Bzzzz.

Bzzzz.

Taeyeon grumbled and pulled the blankets over her head, attempting to avoid the morning sun filtering just the right way through her window, directly into her eyeballs.  Her brain throbbed in a skull that felt ten sizes too small, each heartbeat a hammerblow on her temples.   seemed like it was stuffed with cotton balls, and the back of her tongue tasted like bad choices.  Death, this had to be what dying felt like.  And for what?  Saturday night alone with her boxed wine.  She could tell herself she would never do that again, but it would be a lie, same as it was the last dozen times she did the exact same thing.

Bzzzz.

Who the was texting her so much at this unholy hour?  Her stomach tossed like a ship in a storm.  Don’t puke don’t puke don’t puke.  

Bzzzz.

Wait, those weren’t texts.  Someone was calling her.  Taeyeon’s hand darted out from under her blanket fortress and d blindly across her nightstand.  Finding the infernal buzzing contraption, she pulled it back under the covers and squinted, bleary-eyed, at the name of her torturer.  It was Sunny.  It was also well after 11 am.

“Hnrhhgh… hello?”

“What the hell did you do?”  Sunny and Taeyeon’s mom both had the exact same tone of voice when they wanted Taeyeon to know that she royally screwed up.  It was shrill, piercing, and Taeyeon winced, holding the phone an inch away from her ear to avoid aggravating her miserable condition further.

Taeyeon mumbled into the speaker, attempting to not drool all over her phone.  “Got a hangover. Shhhh….”

Sunny continued her tirade unabated.  “I’ve been texting you all weekend!  Have I heard a word back from you?  No!  I figured you were just in one of your pissy- moods, so I left you alone.  I didn’t know if you were dead or alive, but hey, whatever!  So I called Tiffany this morning to see if she wanted to go to brunch, since she’s not a mopey social recluse.  Do you know what she said, Taeyeon?  Hmm?”

Hearing Tiffany’s name was a fresh wave of guilt.  Taeyeon thought she had been doing a fine job of avoiding the subject all weekend, but here it was, being shoved in her face.  “Um… that she would love to go?”  They always went to Mack’s down the street for pancakes on Sundays, after Tiffany and Sooyoung got back from church.

Sunny laughed bitterly.  “Ha ha ha… NO.  She said she wasn’t feeling up to going anywhere.  Tiffany Hwang, not wanting brunch!  This is your fault, Taeyeon, I know it.”

“How d’you know it’s my fault?  Maybe she’s sick.”  There was no way she could hide it, but dammit, Taeyeon was going to try.  She poked her head out from under the blankets and peered over the edge of her bed.  At least she was smart enough to place a bucket on the floor last night.  Odds were, she was going to need it shortly.

“I’m not stupid.  You always do this when something goes wrong with a girl.  And Tiffany tried to hide it, but I know she’s upset.  Let’s put two and two together, shall we?”

Taeyeon put her phone down to grasp the sides of the bucket.  Last night’s microwaved gas station burrito came back up to wish her a good morning.  She could still hear Sunny shrieking over the line, “Don’t think that throwing up is going to get you out of this conversation!”

Wiping , Taeyeon then put her phone on speaker and set it on her chest while she laid on her back, watching lights explode behind her closed eyelids, praying to any god that was listening for Sunny to get the hint and leave her alone.

Sunny seemed to sense her bad cop routine wasn’t getting her the answers she wanted.  She switched to good cop, softening her voice.  “She guessed it, didn’t she?  Did she freak out?”

“Sooyoung told her."

“WHAT!  Now I have to kill you and Sooyoung!  What is wrong with you people?!  Ugh!”

“Don’t kill Sooyoung.  Least not before I do.  I went to Monarch with Tiffany on Thursday…”  And, piece by piece, it all came out--the drinking, the dancing, the kiss, the fight.  

Sunny listened to all of it without making a sound.  At the end, all she could say was, “Oh, jeez, Tae…” with equal parts pity and frustration.  

“I ed up, didn’t I?”

Sunny sighed with the unbearable weight that comes with being the “responsible one” in one’s group of friends.  “Yeah, you ed up, but I’m trying real hard not to judge you too much right now.  Look, be ready to go out in an hour.  I’ll come pick you up.  We’ll get some lunch, just the two of us.  We can work this out.”

Food was just about the last thing Taeyeon wanted at that moment, but she hadn’t had any human contact since Thursday.  Seeing Sunny was probably a good idea.  Showering was probably also a good idea, since she hadn’t done that since Thursday, either, and she was pretty sure her hair was going to start sticking to her pillow if she didn’t wash it soon.  “All right,” she acquiesced.  “See you in a bit.”