It had been a normal school morning. The alarm clock was as annoying as always. Unsurprisingly, her room was still as she had left it the night before: a labyrinth of unwashed clothes and dirty plates, accompanied by stray manga and unfinished school projects. And, as to be expected, once she finally made her way to the kitchen, the house was already empty. In other words, everything was as it should be. 

Yet, once Heejin reached her school, the day seemed to take an unexpected turn as she was greeted by a crowd of people gathered near her locker. She recognized some of the girls and quickly made her way to them to figure out what was going on. 

“Hey, Haseul! What did I miss?” She greeted.  

“Oh! Heekkie, you’re not gonna believe this-”  

“Yeah! She said she fought like four guys!” Cut in Vivi.  

“I’m pretty sure she said five,” Corrected Sooyoung. 

“Hyejoo! Do you think I could have taken them? Cause I’m pretty sure I could without even a scratch!” Came Chaewon’s voice from deeper in the crowd. And as she moved closer to the raven-haired girl, Heejin could finally see that in the middle of all this chaos stood none other than Hyunjin.  

“I kind of doubt she actually fought and won against some thug, let alone three.” Jungeun voiced her disbelief only to be challenged by Jiwoo, who was standing up on tiptoe while steadying herself with a hand on her best friend’s shoulder to see the girl who was the topic of their conversation over the crowd of people. “Where do you think she got the black eye then, huh?”  

And as if on cue Hyunjin turned to the side while conversing with the girls gathered around her, showing off the black eye, that bloomed on her face, in all of its glory. The sight made Heejin think back to a certain accident she witnessed the day before.  

After excusing herself, she started making her way towards the lockers. Hyunjin seemed to be so caught up in conversation that she didn’t even notice the new face amongst the group of girls. Wanting to get to her own locker (and totally not because she was interested in hearing the full story) Heejin made herself known “Excuse me!” 

She was quickly met by a pair of eyes shining with excitement. “Heejin! Hey! You want to hear the whole tale from the source?” Hyunjin asked, voice full of confidence.  

“Yeah! It’s so awesome! You for sure need to hear it!” Yerim joined in, seeming to be even more eager than the protagonist of the story.  

“Actually, I just wanted to get to my locker,” Heejin answered with mock frankness.  

The smile showing off the girl’s canines quickly disappeared. “Oh. Right. Sorry.” Hyunjin mumbled hastily closing her own locker and making room for Heejin to reach hers.  

An awkward silence filled the air until Hyunjin decided to give getting Heejin’s attention another shot. “Have you noticed anything different about me today?” The girl queried while not so subtly flaunting her black eye.  

Heejin pretended to be deep in thought as she looked the excited girl over head to toe. “No, not really. Did you cut your hair?”  

Hyunjin was taken aback by the question. She appeared to be completely lost in thought while brushing a hand through her locks. 

Ultimately, Yeojin was the first to lose her patients. “Hyunjin got into a fight with these huge blokes! And there was like six of them! And she totally beat their asses and got away with just a shiner!” The younger girl was at this point, almost jumping out of exhilaration. “Tell her, Hyunjin! Tell her the full story!” She was practically shouting.  

“Is what the bean speaks off the truth?” Heejin asked, barely managing to suppress her smile when she was once again eye to eye with the star of the morning. She could hear Yeojin voice out her dissatisfaction with the nickname but chose to ignore her. 

“Kind of. Yeah. Do you want to hear the full story now?” Hyunjin spoke in a hopeful tone while rubbing the back of her neck. Yet once she got a quick nod from Heejin, her demeanour completely changed. The confident girl from before was back as she recalled the events of the night before.  

“I had hung around after soccer practice to help coach clean up the equipment. So, once I started making my way home, it was already dark outside. I was just casually strolling by the coffee shop whe-” 

“Wait, I thought you said it was by the corner store?” Hyejoo suddenly interrupted the story. 

“Right...” Hyunjin seemed to be a bit lost, “Right! I walked by the café to get to the convenience shop an-” The girl appeared to have gotten her bearings when she was once again hindered, this time by Chaewon. “But there’s no coffee shop on route to the convenience store?” 

Hyunjin seemed to be losing her temper with the constant interruptions. “It’s a different convenience store,” She simply answered. 

After giving the younger girls a stern look, she took a breath and continued. “As I was saying. These guys just came out of nowhere. They started catcalling at me, and after I didn’t react, they started getting aggressive. One dude tried grabbing me by the shoulder, so as I turned around, I got a good wound-up and backhanded him right across the face. Two of his friends ran up to, you know, defend his honour, or whatever, so I uppercut one, and knee kicked the other in the you-know-where. The last guy though, he managed to catch me off-guard and get one lucky swing in, which resulted in this bad boy,” -she pointed to her black eye- “But I quickly recovered. Stepped on his foot, then punched his nose with the ball of my hand. And after, I just walked away while they were writhing on the ground in pain.” 

The end of Hyunjin’s story was greeted by cheers and applause from the girls surrounding her. Sadly, the cries of support were quickly interrupted by the school bell. Brief goodbyes were thrown around as the girls started making their way to class. 

“I’m so proud of you, dude!” Said Jinsol with pure admiration in her voice. “I’ll see you at practice, though, right?” She asked while fist-bumping Hyunjin goodbye. Then she just took off without even getting a reply. 

In a few moments, it was only Heejin and Hyunjin, left in the quiet hallway. 

“Does it hurt?” The older girl asked, all the pretence gone from her voice replaced by honest concern.  

“Only a little,” The hero of the morning answered. A wide grin made its way across her face disappearing shortly after with a slight wince as if to prove her point. “But you should have seen the other guys,” She quickly continued. “They-”  

“You do know I saw you walk into the stop sign by my house yesterday, right?” Heejin interjected.  

“I-” Hyunjin’s explanation was cut off by the second bell.  

Heejin started making her way to class, but with a sudden burst of confidence, she turned back. “Don’t worry!” -a smirk stretched her lips- “I won’t tell.” Her words were accompanied by a wink, which left the other girl frozen in place, a deep red blush spreading across her face.