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A loud thud in the study room pulled Lily out of her trance. All thoughts she was having were instantly evaporated and lost, although she knew they were completely unrelated to the topic at hand. She had lost focus again, exhaustion definitely putting her at her limit.
She kept staring at her textbook as if it was the proximity that would make her absorb the words printed on the pages. At half past midnight and with an exam set to begin in nine hours, she decided to get up.
After hours of almost no variation in her posture, it was a task easier said than done. She slowly stood up, clasped her hands together and stretched as much as possible before starting to walk.
One by one, sometimes in pairs, people around her were starting to pack their things and put their coats on. At this point of midterms, she’d started to recognise the people in the order they came in or out, and the spot they always took to study.
Her target was a vending machine with an energy drink. She wasn’t one to usually consume the product, but she was certain that, if the can was able to do its advertised magic, she'd be able to complete her work and get a few hours of sleep in.
Upon inspecting the variety of snacks and drinks available, she saw a good option she could afford. As she was taking out her phone to pay and placing it on the sensor, she heard a far voice telling her to stop.
“Wait!” is what she heard.
Lily’s brain was still catching up when the payment went through. She spun around at the shout.
Upon turning, she saw a hurried girl, just about her height. She had straight, dark hair reaching down to her shoulders with not a strand out of place. Approaching Lily at a fast pace, the girl wore a neutral expression that quickly turned into frustration upon reaching her.
“Ugh! I'm sorry…” she apologised. Lily was watching her wide-eyed. “...this one doesn't work.”
Lily looked back at the vending machine and noticed how, after receiving her payment, it wasn't giving anything in return.
“It’s crazy they haven't fixed this piece of crap yet, I'm starting to think they just leave it here to take money from people,” said the brunette.
In complete disbelief, Lily poked at the machine, tapped it a couple times and left her hand over it. “What? What do you… what do I do now?”
She watched the girl put her hands in her pockets and turn towards the next vending machine, right beside the traitorous one. “Nothing, I got you.”
Lily trailed her path towards it as she protested, “No, it's fine, I can buy another one, I just didn't know—” But the woman had already put in a five-dollar bill.
No words came out of her; she simply pressed the button corresponding to the drink she had bought earlier. As soon as it dropped, she reached down and grabbed it, then stood upright again to look at the girl who paid for her drink.
“You really didn't— I could pay for it, I mean— I'll get you—”
The stranger smiled at her with crescent eyes and hands in her pockets, then interrupted. “It's fine, really. I should've warned you earlier.”
Lily sighed in relief. “Thank you, you didn't have to,” she said, then offered a greeting hand. “I'm Lily.”
She received a soft handshake and a warm smile in response. “Haewon.”
Lily focused on the metal box that took her money. “So, has the scamming machine always been here?”
Haewon snorted and looked in the same direction. “Yeah, kind of. Lots of people go through the process of getting scammed and saying they'll complain, but I'm starting to believe none of them have actually raised any complaints about it.”
“Did you?” asked Lily.
Haewon snapped back towards her. “What?”
“Like, did you complain?”
“Oh, no. I pace around here until someone walks up to it, and then I pass the knowledge.”
“Right,” said Lily, unconvinced. A couple seconds in silence passed as she weighed the thought in her head. She puffed. “Wait, really?”
Haewon smiled in amusement, watching Lily as if she was savouring her naivety. “No, I'm just too lazy to complain.”
Lily laughed with something like relief. “Okay, I get that. It's still good you're doing your part, somehow.”
“Uh, yeah, that's me.”
Lily opened her can and gulped a good portion of it. “I— I promise I'll pay you back,” she said. Her free hand was patting down each of her pockets, but it didn't seem to find what she was searching for. “I can send you the money right now, I don't have any change on me.”
When she looked up again, she saw Haewon typing on her phone, then locking and putting it in her back pocket, returning her attention to Lily.
“Yeah, no, it's fine, don't worry. I don't use those apps, but if you’re ever around here with cold, hard cash I'll gladly cross off your debt.”
Lily laughed at that. “Okay, I'll try.” She covered her mouth with her whole arm to yawn.
Haewon walked towards a bench, right next to the vending machine. “Midterms getting to you?” she asked as she sat down with eyes on Lily, who chose to stand in the middle of the hallway.
