MoonByul did not want to get up for school. She was stuck with the night shift at the convenience store, the worst part of it being that her co-worker tattled on her to the boss about being late to work. Now she is stuck doing the night shift for a month. She tried to explain to him that she ran into some bad men on the way to work, she even had the cuts on her knuckles to prove it, but he didn’t want to believe her. That is what she gets for trying to save a pretty girl from a bad situation.
So now she was dragging her tired body out of bed. The floor was cold on her bare feet, her shoe box sized apartment was never warm. She pulled her favourite grey hoodie over her head and went to wash up in the bathroom. Her fists looked better than they did the night before, a little sore but nothing she was not used to, she had her fair share of fights in high school.

She was running late for school now because it took her forever to get out of bed, no shock there, Byul was late for a lot of things, that is why she was good at running. Just like now as she was running for her bus, catching it just as it was about to pull away from the curb. The man grunted but let her on the bus, she gave a bow in thanks and took a seat in the back of the bus.
She pushed her earbuds into her ears, turning up the volume, hoping for a few more minutes of sleep before she had to get off.
The girls from the night before danced in her vision. Cute chubby cheeks, round eyes, slender figure. Leave it to Byul to meet a cute girl and have to run away, it was like a bad drama plot line. She could feel a smile creep up on her as the image of the girl’s shocked face popped up in her mind again.
The bus came to a quick hault, ripping MoonByul from her day dream and back to reality. Her eyes flew open as she saw the driver hollering something at the car that just cut them off. She didn’t have a chance to close her eyes again for the rest of the trip. 

YongSun was in class early again. She barely slept all night, so she decided getting in some extra study time was probably a good idea. It was her Friday morning lecture, a room so big it fit about two hundred students at full capacity, lucky for YongSun only about half of that filled the seats on a good day. It was not a popular class, the teacher had a dry voice and often caused a lot of the students to fall asleep, YongSun learned to have a coffee on hand. If you risked getting caught by the teacher, he would call you out in front of everyone.
Nine o’clock hit and the students were still slowly filling up. YongSun never paid them much attention, she was a bit shy, the last time someone had only ask her for a pencil her heart almost went into overdrive. Like always she just averted her eyes and tried to absorb more of her readings. However the events of the night before kept playing in her mind, just as they had all night. What shocked YongSun the most was that, yes, she was afraid of the men; but it was the blonde girl who kept popping up in her mind, she couldn’t stop thinking about her. Just the thought of her body so close to YongSun had her face turning red. The teacher walked in the room and YongSun shook her head, trying to erase the images, opening her eyes wide to pay attention to the teacher as he began the lecture. 

About an hour into the lecture YongSun found her eyes starting to drop. Her coffee was long drank and the cup now sat empty in front of her. Her head was resting in her hand as she tried very hard to keep herself up right. Her eyes however were not obeying her and they finally fluttered closed. 

A loud clap made YongSun jump in her seat. She caught herself before she hit her head off of the desk. She sat up and looked around confused, pulling the strand of her hair that ended up in out of it as she did so. It was then YongSun noticed she was one of four people still left in the class, the teacher was at the front looking very angry.
“I seems,” He said adjusting his glasses. “That my class is not challenging enough for you four.” YongSun kept her eyes glued on the teacher. “Since you understand the material enough to fall asleep in my class, why don’t you prove it to me. I want a five page essay on the current topic by next week's class.”
YongSun suppressed a groan, as she was sure so was everyone else, they had enough homework, a seemingly impossible pile as it was. The teacher went and stood near the front door. “Have you ID’s ready when you leave so I can see who is clearly above listening to me.” YongSun wanted to cry, she had never fell asleep in class before, she shurley wasn’t one of those students, she didn’t get amazing grades but she tried very hard on everything.
Reluctantly she pulled out her ID and shuffled to the front of the class where the teacher was waiting for them. He shook his head at YongSun as he jotted down her name. Before she could leave he put out an arm to stop her. She looked over at him, he silently pointed to her seat, to the empty cup she left there. YongSun wanted to hit herself in the head, she was in such a panic she forgot it, yet another strike against her.
She hurried back to get it as the last person was going to the door. “This is the fourth time in a row Moon ByulYi ssi, maybe I’ll have to talk to your academic advisor.”
The person gave a ninety degree bow. “Sorry sir, it won’t happen again.”
“It better not, if you were not such a good student I’d would have had to take more drastic measure already.”
YongSun wasn’t trying to eavesdrop, but it was kind of hard when they were the only people left in the classroom. She dared a second look over her shoulder, and to her surprise she saw a very familiar head of blonde hair. YongSun’s heart dropped, it was the girl from last night. YongSun almost tripped over herself to get to the front of the classroom, but before she even got out of the row the girl had disappeared into the hall. YongSun rushed after her, pausing briefly to bow to the teacher as she left. As soon as she got into the hall she hit a wall of students, she looked in either direction but saw no sign of the girl. She felt very disappointed for more reasons than one, but she wanted to at least offer to treat the girl to a meal for what she did for her. She continued searching for a few more minutes, but there were so many places she could have went and YongSun’s class was about to start. She gave one last glance and headed off to class.

