Chaerin is really disturbed by herself. If she shocked herself earlier at Dara's house, now she wants to jump out of a window because she's dreaming of a Dark Angel (and who the hell would know what to make of that?)

       She goes to work on Monday and she finds her eyes never leaving Dara's hilariously fake cashier-smile and her light makeup and her soft, silky brown hair. And her back, which Chaerin knows has two huge, magnificent designs marking the wings that are quietly, patiently resting inside (unlike her own impatient, aggressive white ones).

       Chaerin has never seen a Dark Angel's wing markings; she's only seen the wing markings of herself and her parents. But judging by how breathtaking Dara's wings are, the wing markings on her back are probably pretty damn breathtaking too.

       Chaerin thinks she's probably going to dream about wing markings tonight.

       Every time Chaerin comes out to dump some more gross orange chicken into the tray, she takes a glance at Dara at the cashier. And every time she takes a glance at Dara at the cashier, she notices something new, whether it's her flawless skin, her curved nose, her gentle smile, or even her healthy pink lips.

       (She tries not to focus on the healthy pink lips too much.)

       During the morning "dead period" as Seungri calls it, when barely any customers trickle in, Chaerin resumes cooking to prepare for the lunch rush. The kitchen station is so loud that she doesn't hear Dara's worn-out Converse on the floor.

       "Hey wimp. Chae! Yah, Lee Chaerin!" Dara yells, standing a couple feet away because the station is too hot. Chaerin jumps in surprise because she was kind of spacing out thinking about Dara and the dream and Bom and the dream and Dara.

       "What, yeah, what?!" she answers hastily. Dara smiles a little at something Chaerin can't pinpoint.

       "Bommie really likes you," Dara says. Chaerin's cheeks redden a little as she turns off the cooking station and wipes her oily hands on a nearby towel. No one has really said they like her before. It feels nice and fuzzy inside to hear those words.

       She subtly moves forward to see if she can feel Dara's Aura. It doesn't really work, but Dara's presence in the same room is enough. Enough for what, she isn't exactly sure. It's just...satisfying.

       "I like her too," Chaerin answers, smiling happily. Dara laughs because Chaerin probably looks like an innocent three-year-old that hasn't had any friends before. Although Chaerin must admit that she hasn't had any real friends before, aside from the random short-term friends little kids make when they don't know any better.

       "She wants you to come over again today, you want to?" Dara asks, looking somewhat hopeful. Chaerin's eyes sparkle because Friday night really was a ton of fun and she would probably do it again a million times over if she could. Not even probably; she would definitely do it again.

       "Sure!" she immediately answers, maybe a little too quickly. Dara's eyes visibly brighten with her answer.

       "Great! We can walk home together again after this dump of a restaurant closes for the day," she says, sticking her tongue out cutely. Chaerin giggles a little before nodding and Dara flashes one of those vibrant smiles before leaving to tend to the lunch customers.

       Chaerin's heart is beating really fast and all she knows is she is damn excited for this dump of a restaurant to close for the day.

       Dara and Chaerin spend more and more time together, often with Bom in stride. They start eating dinner together, getting coffee in the morning before work together. Chaerin even slept over one night when they stayed up watching too many movies and she was too tired to go back home to sleep.

       Chaerin honestly can't believe how close she's become with Dara, who was the fear of her life just a while ago. Dara is fun, bright, happy, exciting. Much more of all of those things than Chaerin's entire life has been since her mother died.

       An empty space forms in her heart when Dara is busy and can't hang out. And nine weeks later, Chaerin is wondering how she survived before Dara entered her life and made it worth living.

       During the afternoon dead period one day, Chaerin comes out after finishing her prep for the dinner rush. She washes her hands and wipes her sweat. Then she looks at her distorted reflection in the metal shelving, fixing her hair and then thinking what the hell am I doing trying to make myself look good? So she ruffles it up again.

       She walks out and sees Seungri packing a Styrofoam take-out box with a familiar order in it.

       "Jiyong's order?" she asks although she already knows the answer. Kwon Jiyong, a regular customer here that orders the same thing every day and comes at the same time, 4:00, to pick it up.

       "Yep," Seungri replies absentmindedly, knowing that Chaerin knows the answer but answering anyway. Chaerin glances at the clock. It's 3:50, Jiyong should be here soon.

       Chaerin grabs a small piece of Mandarin chicken straight from the tray, popping it in and cackling when Seungri protests with, "YAH, EACH CHICKEN PIECE COULD FEED A STARVING CHILD!"

