Sinb’s throbbing heart pounded stronger as seconds passed by, it caused for her mind to adapt a new sensation of paranoia. Both girls remained silent after Yerin’s apology, so Sinb was sure her heart-beating was loud enough for the girl to hear. They hadn’t stopped exchanging looks, mostly because Yerin never took her eyes off Sinb.

“I’m sorry too.” She spoke slowly, trying to hide the nervousness she’s been trying to fight. Sinb was aware she was losing her own game, letting her agitated side develop by the self-assured appearance Yerin had.

The girl was patiently waiting for a word to come out of Sinb’s mouth. In that instance, Sinb wanted to be as talkative as allowed, actually fearing the sounds in her chest might reach Yerin’s ears.

“Wait, what are you sorry for exactly?” She added.

Yerin let go of Sinb’s arm and straightened up her old posture. That’s how Sinb noticed their probably slight height difference. The blonde was taller than her for at least four inches, Sinb thought it was cute. They were quite close but not close enough for an abrupt kiss, which ruined for better Yerin’s need of stealing a peck. She acknowledged now the inadequacy of not having the girl's concern for something so intimating as the connection of their lips.

“For kissing you without permission… And for acting the way I did that day.” Yerin dropped her gaze from Sinb's, focusing on the background and just returning her eyes occasionally to the girl's face. "I hope I didn't cause you any harm in any way possible. And I promise it won't ever happen again." Unless you want me to.

Yerin knew something was missing in her speech. She felt hypocrite for asking for forgiveness only for her bad demeanor from yesterday when she had been misbehaving for months. However, her embarrassment absorbed the words missing. Her sudden personality change from confident to shy clouded Sinb even more. She longed for this conversation to be over, her flourishing sentiments uncomforted her and she didn't think she'd be able to handle them properly in front of the girl who was causing them. Her face heated up at the mention of the kiss. She wished she weren't this sensitive whenever the subject came up, but it was her first kiss after all, her first kiss and with Yerin.

What Yerin did was not something to be proud of, but Sinb would be a liar if she didn't recognize she loved the part where their lips touched. Her belly did a weird thing when she processed the light-haired girl saying she was sorry, it felt nice how Yerin acted as if she were really worried about her feelings. Nonetheless, the last part caught her off guard. What did Yerin mean by “I promise it won’t happen again”? Was she talking about the impolite attitude she had built for five months, or was she talking about the kiss? Did Sinb want for them to never experience that again? She was desperate to question Yerin about it, but she’d give the impression she’s too interested and she didn’t need for the blonde to suspect some irrational things like… Sinb might not be against them kissing a bit more. If she had been perfectly conscious of her thoughts, she would have mentally slapped herself when she pictured Yerin's lips on hers. Unluckily she wasn’t, so she did it a couple more times, staring sneakily at her lips.

“It’s okay- I mean. It’s not okay because you kissed me and acted all crazy but, there’s no hard feelings. Like, I forgive you. I accept your apologies. It’s fine.”

Yerin let out a crooked little laugh at Sinb’s panicked rambling. After that, her lips formed a narrow, pursed smile along with her now crescent moon-like shaped eyes. Sinb contemplated in silent awe the blonde’s features, she got to see Yerin’s dimpled cheeks and a bit of her shiny white teeth. She had never been this interested in the girl’s face, but something was different today. Sinb was clueless about the reasons of her current situation, Yerin had smiled before yet she hadn’t struggled this much with it. She couldn’t evaporate the way she was reacting towards Yerin’s unique existence. She experienced a burst of emotions, all while still staring at her supposed enemy. Sinb felt scared, and anxious, and happy, and sad. The overwhelming war of sentiments almost brought her to tears, she wasn’t used to cope with such explosion in her insides.

“What?” Yerin asked with curiosity, changing her radiant mood to a brooding one, due to the straight-faced Sinb. It was the shorter girl’s attempt to avoid showing everything she was going through.

Sinb blinked a couple times. Yerin’s voice brought her back to the reality in which she shouldn’t be analyzing every little move the blonde did.

“…What?” She replied.

“I don’t know, you had this strange look. Are you okay?” Yerin asked, amused once again.

“Yeah. I was just… I remembered I have to finish this project for tomorrow.”

“Lies. We don't have any project for tomorrow.” Yerin couldn’t care less about what was happening in Sinb’s mind, but she loved to have an opportunity to mess with her. Sinb was bug-eyed, genuinely thinking Yerin heard all her thoughts and knew everything. “You were probably thinking about our kiss.”

She sighed with relief when she realized Yerin was just being her annoying self. Anyway, Sinb would have preferred Yerin to think that’s what got her zoning out, instead of her heart having unusual responses thanks to how pretty the girl looked with a smile on her lips.

