Now Soojin’s truly confused. She leans forward in her chair. “How did you get to torture? That doesn’t seem realistic in the slightest.”
Shuhua scrunches her nose. “I got your attention, but no, not that. It took me a bit to figure out what she meant, but I think I get it.”
“Get what? Please, just get to the point.” Soojin doesn’t mean to sound snippy, but her wrist still hurts a bit and she’ll be damned if she doesn’t hear what Shuhua has to say.
Soojin grabs a bottle of water beside her, left there from the past day, drinking it steadily. Shuhua gets up, sits beside Soojin, and lightly taps her nose. “You like me, don’t you? Romantically, I mean, before you start saying something about being a friend. ”
At that, Soojin spits out all the water in her mouth. It’s embarrassingly similar to a water gun, but Shuhua just laughs like nothing is wrong. “I figured it out, didn’t I? Maybe Miyeon was right about her subconscious stuff, or it was just the medical dramas talking.”
Soojin was still stunned. “This is a dream, right? Because this situation is not happening to me right now.”
“You don’t want it to?” Shuhua frowns.
“No, I… The reason I was in a bad mood wasn’t just because I felt left out. It was because you forgot about me.”
Shuhua looks confused, so Soojin elaborates. “We were supposed to cook dinner together. I’m not mad that you decided to cook at all!” Soojin takes a deep breath. “Like the meals I used to make. It’s my way of showing I care, I guess.”
Shuhua smiles. “That’s beautiful.” She pauses. “Hey, do you want to cook now? Since we weren’t able to, earlier.”
When Minnie, Miyeon, Soyeon, and Yuqi come back from their day-long couple retreat, they don’t expect much. It definitely wasn’t Soojin holding Shuhua up like they were ice dancers in order to wipe off cake batter from the ceiling.
Soojin and Shuhua were so focused that they only realized everyone else was back because of the door clicking shut. Their eyes locked onto the newcomers, equal parts guilty and giddy.
It’s Shuhua who speaks first. “Hey, you guys… It’s totally not what it looks like.”