I was sitting at our doorstep after running a full mile around the campus. I looked at my watch. 6:21 am. Fany and I went back to the campus at around four in the afternoon yesterday. I had a hard time sleeping last night and I woke up at 5:30 in the morning. It was all because of my stupid brother and the things he told me yesterday before we left.

Flashback

I was waiting for Tiffany in our living room when my brother dragged me out of the living room and into the kitchen. He dragged me by the collar of my shirt. If he wasn’t older than me I would’ve kicked him in the shin for almost choking me to death.

“What is your problem?” I glared at him and the smirk plastered on his ugly face… No wait, I didn’t mean that. We look alike so I shouldn’t be saying that. The smirk on his face infuriated me more.

“When will you ask Tiffany to be your girlfriend? Make sure you do it nicely because she will forever remember how you asked her to be your girlfriend.” He was patting my head and I immediately flinched. Did I hear him right?

“What are you talking about? Tiffany’s dating Sooyoung, the tall girl who was with her the day you guys met. I don’t even like Tiffany and neither does she.” I couldn’t help but chuckle at how absurd his statement was.

“You don’t like her?” he asked sceptically. 

“Well, not that way.” I like Tiffany now and how we treat each other is way better nowadays but that doesn’t mean I’m in love with her.

“So you brought her with you when you visited mom’s grave, you brought her here and you look at her like that because you don’t like her that way? That makes sense.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know I couldn’t bring my friends here.” I tried to match the sarcasm in his tone. “And what do you mean by ‘you look at her like that’. How do I look at her and how does it differ from when I look at other people?”

He gasped…in a very girly way. Sometimes I think my brother’s gay.

“You’re not aware of how you feel about her? You have some serious issues, Yuri-ah,” he stated.

“Are you insane? How can I not know what I feel about her?” At this point, I was ready to give him a hard punch in the face just to stop him from talking non-sense.

“Have you ever been in love?” That question. Tiffany’s already asked me that question before. It was the night I got mad at her for calling me ‘Manyul’ despite the fact that she promised not to call me that anymore. The night when she figured out that Sooyoung likes her. She mentioned something about ‘love at first sight’.

I broke out from my reverie and answered him. “No, I haven’t. What does that—“

Before I could finish he cut me off with another question. “Then how would you know that you’ve already fallen in love with someone?”

I answered his question the best way I can. “I don’t know. I suppose you just feel it.”

“Yeah, you feel it but then you decide to just shrug it off because in your puny head, Tiffany is just your annoying roommate who calls you ‘Manyul’ and who won’t let you win an argument.” He smirked. “That’s right, I, Kwon Hyuk-joon, your amazing brother, took time to actually observe how you two interact with each other.”

I shook my head and looked at him seriously. “I’m not in love with her. Stop insisting that I am. You’re only putting things inside my head and I’ll start to think about it. Then, I’ll start thinking if I really am in love with her when the truth of the matter is, I’M NOT!” I looked at him disdainfully, “Are you trying to make me your guinea pig? You’re planning to use all of this psychology crap and messing up with other people’s head to your wife, aren’t you?” I still think he’s instilling things inside my mind. How can I be in love with someone and not know about it? How stupid could I be?

“Now you’re talking crazy,” he rebutted. “I’m not even using psychology crap on you. I don’t even know how to do that. My knowledge about psychology is half the size of my eye gunk every morning. I’m just stating the observation dad, my wife, Victoria and I have made.”

I cannot believe what I’m hearing right now. Observing us? 

“You could deny it all you want but it won’t change the fact that you’ve already fallen for her. There’s nothing bad about it really. Well, save for the fact that she’s already with someone which is kind of your fault for being so clueless about YOUR OWN FEELINGS!”

“You do realize how crazy that sounds, right?”

He didn’t answer immediately. I started walking away but stopped when I heard his next question. “You said she’s dating this Sooyoung, right? Do you ever get jealous when you see them together?”

