There were eleven girls in the dorm when they began. Now they were down to five.

When the first four girls had left, and the subunit had formed, it had been a strange adjustment. The dorm was built for eleven people, and while it was certainly no less noisy it did feel emptier sometimes. Sohye would sneak into the kitchen and expect to see Mina already rooting through the cupboards. Somi would wake up early and expect to see Chaeyeon already sitting in the living room. When Jieqiong and Doyeon were yelling from separate rooms to each other, Nayoung expected Yeonjung to join in, or Sejeong to shush them.

It was odd, that a group who mostly hadn’t known each other a year ago got on so well, but they laughed a lot, enjoyed being with each other and the atmosphere definitely felt different when the first girls left.

But then something even stranger happened. Perhaps it was because they had still been getting to know each other properly when they became seven, or perhaps it was because the smaller group meant no one could avoid becoming close to each other, but after a while the place didn’t feel so empty. Somi would catch Sohye sneaking around in the kitchen and drag her off grocery shopping. Jieqiong would wake Yoojung up in the morning and they’d go around bothering the others until everyone was out of bed. Doyeon and Chungha would call each other from separate rooms, but Nayoung gained enough confidence as leader to shush them without Sejeong’s help. The remaining girls gelled together in a way none of them could have anticipated, and soon the extra beds weren’t so sad to look at. After all, every room still had at least two girls.

Only now, there were just five of them left, and while four girls still had a roommate, Chungha sat alone in what had been her and Nayoung’s shared room up until yesterday. Perhaps she wouldn’t feel so alone if it had felt like the inevitable parting it was, but with the return of the other 4 girls for their final comeback everything had felt livelier than ever, and to go from eleven girls who’d grown to know and love each other well, to five girls counting down the final days, it was a bitter pill to swallow.

Once the final concert had finished nine of them (Chaeyeon and Yeonjung had schedules, so despite their tears they had no choice but to say goodbye) had crowded into the dorm for one massive movie marathon and sleepover. The next morning, Sejeong and Mina had said their last goodbyes and left for the Gugudan dorm, leaving the seven to mope around for the rest of the day. With the final concert done and their debut imminent, Nayoung and Jieqiong had packed up their things and left the dorm for the final time last night. There had been many tears, and Doyeon had joked that they hadn’t stopped crying since the first night of the concert. Yoojung had wrapped herself around Nayoung and hugged her so tight that for a minute Chungha feared she wouldn’t let go. It wouldn’t be a graceful way to return to your company if you had a tiny, sobbing girl clinging to you.

“You’ll be fine.” Nayoung had told Chungha, when it was just the two of them clearing out their shared room. “It’s only a week or so. You’ll be fine without us.”

“Are you trying to convince me or yourself?” Chungha had asked with a sad laugh. “Don’t pretend I’m anywhere near as good a leader as you.”

As if to prove her point, the sound of a crash from the kitchen distracted Nayoung from replying, and she sighed in frustration when she heard Yoojung yelling at Doyeon and Somi.

“It’s just a week. You’ll be fine.” she insisted firmly, ignoring the sounds of a plate smashing and Sohye crying for help.

Chungha had raised an eyebrow in disbelief, but in the end there was nothing they could do to get Nayoung and Jieqiong to stay. IOI was over and Pristin needed them, it was as simple as that.

The remaining girls companies had given them a choice, and they’d chosen to stay in the dorm until their contract ran out. The final concert had been the end of IOI, but none of the five girls were ready to let go of this makeshift family they’d made. Three of them didn’t have groups to return to, and Doyeon and Yoojung only had the beginnings of one. This bond they’d created was not something any of them were ready to let go of, nor were they ready to leave the fancy dorm that had become their home, so why not delay the inevitable?

So far, it had been a day since Nayoung left and nothing had caught on fire yet, so Chungha felt like she was doing an alright job looking after the kids. They’d splurged on dinner, not caring about their diet for once. (Sohye had tried to resist the temptation, but Somi had stuffed a piece of chicken in and that had been the end of that) Now the kids were curled up in the living room watching TV or on their phones, and while Chungha wanted to join them she was also very, very tired.

But coming back to the empty room, and realising she’d never see Nayoung or Mina in here again, had hit her with an unexpected surge of sentimentality. She didn’t cry, because after four days of it her tear ducts felt mostly empty, but she just lay on her bed and soaked in the silence.

It felt unnatural; this dorm was not meant to be a quiet place.

Chungha wasn’t sure how long she lay there until a knock on the door disturbed the eerie tranquillity of the room. She shuffled over and opened it, to see a teary eyed Yoojung sniffling on the other side.

“I was just about to go to bed but I wanted to say good night to you and, and then I realised there was no one else here and I, I miss them.” Yoojung mumbled, her voice becoming choked near the end of her sentence.

