It's In The Cards

By Snapplelinz

Nine beautiful goddesses were racing frantically through the Departures terminal at Incheon International Airport. They just had a few minutes to make it on time for their flight to Paris for SM Town. Because it was so close to Christmas, it wasn’t even guaranteed that they wouldn’t even get a flight out. But their manager had gotten a phone call from the airline an hour ago with the fleeting promise of nine seats which were still available.

“Come on, ladies, move your asses!” Taeyeon, the leader, shouted. After getting conned by a certain lady who loved pink, she was wheeling both her luggage and Tiffany’s, the bags teetering dangerously over the edge of the metal trolley.

“I…don’t…have…the strength…to run…anymore,” Sunny wheezed. Her winter boots were close to snapping off at the heels due to the breakneck speed she was running at with her luggage in tow.

“Just a little bit more, Sunny. We’re almost near the terminal.” Seohyun urged. Sunny marveled at the fact that the maknae of the group could jog at such a steady pace while carrying all her luggage in her two hands.

Sooyoung shot past Seohyun and Sunny, but emitted a loud cry of pain and stopped short.

“Soo, what’s wrong?”

“I dropped my cream doughnut!”

“Choi Sooyoung, don’t even think about eating that doughnut off of the floor. We don’t have time!” Taeyeon barked in a no-nonsense tone.

Sooyoung, who had bent down to retrieve her ruined doughnut, got back up with a scowl on her face.

“Guys, wait for me!” Tiffany begged, trying to shrug on her winter coat while running.

“Not a chance,” Yoona retorted, both her and Hyo chortling as they sped past the pink-loving girl.

Yuri, who was ahead of both Yoona and Hyo, took pity on Tiffany and waited for her to catch up.

“Come on, Fany,” she said with an encouraging smile, taking the shorter girl’s hand in her own.

“Thanks, Yul. I’ll remember you in my will!” Tiffany shouted for Hyo and Yoona to hear.

“We’re almost there,” Taeyeon muttered, even though her calf muscles were on fire.

Sure enough, her feet touched a thick layer of carpeting and she could see rows of metal seats fastened to the floor with an airplane gate in front her. They were going to make it, all nine of them –

“Jakkaman, where is Sica?”

With a lurch in her stomach, Taeyeon whipped around, as did the other seven women, searching frantically for their missing bandmate.

Hyo caught sight of her first and rolled her eyes, “Aish shibal, this idiot.”

“Sica, are you kidding right now?” Sunny asked, laughing her head off.

Jessica hadn’t been running after her bandmates at all. She’d made good time on her own, but ended up stopping when she caught sight of a random stall for Blanc and Eclare. The young singer/entrepreneur was in the middle of trying on five different sunglasses at the same time.

“Guys, don’t you think I could totally rock these blue shades?” Jessica asked of the group, seemingly unaware of their current predicament.

“We definitely don’t have time for you to try on your own sunglasses, Sica!” Taeyeon fumed.

When Jessica saw the thunderous look on their team leader’s face, she turned red with indignation and put the glasses back on the racks. “Spoil sport,” she muttered under her breath.

The nine of them were getting closer to the gate just as an airhostess was closing the heavy doors.

“Wait, please stop! We made it on time for the flight!”

Taeyeon nearly crashed head-on with the airhostess as she said those words, stopping for a brief moment to nurse the stitch forming in her side.

“I’m sorry, ladies, but the plane is already pulling away from the gate and about to take off.” The airhostess apologised without looking sorry in the least.

“Ma’am, you don’t understand, we need to be on that flight to Paris. We’re musicians and performing at a concert tomorrow!” Yoona countered.

“Again, I’m terribly sorry, but you really should’ve gotten here on time if you needed to be on that flight.”

“Listen, you stick-figure in a wig! I did not drop my cream doughnut and ignore the ‘Five-Second Rule’ just so you could be unprofessional in a truly y way!” Sooyoung roared, getting right in the airhostess’ face, who gulped nervously in turn.

“Take it down a notch, Sooyoung, people are watching,” Seohyun pointed out, looking just as anxiously by the sudden conflict.

“What was the point of trying to fly with Korea Air? I thought Koreans were supposed to help each other out. Everything my grandmother told me as a child was lies.” Hyo fumed.

“Great, so we rushed over for nothing? I could’ve had more time to try on the red sunglasses too,” Jessica added, causing Yuri to slap her forehead in exasperation.

“Guys, forget about it, let’s just go wait over there.” Taeyeon said, looking extremely dejected.  

Sooyoung got in the huffy air hostess’ face one last time, wagging her long, tanned finger at her. “You’re lucky my friend Taeyeon is such a classy woman, otherwise I would’ve made you eat your airline hat by now.”

The airhostess gasped incredulously at Sooyoung’s threat while Seohyun steered Sooyoung away.

Tiffany went to sit down next to Taeyeon, who was chewing her nails ferociously like she did whenever she was stressed out. She laid her hand on her friend’s knee and rubbed it soothingly in a bid to make her feel better. “I’m really sorry, Tae. We all should’ve tried harder to get to the airport on time.”

“Yeah, we’re really sorry, Taengoo.” Yoona added, coming to sit down on Taeyeon’s other hand.

Everyone else said the same thing and waited expectantly for Jessica to join suit. Jessica looked up at everyone and shrugged her shoulders. “I guess I didn’t need to try on five sunglasses at once.”

“In San Francisco, that’s considered an apology.” Yuri joked, which made everyone else laugh.

Taeyeon cracked a half-hearted smile at Yuri’s attempt to cheer her up, which was already a good sign in itself. “Don’t worry about it, girls. I guess it just wasn’t meant to be.”

