During the middle of the night, when Sooyeon's café was closed, she cleaned up the area, wiping the tables and cleaning the floor. As she cleaned, she glanced at her younger sister, who seemed busy writing something in her little notebook. Sooyeon tried to peek, but Soojung quickly caught her in the middle of the action.

"Can you please finish up cleaning the store so that we can go back home?" Soojung asked.

Sooyeon flinched and let out a small laugh. "You caught me. I'm almost done."

"Thank you," she said shortly, continuing to write.

Sooyeon paused. "What are you writing about?"

"Nothing important."

"Really? It seems pretty important, especially since you're keeping this a secret from me," Sooyeon said. 

"It's nothing. Really. Don't worry about a thing," Soojung said, trying to assure her older sister. The least thing she wanted was to have her sister involved in some petty high school drama. "Just hurry up and clean."

"Okay, okay," Sooyeon said, having enough with all the nagging. "By the way, that really handsome guy from your school came again."

Soojung stopped writing and looked at her. "Who?"

"The guy who has tanned skin. He came here a few days ago with Seulgi and three other people. You were upstairs with two other girls, remember?" Sooyeon reminded her.

"Jongin came?" Soojung asked.

"Yeah, I think that's his name. Actually, I think he came here following you one time," Sooyeon said. She made a small frown. "Should I worry about that? Is he harassing you?" She made a strange smile. "Or should I look at this more positively and think that he has a crush on you?"

Soojung narrowed her eyes. "Please don't."

"Why? I think he looks cute," Sooyeon said. "He's very well-mannered. Always leaves a tip. He seems to be looking for you every time he's here, though. You should stop hiding on top of the second floor and come down to greet him when he stops by."

"I'm not going to do such a thing," Soojung said sharply. "He's someone that Seulgi likes. I'm helping her get hooked up with him. Those two are on completely different levels, and I'm trying to make it so that she can at least stand besides him."

"Oh. Well, that's a little disappointing for me. I was hoping that I could cheer for you and your new love," said the older sister.

Soojung gripped her pen. "I don't want a boyfriend. I don't need one."

"Okay, okay. I won't push it. I know how you feel when I talk about your past experiences," Sooyeon said. "But that guy with Seulgi? If anything, the other good-looking guy seemed to suit her better."

"Sehun? The one who's close with Jongin?" Soojung asked.

"No, I was talking about the one with long hair."

"Taehyun? Those two are just friends. Trust me."

"Well, I won't deny that I felt that they were only going to be friends."

"What about the Sehun guy? What do you think about him with Seulgi?" Soojung asked curiously.

"The only reason why I'm not considering him is because it looks like Seulgi doesn't like him very much," Sooyeon explained. "Otherwise, I think there's something going on between him and her. Not sure what it is, romantic or not, but there's something there."

"As expected of my sister," Soojung said, smirking, "you're quite observant with these things like me."

"Maybe I'm just a tad better than you," Sooyeon said, giggling. "What can I say? It's in our blood." Her bright smile quickly faded into a serious one. "But Soojung, I want you to understand that even though you're observant and have an eye on things like these, you shouldn't temper with people's feelings and lives. Don't be too much of a bother, okay?"

"I'm not," Soojung said quickly. "It's Seulgi who's doing everything. I'm just helping her."

"Are you really helping her?" Sooyeon inquired. 

Soojung stopped writing. She looked up at her older sister, who had a neutral expression. They stared at each other, trying to read each other. However, when Soojung felt intimidated, she quickly averted her eyes.

"Can you just finish cleaning?" Soojung demanded, slightly annoyed. "I need to go to school extra early tomorrow. When are you ever going to finish cleaning?"

Sooyeon's expression quickly brightened back to a smile. "Sorry, sorry! It's getting late! I'll put the mop away and grab my keys so that we can go back home, okay?"

"Thank you," Soojung muttered. She continued to write while Sooyeon went away to get ready to go home.

/ / / / /

In Seunghwan's point of view, a person can be either of two things: the prey or the predator. At school, she was clearly able to distinguish who were the predators—the popular ones, including Hyeri and her little group—and the preys—who were everyone else. It was simply a matter of whether the person had the skills to be on top or if they didn't. However, she found herself to be a special case, neither a predator or a prey: a parasite, leeching off of both sides, latching onto the fame while poisoning everyone else.

Was it so bad to be a parasite? She didn't think so. It was only necessary, a way of living. To her, it was a way of getting through life, especially school life. It wasn't like she was doing any big harm. Just hanging out with Hyeri's little crew gave her enough of a name for herself, but since she didn't seem to be exactly part of Hyeri's group, she was more approachable to those who didn't have the guts to talk to Hyeri. It was the perfect scenario for her to be on: popular, but just enough popularity to have the doors opened to both side. It was a sneaky, strategic little act, but she didn't feel guilty about it.

But recently, things seemed a bit odd. Especially since Kang Seulgi came into the picture. Seunghwan wasn't sure what to label Seulgi. At first, she was sure that Seulgi was a prey that could've easily gotten gobbled up by the predators. She was sure that Seulgi wouldn't appear again after that one incident when she barged into the cafeteria and forced herself to join Hyeri's group. That was a huge no-no, something that shouldn't have happened. It was like Seulgi was breaking all the rules and making it obvious, but at the same time, it wasn't very obvious.

With recent events, Seunghwan could see that Seulgi wasn't a prey, but she definitely wasn't high on the chart to be called a predator. In fact, Seunghwan was curious as to why Seulgi was able to hang out with all the popular kids for this long. It just seemed off, but at the same time, there was no reason to make it strange. So could she be a parasite?

