Gyuri looked up upon hearing someone call Victoria’s name, an attractive milky skin girl was slowly making her way towards their table. In a small whisper enough for only the two of them to hear, Gyuri asked “Vic, do you know her?”

Before Victoria could reply, the girl continued “is that really you Victoria?” Reaching their table, a wide grin crossed the girl’s face as she looked at Victoria intensely, “Oh my gosh, it really is you. I can’t believe it.”

Victoria hesitated greeting the girl because she still couldn’t recall the identity of who this girl was. After a few seconds of uncertainty, Victoria nodded her head slowly and weakly uttered an hello under her breath.

Upon seeing Victoria’s confused expression the girl raised her eyebrow then let out an awkward laugh, “…It’s me, Han Sunhwa. We went to the same middle school, remember?” After a few seconds of silence the girl continued, “remember how we use to watch Kris’s basketball games together? Back then I had short hair and wore glasses…”

Kris. Hearing that name stung a little, Victoria thought as the girl continued to describe herself. Victoria didn’t really have any female friends until high school, aside from Gyuri. Living in Korea, girls would either bully Victoria because they were jealous of her for being childhood friends with Kris and Siwon. Or they would pretend to be her friend just to get closer to her childhood friends. This was one reason why she had decided on attending an all-girl high school, before moving to America. She wanted to get away from the shadow of her childhood friends.

 “We often went to eat ice cream together, remember now?”

“Ah, yes. I remember now, you’re that Sunhwa” Victoria tried to sound convincing. Honestly, it’s hard to remember each and every girl who had used her just to get closer to her childhood friends.  There have probably been well over 100 incidents throughout their childhood regarding similar tactics girls had used inorder to get closer to her.

“You remembered! That was all in the past” Sunhwa laughed awkwardly as she recalls the incident. “I’m sorry I was so mean to you back then. I was really jealous of you because you were close to Kris and he only had eyes for you. I didn’t mean to give you that mud filled ice cream back then, I really regret it. Anyways, I’m really sorry for being so childish back then. I’ve changed now.  So, when did you come back to Korea? Are you just visiting or are you moving back here?”

Hearing the story, Victoria remembered the incident well. Sunhwa was one of the first few friends she thought she made when she first started middle school. Sunhwa was always there to defend her when other girls were bullying her because of Kris. She thought Sunhwa was a great friend, until Sunhwa had asked her to give a confession letter Sunhwa had written to Kris. At that time Victoria didn’t want to help Sunhwa because Kris would get mad every time she’d bring him a confession letter someone had asked her to give him. He was always bad at controlling his temper and when that happened, he would sometimes throw those letters back in her face. It made her feel guilty for forcing him to read them.

Sunhwa started to be really mean to Victoria after that, saying how Victoria isn’t a real friend because she didn’t help her. If Victoria was a real friend, she’d give Kris the letter and stuff like that. When Victoria finally decided to give the letter to Kris, Sunhwa found out that Kris had thrown it away without reading it and had blamed Victoria for not giving it to him sooner. She later told Victoria she had forgiven her and that she’ll treat Victoria ice cream as a way to say sorry for blaming Victoria for the Kris incident. Later that day, Sunhwa came by with a mud filled ice cream, saying how it’s a popular chocolate flavored ice cream and it’s really good. Seeing Victoria hesitate eating the ice cream Sunhwa ‘helped’ shoved the ice cream down Victoria’s throat.

Chills ran down Victoria’s back as she recalls the incident. Girls can be so cruel when it comes to matter of the heart. Victoria’s glad that Sunhwa understands it was wrong to have done those things and glad that she has changed.

“It hasn’t been too long since I came back.” Victoria paused for a few seconds feeling conflicted. Trying to avoid answering the second question she held her hand towards Gyuri, “did I introduce you to my friend yet? This is Park Gyuri. Gyuri, this is Han Sunhwa.”

Sunhwa shook Gyuri’s hand then she looked at her watch. She turned her attention back to Victoria, “how long are you going to be here for?”

“I’ll be leaving Korea in a few weeks” Victoria lied. Looking away, she caught Gyuri eyeing her suspiciously. Gyuri mouthed “L.I.A.R.” then stuck her tongue out. Victoria made a face at Gyuri that says, ‘you shush.’

“I meant to ask, are you going to be eating in the restaurant for awhile?” Sunhwa looked over her shoulders to a table where 4 boys and 2 other girls sat, “actually Kris is supposes to meet me and a few other friends here today, but it seemed like he’s running a little late. It’ll be good if…”

Before she could finish her sentence Victoria interrupted, “actually my friend and I were just about to leave before you stopped us.” Taking a deep breath she tried to control her shaken voice, turning her head towards the other table “you should hurry and get back to your friends. They’ve been staring at us for quite some time now.”

“Are you sure you can’t stay a bit longer? He should be here soon” Sunhwa grabbed her phone from her purse and showed it to Victoria as proof “he should be here within 5 minutes.”

After reading the content of the text, Victoria stood up instantly. The words came out hastily, “sorry we can’t. I promised someone I’d meet them and I’m running late as it is.” Panicking, she looked at Gyuri with pleading eyes for assistance.

