For the past day and a half, Momo was at a loss. She kept replaying the events that happened at Dance Hall # 3. She mulled over the words she said, and marvelled at how stupid she was. Of all things, why did she have to make fun of Dahyun’s cooking? Why couldn’t she just roll with the flow and praised the jokbal as if Dahyun made it? Why did she have to make the love of her life cry and leave her behind with a broken heart?

Depressed to no end, Momo did the only thing she could as a proud dancer and head of the Street Dance Crew: eat entire tubs of moose tracks ice cream while huddled in the corner of Dance Hall # 2 with the lights turned off. No one was scheduled to use the hall on that Saturday afternoon, and she wasn’t in the mood to dance just yet, so she let her infuriatingly flat stomach have its way with the chocolatey, sugary, fatty treat. Once she was done, she’d spend an hour or two dancing so hard her legs would wish they just felt like jelly.

She was about to stuff the nth spoon of ice cream in when the door to her left opened. In her daze she spared the newcomer a glance, only for Momo to find that she was a familiar face. But she didn’t care whoever it was. She only wished they noticed the creepy figure sitting in the corner and mistake her for a ghost so they’d leave her alone eating ice cream in peace.

But apparently the person actually needed to use the hall, because they felt around for the light switch and flipped it on. The mysterious girl screamed like a whistle when she finally saw Momo, resplendent in her grey hoodie marked with ice cream stains. Momo didn’t care. Momo could do whatever she wanted. She stared blankly ahead, shovelling more ice cream into .

“Momo? Is that you? Oh my Lord, you scared me,” the girl said. Momo heard footsteps approaching and looked up to see a slim woman wearing black leggings and a loose, navy blue top. Her coffee brown hair fell upon the side of her face when she knelt down to Momo’s level. With eyebrows scrunched, she was the very picture of a concerned friend. “Why are you here?”

“Trying to drown myself in ice cream,” Momo mumbled, eyes unfocused, ice cream spoon dangling in her hand.

“Yes, but why are you doing it?” the girl insisted, taking out her pink handkerchief and wiping away the stains on Momo’s face. Each touch was like a summer breeze: gentle, warm, and comforting. With each dab of the cloth Momo felt the numbing wall keeping her emotions at bay breaking apart.

“I…”

Crack.

“I did…”

Crumble.

“…something stupid…”

Shatter.

“I…”

Overflow.

And Momo’s face crumpled in despair. She started bawling, the cry starting out small and rising in a crescendo of grief. She leaned forward and buried her face in the girl’s shoulder, dropping the half-eaten ice cream tub and spoon on the floor. She pulled the surprised girl into a tight hug. “Mina-yaaaa…” Momo half-spoke, half-sobbed. “I made fun of Dahyun and she broke up with me…”

Momo’s words turned to incoherent crying, her sorrow amplified by the acoustics of the empty dance hall. Mina, shocked at the revelation, did her best to ease Momo’s pain, rubbing her back and whispering soothing words in her ear. “Maybe it was just a misunderstanding,” Mina said. “Why don’t we go find Dahyun and maybe we can talk it over coffee? Or tea?”

“No we can’t,” Momo said in between sniffles. “She made me jokbal and I didn’t believe her. I made fun of her cooking, Mina-ya… I called her bland and tasteless and it’s all my fault…”

“S-Surely it can’t be that bad…”

“I also told her that she goes bad quickly like dubu…”

“…”

Mina was stumped. Just like a certain honey-voiced lady, she knew that the DahMo couple was tighter than a Gordian knot. With what she heard so far it seemed like it was all Momo’s fault. But in her heart of hearts she wanted to believe that it was all a misunderstanding and that there was something she could do to help bring them back together. 

Some might think this strange, especially since Mina used to have a crush on Momo. She was her first love. She remembered those days when she gawked at the girl whenever she moved to the music. Mina was at her shyest then, and she never thought she could get close to the bombastic girl, much less talk to her. So she held her place until Dahyun came into the picture and gave her the first, painful lesson in unrequited love.

It worked out for the better, anyway. Fate led her to a certain tiger cub, and she found happiness. But little did she know that the arms wrapping around her in sorrow carried an undercurrent of a past not so different to hers.

Momo had a crush on the lithe dancer from the Ballet Club. Mina was the very image of poise, grace, and balance. Every time they attended their joint sessions she was enraptured as Mina wove prose in motion. It didn’t have the pumping energy of the dancing she was used to, and yet each sweeping movement was laden with equal parts emotion and passion. Momo found herself helplessly falling for the one person she couldn’t find the courage to approach. Mina was someone to admire from afar, a shimmering diamond inside a glass box. She had no right to take that diamond away and keep it for herself.

It worked out for the better, anyway. Fate led her to Kim Dahyun, the girl who showed her the world through a different perspective. And Momo was happy in the weird dances, the strange antics, and the unabashed displays of affection from her precious dubu. Right up until she ruined everything by rejecting Dahyun’s greatest show of love with insensitive words.

