The girls didn’t sleep for the rest of that night.

Tiffany had left the dorm again after her talk with Jessica, and the other girls had watched in confusion as their ice princess simply watched Tiffany walk out the door, seemingly at peace with the girl leaving. Taeyeon mentally made a note to ask Jessica about it later.

Yuri had retrieved the puzzle she had custom-made for Lexi. There was still a huge portion of it that wasn’t finished. The tanned girl wanted to finish it so that Tiffany could take it with her to the States. It was not reasonable to have such a huge puzzle buried with Lexi, so Yuri had each member pick out one piece of the puzzle to write whatever they didn’t have a chance to say to the little girl on the back of the puzzle piece. These pieces would be the ones to be buried in the coffin with Lexi. As to the puzzle itself, Yuri would give full reins to Tiffany as to what she wanted to do with it. The puzzle would forever remain unfinished, but the unfinished pieces would forever be engraved in their hearts, just like Lexi was. And, as a fulfillment of her promise to Lexi, Yuri also decided to send her favorite Mickey along with Tiffany. She knew Lexi would love him better than she could.

Sunny wrote a twenty-three-page letter to Lexi, telling the little girl everything she had every wanted to say and perhaps would like to say to her in the future. Everything from how much she loved the little girl to how she had wished to see her grow up and graduate, and find the guy of her dreams. Sunny imagined how it would be like to have the little girl live with them in their dorm. She imagined having to take turns walking Lexi to school as they all had different schedules. She imagined Lexi coming to her with boy troubles. She imagined herself confronting whoever it was who would dare bully Lexi or make her cry. She imagined taking Lexi-belle out for ice-cream after picking her up from school in secret because Tiffany wouldn't like her baby sister eating too much junk food. She imagined the little girl running into her room at night because Tiffany wasn't home and the thunder and lightning was scaring her. Sunny imagined a whole lifetime with Lexi...and she wrote it all down on paper.

She folded the pages into twenty-three paper cranes, because even if Lexi had passed away and left them, Sunny still had hope. It was a hope for Tiffany's future.

Seohyun chose her favorite book, a personally annotated Korean copy of Jane Austen’s ‘Pride & Prejudice’ that she had read to Lexi in the hospital. The pages were wrinkled and dog-eared. It had belonged to Seohyun’s mother and Seohyun’s umma had read the book to her in much the same way she had read to Lexi.

Hyoyeon had her first pair of baby shoes bronzed. Even as a child she was passionate about dancing and she knew Lexi had wanted her to remember that. As Hyoyeon had grown up and introduced more and more into the world, she began to lose some of that passion to her fear of what the world thought of her. She found herself placing more and more emphasis on stupid things such as ‘lucky dancing shoes’ or ‘lucky socks’ or ‘lucky numbers’ and other such idiocies. By giving Lexi her first pair of shoes, Hyoyeon was vowing to refind that fearless, almost careless, passion she once had for dancing. She wanted to regain that faith she used to have in herself. She needed to trust that the countless hours she had spent sweating and practicing were enough, simply because she was good enough. It’s what Lexi would have wanted.

Sooyoung took the saved up money she had meant to spend on Lexi and placed it in a huge ceramic babyblue elephant piggybank. She wouldn’t be sending anything along with Tiffany; instead, she was going to continue saving up money and perhaps later on start a fund of some sort for orphans like Lexi and Tiffany. Taeyeon decided to do the same. The two of them placed the piggybank (which was the size of a large dog) in a corner of the living room, and everyday, when they came back home, they promised to empty whatever bills and coins were in their pockets into the piggybank. It turned out to be such a good idea that all the other girls decided to join as well. They hope that in a few years, they would have enough to do something good with the money.

Yoona also wouldn’t be sending anything along with Tiffany. Instead, she decided she was going to document everything each member did as they grew up and went about their lives. The second maknae went out and using her own saved up money, bought a nice, decent Canon DSLR. The camera went everywhere she did, and Yoona vowed to keep Lexi up to date as to the antics of their career and their lives.

Jessica.

Jessica felt she had nothing worthy to give Lexi. Her time with the little girl was too short and there was so much she had left unsaid and undone. All she had were a lot of regrets and feelings of uselessness. So instead of sending something meaningless, Jessica decided she would personally fly to the States and lay something on Lexi’s tombstone when she could think of the right way to say goodbye.

All the girls huddled around the expansive puzzle and worked late into the night. When Tiffany came home from another bout of boxing early next morning, she found all eight girls sprawled messily about the living room, the puzzle finished on the living room floor.

Tiffany gazed down at the puzzle picture of her and Lexi in the woods and couldn’t stop the stab of guilt that skewered her heart. Nevertheless, she was grateful for what the girls had done.

One by one, Tiffany carried the girls to their beds. Most of them woke up when Tiffany lifted them off the ground, but each one continued to feign sleep. None of them wanted to ruin such a tender moment, especially not when Tiffany had pretty much avoided all voluntary skinship since Lexi died. All eight girls loved the fact that they had never felt safer anywhere else than in Tiffany’s arms.

Tiffany herself knew her members were faking sleep, but she took advantage of their faux-sleep state and in turn forcefully deceived herself, refusing to acknowledge the truth, just so she could spend a few moments caring for her members without really having to lower her barriers.

They’re asleep on the cold hard floor with no blankets. They could get sick. Any decent person would not have hesitated to do the same. So what if Sooyoung is snoring louder than usual? Doesn’t mean she’s faking it. So what if Yuri’s tongue isn’t sticking out in her sleep like it usually does? Do you watch her sleep every night to see if she does it every time? So what if Seohyun nuzzled her face into your chest? So what if you were sure you saw Sunny take a peek at you? So what if you caught Yoona gripping your shirt? So what if Hyoyeon practically gasped out loud when you picked her up? So what if Taeyeon mumbled her multiplication tables correctly this time? So what if Jessica kissed your neck? They’re asleep. Just leave it at that.

After settling her members, Tiffany cooked breakfast as per usual, like nothing was wrong, like nothing had changed, like her world had not crumbled to pieces around her…like everything was ‘just fine’.

Then, like so many times before, Tiffany left the confines of the dorm again before the girls could ‘wake up’. She still wasn’t really ready to face them.

The moment the door closed, eight girls came running out of their rooms, not expecting Tiffany to have left again so soon. Yuri was about to run out the door after Tiffany when she felt a hand on her wrist, stopping her from going any further.

“Let her go,” Jessica said reservedly, sadly accepting the fact that it was better to leave Tiffany alone, even if it went against every sinew of her heart.

“She’ll be ok. She’ll probably hit the gym again or something. Maybe come back bloody and bruised like before. But even though she pushes limits, she’ll always come home safe. If you happen to see her and she’s hurt, don’t freak out and don’t pounce on her and make a big deal. She’ll just push you further away. She just needs some time alone. The only thing we can do is wait and be patient,” Taeyeon asserted.

Jessica looked at Taeyeon in surprise, astounded that the kid-leader had picked up so much and understood Tiffany so intimately. The brunette suddenly felt very grateful and warm towards the baby-faced girl. Taeyeon was someone she could always depend on to com