She hops on the train car with anxious steps. Her eyes were bloodshot from all the crying, her hair looks like a flock of birds lived there, and her shoes were mismatched.

No one would blame the passengers from staring at this poor woman who had lost a girlfriend that she never knew she had.

Jessica wakes up as the train stops at the station near the hospital. She dashes through the exit and stopping at Hongik Walking Street where it’s already packed and it’s barely noon.

She squeezes through the crowd but her body froze at the sight of a woman with jet black hair singing in the middle of the street. Jessica rubs her eyes, thinking her vision is playing tricks on her. But this no joke, it isn’t a dream.

It’s really her.

After the final song ended, the small crowd gathered around Taeyeon gave their applause and disperses into their own groups. The brunette was standing in front of the street performer. She lets a tear roll down her cheek.

Taeyeon unplugs her microphone and finally turns around to see the weird girl with unkempt hair analyzing her every move with tears b her eyes.

“Miss? Is everything okay?” asks Taeyeon.

The taller woman snaps out of her trance. “Uh, yes, yes! I’m sorry!” She chuckles. “You look really pretty with dark hair,”

Taeyeon blushed, timidly bowing to thank her for the compliment then looking away to hide her reddening face. “Thanks, I got so tired with pink,”

Jessica mentally scratches her head in confusion. Pink? Wasn’t she blonde? I called her Blondy for heavens’ sake!

“I think you’d be prettier with blonde,” She suggests all of the sudden. Taeyeon has finished packing the smaller equipment.

“Noted!” She gives Jessica a toothy grin. The same grin that the news showed.

Jessica then remembers what she’s here for.

“Are you new in this area, by the way? I haven’t seen you around before,” questions Taeyeon before the taller woman could even open .

“Yeah, I was offered a job here,” Jessica lies.

“What do you do?” Taeyeon advances south carrying her equipment. Jessica follows suit, unwilling to end the conversation.

“I’m a copy editor,” Jessica smiles sheepishly.

If there was one thing she was proud of, it was being a part of the biggest publishing company in South Korea.

“Ooh, maybe you can help me write one of my songs?” Taeyeon enthusiastically offers.

“That’s not how copy editors work, Taeyeon,”

“How did you know my name?”

Jessica stops dead in her tracks. Taeyeon stops too, waiting for her new friend to answer the question.

“Oh, I just heard from one of the people in the crowd,” She laughs forcedly and waves her hand as if it would help abandon the topic.

“I go by TY, though…”

Silenced followed. The two women continue to walk quietly in unison and Jessica offers to carry the shorter woman’s microphone case or speaker (which seems to be too large for her tiny body to drag or carry), but Taeyeon politely refused. The air between them was awkward once again.

“I’m sorry,” Jessica begins because the tension is killing her. “The truth is, one of our journalists wanted to do a feature story on the street performers of Seoul, so I apologize if we did a little background search on some of you guys…”

Please buy my ruse. Please buy my ruse.

Taeyeon raises an eyebrow then nods in disbelief.

No one would blame her for being skeptical of a girl with a bird’s nest for a hair and puffy red eyes who suddenly became friendly with her.

The little nod was good enough for Jessica as she exhales and they continue walking silently.

“Are you moving to a different location to sing?” The taller woman tries to break the ice that was getting thicker by the second.

“No, I’m going home,” Taeyeon answers flatly. “Well, this is my car,” She opens her smartwatch and one tap on the screen makes the vehicle purr to life.

This is so advanced, Jessica thought. She must be rich.

“It was nice meeting you, uh…?”

“It’s Jessica. Sorry, I didn’t look the best; I had a rough day,” Jessica attempts to straighten her hair a bit and extends her arm.

“I understand,” Taeyeon shows her million-watt smile. “I’ll see you again, right?” She shook her hand.

“Of course!”

The two women bid their farewells. Taeyeon drives off and Jessica sits on one of the benches to gather her thoughts.

“She didn’t know who I was, her hair wasn’t black nor pink when I met her before so I must be color blind—is this a hidden camera prank or something?” She groans in annoyance.

Although she was happy to know that Taeyeon isn’t actually injured or worse, dead, a lot of things didn’t seem to add up. She was ready to accept this as just a deliberate prank by someone she knows, except Jessica isn’t the type to give up this soon.

She gives another shot and check the hospital where the ‘other’ Taeyeon had flatlined.

Hongik Hospital.

Jessica walks through the revolving door with heavy steps. Hopefully, this place can answer all of her questions.

She goes to the front desk and asks, “Do you have any patient named Kim Taeyeon?”

The receptionists all look at her with worry. One of them thought she needs to be admitted just by the state of her look.

“Patient? You mean volunteer?” The receptionist takes out a clipboard of the list of volunteer workers in their hospital. Her manicured fingernail points at the name that the brunette is very familiar with.

I really should get an MRI scan one of these days.

“Oh. Thank you,” Jessica bows shortly and exits the hospital.

Taeyeon is still alive. That’s all she needs to know.

Jessica decides it would be best to go home to her family in Busan in the meanwhile. If she really is losing her mind, she needs to be in the comfort of her own home at the very least.

She takes the KTX to travel back to Itaewon and get her belongings for the weekend stay in her hometown. She calls Krystal, her sister, while riding the train but the number doesn’t seem to exist. She tries to call her parents, yet it all yields the same outcome. Shrugging, she decides to try to call them again after a few hours.

Jessica stops by the convenience store near her place to get brunch. A couple of bites from her toast this morning certainly didn’t fill her stomach.

As she goes closer to the CU Mart to get food, the louder the cries, shouts, and the ambulance siren get. She grows anxious with every step. The trauma from Taeyeon’s “accident” is still implanted in her mind.

“NO! Please! Let me come with you!” A girl cries, shaking the paramedic’s arm, pleading to them.

“Please, let me see her one last time!” She begs again.

Curious, Jessica turns her head to find the owner of the familiar voice. It was Taeyeon.

The paramedics stopped and gave Taeyeon a final moment with the severely injured person. They back up a bit to reveal the woman in the gurney, slowly welcoming death by her shortened breaths.

Jessica audibly gasped at what she saw. Her legs gave out and she fell to the ground with a thump. Taeyeon heard her—the perfectly healthy her—on the ground at the front of the convenience store in the same outfit that Jessica wore when they first met each other.

Jessica becomes pale, she feels nauseated, and her eyes are almost ready to roll back. The blonde girl rushes towards her. Taeyeon catches the taller woman's upper body before her head could hit the ground from blacking out.

Go back.

Go back.

Go back to—

Jessica wakes up in cold sweats. She feels her heart pounding so loud that it feels like it’s ready to burst at any second.

She blinks to adjust her eyes to the morning light and takes a look around to identify where she is.

She’s back to her apartment and she’s comfortably on the bed with a blonde girl’s back, facing her. Her eyes landed on a note on the bedside table, opposite from the girl sleeping soundly.

“Don’t overuse it.
—TY x”

“Don’t overuse what, Taeyeon?” whispered Jessica loudly in vexation. The girl beside her stirs. She sits up and rubs the sleep from her eyes.

“Good morning to you too, Sica,” mumbles the sleepy blonde girl, no other than Taeyeon.