November 2010

"Soojung?"

It had been awhile since anyone had called her that. It had also been awhile since she'd taken a ing shower. 

It was 6:30 in the morning and Soojung had packed up her guitar and her small green backpack was ready to head down to Bay Area to busk for change again.

"Who're you?" 

The girl standing in front of her was short in stature, with a beige scarf loosely tied around her neck, concealing the bottom half of her face. She wasn't wearing a coat to shield herself from the chilly San Francisco autumn. The girl's eyes traveled from Soojung's guitar to the thrift shop jacket she wore, to the homeless shelter behind her. That's when the tears started welling up and the girl broke down. 

"I'm sorry." she said over and over again, her scarf falling off and landing on the concrete ground.

Confused, Soojung reached down and picked up the scarf the hand to the girl and hopefully make a break for it. She then saw the girl's face.

"Holy-" 

Soojung nearly dropped her guitar. Her memories were foggy, but she knew. 

"Sooyeon?" 

***

Really sweet or really greasy?

Right, that's the part to focus on, you idiot. 

What the was Soojung even supposed to say? Jongin was looking at her so hard that she wanted to run, to hide. It could've also been how horridly smudged her makeup had become after bawling for a good five minutes, but something in her mind told her it probably wasn't.

"I've never met someone like you." 

Oh, sure. She remembered one time when she was entertaining a bunch of beer bros as hostess, she had asked for alcohol requests. One guy shouted, "I request that you show us your " while his buddies laughed and high fived him. To Soojung, this was how men were supposed to treat her. History repeated itself all the time.

Jongin had basically poured his heart out to her and all she could do was look at him stupidly. She wasn't used to men being sweet and her initial gut reaction was that he wanted something from her. Her second one was that he was being cheesy as . Her third one was a feeling of what she thought to be content mixed in with a little bit of embarrassment. 

"It would really help if you could say something right about now." Jongin broke the silence. 

Instead, Soojung drew her bottom lip in between her teeth and nibbled on it. It was a habit when she was nervous and she just couldn't help it. She couldn't look Jongin in the face, so she looked ahead, where she was eye level with his neck. She watched as he swallowed, Adam's apple bobbing. Then, all of a sudden, he took the pad of his thumb and gently pulled her lip out from her between her teeth. 

"Don't do that. Not here, not now." Jongin said as he took a step back away from her. 

"Sorry." Soojung murmured quietly. "About what you said..." 

Jongin perked up a little to listen. 

"Can we talk about this... elsewhere?" Soojung could feel heat creeping up her cheeks.

They were cooped up in the stall of the ladies washroom and granted, no one else was in there, but Soojung didn't want to risk anyone coming in. 

"Right," Jongin said. "We'll talk after." 

He unlocked the door and stepped out. "You need a moment?" 

"Er, yeah." 

Jongin nodded, opened to door, and left the washroom. 

Soojung's heart finally dropped.

. That was too close.

She knew it was wrong. She knew this would never work, but she hadn't wanted anything with anyone the way she wanted something she couldn't even explain with Jongin in a long time. 

***

Krystal was still getting cleaned up as Jongin left the women's washroom. He received a few skeptical stares, but there was too much going on inside his head for him to care. 

Oh God. It was one of those moments where he thought back on what he had said and regretted it a little bit, but he did mean what he said, despite it being soap opera worthy, which is incidentally where he paraphrased it from.

But when Krystal drew her bottom lip into and worried it, it took a hell of a lot of control to simply drag it out of ; he had to fight the urge to lean down and kiss her. He sat back down at their table and waited.

"Hey." 

Krystal's face was clean of makeup and little puffy from crying.

"So, can we continue our discussion from before?"

Jongin was dying.

"Um..."

Still ing dying.

"I-I don't... I just-"

"Okay, okay, you're overthinking already. I can tell, but I'm not asking about whether or not you see a future. I'm not asking you to go out with me or be my girlfriend. I'm just asking, point blank, if you perhaps feel anything beyond friendship." Jongin said. "That, or if you feel anything beyond a fling."

"We're friends?"

"I like to think that we are to a certain degree." 

"I don't mean to be indecisive. I just, I don't know. I'm just not good at this stuff." Krystal flushed. "I never was, not even when I was... with..."

"Myungsoo?" Jongin instantly wanted to punch himself in the face after saying that. ", I'm sorry."

"No, it's alright." Krystal shook her head. "We broke up a long time ago."

Jongin nodded. "I see. And about you not being good at this kind of stuff, I'm not either."

"Really? With all that TV show worthy lines you said in the washroom?"

"Yeah. I'm kinda guilty of a little bit of minor plagiarism on that one, but I meant everything I said."

"So you've never dated."

"Um, no, I've had a couple girlfriends." Jongin scratched his ear.

"A couple?" Krystal looked at him suspiciously. "Are these girlfriends fat cats like you?"

"Depends."

"Give me an example."

"Well, I mean, some people know them, some people don't. It's really subjective."

"Spit it out."

"Okay, fine. I dated Im Yoona in university, if you know-"

"You dated her? You dated Im Yoona? Are you ing with me right now?" Krystal's jaw dropped. "She just signed with IMG and you went out with her?"

"It was before she started modeling and all that."

"Who else?" 

"Okay, it doesn't matter-"

"Yes, it does. It does! I've got nothing compared to Im Yoona or any of the other rich, model girls you've been with. I'm a low paid receptionist slash hostess." she said bitterly.

"I already told you I don't give a about any of that."

, Jongin lost his temper a little bit. To his surprise, Krystal was not at all offended or upset. She just continued looking at him with those dark eyes of hers. 

"Fine. Let's say my position in the social castes doesn't matter. Even then, there's... stuff about me that--."

"I don't care about any of that. I don't care what you've done before. I'm looking at you right now."

Krystal sighed. "You say that now."

"Yes, I am saying that now. What about you?"

"Pardon?" 

"You. What are you thinking?" 

Krystal bit her lip again and Jongin's breath caught. 

"Fine, you want an answer? I'm thinking about it."

"It?"

"It, you, us, whatever."

"You think about us? About me?" Jongin couldn't help but feel content.

"Yes, and , I hate it."

***

There. She ing admitted it. 

Jongin looked at her blankly for a moment, then flagged down the waitress to ask for the bill.

What the hell?

Was that all she gets? The first time in nearly a decade Soojung let it be known she was capable of emotion and that's it? She was still trying her best to swallow the lump in , which actually wasn't so hard since she had gotten so good at it.

"We need to get out of here." Jongin grinned. 

Oh? Soojung wasn't complaining; the cafe was getting a little too stuffy. "Alright. May I run to the washroom real quick?" 

"Of course. I'll wait outside." Jongin nodded towards the exit. 

Soojung turns for the washroom and tries to freshen up the best she can. Her eyes were still a little swollen from crying and her makeup was gone, making her feel exposed, even. She shook her head; she looked fine. She had to since she didn't have much of a choice at this point. 

Part of her wondered if Jongin was just going to take her home. 

Another part wondered if he would take her somewhere else. 

Soojung hoped, just a teeny little bit, that it was the latter. 

When she went back outside, she found Jongin standing with his hands in his pockets and a crooked smile on his face.

"Ready? My car's parked across the street." Jo