       The restaurant is pretty much empty so she picks a random table and sits down. She looks around, spotting Dara talking on the phone in the corner. Chaerin can tell that she's talking to Bom because she's jumping up and down and laughing and smiling and stomping her feet like she only does when she's with that y Siren.

       When Dara hangs up, Chaerin tries to act as natural as she can after essentially staring at Dara while she talked on the phone like an adorable little rabbit. Dara notices and walks over with a teasing smile, lightly throwing her phone from hand to hand.

       "Mind if I sit here?" Dara asks, pretending to polite but just sliding into the booth-seat opposite of Chaerin without waiting for a response. Chaerin chuckles, shaking her head and looking toward the door to hide the fact that she feels really warm and fuzzy because she can feel Dara's Aura from across the table.

       The door jingles and Chaerin blinks because she was too zoned out to even notice that someone walked in the door she was staring at. She smiles when she realizes that it's Jiyong, wearing a casual black blazer and worn out jeans.

       "Hey!" Jiyong greets, smiling and waving. Chaerin and Dara both wave back. "Nice to see you, Chaerin!" he continues. Chaerin blushes. She barely left the kitchen during dead periods before, the antisocial thing always too much of a problem, so she and Jiyong are just acquaintances.

       "Yeah, nice to see you," she mumbles, noticing Dara trying to stifle a laugh. Jiyong smiles again, exchanging a weird glance with playful Dara before walking to the counter and greeting Seungri. He takes his takeout box and approaches Chaerin and Dara's table again, stopping next to Dara's seat. Chaerin instinctively heaves a sigh of relief when she feels no Aura from him. So it's safe to say he's just a Mortal.

       "May I?" he asks. Chaerin nods politely while Dara snorts, probably because Jiyong isn't typically so formal, but how the hell is Miss Introvert Chaerin supposed to know that?

       Jiyong sits down next to Dara and diagonally from Chaerin. He pops open the box of food and jokingly wafts the smell of food, sighing happily.

       "Ah, the smell of heaven in the form of food," he says happily, earning a punch on the arm from Dara and a quiet laugh from Chaerin.

       "Hey, Ji!" Seungri yells from the counter where he's cleaning diligently. Jiyong looks up with his mouth full of food. A single noodle drops from his mouth and Dara laughs at his stupid appearance.

       "You normally don't hang around to eat. Something special happening?" Seungri continues. Jiyong nods, not bothering to chew or swallow before answering.

       "Yeah, I was gonna tell you guys. No more daily take-outs for the time being, I'm goin' to Michigan in the U! S! A!" he says, pumping his fist. Bits and pieces of food fly out of his mouth and a few shoot across the table and land on Chaerin, who gasps in surprise. Dara bursts out laughing, slapping Jiyong's arm.

       "Yong, you idiot!" she cackles, using a nickname that for some reason dulls Chaerin's mood a little. "You're gonna get your dummy disease all over Chaerin!" she says, pushing his head to the side and snickering. Jiyong laughs in reply.

       "Oops, sorry Chaerin. D's right, I've got my own strand of the dummy disease." He chuckles lightly, using another nickname that dulls Chaerin's mood even more.

       "It's okay," Chaerin says with a reassuring smile, trying to hide her rising discomfort.

       Dara nudges Jiyong. "So what's up? Why are you going to Michigan?" Jiyong makes sure to swallow his food completely before answering this time.

       "I started talking to this girl on Twitter, she's a producer. She lives over in Michigan so I'm gonna go visit her and we're gonna make some dope beats," he explains with an excited twinkle in his eyes. "Name's Michiko Kobayashi."

       "Michiko Kobayashi?" Surprised, Dara laughs a little. "She's still in Michigan? I used to know her."

       "Oh?" Jiyong smiles curiously.

       "She moved into my neighborhood in Michigan when I was four or five. Our parents told us to be friends, we went trick-or-treating one Halloween. It was stupid," she snorts, chuckling as if remembering a carefree childhood moment. But then she tilts her head thoughtfully. "She wasn't that bad though. Pretty fun to be around. How is she now?"

       Jiyong grins. "She's awesome. We just instantly clicked."

       Chaerin watches as Dara and Jiyong just keep talking so casually and Chaerin doesn't know why but she hates it. She hates this entire situation so much that it almost hurts.

       "Um, sorry I'm gonna go to the bathroom. Excuse me," she says quickly, scooting out of the booth and hastily making her way to the bathroom near the back of the restaurant.

       Harshly pushing the door open, Chaerin bursts into the disgusting bathroom and puts her hands on the first sink, looking at her feet and breathing hard.