“Yeah, it's hard. Chemistry's kicking my ass, I've got an exam tomorrow, a presentation this Friday and none of my group-mates are reading my texts.”
Haewon chuckled. “I get that.”
“I don't know what to do,” Lily muttered, picking at the tab of the can. “I mean, I know what to do, it's just I'm so stressed. This…” she waved her arms at the space around them, “...is stressful.”
“Yeah, I—”
“And when no one's bothering to participate it just— it feels like I'm the only one who actually cares. But, like, we're on the same team. It'd be easier if everyone simply did their part, right?”
“Right.”
“Maybe I'm just losing focus. It's all getting to me, I guess.” She brought the drink to her lips again.
Haewon waited, in case Lily had something else to say, before talking again. “Yeah, it's tough. And you're on…?”
Lily drank, then lowered back the can. “Pre-med.” Haewon hissed. “You?”
“Yeah, I've got exams as well,” said Haewon somewhat quickly. She got on her feet and stretched. “I was here for the same reason as you, actually.”
Lily observed as Haewon walked in front of the vending machine that actually worked and purchased the same drink as her. She thought of repeating her question, but Haewon’s words reminded her of the presentation she intended to finish.
“I'm going then, thanks again for saving my life. I'll pay you back next time,” said Lily, then made her way back to the study room. Haewon smiled at her, drink in hand, before walking away in the opposite direction.
One dreaded exam had passed and Lily found herself needing to visit the advised vending machine again. With the final date for her group project approaching, her group-mates had still not been helpful, making her “part” exponentially grow in size up until the very last moment.
No progress had been made in the last 15 minutes, so she closed her laptop and started replicating her path from earlier that week.
She put one foot in front of the other, over and over with not much energy, moving across the hallway for the first time since the afternoon. She had been bouncing between the study room and the bathroom for a while, and the dim lights weren't helping Lily keep her eyes open. The rhythm of her footsteps served as background for the infrequent sound of doors opening and closing.
It was a small surprise to see Haewon there, sitting at the far end of the bench next to the vending machine. She stood out to Lily for looking quite put together at this hour, wearing a white shirt with not a crease on it and dark jeans, like she had only now started her day, unlike Lily who’d been awake through all of it.
Haewon was tapping away on her phone as Lily approached the vending machine to get her drink. As she paid and made her choice, she glanced towards Haewon. Still on her phone, Haewon showed no signs of noticing her presence, except for a slight tilt of her head as Lily pressed one of buttons, which went unnoticed.
She reached down for her drink and then walked over to Haewon, both hands wrapped around the can. As she couldn’t seem to catch Haewon’s attention by standing right in front of her, she finally talked.
“Hey,” she said. This instantly made Haewon look up towards Lily and smile with crescent eyes upon recognising her.
“Lily. Here to pay off your debt?” said Haewon.
Lily’s expression immediately shifted into a worried one. She started to inspect the contents of her pockets, but to no avail.
A smirk tugged at Haewon’s lips. “Don’t tell me.”
“I’m so sorry,” said Lily, giving up on her search.
“I’m kidding. It’s fine, really.” Haewon was at the edge of her seat, but she still scooted only a couple centimetres outwards for Lily to know she was invited to sit with her. ”How was last week?”
Understanding her intentions, Lily took a seat with Haewon. A third person could have fit between them, giving them space to look at each other as they talked.
“I think I did alright. I… ugh.” Lily looked up in frustration, then back down to the floor. “I struggled a lot with titration curves, and I think at first I—”
“Yeah, those ones,” Haewon quipped.
Lily gasped. “I know, right?”
“No, I have no idea.”
“Oh. Right, well it’s…” Two, three seconds to find the words. “It’s like a picture of something changing slowly and then all at once, like right around a point you’re trying to find. And then it levels off.”
Haewon chuckled. “I appreciate it, but I’m not going to get it. It does sound hard though, so I think I get the struggle, at least.”
Lily sighed and sank onto the bench, elbows on her knees, still holding her drink. “I should’ve crushed that. I was so sure, but I hesitated and lost a lot of time.” She popped open the can.
Haewon hummed solemnly. “Well, you couldn’t have done that bad if you’re able to explain it to me that easily.”