“It’ll be ok, Taengoo. You know that Manager-oppa will be able to book us another flight to Paris,” Yoona said in a diplomatic voice.

“Exactly. Manager-oppa is like a ninja. Remember last Christmas when I got sick with bronchitis and needed an inhaler to stop my chest from closing up? It was 23:00 and all the pharmacies were already closed. He still found a way to get me that inhaler and little chocolates with sunflower seeds in them that I like so much.” Yuri declared while sipping from her bottled water.

“That was pretty cool, even though you coughed all over my tteokbokki,” Seohyun remarked, cringing at the memory.

“You guys are right, there’s no point in sulking about a missed flight,” Taeyeon conceded, realising that this was out of her hands. “I guess we’ll just have to hang out here till Manager-oppa calls us.”

“Sounds great. I saw a Michael Kors boutique just around the corner-”

“Omo, stop trolling us with fashion brands for one day, Sica,” Sunny quipped, holding her head in her hands and laughing. “It’s Christmas for Pete’s sake! I know work and…fashion,” she began, acknowledging Jessica’s love of clothes and accessories for the barest second, “are important, but couldn’t we at least try to get into the Christmas spirit?”

“What do you suggest we do, Sunny-bear?” Hyo asked curiously.

“We could get into the Christmas spirit by buying me another cream doughnut.” Sooyoung piped up.

“That’s not Christmas, pabo. That’s just another ‘Shikshin Day’ for you.”

“Yah, you take that back, Tiffany! Shikshin Day would be a real holiday by now if our stupid Prime Minister hadn’t ignored my email on the subject and been too busy giving her besties kickbacks instead.”  

“Guys, you’re missing the point as per usual! Can’t we just…tell some Christmas stories like we did last year?”

This remark was met with Taeyeon nearly falling off her chair and Yuri spitting water out of .

“Aww, not again, Sunny!”

“That was a one-time thing last year!”

“It was embarrassing with Yuri and I having twice in two separate stories!”

“I didn’t get kissed once under mistletoe!”

“I was homeless!”

“I kissed a girl and liked it! Once with Luna and the other time with Yuri!”

“I was homeless!”

“Oh grow up, Taeyeon! You got to date Tiffany in that story too. Being homeless gave you a love life!”  

“Guys, calm down,” Sooyoung said with surprising diplomacy. “It wasn’t that bad. Save for the fact that I was pregnant and had no boyfriend, I kind of liked my Christmas story with Kyuhyun-oppa.”

“Me too. I had super-powers and looked awesome in a vintage dress.” Jessica said with pride.

“I suppose it was alright that I kissed Wendy under mistletoe.” Taeyeon acknowledged with a thoughtful look on her face.

“There you go mentioning mistletoe again. Hurtful,” Yoona said with a sniff of indignation in her voice.

“Well…I guess it wasn’t so bad that Yuri courted me in several stories.” Tiffany conceded with a blush.

“Don’t bother trying to apologise, Fany. Maybe I’ll just kiss someone else this year.”

With that, Yuri got her revenge on Tiffany by planting a sloppy kiss on her cheek.

“Guys, things always happen differently every Christmas. Once we’re done in Paris, who knows what could happen.” Sunny reminded the girls who were getting off track yet again.

“Sunny’s right. In fact, I’ll prove it by making a few predictions of my own.”

With that, Hyo ped the top section of her suitcase and retrieved a pack of strange-looking cards.

“Omo, I thought you were just joking around, Hyo,” Yuri said with chagrin in her tone.

“I never joke about the future, Kwon Yuri! Remember the last time I read the cards? I predicted that I would meet a cute guy at the last SM party. And I totally did.”

“Hyo, I don’t think that had anything to do with accurately reading tarot cards. You got that cute guy’s attention by dropping your purse and bending down to pick it up.” Jessica countered.

“Well I don’t deny that it helped. But my readings are still pretty accurate.”

“Hyo-unnie, isn’t tarot-card reading the Devil’s Scripture?” Seohyun questioned in a timid voice.

“Seo-bear, you’ve got to get out more.” Tiffany said, wrapping her arms around the maknae of the group.

Hyo laid out the cards and the eight women leant over her to look at her handiwork.

“Omo, there’s the king with the swords sticking out of his bloodied head! Don’t tell me that’s a good Christmas omen,” Taeyeon quipped sardonically.

“Give me a minute, Tae,” Hyo snapped. “A-ha, here we go! I see a woman holding two hearts who looks a little like Yoona. Maybe that means you’ll finally get a romantic Christmas story this year, or even two.”

“I knew it! I totally felt like this was my year for romance!” Yoona exclaimed, pumping her fist in the air.

“Yoona-shi, you’ve got to get out more.” Tiffany repeated.

“Hmm, an image of a soldier – perhaps a loved one is going to the army…” Hyo murmured quietly to herself.

“Ooh, how intriguing,” Jessica replied, looking fascinated with something other than fashion for the first time in minutes. “Do another one, Hyo!”

“Pen and paper…maybe one of us is going to get inspired by Christmas and write a story of her own.”

The sound of an airplane taking off in close proximity sounded in their ears. But the nine goddesses were no longer fixated on getting on a flight to Paris. For now, they were forgetting about the stresses of their everyday life and enjoying each other’s company.

“Ok, last card, Hyo. What does it say?” Sooyoung asked with growing enthusiasm.

Hyo flipped over the card in question and all nine women saw a picture of a lone, but familiar image. They all smiled while looking down at the image of a Christmas tree with twinkling lights all around it.

“I think it’s going to be an interesting festive season.” Hyo concluded, a secret smile forming on her lovely face.