"No."

Seunghwan whirled around, shocked. She was standing in the middle of her classroom, holding onto a piece of paper. With wide eyes, she stared at the figure casually leaning against the wall. Quickly, Seunghwan hid the paper behind her back and paled a little.

"W-Why are you here?" she stuttered.

"What's that?" Soojung asked, glancing at Seunghwan's back. Seunghwan crumbled the paper in her hand.

"N-Nothing!" Seunghwan exclaimed.

"Is that for Hyeri? You seemed to have wanted to put that in her desk," Soojung said.

Seunghwan looked at her bitterly. "That's none of your business!"

"Really? Because…" Soojung slowly approached Seunghwan, who continued to try to crumble the paper into an even smaller ball. "…I don't believe that witnessing harassment is 'none of my business.'" Soojung stopped when she was inches away from Seunghwan. "So, are we going to be honest or not?"

Seunghwan narrowed her eyes. "What do you want?"

"I don't want anything," Soojung said. "I never really wanted anything."

"Lies!" Seunghwan accused in a cracked voice. "Otherwise, you would've—"

"Hid somewhere and stay low?" Soojung nodded. "Perhaps so."

"So what are you after?" Seunghwan asked.

"I'm not after anything," Soojung said, "but you will be."

Seunghwan frowned. "What? You—"

"What do you think of Kang Seulgi?" Soojung asked.

Again. That name. The girl who suddenly appeared in everyone's life.

Seunghwan listened closely. "She's not…bad—"

"She's a peculiar one, right?" Soojung pointed out. "She's weird. In a way, she follows your view on popularity, but in another way, she doesn't. She breaks the normal social ladder. It's like she's skipping steps."

"And what is my view on popularity?" Seunghwan asked, adding a small laugh at the end.

"Parasite," Soojung said, causing the other girl to freeze. "Or am I wrong?"

"No," Seunghwan said slowly. "You're not…"

"Okay. Well, it looks like school is going to start in a couple of minutes, so I'll finish say this quickly and all you have to do is agree, okay?" Soojung said. "Be Seulgi's friend."

Seunghwan stared at her. "What? Are you crazy?"

"But didn't you go to the movies with her? You guys even had fun at the café!" Soojung exclaimed, putting on her friendly little act.

"I know, but that was just because I wanted to know what kind of person was grabbing everyone's attention—Wait. How do you know about that?"

"Not important. What really matters is that you become Seulgi's friend—her best friend."

Seunghwan gave her an odd look. "Seulgi's best friend? The weird Seulgi? That Seulgi? You want me to befriend her?"

"Is it difficult?" Soojung asked. "I know that you ran through some…challenges in the café, but you made the conversation continue quite nicely."

"Look, that was a one-time thing. I don't want to hang out with Seulgi anymore. I just hung out with her that day to understand why so many people were becoming interested in her. Now that I know that it's because she's an odd ball, I want nothing to do with her. Hyeri doesn't even know about this," Seunghwan said.

"But don't you want to be popular?"

Seunghwan froze over those words. A shiver ran down her spine when she heard the last word: popular. It was taunting, intimidating, but desirable. She made a small fist with her hands as she held her breath and continued to look at Soojung.

"Popular," Seunghwan whispered. "How would befriending Seulgi make me popular?"

Soojung smiled, satisfied with her perking interest. "Why don't you talk to Seulgi? She's a brilliant mastermind."

"Is she?" Seunghwan asked curiously.

"Of course," Soojung said, her smile looking more sinister but inviting. "She has the same dream as you, but she can't do it without having someone hold the image of her 'BFF.'"

"But that's for Taehyun."

"You don't mind stealing that spot, right?" Soojung asked. "All you have to do is fight for that spot—make Seulgi want you as her best friend. That way, it'll be easy to surpass Taehyun."

"And then what happens after that?"

"You support her. Make her seem natural, like she was meant to fit in with the popular kids. I've noticed that you're quite good at blending in with people. I'm sure you can make others blend in with the situation, too."

"Did Seulgi send you to me?" Seunghwan inquired.

Soojung paused for a second before nodding and lying. "Yes. She's the one who told me to say all of this to you. She's not just some dumb socially-awkward girl. She's cunning and knows what she's doing. She just needs the right group to dominate the school. However, I wasn't expecting to catch you in this kind of act. Seulgi has no idea about this."

"What are you to Seulgi?" Seunghwan crossed her arms. "If anything, I'm pretty sure I've seen you around Seulgi at least once somewhere…"

Soojung smirked and glanced at the clock. "I'm just an acquaintance who wants to see her rise. It's interesting to see what she can do in the span of a year, don't you think?" She looked back at Seunghwan. "Anyway, talk to Seulgi, or else I'm reporting what I just saw to the teachers."

With that, Soojung walked away, leaving Seunghwan slightly dumbfounded. However, she wasn't as bothered with the fact that she was caught. Rather, she was thinking about Soojung's words, and her thoughts followed back to Seulgi.

What kind of person are you, Seulgi? Seunghwan wondered. She looked out the window and watched the students come in from the gates. Well, it looks like I have someone else to leech on. Might as well stick to both Hyeri and Seulgi for now just in case something happens.

Seunghwan whipped out her phone and started to make a call.

"Hello? Yeah, Taehyun? Hey! I had a lot of fun watching the movie and hanging out last time with you and Seulgi. If you can, can you schedule something again so that the three of us can meet up…?"