Lily hadn’t taken a sip yet. She turned straight towards Haewon. “What’s your major?”
“What?” Haewon said, surprised.
“You didn’t tell me last time. What’s your major?”
A scoff escaped Haewon. “Literature.”
“Do you have exams this week as well?” Lily asked as she fixed her posture, with her attention still fixed on the girl.
“Yeah, I’ve got one tomorrow, and some stuff on Monday.”
Lily laughed in-between the words in her reply, “What do you mean some stuff? What is it that you do?”
Haewon turned towards the wall in front of them, as if trying to somewhat hide her current expression. “Exams, finals, a presentation too, I think. I don’t really write them down, I’d have to check.”
“Right, you’re so smart you don’t need to write your schedule down.”
“It’s not that,” said Haewon, sounding almost offended. “I just don’t… studying is not my thing, you know? I kind of absorb what I can, and then wing it at most exams.”
Lily hummed in understanding. Not that she could actually empathise with Haewon. It sounded like a struggle she wasn’t going to go through anytime soon, considering the hours per day she found herself in front of books or digital documents.
She then peeked towards Haewon’s hands. Lily saw each hand hold nothing but the other, and wondered at what point Haewon had completely abandoned her phone when she had seemed so absorbed in it before. “Where’s your drink?” she asked.
Haewon glanced at her own hands as well, and puckered her lips. With a deadpan expression, she locked onto Lily and asked, “What, I gotta be a customer to sit here? Do you work here?”
“No, I— of course not, I was just—” stuttered Lily, flustered; but seeing Haewon crack a smile at her response made her reset. “Fuck you,” she said with a smile.
“I just like it here.” Haewon looked down for a bit, reflexively. “It's not too long a walk from my dorm, there's easy access to snacks and it's somewhat quiet at this time.”
Then, she redirected her gaze towards Lily once more. “But you came for the drink, didn’t you?”
Lily looked down at her drink again. “Y-yeah, I got the machine right this time.” She chuckled. “Thanks again.”
“I’m glad to know you did well. Good luck tomorrow, you'll do even better,” said Haewon as she started pulling her phone again.
That was Lily’s cue, reminding her of her duties and signalling the conversation was over.
“Yeah, I hope so.” After she got on her feet, she reached down and put her hand on Haewon’s right shoulder for a second. “See you.”
The contact startled Haewon, making her look up with wide eyes, then relax back again, all of it in a fraction of a second. “Bye,” she said with recovered composure. Lily left, and Haewon placed her attention on her phone once again, looking to kill some more time.
“Monday, 11:39 PM” read on Haewon's digital clock. Book and notes in front of her, this was around the fifteenth time she’d unlocked her phone to start scrolling mindlessly. Not that she was becoming any more aware of it as time passed.
A voice cut through the silence from behind her. “I’ll be back in an hour or two, I got to meet with my group again for a bit.”
Haewon looked back at Kyujin, then once again at her screen. “Alright, don't get lost on the way there. Or here.”
Kyujin scoffed. “You’re the one getting lost at night. You don't even use the study rooms, where the hell could you be on a weekday at—”
Haewon turned around. “God, are you my girlfriend now, or something? Go, I'll probably still be stuck here reading this when you're back.” She spun back to her desk, propping her head up with one hand like it was the only thing keeping it upright.
She heard the door open. “Reading tweets, maybe. The book? I doubt it,” said Kyujin before walking out the door. “Bye.”
“Bye,” replied Haewon. Truth be told, the scrolling continued.
Twenty minutes later, zero progress was made on her reading. Laser-focused on her phone, she saw a call come in and instantly picked up. “Yeah?”
Haewon listened for a bit and thought about her response. She looked at the clock on her desk. “Yeah, I'd love to, but I— I'm just really busy right now. I’ve kinda got this paper that I haven't even started yet.”
A disappointed voice wailed through her phone. Haewon glanced at her notes, the last one referenced something from twenty-four pages ago. “I know, I'm sorry, guys. Let me come along next time, I promise I'll go.”
Something was said that made her laugh. “Alright, have fun. Tag me in the group chat if something fun happens… alright, bye.”
She locked her phone again and put it on the desk. Sinking into her chair, she glanced over her book one more time. She took a pencil, put it between the pages as a marker and closed the book.
