“Hey, are you waiting for Himchan hyung?” A voice asked, startling Misun and causing her to look up from her phone. Daehyun stood there next to her with a gentle smile on his face. Misun just nodded, not really wanting to strike up a conversation right now. “He wanted me to tell you that he’ll be here soon, do you mind if I keep you company?”

“Yes, I mind…” “No, go ahead.” Misun said the opposite of her actual thoughts, not wanting to be blatantly rude. Daehyun hadn’t done anything wrong and she knew that he didn’t deserve the cold shoulder that she was giving him now. But it felt different interacting with him here as opposed to in the comfort of her own home. It was a cool autumn day and Misun had been passing the time outside. She had admired the changing colors of the leaves for a time before going to her phone to take some pictures. But she stopped once Daehyun joined her.

“Cool, thanks.” He sat down on the bench next to Misun, just far away enough to not be touching her. “So… Have you started the designs for the play?” He asked as a way to start up a conversation.

Misun looked up in confusion for a moment before she figured out what he was saying. “Oh, yeah. I have pretty much everyone’s outfits planned out.”

“Really?!” He practically yelled in his excitement, startling the girl for a moment. She nodded in reply, not sure how to react to such an extreme tone. “Can I see?”

“No.” “Sure…” She leaned forward reluctantly and grabbed her sketchbook from her backpack. As she sat up, Misun brushed her hair back and away from her eyes. Careful to hide her other drawings, she quickly flipped to the pages with the outfits drawn out and colored. They were performing ‘Beauty and the Beast’ so most of the outfits didn’t need to be different from the Disney movie version. Without letting the book leave her hands, she turned it toward Daehyun for him to see the pictures.

“Waaaah~ They’re so good!” He said, excitement in his eyes. “Where’s mine??”

“Ah, well your’s is the hard one.” Misun told him, flipping to the next page. “Beast is going to have at least two different outfits. But I wanted them to be cooler than what the plans originally called for because I think you could pull it off-” Misun blushed and stopped herself from going any farther when Daehyun looked up and met her eyes with a surprised grin on his face. He enjoyed the sparkle in her eyes as she talked about something she’s passionate about.

Scratching the back of his head, he decided to confide in her. “Really? I’m not sure I’m ready for a lead role like this, though. I’ve actually asked the club president to consider someone else. Partly because I don’t want to be with Sooyeon for the whole production, but mostly because it’s just such a big role.”

Misun raised her eyebrows at this, which Daehyun misunderstood. “Don’t get me wrong, Sooyeon is great, but she’s a little… clingy.” He said, looking away.

“I don’t care about that.” Misun said in a flat tone. She wasn’t going to even try to defend her old friend anymore. “But what do you mean it’s too big of a role? You’ll do great. At least, I think you will..” She trailed off as the blush rose up higher on her cheeks.

Daehyun showed her a brilliant smile. “Thank you~ Oh, can I see some of your other-”

“Daehyunnieeeeeee~” The unmistakeable voice of Sooyeon echoed across the courtyard as she ran over to the bench that the other two were sitting on. Daehyun tried unsuccessfully to hide the distaste from his expression as he looked at Misun apologetically. Sooyeon practically tackled Daehyun, throwing her arms around him aggressively. She pushed him over into Misun, causing her notebook to go tumbling out of her hands. Half of the book landed in a mud puddle at the girl’s feet. It lay open to a quick sketch Misun had done of one of the scenes from the play where Daehyun and the actor for Gaston were fighting.

For a moment, no one moved as they stared at the pages soaking up the water. Then Misun stood up. With a trembling hand, she picked up the book.

“Misun, I’m so sorry. I’ll get you a new book.” Daehyun said, looking at the girl with worry evident in his eyes. He brushed Sooyeon off and stood up as well. Misun still couldn’t look up as she closed the book. She wanted to make sure Daehyun didn’t feel guilty about what had just happened..

“N-no, it’s o-”

“It wasn’t your fault, Daehyunnie. She should have had a better grip on the book.” Sooyeon interrupted, patting Daehyun on his arm comfortingly.

That was all Misun needed to snap. She looked up, her most vicious glare showing her anger clearly on her face. “You….” She didn’t even have any words for this girl anymore. She tossed the book onto the bench, moved forward, and grabbed Sooyeon by the straps of her backpack. Daehyun tried to pull Misun’s arms away, but the girl just shrugged him off.

“MISUN, STOP.” She heard Himchan’s voice and that was the only thing that kept her from punching Sooyeon in the face. He ran up to the group as Daehyun looked on in surprise. Himchan quickly pushed the two girls apart and took Misun into his arms. “You don’t need to do that.”

“But she-”

“I don’t care what she did. It’s not worth getting in trouble.” He told her reasonably as he the back of her head. He looked over at Daehyun with a questioning look, to which the younger boy replied with a nod of his head toward the wet notebook lying on the bench. Himchan hugged Misun tighter, but she still didn’t hug him back, angry that he had interfered.

“Let go, oppa.” She said, her words muffled against his chest.

“No, I don’t think that’s a good idea.” He replied with a small grin. Then Himchan turned to look at Sooyeon. “I think you should get going before I actually have to let her go. She needs to cool down.”

“Whatever. Some friend she turned out to be anyway. She’s barely talked to me all week. You both shouldn’t waste your time with her.” Sooyeon scoffed.

“What do you know?” Daehyun asked, his tone surprising all of the others present. “It’s not like you were that great of a friend to her. Just go.” Sooyeon looked at him with a shocked expression but followed his command, turning on her heel and walking away as fast as her stilettos would let her.

For the next few moments, everything was quiet. Once Misun’s heart rate had returned to normal, she gently pushed Himchan away. She looked at his chest as she spoke quietly to him. “I’m sorry for the trouble, Himchan oppa.”

He ruffled her hair before picking up her backpack from the ground. Daehyun grabbed the sketchbook and followed along as Himchan wrapped his arm around Misun’s shoulders. “Anything for you, Misunnie. Now let’s go get ice cream since we didn’t get any yesterday.”

As Daehyun walked behind them, he couldn’t help but feel a little jealous of Himchan. He was so close and Misun trusted him to a level that was almost scary. What would he have to do to get that close to her…