       She feels the anger slowly ebb away as she watches a tiny spider crawl along the wall underneath the sink. It looks so tiny and so...stupid. Chaerin is suddenly overcome with exhaustion as she stares at the spider with fascination at just how small it is. Where is it going? The thoughts stop bouncing around and instead just lay on the floor of her mind in a messy heap.

       ", um...okay," she whispers to herself. She doesn't know what's going on, she just saw them talking and she saw Dara laughing and joking around and Jiyong smiling and the nicknames and she doesn't know what came over her, she just felt the need to get out of there.

       Looking at her somewhat disheveled appearance in the mirror, Chaerin forcefully turns the faucet on and splashes some water on her face, not caring if it just makes her look more haggard than she already was. As the cold water calms her in an oddly sharp way, she starts trying o decipher this entire situation.

       Chaerin feels really damn happy whenever Dara is around, especially when she's smiling. And she feels really worried when Dara is sad and scared, and she feels really, really unsettled when Dara talks to someone as...perfect as Jiyong so damn casually.

       Dara makes her frustrated but more content, she makes her uncomfortable but more relaxed, she makes her scared but more excited, and....

       Lee Chaerin just realized she's in love.

       And with this realization, everything in Chaerin's life snaps into place and it gets all ing screwed up at the same time.

       "Damn it!" she shouts at herself in the mirror because this information is too much. Chaerin is uncovering too much about herself in too small an amount of time and it's too overwhelming and crazy and different and scary.

       Falling in love with a Dark Angel? That's ridiculous. Impossible. Outrageous.

       But it's true, something whispers inside her.

       "But it's true..." Chaerin mutters out loud, looking at herself again in the mirror. Does she even know this face anymore? This familiar, round, fierce and yet so vulnerable face? Was everything she knew about herself before just a lie? A cover-up? Or is she just discovering a hidden side she never knew existed?

       But before she can start to look for answers, she hears the door click open. Immediately straightening up, she rips a piece of paper towel from the dispenser nearby and wipes her face, acting natural.

       "...CL-roo?" she hears Dara's gentle voice. Chaerin stiffens at the sound of the familiar nickname Dara came up with a few weeks ago.

       You love her.

       "Uh, yeah?" Chaerin asks, trying to sound nonchalant. Dara shows herself behind Chaerin, looking really worried.

       "Anything happen? We heard you yelling from the restaurant," she says quietly, uncharacteristically timid. Chaerin shakes her head.

       "I'm fine, just not feeling so well," Chaerin answers. Yeah, not feeling so well in the ing brain because I'm in love with you.

       Dara looks sick with worry now. "You sure you still wanna come over tonight? I'm sure Bommie will understand. And I will too." Chaerin definitely doesn't feel so well with that thought, despite them spending an obscene amount of time together nowadays. She shakes her head vehemently.

       "No, no! I'm totally fine. I just needed some air, I'm completely okay now," she reassures, throwing away the wet paper towel but missing the trash can. ". Oh whatever," she mumbles. Dara giggles a little, more relaxed now. Chaerin chuckles awkwardly, glad that Dara isn't worried anymore.

       "Getting air in the bathroom?" she asks teasingly. Chaerin shrugs, sputtering weird noises for a second.

       "Well, psh, you know, b-bathrooms have air too." Dara laughs and Chaerin feels satisfied that she can get Dara to laugh the same way she laughed when she was sitting next to Jiyong and playing around with him and talking and...

       You love her.

       Chaerin tries to shake her head subtly because that thought is slowly decomposing her from the inside out. She might self-destruct soon.

       Seemingly reassured that Chaerin is fine, Dara smiles at her through the mirror, picking up Chaerin's paper towel from the floor and throwing it away before winking jokingly and walking out. Chaerin chuckles, half preoccupied by the craziness in her head and half giddy at Dara's cuteness and iness and...Dara-ness.

       Chaerin stares at herself in the mirror for a couple of seconds before nodding firmly at her reflection and walking out. She still has no idea what the is going on in her brain but she can deal with that later, on her own time.

       She sits back down at her spot at the booth, next to where Seungri is now sitting, and spends the rest of the dead period pretending she's having fun and pretending she isn't bothered by Dara and Jiyong's "bro relationship" and pretending she didn't just realize she's in love with a Dark Angel.

       "Hey Chae, let's go go go!" Dara says excitedly the instant Seungri flips the "Open" sign to say "Closed" in the window. Chaerin pumps her fist excitedly, giggling a little at how stupid she probably looks. She's just happy to spend time with Dara again, as if she hasn't been doing that almost every day for the past two months.

       Dara laughs at Chaerin's cuteness. Seungri sighs, pretending to be frustrated.

       "You two girls, when did you become so close? Just leaving me to clean up the restaurant all by myself." He shakes his head as if scolding them. Dara snorts in response.