Haewon held that position for a minute, slumped towards her desk, her eyes not focusing at anything in particular. After a bit, she scratched her head and decided to get up.
In what was now an almost automatic motion, Lily made her payment, reached down and grabbed her drink. The cold hallway, only home to a pair of vending machines, a bench and a couple posters had become a habitual place for her.
Her movements were more sluggish than usual. Although she was no stranger to exhaustion at this time, Lily's body felt much heavier than in other nights. It didn't help that this routine only served as a reminder she had to keep going as soon as she was done.
Every time she walked through this hallway, she moved her head to try and peek around the machines, seeing if she’d find a familiar face sitting on the bench. Although their encounters were always at night, she would check in the afternoon, too.
But this time, in another late-night quest for her usual energy drink, she was out of luck. Something she could only register as disappointment ran through her head for a second, but she found herself trying to dismiss it. Why would she expect someone to be there? She got what she was there for.
She slowly moved to the bench and slumped on it. With her vision strained by the bright white light bouncing on the walls, she looked to her left. Not staring directly at anything, mainly because there wasn’t anything to stare at. Looking in that direction only offered a view of a fire extinguisher and a corner, which turned into the lobby.
Lily’s gaze drifted off, sighing as thoughts of her pending work started passing through her head. Nothing was really catching on, only unavoidable deadlines, group-mate complaints and pending lab reports. She put her drink aside and brought both hands to her face, sliding them all the way down.
She was going to get back on track as soon as she sat down in the study room again, so she took her time to rest a bit more. After all, it was true that the bench was in a nice and quiet place. In complete silence, she could hear, once more, people opening and closing doors, but now their footsteps were the backdrop instead of her own.
At that time of night, people weren’t running, but they weren’t taking their time either. Even with variant paces, one could infer that whoever came through this building right now had a clear and urgent objective when passing through each room, hallway and door.
Rhythm was slowly built from chaos, out of the sound of people's shoes hitting and squeaking against the floor; the soundwaves bouncing on the walls, routing from the study rooms and the main lobby right towards Lily's location. As she became accustomed to the noise, she grabbed her drink again and started stretching to get up and go before she zoned out again.
A door opened harshly, then slowly closed. The unexpected sounds made Lily stop as she was getting on her feet, but she figured someone had crossed the entrance in a rush.
Then followed quick, heavy footsteps. Hurried, heavy footsteps, closer to her but not quite towards her. She could only notice them get louder for a second until they stopped.
Lily stayed in place, frowning. But as curious as she was to see who would walk so hurriedly into the building, she had better things to do. With her unopened can in hand, she restarted her path towards the study room.
“Lily!” a voice cut in. She was halfway through leaving the corridor when she heard it and turned to see Haewon, smiling at her right before the corner. Her body didn't allow much more than a faint smile, watching Haewon at the other end lightly jogging towards her.
“Were you leaving?” asked Haewon.
“Yeah, I was gonna get back to reading, but…”
“Did I come in too late?” said Haewon, turning her head playfully.
“No, not at…” She trailed with squinting eyes. “...are you the one who ran into the building?”
Haewon furrowed her brow and chuckled. “Lily, everyone knows you can't run inside this building.”
Lily rolled her eyes. “Ha-ha, okay, I'll see you later,” she said as she slowly turned around.
A hand grabbing her arm stopped her. “Wait, I-I was kidding, but it really wasn't me,” Haewon blurted out.
Lily returned to Haewon, and took a moment to properly inspect her: usual makeup and denim pants, but she was now wearing an oversized hoodie and a baseball cap. Haewon's hand pulled back suddenly and disappeared inside her pocket.
“Were you going to the study halls as well?” asked Lily.
“No, I was going to get a snack and go back, but— but I'm not in a hurry, so…” Haewon trailed. She received an expectant look, eyebrows slowly getting higher. “...so, like, how'd you do this week?”
Lily scoffed, and her eyes moved past Haewon. She knew Haewon was waiting for a response, but she still let a few seconds pass as if the answer would magically find its way into Haewon's brain and she wouldn't have to talk herself. Eventually, she decided to walk towards the bench and sit, closely followed.
“Is everything alright?” asked Haewon.
“Yeah, it's just…” Lily began, but quickly stopped to recollect. Her answer was affirmative, but she was shaking her head. “...I— I just had a bad presentation, is all.”
