Your comments have successfully semi-hijacked the storyline so I'm not super confident with this. 

A Jeti and OT9 scene had to die for this to happen.

Chapter 14

November 5, 2014

(3 days before Tiffany left)

Taeyeon tries to bury all evidence of sadness when she hears the doorknob turn.  Her sleeve is already smeared with a revolting blend of makeup and tears and all she wants to do is scream. She buries that desire too. Taeyeon crashes her head against her knees, squeezing them as tightly as possible with whatever strength she had left in her arms. Perhaps if she took up a smaller space, the universe will allow her to disappear altogether.

“There you are,” a tender voice brings her back from the brink of fading. “Can you believe I’ve never been in this room before? I somehow convinced myself that you came here whenever you wanted to hide from me, so I respected that.”

An instant wave of relief hits and she lifts her head, choosing to rest it against the wall behind her instead. Her tears are falling more freely now because Tiffany is there, Tiffany has seen her cry more than anyone else has, and Tiffany makes damn sure no one else sees her cry when she doesn’t want them to.

Tiffany bumps her head against the handle when kneeling in front of the door and laughs lightly at her own clumsiness. Taeyeon feels safer already, having an additional barrier separating her and the rest of the world. Tiffany could be a bridge, or a barricade, depending on what she needed. 

“Do you know what’s unfair?” Tiffany picks up a stray paper clip from the ground and throws it at Taeyeon, hitting the edge of her shoe. “You still look good when you cry. You look like a complete mess, but I think people can really fall in love with you if they see you cry.”

What started out as a chuckle somehow evolved into a coughing fit and Taeyeon is convinced that her organs are failing her one by one. First her heart, then her lungs. Why couldn’t it be her brain?   

“See? You’re completely adorable.”

It was as if they were having two separate conversations.

“Are you okay?” Taeyeon asks, barely recognising the sound of her own voice. Perhaps her voice is broken too. 

Tiffany closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “Right now, yes. We’re just not built to fall apart at the same time, Taetae. If that happens, all hell will break lose.”

When her eyes open again, they are clear and bright. They could pierce through Taeyeon’s soul if Tiffany willed them to.

“Jessica’s gone,” Tiffany announces the way a doctor would declare a patient dead. Her tone is so final, so hollow but somehow it reverberates in Taeyeon’s head. “Stop blaming yourself. All 8 of us made this decision together. We did a good thing.”

Taeyeon wonders how Tiffany could be so sure.

It was Jessica’s choice, but they had chosen her company for her.

That was wrong.

She’s just realising it now, but once her mind latches onto the truth, it feels as if she’s known it forever.

They had made a mistake. She had made a mistake. Oh god oh god oh god.

The room starts to spin and Taeyeon feels sick to the stomach. She wishes she could throw up so everything vile and everything she’s ever buried will finally leave her gut before the toxic eats her from the inside.

“Why didn’t you come to me, instead of Jessica, all those years ago?”

The world shifts back into focus when Taeyeon realises that this room is starting to hurt Tiffany too, one way or another.  She doesn’t bother lying.

“No one else knows me as well as you do. What if I forget who I am and you’re not around to remind me? I need to scatter parts of myself in other people and things just in case I ever need to piece myself back together.”

“You think too much sometimes. Why wouldn’t I be around?” Tiffany smiles that reassuring smile that makes her feel foolish, as if all her arguments - all the words she had poured over and over in her head have suddenly become invalid.

Just because Tiffany smiled.

“Who knows? Maybe you have forgotten who you are as well.”

__________________________________________________________________________________

Present.

Tiffany wonders if it’s possible to have a hangover from feelings alone. The intoxicating effect of intimacy wears off, like alcohol eventually does, and all you’re left with is a throbbing conscience and a bucketful of nauseating guilt.

She could hear the rain beating against the window and it’s beautifully soothing. “I like rainy days. They make me sad, but in a good way,” Taeyeon had said, when they first became roommates, as she turned the music volume up louder in their room, careful to only play songs that only reflected her mood. “You don’t want to accidentally feel things you weren’t feeling in the first place. The rain can do that to you.” Taeyeon would explain.

Perhaps she had a heart full of rain and Taeyeon just happened to be the song playing.

Her right hand is damp from sweat so she brings them over the covers, keeping her fingers securely intertwined with Taeyeon’s. She wonders if Taeyeon is asleep, or if Taeyeon minds holding on to her perspiring hand.