“Yes, it was a traumatic experience. I even had nightmares about it.” She played along.

“Am I a good kisser?” Yerin questioned all of a sudden, letting her back rest against the locker again. She had her lips curved a bit.

Sinb saw the wonder in the blonde’s eyes. Is she serious? How can I know that when the kiss lasted like one lame second?! And why is she asking me something like that, isn’t she embarrassed about it?!

“You have no shame. How do you talk about it so freely?”

“Why? It was just a kiss after all. It didn’t mean anything. Right?”

Just like that, without knowing, Yerin broke a tiny piece of Sinb’s heart, who had her lip trapped between her teeth and down-casted eyes. Blushing would have been okay for her, but she went as red as a beetroot. She had been going crazy since the bathroom encounter just for Yerin to say it was nothing, she felt stupid for thinking someone like Yerin would kiss her out of attraction. Of course it wasn’t like that. This is how Sinb figured out how much the kiss meant to her. The smooth pain in her chest proved what she never thought she’d be having: feelings for Yerin.

The blonde hoped the shorter girl would say something against what she stated, but deep down she knew Sinb wasn’t going to do so. For Yerin, the kiss was more than what she wanted Sinb to know. She couldn’t get out of her mind those pair of innocent, glossy lips which she aimed to kiss right now. However, she wasn’t allowed to let Sinb know. Not yet, at least.

Yerin was aware of Sinb’s reaction. According to Yerin’s perception, she looked upset. It got her thinking about the possibility of Sinb caring about their kiss secretly, just like her. But she couldn’t take any action based off a supposition.

Sinb took a pause before answering.

“Right.” Her eyes were still not meeting Yerin’s. “But it’s still weird to me.”

Yerin nodded, knowing the girl couldn’t catch her body-language. kept shut, she wasn’t sure what to respond next. The light-haired girl cursed herself for creating this unbearable atmosphere, she wished she could take back her words.

“Why did you do it?” Sinb looked up, finding out Yerin had been staring at her this entire time they both didn’t speak.

“Do what?” The blonde furrowed her brows, tilting her head just a bit, as if she didn't know perfectly what the girl was talking about.

“Kissing me.”

“I kissed you?” Yerin squinted her face, trying to achieve a mysterious look. “Or was it all part of your imagination and this conversation isn’t really happening at all?”

Sinb rolled her eyes. She did found this new dorky side of Yerin adorable, but had to contain her giggle and maintain a dull personality. “Shut up. Answer my question.”

The blonde tensed up due to Sinb’s demand. She was too nervous to come up with a quick lie. She thought about telling Sinb how she’s been feeling since she first saw her enter the class, but the fear of rejection, of being made fun of, of not being understood, vanished that intention. Everything would be a bit easier if she hadn’t behaved like a jerk for such a long time. Yerin knew it wasn’t normal to pretend to hate someone just to one day confess that you’re crushing on them, she couldn’t do that. Also, there’s a big chance that Sinb doesn’t feel the same, and maybe she already has someone if she takes in consideration what she witnessed the day Sinb and her kissed.

Yerin was taking another risk with was she was about to say, her upper lip trembled slightly when she opened . “Okay. I’ll tell you.”

Sinb’s anticipation for Yerin’s answer tingled through her like electrical sparks on the way to the ground. She was eager to know what was going on inside Yerin the day she kissed her.

“I did it because I-“

“Sinb-yah!” Both girls turned their heads, pursuing where the sound came from. They saw an enthusiastic Somi running to their direction, she was holding a girl’s hand who was trying to catch up with her pace.

Sinb mentally cursed her friend for interrupting the blonde. She felt as if Yerin’s next words were about to be utterly crucial, but had discarded the thought of them being something related to romance in any form or grade.

“Baby, what are you doing here? I didn’t expect to see you till lunch break where we finally have the recess at the same time!” She excused her precipitous running and scream as she circled Sinb’s neck with one arm, not wanting to let go of her accompaniment’s hand, and joined their bodies in a hug. Her affectionate self couldn’t help but plant a couple of velvety kisses on her cheek. Despite smiling, for the first time Somi’s lovey-dovey attitude made Sinb uncomfortable. She couldn’t fathom why, but she didn’t want Somi to act that way if Yerin was near. She looked towards the blonde, noticing how expressionless her face was.