       "What the hell are you talking about? You never clean up the restaurant after closing. You make all the high school workers do it for you," she counters. Chaerin bursts out laughing because Seungri looks like someone just threw a brick at him. Before he can retort, Dara opens the door and leaves, Chaerin following close at her heels.

       "Seungri is such an idiot," Dara says, shoving her hands in her pockets and looking up at the sky. Chaerin snickers because it's true.

       They continue to walk along the sidewalk in silence. Comfortable silence, not awkward silence, Chaerin can't help but notice. As if they have a mutual understanding of each other (which they kind of do) and as if their relationship doesn't involve very much talking but that's okay because that's just how it's supposed to be.

       Suddenly, Dara's phone rings with an audio clip of Dara singing a cute song. Chaerin tries to stifle her giggling as Dara answers the phone.

       "Hello? Oh wassup wassup!" Dara greets happily. Chaerin grins because she can already tell that it's Bom on the other line. She can't help but eavesdrop a little (but it doesn't really count because she can't hear Bom, right?)

       "Oh? What happened?" Dara asks after a moment of silence. She sounds kind of disappointed. Chaerin blinks in concern. Another moment of silence passes.

       "Oh that's fine! Yeah, no problem...aish, Bommie it's fine!" Dara continually insists. Her face is getting all scrunched up and Chaerin feels her heart flutter.

       "Okay okay. Yeah I know, it's fine. It's fine! Okay. Okay bye." Finally, Dara hangs up the phone and turns to Chaerin. Chaerin pretends that she wasn't eavesdropping and looks at Dara curiously.

       "Bommie called."

       "Oh." As if she couldn't tell already.

       "She said she isn't gonna be home tonight because her boss dragged her to a business dinner. And then they're probably gonna party at Club NB because her boss is a crazy man." Dara shakes her head as she says it. Chaerin nods, silently thanking the heavens that the Panda Express boss isn't a crazy man.

       "So you still want to come over? I dunno how you feel about her not being there." Dara looks really hesitant as she says it. Really different from the badass Dark Angel Chaerin is used to. Although most of Dara is different from a badass Dark Angel. Chaerin just isn't completely accustomed to all of it yet, she thinks. Some of it, but not all of it.

       "Yeah, totally! I mean, if you're okay with it," Chaerin answers, really wanting to go hang out with Dara no matter what. Besides, they've spent some time alone already. She nods vigorously.

       Dara smiles like the sun just possessed her with happy, bright feelings and Chaerin feels her own happiness growing too.

       For the first time, Chaerin lets the idea of you love her hang around for a little, and she hopes that this isn't all just one-sided.

       Dara lets Chaerin in the door and Chaerin walks in like it's her own house. She takes off her shoes and she takes off her light coat and she puts it on the rack and she walks over to the couch and she sits down comfortably.

       Dara raises her eyebrow in amusement but doesn't say anything as she goes to the kitchen and grabs two cups of orange juice. She puts one on the table in front of Chaerin while taking a sip out of her own. And Chaerin automatically leans forward and takes a sip too.

       Dara leaves to change really quickly and when she comes back, her black wings are relaxed behind her and Chaerin's wings have also shown themselves.

       "Well you seem like a different person now, Miss Lee," Dara teases, eyeing Chaerin's poofy white wings. She watches as Chaerin turns on the TV.

       Chaerin shrugs. "I mean, recently it's been really fun. I feel comfy around here now. You don't mind, right? She turns to look at Dara, suddenly realizing the rudeness of her actions.

       Dara giggles that tinkling giggle again. "No, of course not. I haven't had many friends before, this is actually pretty ing awesome to me." She smiles brightly. Chaerin, however, loses her smile when she hears those words.

       "You? An amazing person like you, not having any friends? Impossible," Chaerin says scoffing skeptically. Dara's golden eyes deepen unexpectedly. She looks like she entered into a completely separate world Chaerin will never be able to understand.

       "An amazing person like me?" Dara mirrors Chaerin scoffing harshly. "More like an evil emo . A freak. A murderer, a drug dealer, a ?" She looks at Chaerin as if daring her to protest. Chaerin doesn't know what to say, she wasn't expecting any of that. Dara's eyes are harboring a sadness that Chaerin doesn't think she will ever fully relate to. A deep trauma that has scarred Dara to the bone. To the heart.

       Instead of replying, Chaerin can only stare at Dara, stunned at all the horrible words that just came out of Dara's mouth.

       And to Chaerin's shock and dismay, Dara begins to cry.

Author's Note:
This chapter is dedicated to
my friend, VIPIKACHU.