“How bad?”
Mid-thought, Lily briefly glanced at Haewon. Her gaze quickly bounced back after looking at her; she hadn't expected the proximity between them. A third person couldn't have sat between them at that moment without requiring the pair to make a little space.
“Well, you know the presentation I mentioned?”
“Yes.” The affirmation was so strangely definitive to Lily that she had to glance again. This time, she noticed how focused Haewon seemed. There was no doubt in Lily's mind she was being listened to.
Her focus shifted again, now to the floor. “That was my group project. We had to talk about CRISPR-Cas9, and my part was about how the enzyme does the gene editing.”
Haewon was inclined forwards, body supported by her elbows on her legs. The last sentence made the path of her gaze wander, recalling the words and trying to commit them to memory. A short laugh came out of her. “Yeah, I think I get it.”
But after glancing back at Lily, she could only mirror her serious expression towards the floor. A frown was slowly forming in Lily's face, deepening the more she remembered.
“And… a-and they were clueless, like— nothing, they knew nothing.” She turned towards Haewon and shrugged to emphasise that last ‘nothing’. “At least Jinsol had notes, but they— none of them could answer a single question.”
“Why did—”
“Oh my god, and the professor…” She looked up and brought both hands to her face. After a groan, she sat straight again. Haewon's eyes were locked onto Lily as she aired it out.
Lily continued, “She asked– she asked, like… something about the fucking… the HDR, I think.” She paused to think about it. “A-and as I was answering, she cut me off and said ‘why are you the only one answering?’”
Haewon opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again, choosing to let Lily finish.
“And they just looked at me, they didn't say anything. I— I couldn't say anything either, I said ‘it was my part’ and she said ‘is all of it your part?’ What do I— What am I supposed to say to that? Now it looks like I threw my own group under the bus.”
“That’s not on you though,” Haewon finally said. “That's on them for not bothering to learn their part.”
“I know that, I know that.” Lily's voice cracked on the second one, quieter than the first. “But she asked me why I didn't just do it myself if I knew the material better.” She covered her face as tears started falling out. “I…”
She didn't finish that thought, and Haewon waited for her to do so. When she realised it wouldn't come, she asked, “Do you want me to say I think you're really smart or that everyone else sucked?”
Lily let out a wet-eyed laugh at the question. “Both? I don't know. I'm tired, I'm always the one who…” she said and left another sentence unsaid, shaking her head.
They sat in silence for a while. Comfortably so, as Lily gradually relaxed. Every now and then, she'd glance at Haewon and catch her lost in thought, looking at the floor or the posters on the wall. Lily turned her focus to Haewon's pocket, half-expecting her to see her pull out her phone as she usually did. She didn't.
“By the way,” said Lily, instantly reclaiming Haewon's attention. She put her hand inside her pocket and took out a five-dollar bill, offering it to the girl. “Here.”
Haewon's hand slowly moved towards it, until it pulled back. “Thanks, but I don't use cash anymore,” she said with a smile.
Lily was dumbfounded. “What?”
“I'm on the apps now.” Lily's eyebrows lifted slightly, her confused look still in place. “I mean the— Like the— The banking apps, and… yeah.”
“Okay, then I'll just…”
“Are you feeling better?” Haewon asked.
Lily froze in place, then let out a weak laugh. “A little bit… thank you.”
“I'm glad.” Haewon smiled from ear to ear. “Listen, I have to go. I've got a paper waiting to be finished and an exam on Thursday, but I'll see you soon.”
The prospect of going back to studying was making exhaustion dial back into Lily, but Haewon's smile was so contagious she couldn't help but replicate it, even as she talked in monosyllables. “Yeah.”
Haewon stood up and placed a hand on Lily's shoulder. “Good luck,” and then left.
“Bye,” Lily replied. She stood up and stretched. The silence that enveloped their private meeting was dissipating, and she could hear Haewon's footsteps blending into the rhythm of the building once again.
A small graveyard of energy drinks stood on the back corner of Haewon’s desk. Another afternoon of very light study for her was being spent on her bed, mindlessly scrolling. From time to time, she'd doze off and let the phone fall on her face, and she'd perpetuate the cycle by picking it up and unlocking it again.