“Oh baby.” Chungha whispered, reaching out and tugging Yoojung into her arms for the most comforting hug she had in her.

She could feel Yoojung sob against her shoulders, her crying becoming less restrained the tighter Chungha hugged her.

“I miss them too.” Chungha murmured, softly Yoojung’s hair until the younger girl stopped sobbing. “But I think I’ll be less lonely if I don’t sleep alone tonight, what do you say?”

Yoojung nodded, the tears still dripping down her face. Chungha climbed into bed and held out the covers for Yoojung, who curled in next to her and clung to Chungha’s arm like her life depended on it.

“Have you washed up?” Chungha suddenly remembered.

“Yes.” Yoojung grumbled, burrowing further into the bed.

“You know Nayoung-unnie would kill me if the hygiene in the dorm suddenly dropped once she left.”

“I know, I know, but Doyeon whacked me with a pillow until I washed and cleansed. I’m all fresh and bare faced I promise.”

“Good.” she snuggled down next to Yoojung. “Let’s sleep then.”

A few minutes later, when Yoojung had dozed off in her arms, Chungha heard footsteps entering the room, and suddenly there was another weight on the bed. She didn’t even need to open her eyes to see who it was. Somi may look like an unconventional maknae, but she had the uncanny ability to sense when cuddling was happening nearby, and never hesitated to join in.

After some wriggling and one accidental knee to the gut that woke Yoojung right back up, Somi finally settled down on Chungha’s other side.

“My room was too empty.” was all she mumbled before closing her eyes and nuzzling into Chungha’s shoulder.

Chungha wondered whether Sohye had noticed her leave, or if she and Doyeon were both fast asleep already. Her question was answered five minutes later when the two of them walked in, disrupting the lethargic atmosphere in the room.

“What’s all this? Are you guys having a sleepover without us?”

“Why wouldn’t you invite us?”

“We were wondering why it was taking so long to say goodnight to you!”

“Just come on in.” Chungha said wearily, before the two of them could really get going.

“But unnie, we can’t fit on the bed.” Sohye pointed out sadly.

Chungha sighed and glanced at Nayoung’s bed, then at the two kids staring pleadingly down at her. She doubted sleeping in separate beds was what any of them needed tonight.

Groaning, she gently whooshed Yoojung off her numb arm and wriggled her shoulder away from Somi’s head. The two girls next to her stirred, and blearily blinked themselves awake.

“Grab all the pillows and blankets you can.” Chungha instructed. “We’re having another sleepover in the living room.”

Sohye and Doyeon cheered, while Somi and Yoojung still struggled to figure out why they were suddenly awake.

It took them a few minutes to get all the necessary blanket and pillows into the living room. Yoojung tripped on Doyeon’s blanket and almost banged her head off the wall. Somi and Sohye both wanted the pillow Jieqiong had left behind, and then Doyeon and Somi couldn’t agree on where to sit. After some minor bickering, all five of them were cuddled up in front of the couch. Somi had bagged the middle spot, and squished in between the other 4 girls she looked so content Chungha wouldn’t be surprised if she started purring.

Yoojung the TV, being careful to stay away from all idol related programmes. None of them were in the mood to dance, not when the dorm still felt too empty. They finally settled on a dramatic looking action movie that got more and more inappropriate the further on it went. None of the kids seemed really bothered by the gore, although Sohye buried her head in her pillow when the villain got his leg cut off with a chainsaw. Somi just laughed.

“Did you see how far they squirted the blood?” she chuckled. “Was that supposed to be comedy or did they actually think it was realistic?”

Soon she and Doyeon were laughing at every horrific act of violence that occurred, but the other two kids didn’t seem as enthusiastic about it all. When Sohye’s eyes began drooping and Yoojung started looking very green, Chungha decided to end the cinema for the night.

“Hey!” Somi cried when the screen went blank. “We were just about to see if he rescued the girl!”

“Of course he rescued the girl; it’s a cheesy action movie.” Doyeon grumbled.

“C’mon.” Chungha snuggled further into her blanket, wrapping her arms around Somi to drag her down too. “The others are tired, so let’s go asleep. It wasn’t a very good movie anyway.”

For a minute the only sound in the room was the soft breathing of the five girls. Yoojung seemed to doze off quickly with Doyeon’s arms around her, and Chungha was fairly certain Sohye was asleep too until she noticed sad eyes staring at the other girls.

“It’s so strange.” Sohye mumbled, her eyes glassy. “At the beginning of it all, I knew it wasn’t permanent and I was fine with it. I never thought I’d feel this way about losing you.”

“I knew I’d feel sad.” Somi whispered back. “I just didn’t realise it would hurt this much.”

“I was scared, at the beginning.” Sohye said, four pairs of eyes paying full attention to her now. “I didn’t think I was good enough, and I was worried that you all felt the same.”

