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The thought comes to Megan’s mind, dimly, that Yoonchae’s dressed like the sunset dying right in front of them. Pale orange shirt, pink cardigan, white denim shorts. Totally stereotypical sunset colors. She’s even got palm trees on her shirt, with some kind of cheesy saying about LA.
In literally any other situation, Megan would’ve teased her for it, poked at her outfit like usual, but things have just been… weird between them lately. Not bad-weird, not tense-weird, just the kind of weird that makes you overthink every tiny thing you say.
Ever since they made up behind that stupid dumpster, things had been different. Better, actually. Megan talks to Yoonchae more now instead of snapping at her or disappearing into herself like she used to. And Yoonchae, in that gentle-but-not-soft way, tells Megan when she’s being rude, asks her if she’s okay like it’s a normal question and not some big dramatic thing.
It still feels weird, though. They haven’t really settled into that easy rhythm they used to have back in their trainee days. Back when things were hard, sure, but not like this. Not the constant stress of being in a girl group, the weight of expectations, the pressure to perform perfectly every single time.
So Megan just stays quiet, watching Yoonchae out of the corner of her eye as she stirs her drink with a finger. Normally, the younger girl would scold her lightly—Do you know how many… things are on your fingers, Megan? You’re putting that in your mouth!—but tonight there’s none of that.
This time, Yoonchae doesn’t say anything. She just leans against the porch railing outside the bar, elbows hooked over the wood like she’s been here a thousand times before. She’s looking out toward the beach, toward the pale orange glow fading into this deep, bruised purple.
Megan looks at her instead. At her warm, chocolate-brown eyes—warm in a way that used to make everything make sense. There’s something flickering in them now, faint, like a light behind a curtain. She would’ve known exactly what it was months ago, would’ve read it instantly, but she can’t now.
She looks down at the glass in her hand, caramel colored soda bubbling and fizzing, and squeezes the lime on the rim inside, tossing it out somewhere into the night. Yoonchae lets out a startled laugh, giving her a sideways glance.
“You taught me how to do that,” Yoonchae says, voice low, eyes soft and a little unfocused. She stirs her own drink—this glowing red mix of soda and cherry syrup that looks way too sweet for anyone over the age of ten—and then her perfectly manicured fingers dip in. She pinches a cherry by the stem and lifts it out, the red dripping for a second before she pops it into her mouth.
For a moment, Megan can’t look away. It’s stupid, really—just a cherry, just a drink, just Yoonchae doing something she’s told Megan multiple times not to do—but the bright artificial red feels like it’s igniting something inside her. She knows that same red is going to be stuck in her mind for the rest of the night.
Yoonchae’s mouth is still moving, her tongue pressing against the inside of her cheek in this oddly focused way. Megan has no idea what she’s doing at first—just that it feels impossible not to notice—until Yoonchae finally speaks.
“I saw a girl make… a knot with a cherry stem in a video Lara showed me. In her mouth.”
Her brows are furrowed in total concentration, tongue still shifting, testing out the trick. Megan wants to taste the cherry herself, the sugary, burning sweetness, the kind that lingers and stains.
And it hits Megan, suddenly and all at once. Hard. Her breath catches, subtle enough that Yoonchae doesn’t hear, or maybe she pretends not to.
It's not the way Yoonchae stares off into the fading light, not the cherry stem thing, none of it.
It’s the realization slipping in around the edges of her brain, warm and terrifying.
This feeling she has for Yoonchae? It isn’t friendship. Not the way it twists her stomach, makes it hard to breathe whenever Yoonchae is standing too close, not the way her chest feels like it’s too big and too small all at once.
Megan squeezes her eyes shut at the realization, tries not to panic. This is Yoonchae. Her best friend. The person she’s supposed to tease, to roll her eyes at. Unnie, Megan hears in the back of her mind, Yoonchae’s voice, faint and teasing. You’re so weird.
She stares at Yoonchae, dark brown hair falling in gentle waves around her shoulders, brows still furrowed in that quiet, focused way, dark chocolate eyes that flip from sharp to soft in seconds. How had she not noticed before?
Maybe you never wanted to, a voice whispers, one that sounds suspiciously like her own.
Megan thinks back to when they were fifteen and sixteen, back at Dream Academy—late-night rehearsals, shared headphones, sodas passed back and forth. Yoonchae felt so young then, Megan tells herself, but the thought is unfair the second it forms. She was only a year older. She still is only a year older.
But somehow, now that they’re seventeen and eighteen, it feels like a whole bridge has opened between them. Not a chasm, just… a space. A shift. A line that wasn’t there before.
Megan and Yoonchae.
18, 17.
Cherry, seashell.
Paired things that don’t quite match but still end up next to each other, touching edges in ways that make Megan’s chest ache with something she doesn’t have the right words for yet. She looks up, watching stars begin to appear in the night sky.