Kyujin walked up to Haewon’s desk. Haewon glanced in her general direction and assumed, by the fact she was carrying her bag and wearing her coat, that she was about to nag at her before going out. She was looking at Haewon's open book and notes and reading them silently.
“This is— you're still on the same page as last week,” said Kyujin. She kept looking at it, as if she needed to confirm what she said. Turning around, she met Haewon's eyes directly.
“I know it by heart.”
“I’m sure you do, but you can't possibly get any notes down just from memory.”
“The things I'm capable of would amaze you.” Haewon turned around in her bed, unlocking her phone once again.
Kyujin sighed. “What have you been doing lately? Like, you're going out at night for no reason and coming back, sleeping and reading the same book.”
She waited for a response that didn't come. She continued, “But lately you're leaving for half an hour and coming back with the same drink. You know there's a store across the street, right?”
Another chance to respond, but to no avail.
Kyujin talked to her again. “You don't study, you barely go out with us. You bounce between the classroom, our dorm and who knows where. Haewon. Haewon.” She walked towards her and shook her awake. “Haewon, you fucking—”
Haewon squealed and squirmed as she jolted awake. “I won't read the fucking book, I'm not going to–-”
“What are you doing?”
That caught Haewon's attention. “What? I'm just on my phone.”
“At night. You leave at night and you come back really late. I know you’re not studying, what is it?”
Haewon looked around, stammering for an answer. “I go out and walk. Decompress a little bit.”
“And you do your makeup for that?”
“You know I don’t go out without looking pretty.”
Kyujin rolled her eyes so hard Haewon thought they might not go back to normal again. “You wanna do something tomorrow? My classmates wanted to go to a bar to celebrate finishing their exams. It could be fun.”
Haewon’s gaze moved around, she was humming in thought. “I don’t know your classmates.”
“Yes you do, they laugh at all your jokes.” Kyujin sat in Haewon’s chair and watched her in silence. Haewon couldn’t help but mirror her, expecting Kyujin to say something else. As they both noticed the other wouldn’t say anything, they started smiling as if a joke was told.
“What?” asked Haewon, chuckling.
“Let’s do something, come on.” Kyujin put her leg out and started rocking Haewon with her foot. “It’ll be fun.”
“Kyu, I’m–-”
“Don’t tell me you’ve got something to do tomorrow.”
“No, I don’t. I’m just…” Haewon trailed as her eyes searched around the room for an excuse. She found the towers of cans on her desk. The unfinished notes, the unmarked book. She tried to look somewhere else and saw the piles of recently worn clothes and coats stacked on the chair Kyujin was borrowing.
Her alarm clock was off, redundant for some time now when her phone fulfilled the same purpose. She hadn't been finding herself in the studying headspace that required her to turn off her phone and focus.
“You're just what?” said Kyujin in an immediate request for her attention.
“Nothing. Where are we going?”
The next time Lily saw Haewon, it was on her way to the study rooms instead of the other way around, a backpack hanging from one of her shoulders. She got a view of the girl sitting, head in hand with her elbow propped on her knee, eyes glued to her phone screen. In the few seconds Lily stopped, she thought that for once Haewon must be the tired one between the two. This could only be inferred from her pose and furrowed brow though, Haewon still looked as well made up as usual, not like Lily tended to do at that time of night.
She said "Hey" to Haewon and observed as her head quickly turned. For a fraction of a second, she could see Haewon's expression morph from one of frustration towards whatever was on her phone to one of excitement.
"Hi!" said Haewon. Her phone was locked and put aside in an instant. Staring at Haewon's expression distracted Lily from the motion, only noticing it was gone after. "Studying again?"
Lily walked towards the vending machine as she talked. "Yeah, but I'm not in a rush, I just have some stuff to re-read for a bit. How…" She stopped as she inspected the contents of the machine: not one can of the drink she liked to buy was in stock. "…damn."
"What? Oh. You can have mine," Haewon offered.
Lily took the cold drink, still perplexed. "Thanks, but like, since when do these run out so quickly? I mean, they're not that good." Haewon made a duckface at the machine. "There's no way someone's buying them in bulk here, right?"
Whatever thoughts Haewon was having, none of them came out verbally. "Beats me," she said eventually, then turned to Lily again. "How have you been?"
