Gonna write quite a lengthy author note below. Meanwhile, enjoy! Thanks for everyone subscribing and upvoting, but I have quite a bad news coming up :/

A good moment that turned to a sad memory.

“Unnie, do you know where I feel like going these days?” Irene looked at Wendy who was using her lap as her own pillow. Her official excuse today was she wanted to read while laying down but Irene was taking up the space on the couch because she wanted to watch the TV. But they both knew Wendy loved it when Irene absent-mindedly her hair and before long, she would fell asleep. This time, Wendy was a bit talkative and Irene decided to play along.

“Hurmm. Where, Wan-ah?” Irene was her hair then and the younger girl gave a mischievous smile before answering.

“Your heart.” The answer made Irene scrunched up her nose and flicked Wendy’s forehead faster than anyone can say, ‘Cheesy’. Watching Wendy yelling out, “Ow! My forehead!” and rubbing the offended spot with a pout present at her face, Irene allowed herself to smile and not to coo over her cute hamster. How could she admit with her own mouth that she liked her girlfriend’s cheesiness?

Irene removed Wendy’s hands that was still nursing her forehead (that barely hurt, Irene knew she used little force behind her flick; and besides she was not that strong to begin with), Irene placed a soft kiss on Wendy’s forehead which made the latter grinned.

“I knew my pickup lines would work best on you.” Wendy looked smug and Irene almost pinched her but decided against making Whiny Wendy appeared again. Instead, she teased the girl differently.

“So you tried them on other people too, Wendy Son Seungwan?” Irene narrowed her eyes while looking at the girl laying her head on Irene’s lap. Wendy looked nervous and she pretended to close her eyes and acted as if she had fainted while doing absolutely nothing at the cool, air conditioned Bae’s family living room. Irene could have squealed at her cuteness at this point but she had an act to keep so she maintained her posture. She knew Wendy was peeking through her slightly open eyes to look at Irene’s reaction anyway.

“Seungwannnnn.” Irene drew out the last syllable of Wendy’s name but the younger girl still acted as if Irene was only talking to herself. Irene huffed at this treatment while her mind was slowly formulating a plan. She slowly moved her hand on Wendy’s stomach and tickled the girl, making the girl squirmed and laughed out loud; her façade just now disappeared as she got up and sat facing Irene.

A serene moment passed as Irene stopped her tickling session and Wendy stopped laughing as they stared into each other’s eyes. “Well?” Irene raised an eyebrow, waiting for Wendy to answer. Wendy looked at Irene sheepishly and answered while scratching her head.

“Uh, I did say it a few times to Seulgi and Joy. But see, are they people? Sseul is a bear right? And Joy is the chicken. So…” Wendy’s voice faltered with each spoken words as Irene’s glare at her gradually become scarier.

“SON. SEUNG. WAN.” Wendy closed her eyes at Irene’s enunciation of her name and prayed to every gods she had ever heard of to save her from Irene’s wrath. She did not even have to go through her long list as soon after, she heard the Bae’s household doorbell being rang and voices calling out her name and Irene’s.

Irene sighed and went to open her front door. Almost as soon as she opened it, she was ambushed by the so called ‘chicken’, ever the enthusiastic one in the group. Seulgi followed behind Joy, all the while grinning while carrying several plastic bags which carry Teorore Chicken’s logo. Wendy’s eyes lighted up when she spotted her same-aged friend and she leaped at Seulgi and hugged her. “Sseul! How long had it been since I’d last seen you!”

Seulgi frowned when she heard this. She was pretty sure they bumped into each other that afternoon, when they were both on their ways to class. Seulgi was about to say this when Wendy hissed in her ear. “Play along Sseul, let Joy distract Irene unnie for a while until she forgot she was supposed to be upset at me.” Seulgi laughed at this and shook her head. She then side-hugged her friend using her free arm and whispered back, “You will treat me Pringles after this, Wenderp.” Wendy nodded fiercely at this and they both chatted while pretending they did not notice Irene glaring at them from where she was standing, nodding while listening to Joy’s rant about how crowded the chicken restaurant was and how long they had to wait.

“Wah! All the unnies are here!” Yeri rushed in through the still opened front door with her pink backpack, looking tired but her eyes were still twinkling. The buzzing chatters that were going on stopped as all of them looked at Yeri and greeted her. Since Bae’s household was their usual hangout spot, Yeri was like a little sister to all of them.

“Yerim! Where did you go? This unnie bought chicken for you!” Wendy raised her brow at Joy’s statement and looked at Seulgi, who shook her head and mouthed, ‘My money’. Both of the 94-liners held their laughter and just looked at the conversation of the two youngest. They were unaware that their actions were being observed by the eldest, who had a small smile on her face while looking at her precious people.

“I had a study group with Saeron and some other friends just now. We had a paper to finish before the end of the month.” Yeri happily supplied the answer and Joy laughed at this. “Really? You? My evil apprentice busy discussing about a paper she has to submit a month away from now?” The others laughed at this too, except for Irene and Yeri. Yeri pouted a bit and folded her arms in front of her chest.

“I’ll let you know that Yeri was in the third place for her whole grade during the school’s assessment last month.” Irene said coolly and went to take the plastic bags containing chicken from Seulgi before walking to the kitchen. Wendy, Seulgi and Joy looked dumbfounded and Yeri had a satisfied smirk now. “Who’s laughing now eh?” She stated gleefully and chuckled.

“I, uh, I wanna go help Irene unnie to prepare the plates and all. See you girls in a bit.” Seulgi swiftly made her exit from the scene, contrasting to Joy’s fond nickname for her, Slowgi.

“Oh yes! I have to transfer the movie that we want to watch from Irene unnie’s laptop. I better go now or they will be done with the chicken first.” Wendy was the second one to take her leave and she ran on the stairs to go to Irene’s room at the second floor.

With only the two of them remaining, Joy and Yeri were intensely staring at each other. Joy squinted her eyes at the younger kid in front of her. “Yerm ah, let’s be honest, you went there because you have a crush on that kid Saeron right?” Joy whispered to the still smirking Yeri.

“Yeah, but the other unnies don’t have to know that.” Yeri shrugged and closed the front door of her house and Joy shook her head and looked at the youngest with twinkling eyes.

“I’ve raised you well indeed.”

Although Joy and Wendy had a head start, it was not long before Seulgi and Irene managed to catch up with them. The two older girls had always had better stamina than the younger ones. While the pursued girls were slowing down due to tiredness, their pursuers were going steadily and surely in their direction. When Seulgi increased her pace and caught Joy’s free hand that was not holding on to Wendy, the four of them stopped from their power-walking chase. Joy was staring daggers at Seulgi who gulped and tried to keep her calm face on. Meanwhile, Irene stared longingly at Wendy who was training her eyes towards everything else; except on the girl who used to make the rest of the world faded from her view.

“Hey, Sooyoungie. Hey, Wannie.” Joy wriggled her hand free from Seulgi’s grip and ignored Seulgi’s greeting. She instead glared at Irene and Seulgi back and forth.  She tightened her grip on Wendy’s hand and took a step forward as if she was trying to be Wendy’s shield subtly and this caught the attention of the two girls standing in front of them. “Hi, Seulgi, Irene unnie.” Wendy broke the tension in the air with a polite greeting of her own. She seemed to be resigned but her facial expression was unreadable. Irene noticed from the corner of her eye that Wendy was rubbing her thumb softly at the