I was in awe, and Megan was explaining the constellations to me while we were looking at them, Yoonchae had written on Weverse, not too long ago. A shooting star flew by!!!!!!! I seriously almost cried.
It had sounded so simple over text, like she was just stating a fact.
In reality, it went a little more something like this.
“See that one?” Megan had said. “That’s Sagittarius. Your zodiac sign.”
Yoonchae had turned to look, eyes crinkling at the corners, smiling up at the sky. And then Megan wasn’t looking at the stars anymore. She was looking at Yoonchae, at the way the stars seemed to settle into her dark eyes, settling there like they belonged.
“Megan!” Yoonchae had gasped. “A falling star!”
Megan had watched the bright flash streak across the sky, falling, falling, falling, until it disappeared beneath the city line.
“Make a wish,” Megan had said, leaning forward against the balcony.
Yoonchae closed her eyes, and the action made her look even younger, like a child making a wish for the first time. After a few seconds, she opened them slowly, smiling at Megan.
“What did you wish for, Yoonchae?” Megan had asked jokingly, not really expecting an answer.
Something in Yoonchae’s eyes flickered, and Megan couldn’t tell what it was. She could never really tell what it was.
“I can’t tell you,” Yoonchae had said softly. “It won’t come true.”
Megan searches for a shooting star, but none appear. There are far fewer stars out here, washed out by the city lights, their natural shimmer lost beneath the bright glow. She takes another sip of her drink, the sharp tang of it biting at the back of her throat.
A soft hum of excitement next to her snaps Megan out of her thoughts. She turns her head to look.
Yoonchae turns toward Megan, grinning bright, the cherry stem tied in a perfect knot between her teeth. Megan forces a small smile in return, and watches as Yoonchae pulls the stem out and sets it carefully on the edge of the railing. A gust of sea air snatches it away immediately, and something about that makes Megan’s eyes sting. She sniffs, pretending it’s just the wind.
Yoonchae goes quiet again, her attention drifting back toward the water. A single bright star hangs right above where the sun had slipped under the horizon. Megan tries to remember which planet it is, it shining way too brightly to be a star. Venus, maybe, or Jupiter. Could be Saturn. She’d pointed all of them out to Yoonchae at some point, she realizes, on different nights, in different places, small moments that had felt unimportant at the time but suddenly feel stitched into her memory.
She wonders if Yoonchae would like Mars, the bright reddish tint of it—flashy, dramatic. The same kind of red as the cherries floating in her drink. The same red Megan keeps noticing, again and again, without meaning to.
“I kind of don’t want to go back inside,” Megan admits quietly. The screaming and laughter from the bar float out to them, muffled but still too much. She knows the rest of the members are there, shouting, joking, having the kind of fun she’s supposed to want to join. But it’s so hot inside, so crowded, the air thick enough to make her feel like she might melt straight into the floor if she goes back.
Sophia’s laugh bursts through the doorway, caught by the wind, and a second later she hears Lara yell something about “one more drink!” The whole place feels loud enough to swallow her.
Yoonchae nods, not really at Megan but in that absent, thoughtful way she gets sometimes. Her eyes track a couple walking along the beach, their hands linked, silhouettes blending into the darkening sand. Megan watches her watch them.
Yoonchae follows the couple’s shapes past the rocks, past the little lighthouse blinking its steady rhythm, all the way until the pair slip out of sight completely. But she keeps looking anyway, like she’s waiting for something else to appear, or trying to catch a feeling before it fades.
Megan can’t tell what she’s searching for.
Yoonchae finally turns to Megan, really, really looks at her. Her eyes are soft, a little glossy, and Megan swears she sees stars in them. Tiny flickers dancing, like they don’t belong anywhere but there in her gaze. Yoonchae swallows, and Megan watches, stupidly mesmerized, as the gulp moves down her throat.
“Do you ever—” Yoonchae stops, voice catching, breaking slightly. She blinks, and this time her eyes get even brighter, shimmering with unshed tears.
“Do you ever feel like… the world is collapsing in on you?”
Megan’s breath catches, and memories flood her all at once.
Yoonchae sleeping on her shoulder in the van,
Yoonchae laughing, full and easy, the sound blurring over everything.
Yoonchae passing her a can of soda,
Yoonchae handing her the other earbud, just like she always does.
Yoonchae lying on the grass with her, staring up at the stars, watching Megan point out constellations with that same gentle patience.
I’ve loved you since I was sixteen, Megan thinks, eyes prickling, staring at Yoonchae. I look for you in every crowded room I walk into. I reach for your hand every time we’re close. I pull you into my side like it’s second nature.
Yoonchae just keeps looking at her, soft and steady, her gaze never leaving Megan.
It’s Megan who breaks the spell. She turns away, takes a sip of her drink, throat dry. Instead of saying any of the things swirling through her head, she lets out a laugh. Soft, almost bitter.
“Who doesn’t?”