She moved aside, giving Lily the exact amount of space needed to sit with her. She obliged and put her backpack on the side opposite of Haewon, then sat with her.
Lily let out a sigh as if she'd walked for hours to be there, but her posture was relaxed and she seemed more serene than usual. Haewon had to move her head a few centimetres back, taken aback by the sudden closeness. There was no possible way a third person could have sat between them.
"Better," Lily said. "I'm having my last exam tomorrow afternoon and then I'm finally on break. Thank you."
"Did you pass— hm?" Haewon seemed puzzled by the sudden gratitude, making Lily laugh at the ceiling.
“Like, for keeping me company. I still don’t know why you’re here so late, but I appreciate you staying and talking to me.”
“I already told you why.”
Laughter came again from Lily and between every word as she spoke. “No, you’re not coming here just to warn people, I know as much.”
Haewon gasped in fake hurt at her words. “What, I can’t be of service to this community?” Lily was giving her a ‘come on’ look that made her drop the act after a few seconds of trying. “I study for a bit and stop here for a drink, honestly.”
Her answer only seemed to make Lily more curious. She turned her body ninety degrees and lasered in on Haewon, sitting on her leg. “But I don’t believe that either.”
“Do you really need to know?” asked Haewon, and Lily briefly opened her mouth to answer, but she was cut off. “Did you pass your exams?”
“I— yeah. I think so.” Her gaze shifted down. ”I’ve passed most of them by now but I’m supposed to get my grades for two of them tomorrow.”
Haewon smiled. “I imagine there’s no doubt in your mind you’re going to pass it all.” Lily’s eyes peered up for a second with her chin still down, giving a faint smile at Haewon. “I’m not trying to cheer you up or anything, we both know it’s true.”
“What about you? How did you do?” asked Lily with a straight look again.
Haewon’s lips moved as if an ‘oo’ sound was about to come out, but nothing did for a few moments. “On?” The motion was mirrored mockingly by Lily, who chuckled. “What?”
“Your exam.”
Realisation seemed to come. “Ah, you mean my essay?” The affirmative she expected from Lily didn’t come, only silence. Haewon scrunched her nose. “It’s still on my table.”
Lily’s eyes narrowed. “No, you specifically mentioned an exam. You keep doing this. And don’t you dare ask me—”
“Doing what?”
“That!” Lily was raising her voice and laughing in disbelief at the same time. “You do that. Come on, it couldn’t have been that bad.”
As opposed to Lily’s a moment before, Haewon’s eyes widened. She snapped her fingers in a motion that transformed into a finger pointing at her. “The exam, yeah. It got postponed to next week.” Lily put both hands on the bench and inched towards Haewon who remained still, with her gaze following Lily. “You doing anything on break?”
“Haewon! There’s no fucking—” She stopped herself as she realised it was too late to be yelling, too close to people buried in their studies. Again, lowering her voice, “There’s no classes next week! What do you mean it ‘got postponed’?”
“Okay, okay, I passed it. I just forgot about it, I haven’t been doing much this week anyway.” Haewon looked somewhere else, nowhere in particular. But the silence that came made her return to Lily again, whose questions didn’t seem even close to answered.
“What do you mean? You told me the exam was today. And— And your essay. You didn’t ‘do much’?”
No muscles in Haewon’s face moved. She remembered what she had told Lily… a week ago. Yet nothing was said as Lily talked again. “What kind of schedule do you have to be studying so late and not remember when your exams are?”
“I’m just…” trailed Haewon. As her voice lowered, Lily’s eyebrows raised more and more. “…not… really studying.”
Lily turned her head slightly, but her focus remained. “Not… studying? So, you’re not a student here?”
“No, I am. I’m just technically… in my first year.” Lily opened her mouth to speak, but Haewon cut back in. “Again.”
“That doesn’t explain much.”
“What do you mean?” Haewon shrunk into her shoulders and looked up as she said it. “What else is there to know? I’m repeating my first year. I’ve read everything, I’ve done the assignments, I’m only doing it again. There’s not much to do.”
It seemed Lily wanted to say something, but she kept it in and stared at the floor. She only spoke again after a minute of awkwardness between the two of them, in which they didn’t move or change their postures. “Are you doing anything on break?”
