“SEOHYUUUUN!!!”

“Oh my god, our maknae is here!!!”

“Ya, when did you arrive from the States??”

All of my unnies were talking at the same time, I could barely make out their words. But I was sure that they were all happy and surprised to see me, and I can’t help but smile and cry a little bit while they were all taking turns hugging me. Oh, I missed my unnies!

As Jessica-unnie was hugging me tightly I heard Sunny-unnie congratulating TaeYeon-unnie for surprising all of them. “Ya, and you were able to hide it from all of us, that you successfully convinced our maknae to go home?”

“Ya, unnie,” I said, turning to Sunny-unnie, “you make it sound like I had no intention at all to go home and see you all!”

Everyone laughed, and Jessica-unnie let go to turn me over to the next person to hug me. It was Yoona.

“Seohyuuuun!!!” Yoona tackled me with a huge bear hug, and I suddenly felt my heartbeat accelerate to an alarming rate. “Ya, what’s gotten into you? You haven’t even contacted us!! How was Yale??” Yoona was hugging me so tight, as though she really did genuinely miss me. But not in the way that I want her to. Her hug was… too friendly for my liking.

“Ya, you’ve gotten thinner!” Yoona continued, looking at me from head to toe. “But still absolutely beautiful.” I involuntarily squirmed under her gaze, and it didn’t go unnoticed by my unnies, although Yoona seemed to notice nothing.

Prom night, six years ago

I was fidgeting in my yellow dress. The cleavage was too low and the dress too short for my liking, but Tiffany-unnie insisted that I really looked good on it.

“You’ll see, Yoona won’t be able to take her eyes off you,” she said, as she fixed the curls in my hair and I blushed furiously.

When Yoona arrived at Tiffany-unnie’s house I hid in the bathroom and locked the door, refusing to let Yoona see me. I have never applied make-up nor worn a dress like this in my entire life, and in spite of my confidence in Tiffany-unnie’s skill I felt like I looked hideous that night. She might not like me anymore, I thought hopelessly.

After a few minutes of coaxing from Yoona, I slowly opened the door.

“About time—!” Her words were cut short as she stood, transfixed, and I looked down at my toes, too embarrassed to meet her eyes.

“SeoHyun,” she whispered, as she placed a finger under my chin and gently lifted up my face. She looked at me from head to toe, her eyes slowly running down my body, and I involuntarily squirmed under her gaze. “Beautiful,” she breathed out. “Absolutely beautiful.”

That night, I felt like I was the most beautiful girl in the world.

Yoona was still beaming at me, and I snapped out of my reverie as SooYoung-unnie cleared and said, “I know we are all happy to see SeoHyun—don’t get me wrong, Hyunnie, I really did super miss you—but can we continue the chit-chat later and eat now? I’m reeeeeaally hungry!!”

Yoona laughed her huge alligator laugh, and left to go to the dining table laden with food.

I was still frozen on my spot until TaeYeon-unnie approached me and asked, “Seohyun? Are you okay?”

I saw her worried expression, and forced myself to smile. “Of-of course! I’m hungry, unnie, let’s go!”

I hooked my arm around hers, and walked towards the table.

Since they didn’t know that I was coming, there were only eight chairs on the table, and the only vacant one was beside Sunny. Yoona was quick to notice this, and she immediately motioned for me to take her seat. “SeoHyun, come sit here!” I was about to decline, but she grabbed my hand (when was the last time I held her hand?) and pulled me to sit on her chair. “Don’t worry; I’ll just get a chair for myself!” She pulled an extra chair and placed it beside mine. When she sat down, she placed near my ear (my heart’s pounding too fast, I can’t breathe, help) and whispered conspiratorially, “TaeYeon always sits beside Sunny, ‘cause it’s less likely for them to hit each other with their elbows, unlike when they sit beside us tall ones. Always remember that.” She winked at me and smiled (her smile is still the same, it’s still so pretty). I smiled back at her, and I breathed in deeply, trying to steady my heartbeat.

As much as I wanted to enjoy all the food, I couldn’t. Lunch that day was a very torturous affair for me. My arm kept brushing Yoona’s, and whenever that happened my breath would hitch and it would take some time for me to regain my normal breathing. Yoona, on the other hand, seemed really relaxed and happy while she chatted with the unnies. She would occasionally lean towards me and tell me stuff about the other unnies, so that I could understand what they were all talking about.

All the small brushes with her arm, the smell of her perfume whenever she leaned towards me, and even the way she looked at me and smiled at me reduced me to a pool of messy emotions. I was ecstatic that I was beside her, but at the same time it was so torturous, to be affected like that by Yoona and yet I see that she is unaffected by my presence. It’s unfair! Where was the Yoona back then, who would try her best to hide her blush whenever we held hands, or whose eyes would dilate whenever she saw me letting my hair down?

I finally reached my breaking point when during dessert (artisan ice cream, in all the healthy flavors that Yuri-unnie personally picked, according to Yoona), I put too much ice cream into my mouth and some of them were left over on my lips. Yoona saw this and laughed out loud, saying “Aish, you’ve never really changed, have you?” and wiped the left-over ice cream on my lips with her thumb.

At that moment, it was as if time stood still. All the unnies became quiet as they openly stared at me and Yoona. I was surprised by what she did, so surprised that I dropped my ice cream spoon on my bowl, causing it to plop on my melted ice cream and spattering my blouse with little dots of ice cream.

“Oh!” I exclaimed, seeing the little dots on my immaculately white blouse.

“Aish,” Tiffany-unnie tutted, standing up from her chair, “no, don’t wipe it with tissue; I’ll help you clean up in the washroom.”

As Tiffany-unnie grabbed my hand, I got a glimpse of Yoona’s expression. She was looking at me confusedly, as though wondering why I reacted that way.

That did it. I’ve had enough of seeing Yoona unaffected and of her being insensitive to how she affects me.

“Im Yoona,” I said, trying to control the anger in my voice, “why are you doing this to me?”

“Doing what?” She looked at me with her huge doe eyes, but at that moment I wanted to pull it out. What’s the use of her eyes being so big if she can’t even notice how she affects me?

“This is… this is UNFAIR!” I stood up from my chair, and looked down at a very surprised Yoona. The whole table had gotten quiet.

“You—can’t you see how you are affecting me? How you are torturing me every time you lean close, or you brush my hand, or even when you look at me? Why do you keep on being so friendly to me, why don’t you just ignore me!!”

“But—but why?? I don’t—“

“Because you make me hope that you still have feelings for me, when in truth you now only see me as a friend!”

“But you are my friend! We’re all friends here—“

“No, Yoona, no, because I AM STILL IN LOVE WITH YOU!”

Yoona opened to say something, but closed it as though forgetting what she wanted to say.

By now tears were threatening to fall from my eyes, but I pushed them back. “You think I’m stupid, don’t you? It’s been 8 years, and yet here I am, still unable to move on from our one-sided relationship. And there you are, you who were madly in love with me back then, now very happy to have moved on with your life. Are you happy now, Im Yoona?” I said bitterly, making no more effort to hide my tears as I let them fall freely. “We’ve flipped: I am now the one who is in a one-sided relationship with you. I’m now the one who’s vainly trying to chase some unaffected girl who doesn’t give a rat’s about me. Karma’s a , I know that much.”

As everyone stared openly at me, I did the only thing that I was good at: I ran. 

___________________________

Author's note:

Yes, this was written entirely in Seohyun's POV. I will get around to writing Yoona's POV in the next chapter. 

Comments, please? :)

Thank you for reading, and I hope you stick around until the end! :)