Byul was napping under a tree in the mid-morning sun. She was trying hard to catch up on the sleep she had lost, she was going to have to stay up most of the night again at the store and now on top of all her other homework she had to write another five page paper. The teacher usually lets her go easy, it was very easy to fall asleep in his class, but she guesses since so many of them had fallen asleep this time he could not ignore it, and he wasn’t one to give a punishment to one student and not others.
Byul was a smart girl but she was drowning. Having to move to the city by herself, work two part time jobs and finish all her assignments on time was very hard to do. She tried not to complain about it much, the boy she worked with at the store had three jobs. Though Byul couldn’t help but feel tired all the time, and alone. She didn’t really have many friends, not even back home, but now with no time to make any and the emptiness she felt when she thought of her family, made her even more tired. Sure she talked to them every few days over the phone, but money was so tight for her she could almost never afford a ticket home for the holidays. Just as Byul was about to fall asleep completely her alarm tone started blaring through her earphones. She opened her eyes and sighed, it was time to move to her next class. She had considered skipping it, but she heard her mother’s voice in her head scolding her for it, besides with all the sleeping in class she was walking on thin ice with a lot of her teachers, the last thing she needed was to lose her scholarship. Byul hefted her bag up and onto her shoulder and walked off.

Byul may hate working nights but she liked how quiet it was. She was sitting behind the counter at work reading over the notes from her last class and coming up with points to use in her paper. WooJin had taken care of the stocking before he left for the night so she could focus on the cleaning, but Byul never told him how fast at it she was, leaving her time to do her homework in between customers.
She had only had this job for a few weeks, it had taken a lot of begging on her part to get a night job by her place so she didn’t have far to walk at the end of the night. After a month of coming around, the owner finally said yes after one of his other employees had left the spot open.
Byul adjusted her hat again, it was old and always coming loose, falling in front of her face. She couldn’t afford to replace it, not with living costs and her other bills, as well as sending a little back home to her parents every month.

The store bell chimed, letting her know that someone had entered. “Welcome” She called over in the direction of the door, giving a slight bow but not looking over, she was too busy finishing her paragraph. When the customer had disappeared into the store Byul did glance over, making sure the person wasn’t drunk or doing something they were not supposed to, she got a lot of those types this late at night. It was a young girl grabbing some snacks off the shelf. Byul only watched her a little bit, enough to realize she was most likely not going to steel. There was something slightly familiar about the wavy brown hair but she just dismissed it, she got a lot of nightly regulars.
After a few minutes the customer came up to the counter and Byul was forced to stop her homework. She stood up and started scanning the items, there was a lot of junk food and caffeinated drinks, it looked like something she would buy, she almost smiled. “Will this be all?” She asked in her customer service voice. She looked up at the girl. To her surprise it was the one from last night, the one she saved. She looked the same, but somehow more innocent, and more cute because she looked like a sad puppy.
The girl looked up at Byul. Sadness quickly turned to shock, as if she too had realized who was standing behind the counter. “You!” She said as she pointed at Byul.
“Long time no see.” She said with a smirk.