Haewon sighed. “My roommate wanted to go out tomorrow. I wasn’t really sure about it, but…” She rubbed her temple. “…I think I should go, she’s… trying to get me out of my room.”
“Is what you’re doing here ‘getting out of your room’ as well?” Lily received a stare and a scoff for that.
“I guess so. At least I got a couple steps in for walking here every night.”
Lily opened her mouth upon hearing that. “I’m sorry, you were here every night? You know you could’ve just—”
“Asked for your number?”
“Yeah.”
A thoughtful hum came from Haewon. “But there’s something…” She let out an amused huff. “…something romantic… about meeting this way, isn’t there? Not knowing if you’d show up.”
A sudden interest in anything but Haewon came to Lily. She watched the paint on the walls, the texture of the bench, and the material of her own pants. She tried to focus on Haewon again and met a patient, expectant smile that made her gaze bounce back down again.
The silence was interrupted by Haewon after a moment. “You stopped coming though,” she said.
“Yeah, I was…” began Lily with a sigh. “...embarrassed, I think. I thought you might find me weird for… you know. Breaking down like that.” Lily had started to fiddle with the hem of her trousers. “I know I can talk too much sometimes, too.”
She could see Haewon's hand doing the same with the fabric of her own jeans.
“But that's fine, I like listening… to…”
Lily looked up at Haewon expecting her to finish the sentence. A smile gradually drew on her face. “To…?” she asked.
Haewon fidgeted for a second. Her hand lifted off her leg, flipped palm-up for a second, then turned back down with a light slap as it landed again. “...to you.”
Lily hummed in satisfaction. They fell into another silence, in which she kept glancing at Haewon's phone sitting inside her pocket every now and then. Sometimes she'd look because she had nowhere else to, but most of the time, she'd flick her eyes to it when it buzzed.
Every time, she expected her to take it out and check, but it never happened. Eventually, another buzz — a long, continuous buzz, followed by another, led Haewon to take it out.
But she didn't move her head, or put it into her periphery. She took it out, silenced the call and pocketed it again.
Lily looked up at her. “You can take it.”
Haewon shrugged. “It’s probably just my roommate, it’s fine.”
She was fiddling with her clothes again, but Lily directed her full attention to Haewon as she spoke. “I appreciate it, you know? That you listened to me.” She watched Haewon smile as she clicked her tongue. “Really, I mean it. Not only last week, but… every time. You're a good listener.”
She got no response at that, but Haewon's smile wasn't fading away. She took the chance to continue talking. “Can I ask you something?”
The question drew Haewon in again. “You already did, but sure.”
An eye-roll from Lily. “If you're not really studying, why were you here in the first place?”
Haewon's head rotated ninety-degrees and her gaze met the wall. Two seconds later, she returned to Lily.
“I don't know, actually. I think I needed an excuse to go out. But that turned into trying to see you, even if you didn't come.”
“You don't have to come here to see me.”
“Yeah, I do.” Haewon looked at the ceiling and put a finger on her chin in dramatising thought. “Unless…”
Lily put her hand out. “O-kay, I'll give you my number.”
“Wait, really?” said Haewon, turning back down at her in disbelief. Her hand was already inside her pocket, pulling out her phone.
“Yeah, what? What were you going to say?”
Haewon put her phone in Lily's hand. “Like, maybe meet at the library or something. I'd study with you, or… you know, something like that.”
Another silence between them, but this time they were looking straight at each other. A staring Haewon waited for a response from Lily who gave her a warm smile.
Lily took the phone and registered herself as a contact. “We can do that, too,” she said while putting the phone on Haewon's hand.
Haewon's hand went to grab it, but Lily's hadn't moved. Haewon jerked her hand up slightly upon touching her, but seeing as Lily still wasn't moving, she rested her hand on hers instead.
“Will you call me next time you need an excuse to go out?” asked Lily.
“Yeah.” She kept staring at their hands for a few seconds. Lily pulled hers out. “Are you leaving?”
Lily sighed as she got up. “I’ve got one exam left, I should study while I still can.” She grabbed her backpack and put it on her shoulder again.
Haewon didn't move from her seat. As Lily started to walk, she grabbed Lily's hand. “Can I see you again… tomorrow?” She felt a brief squeeze from her.
“I’d love that.”