Do I? Do I get jealous every time I see them kiss and hug each other? Was I jealous when she left me by myself and went to sleep with Sooyoung instead? “No,” I answered him, trying to convince him. I’m not jealous. 
“Liar.”

“I’m not a liar.”

“You dare to lie to me?” he asked in disbelief. “You practically learned how to lie from me. You got all your techniques from ME.” He said it ever so proudly.

“Just shut up. I’m not in love with her,” I walked away from him before he says more stupid things.

“Let’s see how long you could keep lying to yourself then,” I heard him say.

I sat at our couch again and waited for her. I am not in love with that geek. So what if I brought her here? If I brought Sunny, Yoona and Seohyun with me, does that mean I’m in love with them? My brother’s stupid. I shouldn’t even be thinking about his absurd assumptions.

“Hey, let’s go.” I turned to where the owner of the voice was and saw her smiling.

I stood up and walked towards her. We said goodbye to everyone and walked to where I parked my car. Tiffany linked arms with me again just like the time when we went to buy food in the market. Some erted guy was checking her out… Wait a sec! Why am I suddenly thinking about those things?

“Damn!”

“Excuse me?”

Crap! I said it out loud. This is all my brother’s fault.

“Sorry. I just remembered something.”

As I got inside the car, I got full view of what she was wearing and her thighs. “Fany-ah! Why do you have to wear something so short?”

She looked at me like I’ve suddenly lost my mind. “You only complain now when this is the exact outfit I wore yesterday, THE WHOLE DAY.”

It was?

“Whatever. You shouldn’t wear stuff like that when you go out. It’s too…provocative.”

I put the keys in the ignition and started the engine. 

“How is this provocative?” She air quoted the word ‘provocative’ and sounded like she was mocking me. I hate it when she uses that tone with me. That’s one of the reasons why my brother is so~ wrong about me falling in love with HER! 

“If you stand up, it’ll look like you’re not wearing anything other than that shirt.”

“And?”

Unbelievable. She doesn’t even care if some erted guy would check her out!

“Do you think you’re living in ‘Care-a-lot’ where only ‘Care Bears’ exist? Do you seriously think there’s no erted soul that would check you out if you wear something like that when you go out in the streets of Seoul?” I wanted to say more things to make her realize how much of an idiot she is.

She wasn’t answering. This idiot wasn’t even looking at me. She was furiously typing whatever on her phone.

“Hi, Soo,” I heard her say. “Do you think the pants I’m wearing is too short?” She focused the camera of her phone on her thighs so Soo could see it. 

“Y-ye-yeah. Don’t…don’t wear something like that anymore. Well, unless you’re with me and we’re inside a roo—a house. Wear stuff like that only if we’re inside our house and we don’t have any visitors.” 

I saw her pouting and finally said ‘fine’ after a few more seconds. They talked more while I drive. Hearing them talking sweetly like that irritated the hell out of me. And it is not, I repeat, IT IS NOT because I’m jealous. It’s just that I’m not used to any of them talking like that. Can’t they wait ‘til they see each other and spend time alone instead of talking about mushy stuff while I’m driving? I don’t mean to eavesdrop and I don’t want to eavesdrop but we’re inside my car. My ears doesn’t have switch. I couldn’t turn it off and give them the privacy that they deserve. What? Am I supposed to stick my head out of the window to not be able to hear what they’re talking about?

“I wish I could watch it with you,” I heard her say again. Again, not my fault for hearing their ‘private convo’, I don’t have super powers that’ll block any sound waves coming from her.

“I guess I don’t have a choice but to watch it with Yul then.” Yul? That’s me. Why am I suddenly dragged into their conversation? “I’ll try to convince this sourpuss first. Love you, bye. See you later.”

I glanced at her for a second. “What was that about?”

“We’ll watch ‘Thor’,” she said as she put her phone inside her bag.