“We never felt that way.” Chungha said at once.

Sohye nodded reassuringly, reaching her hand out to squeeze Chungha’s.

“I know that now.” she said. “But back then I didn’t, and you were all so loud and talented and you meshed together like a high school clique. I felt like a phoney who faked their way into an unearned friendship, and I was scared that you would all just ignore me for the rest of the year.”

The tears were back now. Yoojung’s were already falling, and Chungha could feel her eyes welling up too.

“But I had Mina, and she was different. She wasn’t as loud as the rest of you, neither of us liked dieting, and we shared a similar sense of humour. She was so genuine and friendly and I felt like if I needed anything I could always go to her and Sejeong-unnie. For a little while I felt like it would be alright because I had someone who actually wanted to talk to me. But then-”

“She left.” Doyeon said, sympathy in her gaze.

Chungha knew Doyeon had felt the same way when Yeonjung left, the way she had felt without Sejeong and the way Somi had felt without Chaeyeon. With eleven girls some bonds were bound to be stronger than others, and to have them taken away so soon hurt. It would have been even harder for Sohye, having no one else she felt as comfortable around compared to Mina and Sejeong.

“And then there were seven of us, and I felt as scared as I did on the first day.” Sohye laughed. “I still didn’t know if Nayoung-unnie really liked me, I still found Chungha-unnie a little intimidating, and then the rest of you were so hyper and had such fun together, I wasn’t sure if I belonged anymore.”

Chungha instinctively wrapped her arms around Sohye, feeling Somi do the same behind her.

“But, maybe it was all the activities we did, or maybe I had just been seeing it all wrong, but a few weeks into the subunit, I woke up one day and went into the kitchen, and Nayoung-unnie smiled at me. I smiled back, just like that, and I realised that I didn’t doubt her anymore. I knew she cared for me not because they had made her the leader, but because she wanted to. It was such a small moment, but it made me so happy.”

“She really is the best leader.” Yoojung mumbled, resting her chin on Doyeon’s shoulder.

“A few days later I saw you all dancing in the living room to some Bangtan song, and I joined in.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t Got7?” Somi interjected. “I can’t really picture that day.”

“It was definitely BTS, Yoojung picked the song.”

“Ah, that makes sense.”

“So I joined in, and I laughed and danced with you, and I let go off all the doubts telling me I didn’t belong. And honestly, I had a fun time. I wasn’t as loud as you, and I wasn’t the best dancer, but you still cheered for me. I had my place in the group, and it didn’t feel like someone else should be standing there instead. The more confidence I gained, the more it felt like I belonged.”

“Well you certainly gained confidence, constantly hitting my when I’m not watching.” Yoojung grumbled, causing the rest of them to laugh.

“In the beginning I would never have dared try that. I would have just watched Doyeon, or Somi, or Kyulkyung-unnie and wished I could join in. But now…I’m just so comfortable here. I can stay up all night talking to any of you, and I trust all of you with every secret I have. I feel like I’ve gained a family.”

The unsaid “and I’m not ready to lose it” hung unspoken between them.

“I think we all did.” Doyeon said, her hands reaching out to pull Somi into her chest.

Somi made a noise of complaint and attempted to squirm her way out, causing Doyeon to put her in a headlock. The melancholic atmosphere was destroyed as laughter rang through the room, while the youngest two attempted to strangle each other.

There should have been six other people in the room, laughing along or joining in the chaos. But maybe, Chungha thought, that was the great thing about this friendship. It didn’t matter how many of them were actually there, they carried the rest with them. Yoojung’s loud voice yelling at Doyeon to stop elbowing her carried echoes of Yeonjung and Jieqiong. Sohye’s shy laughter was similar to Chaeyeon and Nayoung. Chungha’s bright smile contained remnants of Sejeong and Mina.

They were running out of time. Soon it wouldn’t be easy for any of them to find time to meet up, and three of them wouldn’t have another girl with them to share the sorrow. But they’d still text each other, still laugh at each other’s jokes and tease each other. Chungha would see a child dancing in the street that would remind her of Yoojung and Somi. Sohye would hear someone talk with the same ahjussi tone as Sejeong and it would bring a smile to her face. Somi would hear Hotline Bling playing in a shop and for a second it would be like Jieqiong was right next to her dancing along. There was no doubt their separation would hurt, but they would find small ways to ease the sting.

It already felt like the end, but with Doyeon and Somi cuddling Yoojung between them, and Chungha keeping one arm wrapped tightly around both Somi and Sohye, it didn’t feel quite so miserable. They would make new friends, go on new adventures, and experience new beginnings without each other. But there was something here; some energy running between them that would never be destroyed.

They were just a project group. They’d known their time limit since the second they were chosen. But this bond was something none of them could have predicted, and something none of them would regret.