Yerin inspected the interaction, taking a step away from the pair. She disliked Somi for the merely fact of her being that close to Sinb, they didn’t seem to have a normal friendship. Yerin had only seen Somi twice, but she could already tell she liked to kiss, hug, and sweet-talk Sinb, who apparently enjoyed it a lot. She focused on Somi’s arm and her lips touching Sinb’s skin more than one time. Yerin knew she had no power over her classmate, no matter if she was her girlfriend or not. That didn’t stop her from thinking about grabbing the hem of Somi’s shirt and separating her from Sinb’s figure, just to collide her fist with her nicely shaped nose. She shook her head, as if that would dissipate her violent thoughts. Yerin would never hit someone for something like this, she’s said many times she’d have to be angry to a whole new level to get to the point of causing physical harm. Just for security, she crossed her arms. She could feel the anger boiling up in her system as she waited for the embrace to be over, seconds seemed like hours to her. Damn, is it really necessary for a hug to be that long?

Somi finally let go of Sinb, she took the usual distance people have when speaking to others. Acknowledging the blonde, Somi gave her a nod.

“I was just…” Sinb pointed to Yerin, without knowing how to end her own sentence.

“I see.” Somi didn’t go further with her questions, and didn’t even stop to analyze why those two were alone in the hall of a section that wasn’t theirs. She was yearning to greet the light-haired girl properly, so she invested her attention in her with a bright, warm smile.

“I’m Jeon Somi, by the way. I just got here yesterday. You’re Jung Yerin sunbaenim, right?”

The girl didn’t expect to get a serious Yerin giving her a glazed look. Her smile disappeared slowly as Yerin arched a brow, her arms were still crossed while eyeing Somi up and down on purpose, so Somi could realize she wasn’t going to be welcomed by her.

Yerin wasn’t in the mood to be polite towards someone she couldn’t stand at all, she wasn’t known for being a kind girl anyway. Somi’s presence seemed to buzz around her like a fly that you can never swat. Every word, movement and breath she performed annoyed Yerin to no end.

She ignored Somi’s greeting completely, and concentrated on the girl holding her hand. Sinb almost called Yerin out for her rude attitude, but she didn’t, since it’d probably lead them to an argument right there.

Forcing a smile exclusively for the other sophomore, Yerin spoke.

“Yewon-ssi, hello. Glad to see you, hope you’re doing fine.”

Somi looked over to Sinb, as if asking what was up with Yerin. The rosy tone on her cheeks showed the embarrassment she was dealing with. Sinb just shrugged, wearing the same puzzled expression as her.

The girl next to Somi hesitated with her answer, the awkwardness of the airspace affected her a bit. “…Oh, Yerin-ssi. Glad to see you too. I’m doing great.” She squeezed Somi’s hand, expressing some kind of support to the classmate who she quickly created a bond with.

She blushed mildly, mostly because she found Yerin intimidating. They weren’t friends, but they had shared a few words. And for an incentive she didn’t know about, the blonde put out effortlessly her hidden respectful manners with her.

“Amazing. May I ask what are you doing here? You got out of class early?”

“Yeah, uhm,” She stopped to watch how the other girls were reacting to this. Sinb was just staring at her, while Somi pretended to be interested in anything but them. “We had this pair work activity and Somi-ssi and I finished first and before the deadline, so the teacher told us we could get out of the classroom if we felt like it.”

Yerin’s irritable state disappeared for a moment, she even let a tiny chuckle come out, adoring to hear the girl talk. “You finished before everyone else? How cool! You’re so smart, Yewon-ssi. I can barely finish things on time.” She made sure to empathize she was only talking about Umji, there’s no way she’ll let Somi feel part of her congratulations.

God, what’s going on? Sinb’s confusion grew with Yerin’s following actions. She went from coming off like an unmannered human being to the most regardful in less than a minute. It got her wondering what was so special about this girl that she was able to transform Yerin into the loveliest person.

“Yeah…” Yewon was a loss for words now. Conversations with Yerin were hard for her and she hated it. By a of luck, Yerin understood that was the end of their communication. The blonde moved her arm, determined to look at her wristwatch to check the time.

“Well, our classes start in less than 10 minutes.” She raised her voice without looking at anyone in particular, even though by “our” she clearly meant Sinb and her. “I better get going, see you around, Yewon-ssi!” She waved only with her fingers going forwards and backwards, delivering this feminine vibe she always carried with her.

The light-haired girl didn’t even bother in giving Somi some spotlight, her eyes went straight to Sinb’s, and with nothing more she turned her back to the group, leaving the silent scene.

The three students observed as Yerin disappeared from their sights. Somi released the breath she was holding.

“Wow, I feel miserable. She hates my guts.”

A/N: I'D LIKE TO FINISH THIS BY SAYING I'M SO SORRY FOR NOT UPDATING FOR LIKE 3 YEARS. It's just I've had a lot to do and also I've took my time writing this. I'm taking my time again but I promise it won't be as long as this mini hiatus. You'll have a new chapter this friday, I'm almost finishing it hehe. Thank you for your kind words and well, I'm sorry if there's any typo. No matter how many times I proofread my work I can never correct everything lol. Hope you like this!