That didn’t even sound like she was trying to convince me. “Go watch it alone. I’m not going.”

“Fine. Drop me off to the mall then. Wake me up when we’re in Seoul already.”

What? No arguments? No shouting and no name calling?

I smiled while remembering what happened yesterday. I ended up watching the movie with her. Not because I wanted to. Definitely not! If something bad happens to her, it’ll be my fault since I was the last person she was with. My conscience won’t let me sleep.

I’m not gonna deny the fact that I actually enjoyed watching it. I think was I temporarily deaf though because of the flame throwing metal giant dude and its sound effects. Nevertheless, I liked it. 

“Mjolnir,” I chuckled remembering her failed attempt to say the word. I thought she was only imitating one of the characters, Darcy. It turns out she really couldn’t say it. She eventually gave up and just sticks to calling it ‘hammer’.

I was giggling ‘til I remembered the reason why I’m thinking about the events that occurred yesterday. I quickly fished my phone out of the pocket of the jacket that I was wearing and dialled my brother’s number. I stood up and paced back and forth in front of the door while waiting for him to answer his phone.

“Hello?” 

“YAH!” I really don’t care if he’d be deaf after doing that.

“Yuri-ah? What do you want? Can you call later? I still want to sleep! You almost woke up Minhyuk you little—“

“This is all your fault, oppa! Do something about it! Take back everything you said yesterday!”

I heard him chuckling and it made me angrier. Did he think this was a joke? I can’t even sleep with that… that ridiculous thought inside my head.

“What do you want me to say? That you are not in love with your roommate? Is that it? You can’t lie to yourself anymore, huh?”

“Yah~” I was starting to whine like a little kid which made him chuckle more. I cleared my throat and spoke again. “I’m not in love with her. I only started thinking about her ever since you said all those stupid things!”

“No. You’re thinking about her because you’ve already realized that you are in love with her. Come to think about it, Yuri-ah, it’s not that you didn’t know you’ve fallen for her. You just don’t know the feeling of being in love. The idea was unfamiliar for you so you didn’t care much about it. You ignored it and—“

“How sure are you that I’m in love with her? What? Are you suddenly in charge of my brain? Did you suddenly have access to my hypothalamus to know that I’m in love with her, huh?” I was out of breath from all the shouting and was panting while waiting for his answer.

“Yuri, if there’s one person that would know how you feel about someone, that’d be me.” There was a long pause before he continued. “Or dad…or mom…even Victoria. The point is, from our point of view, from the point of view of the people who’ve seen you grown up to the lady…? Are you a lady? Are you a lady already?”

“Oppa!” I hate it when he does this. He really has short attention span. He has the attention span of a dog.

“From the point of view of the people who’ve witnessed how you grew up, you are undeniably in love with Tiffany…what’s her last name?”

“Hwang.”

“You are undeniably in love with Tiffany Hwang.”

I pouted and creased my eyebrows. “I am not in love with her.” I’m not even denying at this point. I am seriously not in love with her. Wasn’t I supposed to be the first person to know if I have feelings for that geek?

“I’m not gonna talk to you anymore. Bye.” I ended the call and sat on the doorstep again. “Victoria,” I suddenly remembered. When I was younger, I always talk to her every time I can’t have a decent conversation with my brother. I dialled her number and told her to meet me later at a café near our school. He’s going to bring Khun-oppa. Great! More people that would disprove what my brother said.


---


When Yuri entered the house, she saw the others descending the stairs. A sleepy Yoona was being dragged by a hyper Seohyun, a lethargic Sunny being pushed by Hyoyeon and Jessica, who seemed like she was sleepwalking, was walking with Taeyeon in tow.

“Good morning, Yuri-unnie,” the very polite maknae greeted.

“Morning, Hyunnie,” she greeted back. When she looked at the person next to the girl, she was greeted by a glare.

“Yah, unnie, I’m the only one who could call her that,” the younger girl protested. 

