One: Be prepared for disorder.

The first reason poses a huge problem when Joy first rooms in with Seulgi.

Park Sooyoung likes to think of herself as a diligent student-idol who would do everything she can to set her life on the right track. She likes to think of herself to be far from the situational chaos that is fame, up to the point she’d even compare her level of organizational skills to Red Velvet’s resident unnie, Irene, which is saying something.

As such, Joy would rather keep shut when it came to Kang Seulgi’s habits on days like this. Days like today. She grimaces as she picks up a stray sock from the floor on her side of the room.

“Unnie, this is disgusting!”

 She yells and promptly sends the sock flying off to Seulgi’s bed, to where the said girl is currently lounging about. The girl sits up, picks up the article of clothing, and upon closer inspection yells back: “This is clean!”

Joy rolls her eyes. She gestures to the pile of laundry on a nearby chair, the most likely origin of the stray sock. “When will you ever clean up after yourself?” She knows most, if not everything on it is Seulgi’s, as the current maknae specifically remembers folding and sorting out her own clothes just the other day.

With a sigh of resignation, Seulgi gets up from her bed, drags herself over to the chair, and begins the dreaded chore of sorting out her clothes.

Joy turns back, and into studying.

A few moments pass, and she hears Seulgi humming under her breath, opening and stuffing her clothes in her drawers. Joy marks something in her textbook, and then she hears a triumphant shout.

“Done!”

Joy swivels around in her desk chair, just in time to see Seulgi jump back onto her bed, a happy smile set widely on her face, before turning to play some game on her phone.

“Unnie,” Joy whines, annoyance increasing by the second. “You barely touched the pile. There’s more!” And it is true as she gestures in agitation, when she finds that all Seulgi did, is get the topmost parts of the laundry.

“But those aren’t mine.”

At that, Joy storms over to the chair. It was her and Wendy’s turn to sort out the laundry earlier this week, and she is absolutely positively sure that those are Seulgi’s. She has seen those pants, those shirts, even the underwear enough times around their room to know.

“Just the other day,” she huffs picking up a striped shirt and facing the elder, “I saw this on your bed. And these pants,” she shoves a finger into the denim material, “I’ve seen these hanging around our closet a couple of times.”

She glares at the girl.

Seulgi waits a while, before sighing. She rolls out of her bed, and goes to stand beside the immensely agitated girl, before the laundry. “Oh.”

Joy sighs in relief when Seulgi finally bends down to pick up the clothes, gathering them in a huge bunch on her arms. Aish, really, this unnie of hers always has to be taken care of—

 “These are probably Joohyun-unnie’s.”

Joy pauses.

Wait, what?

Irene is out of the equation when it comes to troubles like these, so it baffles Joy when Seulgi says her name. She is, no was, certain that these were her roommate’s!

But Seulgi doesn’t say a word when she goes out of their room, calling out for their eldest and the leader.

Joy doesn’t know what to think of these sudden turn of events, and when she tries to draw a conclusion as to how Irene-unnie’s clothing has accumulated in their room, she gets even more confused.

She stares at the open door that Seulgi leaves.

(She soon learns to stay clear of clothing she knows that isn’t hers, and she doesn’t ask questions whenever Joohyun-unnie comes to their room looking for missing articles of clothing.)

Ignorance is bliss after all.

(“Just ask Seulgi-unnie.”)

--

Two: Locked doors, just because.

Yeri groans when Joy shifts and purposely steals away her blanket.

She whines and tries to steal it back, only to have more of her legs exposed to the air with the antics of the elder. “Unnie! Give it back, I’m cold.”

Joy replies, in an even whinier tone, “I’m cold too!”

“But it’s my blanket!”

She tries to retrieve it, but to no avail, as the girl pins the end of it beneath her body. Giving up, Yeri looks around for Wendy, but droops when she realizes the elder is in the kitchen, still cutting up fruits for their movie night snacks.

She is completely and utterly defenseless.

Joy snickers when Yeri pouts uselessly at her, nonetheless she makes herself even more comfortable, cocooning her body underneath the pillows and the stolen blanket.

“You can get my blanket in my room,” she offers as consolation.

“No. Nevermind.” Yeri shoots back, sulkily.