“That’s right. We have to go…” Gyuri got up from her seat and put some money down for the bill. Victoria bowed to Sunhwa apologetically before grabbing Gyuri’s arm, ushering her towards the restaurant exit.

=====

“Who were those girls,” one of the girls asked Sunhwa when she returned to their table a few minutes after Victoria had left.

“I didn’t know you knew such hot girls, Sunhwa” one guy said. “Why didn’t you introduce those pretty girls to us?” another guy asked.

Before Sunhwa could reply, someone spoke first. “Sunhwa has friends who are prettier than her? That’s impossible.”  Kris sat down and winked at Sunhwa. “Her principal is to never make friends with girls who are prettier than her.”

“But these girls were smoking hot,” the first guy argued, “LIKE smoking hot.”

“So who were you guys talking about?” Kris asked.

“Dude, you missed it! A few minutes before you arrived Sunhwa was talking to these two really pretty girls. They had curves in all the right places and their legs were ing y as hell in those shorts” said one guy, “and get this, she didn’t even introduce them to us! How messed up is that?”

“Sunhwa, I’ll introduce you to that one guy you’ve been asking me about, if you introduce me to the girl in the navy blue jacket” a guy with a red shirt pleaded. Tugging on Sunhwa’s arm he continued, “come on, help me. It was love at first sight.”

Chuckling, Kris looked at his friend “What a load of bull . Love at first sight my , more like you just want to get into those pants at first sight.” He grabbed a can of beer on the table and opened it, “Sunhwa, have some pity on Lu Han. Just introduce her to him.”

After taking a sip of his beer, Kris looked at Sunhwa who was just sitting there staring at him. Her quietness was out of the ordinary. “Why are you staring at me?”

Sunhwa hesitated for a few seconds, unsure if she should tell Kris that Victoria’s is here in Korea, or not. Victoria looked reluctant earlier. She didn’t seem like she wanted to see Kris and even gave an excuse in order to avoid seeing him. She does owe Victoria a favor because of the way she had treated her in the past, but Kris was her friend.

Thanks to Victoria leaving Korea back then, Sunhwa did get a chance to date Kris, but it wasn’t what she had expected at all. I guess you can say it was karma for the way she treated Victoria. Kris no matter how much she had loved him, he would always keep a part of his heart locked because of Victoria. Even the girls he had dated after Sunhwa have tried to get in that place that he had only reserved for Victoria, but it was useless. After years of being by his side, she finally realizes that there was no point of getting half a heart, while he kept the other half for someone else. Finally she gave up and decided on just being friends with him.

After all these years he had been wasting waiting for her, he deserves at least this much, Sunhwa thought, to know that Victoria’s back. Before Sunhwa could think any further, the words flew out of “I saw HER today, Kris.”

Kris jerked his attention towards Sunhwa. The way the word ‘her’ came out of Sunhwa’s mouth, made him realize who it might have be. His lips pressed to a hard line and his tone was now serious and icy “saw who?”

“Her…” Sunhwa whispered as she shifted uncomfortably under Kris’s stare. Letting out a sigh, she spoke in a louder tone, “Victoria.”

“Why didn’t you tell me earlier” Kris yelled as he slammed his hands on the table. He stood up from the seat and continued shouting “where did you see her? Where did she go? How long ago was this? Answer me, Sunhwa.”

Sunhwa looked up at Kris who’s was looking at her franticly for an answer. “Kris, I don’t think…”

“I don’t need you to think. I just need you to tell me where she went and how long ago was this.” After a few seconds of silence, Kris grew impatient. He could hear the desperation in his voice as he whispered, “please, Sunhwa. Please, tell me where she is…”

“She left about 5 minutes ago. She was wearing a navy blue jacket, with black shorts. I don’t know where she went, but I saw her turn right towards the main street. Besides I don’t think she wants…”

He interrupted her before she could finish her sentence, “thanks” he muttered as he rushed out the door at lightning speed.

Without thinking, he began running down the street where Sunhwa had said Victoria was headed. Shouting her name as he paced quickly down the street, “Victoria…Victoria…where are you…VICTORIA” He looked left and right, trying to search for her in the crowd of people. After 10 minutes of searching and screaming, he started walking back to the restaurant, motionless.

Of course she can’t be found dummy, he thought to himself. If she wanted to contact him she could have always called. He had kept the same number all these years because of her, scared that if one day she were to call him she might not be able to reach him if he had changed his number.  He pushed his hands through his hair and let out a long sigh. A bitter laugh came out as he murmured “I just wanted to see you once…just once …was it too much to ask for...why Victoria?”

Pushing the door to the restaurant, Kris looked for one of the servers and ordered a few bottles of soju. Taking one of the bottles he tilted his head back and gulped down the whole thing in an instant, then took another bottle.

“Woah Kris. If you drink that fast you’ll get drunk really fast” Lu Han tried taking the second bottle Kris was about to open from him. Yanking it back, Kris glared at Lu Han, “shut up.”

“Just let him be” Sunhwa whispered then changed her tone to a happy tone, “Let’s get drunk tonight.”

[Author’s Side Note] Finally the first male character had appeared! What will happen next? When will they be able to meet face to face? Where the heck is Siwon?

Next chapter, a part of Kris and Victoria’s past revealed. Stay tune :]