Yeonhi was a no-show. As expected. The three remaining Cheap Plastics were now deathly afraid of Tiffany. Also expected. But what was not foreseen was the rather unconcerned attitude for the injured trainee from the other girls. Instead, there seemed to be a lot of barely veiled smirking and sniggering going on in small clustered groups everywhere Tiffany went. She ignored them all. She had become used to having very selective hearing during her time here anyways. Half the stuff said about her was not even worth firing a single neuron in response to.

Tiffany just concentrated on getting her dance moves perfect, meticulously precise, down to her itty bitty little fingersies and toesies. Miyeon, Yuki and Junghwa stayed as far away from Tiffany as possible. The looks in their eyes suggested that they expected Tiffany to pounce and rip them from limb to limb before devouring them.

After practice, Tiffany stayed, wanting to lose herself in the familiar aches of her muscles, and also to avoid the questions that seemed itching to fly from curious mouths. But to her surprise, quite a few girls lagged behind, looking at her expectantly. Tiffany spotted Jessica and Taeyeon at the far end of the room, watching the other girls mill about in slight excited nervousness.

Yuri tentatively stepped forward like she was the spokesperson for all the shuffling, finger-twiddling lambs behind her. Tiffany’s eyes widened a little. The tanned girl had not approached her since Tiffany blatantly gave her the cold shoulder. Tiffany shot a brief glance at Jessica, who gave no reaction, as expected from the ice princess. But Tiffany understood that it indirectly meant she was in the clear.

“So uh…did you really break her nose and punch her teeth out?

“What?!” Tiffany erupted.

“That’s one of the more believable rumors…” Yuri trailed off.

“How many are going around?!” Tiffany exclaimed, incredulous.

“Well there are the simple ones where you just beat her senseless in varying degrees of severity, then there are the more fantastical ones. The last one I heard, you pushed her into an oncoming bus,” said a tall girl called Sooyoung. There were choruses of scattered murmurs. Tiffany swore she heard snippets like “broken arms and legs”, “broken ribs” and even something about a “broken neck”.

“Jeezuz…” Tiffany effused.

“Yea…” Yuri replied, sheepishly scratching the back of her neck.

“No, it was nothing like that! I just slapped her once. Granted it was quite hard. But no broken bones, no blood, and for goodness sake! No buses!” Tiffany’s outburst drew a snort from Jessica. Apparently this was all very amusing to these girls. Tiffany must have underestimated how much Yeonhi was disliked amongst the trainees.

“You must think us all busybodies, asking you like this,” said Hyoyeon. Tiffany had noticed the girl around before. She could dance up a storm, but she usually trained with the guys. Tiffany had more than once sat on the sidelines as Hyoyeon and the guys practiced. Their harder-hitting and more dramatic moves appealed to Tiffany much more than the rather fluid and more feminine movements the girls were trained in. But she wasn’t acquainted with any of them to be able to ask to join, nor did any of them extend their invitations to the weird thug-like girl whom no one really knew anything about.

“No,” was Tiffany’s simple reply.

“Did you think we didn’t know about how those girls treated you?” Hyoyeon asked with some edged sarcasm. The girl could be a little pushy.

“Well whether you did or not, it doesn’t change the fact that none of you did anything to stop it. If you stood by and watched, you’re part of the problem. Haven’t you heard that before?” and Tiffany was going to push right back. The surrounding girls gaped a little at Tiffany’s bluntness. Sensing that a little bit of a storm was brewing, Jessica and Taeyeon decided to stop merely spectating and walked over next to Tiffany. Hyoyeon had actually picked up on the fact that Tiffany hadn’t said it in an accusatory tone. The girl seemed to merely be stating a fact, bold as it may seem. But Hyoyeon wanted to test the waters a little more, see what this girl was made of, so she kept silent and said nothing. The atmosphere around the room grew dark and tense. Tiffany finally decided to speak up again.

“I’m not mad or anything. I understand how I appeared to all of you when I joined. If I were you, I wouldn’t jump into the business of some sketchy thuggish-looking girl either. Honestly, what did you think of me when you first saw me?” Tiffany decided to clear the air once and for all. There was a high chance she would be working with most of these girls for quite some years to come if Mr. Lee’s planning came to pass.

“A girl with a bad run-in with her pimp or a john,” was Hyoyeon’s reflexive reply, sounding just as matter-of-fact as Tiffany had just minutes before.

“UNNIE!!!” squealed a scandalized Seohyun. The young girl was quite innocent and very tenderhearted. Tiffany had noticed most of the other girls babied her a lot. Figures, since she was one of the younger ones. Tiffany laughed mirthlessly. Hyoyeon’s reply was indeed quite harsh, but she had asked for it and she wasn’t one to stir up trouble based on mundane things such as these.

Beside her, Taeyeon was nervously wringing her hands and Tiffany felt Jessica stiffen and exhale forcefully through her nostrils. She almost wanted to laugh. The ice princess was protective of her? That’s a first. The instigator, Hyoyeon, was now studying Tiffany inquisitively with a quirked head, curious as to how Tiffany would respond. The rest of the girls had fallen silent.

“I personally thought I looked more like a drug dealer in a deal gone bad. But I can see why you would have thought that,” Tiffany countered with a cheeky smirk.

“You’re…twisted…I like you. We’re going to grab a bite to eat after we de-stinkify. Come with!” Hyoyeon said enthusiastically, all previous hint of antagonism gone and replaced with a playful kidlike attitude. Tiffany didn’t know what to think of the somewhat bi-polar girl and she was about to politely decline the offer when Yuri decided for her. The tanned girl pulled Tiffany to one side, away from everyone else. She was twiddling her fingers nervously.

“Are you…still mad at me?” she asked softly. Tiffany frowned at how vulnerable the girl sounded, like one wrong word would result in waterworks.

“No Yuri. I was never mad at you,” Tiffany said kindly.

“Oh. Cause I thought I angered you when I poked fun of Seohyun for liking K