Yuri shook her head and giggled, “Fine. Morning, Seohyun-ah.”

She made her way to the stairs but stopped when she heard her name.

“Where are you going?” asked Hyoyeon.

“Upstairs. I’ll wake Tiffany up,” answered Yuri casually.

“She’s already up. She’s in our room, Yuri-unnie. She said she would skip classes today,” said Seohyun.

“Why?”

“She said she’s going to take care of Sooyoung. My stupid best friend is sick.” Hyoyeon showed a disgusted expression while talking. “That shikshin ate too much yesterday. It’s like there was this invisible conveyer belt of food attached to . She didn’t stop eating. Every time I see her, she’s either stuffing her face with barbecue or munching on whatever appetizer she could find.”

“So Fany’s skipping classes today to take care of Soo?”

Hyoyeon nodded. 

“Oh, I’ll just change my clothes then. I’ll eat with you guys afterwards.” She made her way to their room and saw Tiffany walking towards Sooyoung and Seohyun’s room.

Her roommate asked her a favour to tell their professors why she won’t be around. Yuri agreed but reminded her that they would be having their midterm exam on their first class that day. The shorter girl just shrugs it off and said that she’s just going to ask their professor to give her a special exam.

When she was about to enter their room, Tiffany called her. “Yuri-ah.”

“Yeah?” Tiffany was smiling at her.

“Mjolnir,” she said with much ease.

She smiled. “Good to know you know how to pronounce that word. Even first grade students could pronounce that, Fany.”

“Soo taught me. I could’ve pronounced it properly yesterday if you didn’t at teaching,” the shorter girl teased.

“It’s not that I at teaching. You’re just too damn choosy on whom to listen to. You probably listened to Soo attentively that’s why you finally got it,” she retorted.

Of course you’d pay attention to what Soo teaches you. She IS your girlfriend.

“Whatever. I’ll see you later.”

Yuri nodded, went inside their room and locked herself in the bathroom. She was about to discard her jacket and put it in the laundry basket when she remembered her phone was still inside the pocket. She sat on the bathroom floor and browsed the pictures. A photo of her and Tiffany holding the pink oyster mushroom stood out. Her roommate snatched her phone from her and transferred their photo to her handphone via Bluetooth.

You know, people who confess their love for me usually give me a bouquet of flowers. Red roses to be exact. But this. This is…unique. Thanks, Yul.

She suddenly remembered Tiffany’s statement when she showed her the mushrooms and it made her smile. The smile on her face, however, was quickly replaced with a frown. “Am I really in love with you?” she said out loud as if the photo would magically answer her.

She was still sitting on the floor all the while humming to an *N Sync song. She didn’t know when it happened but she was already singing the song while looking at the photo.

“I lose my step, I lose my ground, I lose myself when you’re around. I’m holding on for my life to keep from drowning in your eyes.”
She quickly stood up and shook her head vigorously. “I am not in love with her!” She checked the time on her phone. “Damn it! I’m going to be late if I keep on spacing out like that.”


---


Their PE class under the terror professor just ended with all of them breathing heavily. Taeyeon saw Jessica sitting on a bench, sweating like crazy. She sat down beside her and handed her a bottle of water.

“Thanks, Taengoo.”

“You’re welcome,” Taeyeon said with a warm smile that Jessica was familiar with. “Sica, you still owe me since you didn’t swim with the sharks with me.”

“Oh, yeah. Stop reminding me of your stupidity,” she said coldly. 

Taeyeon smile grew wider. I wish you could just tell me you felt worried when you saw me swimming with the sharks instead.

“You’re free later, right?”

Jessica nodded. “Make sure your plan doesn’t involve getting eaten alive by some beast.”

“It doesn’t. Make sure to bring extra clothes though.”

Jessica creased her eyebrows. “Why?”

“It’s a surprise. I promise you’ll like it.”