But then she remembers how Taeyeon didn’t mind when she pressed her lips against hers.

Taeyeon did not kiss her back, that she is fairly sure of it. Taeyeon (being Taeyeon) passively allowed Tiffany to explore with her tongue, searching for some form of comfort within the insides of her cheek.

Taeyeon must really love her, in some way. From the moment their lips touched and even now when they lingered, she believes that maybe Taeyeon’s kind of love is enough. Tiffany should regret having used Taeyeon that way, but she can’t. Tiffany is selfish like that.

Her eyelids are heavily glued shut by all her dried up tears. Tiffany could almost feel the trail they left behind, sticking to her cheeks, mocking her.

“I’m taking a day off. Would you like one too?” Taeyeon offers her company the way she would offer someone candy. It’s a gesture that is sickly sweet, but Taeyeon (being Taeyeon) probably thinks nothing of it. “It’s raining. That’s nice,” she murmurs softly. 

Tiffany nods, eyes still unopened.

“That’s good. Because I’ve already sent mass emails and texts saying that I’m taking care of a sick Tiffany. It would be awkward if you showed up,” Taeyeon sniggers and hops out of bed, and Tiffany tightens her grip in protest.

“I need to get out of last night’s clothes. They’re so gross. I’m glad I didn’t sleep in my bed,” she complains jokingly. Tiffany tugs at her hand, too stubborn to accept excuses or reason.

The side of the bed sinks again.

“I didn’t sleep at all last night.” Taeyeon sighs, breathing deeply. “I spent all night thinking about why we couldn’t just fall back into normalcy.”  

Tiffany wishes with all her damaged heart that Taeyeon had better luck than she did.

“I think it’s because we’re not present. We’re here, but we’re not here.”

Tiffany frowns. Taeyeon has a bad habit of saying things that make sense to her and only her alone, letting other people turn her sentences over and over again until they’re completely distorted, miles away from their original meaning. “It’s enough when it makes sense to me,” she would say, annoying the hell of out Tiffany.

“You’re living in the past while I’m living in the future. That’s why we can’t reach each other. We’re too far apart.”   

Somehow, this makes sense to Tiffany too.

__________________________________________________________________________________

“Play some music,” Tiffany suggests in the car.

The rain is heavier now, attacking the car violently, the sound of water hitting metal and water hitting plastic blending brilliantly. The air is chilly and Tiffany zips up her jacket, pulling her hood over her head. She glances outside the car window and watches as blurred buildings whizz past, still unable to guess where they are. After lunch, Taeyeon just said she needed to get out of the dorm and Tiffany followed.  

“What do you want to hear?”

“Lost in Love,” she replies almost immediately, having given it a lot of thought.

Taeyeon releases a nervous laughter and opens the glove compartment, eyes still stuck to the road. The inside of the glove compartment contained a messy pile of CDs, some out of their cases.

“I think I have the I Got a Boy album somewhere in there. Haven’t heard that song in ages.” Taeyeon darts her eyes between the road and the CDs, wanting to be helpful.

“Actually…” Taeyeon slaps both Tiffany’s hands away. “Maybe some other time. I want to play you this song I came across one day. I’ve been bugging the company to obtain the rights for this.” She blindly reaches for the first CD on top of the pile and slips it into the CD player.

It starts out beautifully with an acoustic guitar, giving off a completely different vibe that Tiffany had expected. But what surprised her more was that the song was in English. Taeyeon is humming along softly, careful to keep her volume barely audible.

Tiffany just watches her, enchanted by the music, while reading too much into the lyrics.      

What if I fall and hurt myself
Would you know how to fix me?
What if I went and lost myself
Would you know where to find me?
If forgot who I am 
Would you please remind me?
Oh, cause without you things go hazy.

The song starts again and she realises that Taeyeon has her music player set on repeat. Tiffany has a sudden burning desire to know which songs Taeyeon have been listening to excessively when she’s alone in her car. Are they happy? Are they sad? Do they remind Taeyeon of her?

Perhaps this is how she’ll know her better - through scattered clues on rainy days.

Somewhere along the fifth play, Tiffany stops caring about where they are headed (or where they have been).

She is fully present.

(Play it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-IabfCL_T8

You can add http://www.rainymood.com/ if you’d like)