She moves away from her terrible unnie, and grabs a throw pillow, hugging it rather forcefully over her chest. She watches the commercials play in the television, and ignores Joy’s attempts of talking to her. Wendy arrives, and promptly gets the remote control to start the movie, after she sets down the snacks, and settling in between the silently arguing maknaes.

Wendy gives them a rather odd look, as if to say What’s up with you two? but she shrugs it off, when the movie starts.

Yeri thinks that if Irene, or even Seulgi-unnie were here, this wouldn’t happen. She wonders briefly, why on earth the two would dare pass movie night of all things (the brownies Wendy makes occasionally are to die for), but she chalks it off to it being an unnie thing. Perhaps, when she’ll get older, she’ll spend more nights turning in early, rather than losing winks of sleep on absolutely mundane things (like now, but they’d rather not think of the consequences that are to come).

Minutes pass, and she feels the cold air seeping in her skin.

Yeri turns to the two to ask if she could turn the air-conditioning unit off, but when she sees them completely raptured with the film, she knows both her companions aren’t bothered by the cold.

Wendy has always had a high-tolerance for it (she supposes it comes from living in a cold country for years), and of course Sooyoung is absolutely cozy underneath Yeri’s blanket.

That spawn of, ugh, nevermind. I’ll get back at her.

She shivers in her place, the sound completely drowned in the noise of the CGI effects coming from the movie.

“You can get my blanket in my room.”

Yeri remembers Joy’s distinct words, and she debates whether to take upon it or not. She is still mad at her super annoying unnie, but she is cold, and sleepy, and she can’t enjoy the movie if she is uncomfortable.

She waits a while, when the action scene dies down, and she gets up from the couch.

Joy catches her eye when she walks, and Yeri sticks her tongue out at her when she smirks. The girl eagerly responds back, with a disgusting combination of an eye roll and a nose scrunch.

Kim Yerim, you’ll have your chance. She lets the words play on in her head, serving as a mantra.

The floor feels cold on her bare soles when she pads to the room Joy, Wendy, and Seulgi share.

The door is shut, and when Yeri tries the knob, she finds it to be locked.

She frowns, and she knocks on the door. “Seulgi-unnie?”

No response comes. She shakes the knob again. Inwardly, Yeri wonders if the girl is sleeping.

She walks back to the living area, to the couch where the two are.

“Unnie, your room is locked.” She pats Sooyoung’s head, to get her attention. The girl looks up at Yeri, who stands at the back of the couch. “I can’t get your blanket.”

Joy’s brows furrow, as if she is confused. “Locked?” Yeri nods.

Joy turns to Wendy, whose attention is still on the screen. She pokes the elder. “Did you lock our room?” She repeats the question, and the poke, when she sees the girl is still distracted.

She shakes her head. “No. Why? Is it?” Yeri nods again in affirmation.

Wendy shrugs and says that maybe Seulgi went out (but Yeri doubts that she did, what with the way she kept on yawning and muttering how tired she was for most of the evening).

“Huh. Maybe she did.” Joy cements the theory, and they turn back to the movie. She gives an apologetic squeeze to Yeri’s hand, before the girl leaves for the room she shares with Irene.

She ends up having to borrow their leader’s blanket.

(“Did Joohyun-unnie go out, too?” Yeri asks when she comes back from their shared room. “She isn’t in our room.” Joy doesn’t respond, and Wendy gives her a muttered reply. Something about probably going out with Seulgi.)

--

It’s three in the morning and they are halfway into their fifth (or sixth? Who knows) movie.

Wendy is drowsily nodding off into Yeri’s shoulder, and Joy lays unmoving on her side, when the youngest hears it.

An ominous creak.

Yeri jumps, nerves and memory still frayed from the scenes of blood and gore she has witnessed a few minutes prior. The girl on her shoulder jolts awake, but falls immediately into slumber when she sees nothing of importance, prompting her to lean on the lax figure of Joy.

She gives out a squeaky yelp when she hears a voice croak quietly behind her.

“You guys are still at it?”

Yeri swivels around to meet the eyes of their leader, who looks as if she just woke up. She runs a hand through her already messy hair, and Yeri watches her, as she doesn’t wait for a response, prompting instead to trudge through the kitche