“Mina-yaaaaa… what should I do?” Momo cried, burying herself further into Mina’s embrace, desperate for warmth.

Mina didn’t know how to answer the question, but she knew someone else who could. “We could go to the Bunny Cafe and have a cup of tea. There’s someone there who might know what to do with all this.”

“It’s totally your fault.”

The three of them, Mina, Momo, and the bunny-toothed waitress Nayeon, were sitting at a booth in the Bunny Cafe. Tzuyu, to Mina’s surprise, wasn’t in the kitchen. In her place was someone new, who Nayeon introduced as Arin, and she was almost as good as Tzuyu in working the coffee machine and the skillet. Together with the other new employee, Hyojung, they kept the Cafe running smoothly while Nayeon took a break. Each had a cup of honey lemon chamomile tea in front of them, though Momo’s cup was shaking in her hands at Nayeon’s blunt words. Tears bubbled up at the corners of her eyes, her lips trembling.

The waitress earned herself a hard slap on the shoulder from the penguin. “Ow!"

“Nayeonnie? We’re trying to comfort Momo, right? So what are you saying?” Mina said through gritted teeth.

“What? I’m just telling it as it is. Dahyunnie made her jokbal, Momo made fun of Dahyun’s cooking, and she let it escalate into the break up. If it were me, I’d bite the bullet and just tell Dahyun that her jokbal was good.”

“I knew it,” Momo said, her entire body now trembling. “It’s all my fault… Dahyun doesn’t deserve someone like me. I stepped all over her feelings like a bumbling pig…”

“Hey hey hey, come now,” Mina said, quickly rubbing a hand across Momo’s back while shooting Nayeon a glare. “Sure, you said some things that hurt Dahyun and caused you two to break up, but that’s not the end of the world.” 

“You just said it yourself. Dahyun broke up with me. It’s over. Done. She told me she doesn’t want to see. I should go drown myself in more ice cream…”

“Come on, don’t say that. So there’s nothing you can do about what happened in the past, okay. But you can do something about it now.”

“What is it? Is it the tissue thing? Because I can definitely do the tissue thing…”

Mina blinked. “N-No, not that. What you can do is to tell her you’re sorry, that it’s your fault, and that you hope she’ll forgive you.”

Momo laughed in disbelief. “Like that’ll work. After what I did to her, you think she’ll forgive me?”

“Oh, definitely,” Nayeon chimed in. “In the past, whenever I teased Tzuyu about her Korean, she’d get mad at me for days straight. During that time I always do what Mina just said, but with extra aegyo. The first time I did it, I was worried that it wouldn’t work because Tzuyu somehow just gets angrier at me. But she ended up forgiving me in the end, and things went back to the way they were.”

“It sounds like she only did that to get you to stop doing aegyo,” Momo deadpanned.

“The point is it worked. And for you and Dahyun, I’m sure it’ll work too,” Nayeon said, nodding as if satisfied with herself.

“Despite everything she said about the aegyo, Nayeonnie’s right,” Mina continued. “The first step towards forgiveness is admitting what you did wrong, and you already did. The next step is actually asking for forgiveness.”

“But will Dahyun even want to see me? She probably doesn’t want me going anywhere near her,” Momo lamented. “I should stay away. It’s for the best.”

“Even if you guys end up splitting,” Nayeon started, warding away another Mina shoulder slap. “You’d want to part on good terms. Even if it won’t help you two get back together, telling her that you’re sorry still goes a long way.”

Momo looked up at them, a spark of hope glistening among the tears. “You guys think I should go to her and apologize?”

“It’s for the best. Who knows? It just might pull you two back together,” Mina said, ever the optimist.

Finally, finally, a smile appeared on Momo’s tear-streaked face. “I… I guess I’ll go for it. Ask for forgiveness. Even if it doesn’t get us back together, at least I can sleep easy knowing that I cleaned things up.” 

Momo wiped away the tears with the sleeve of her uniform. “Thanks. You guys are the best friends a girl could ever hope for.”

“Awwww, anything for you Momoring,” Mina said, pulling the girl into a hug.

“Yeah! I can’t bear to see our Moguri so sad like this,” Nayeon cooed, wrapping her arms around them both.

Just then the wind chimes announced new customers. By habit, Nayeon looked to the door and saw the last person they wanted to see in the cafe at the moment. “Uh oh. Momo, Mina,” Nayeon whispered. “Don’t look now but the Dubu has just entered the building.”

Momo nearly did exactly the opposite of what Nayeon said, but Mina stopped her by hugging a little tighter. “Not now, Momoring,” Mina whispered. “I know you’re excited to go over there and say you’re sorry, but the other important thing in asking for forgiveness is timing. Botch it, and you guys might end up worse than ever.”

“Um, Mina? Momo might actually end up apologizing after all,” Nayeon said, her voice trembling. “The three of them are walking towards us.”

“Three? Who is Dahyun with?” Mina asked.

“...Our girlfriends,” Nayeon’s voice had dropped into a whisper so soft you could barely hear it.

“Oh. Well. Sh—“