Seulgi exited the gym room with a loud slam of the door, unknown to her that her outrage silenced the whole class as they stared at the closed door with wide eyes.

While some of them asked their classmates what happened, Seulgi on the other hand dragged her feet to the place that she was familiar with. The place where she can always come whenever she needed some time to think, or in this case, to calm herself down.

Thankfully, the hallway she needed to pass by if she wanted to go to the rooftop was close to deserted. She didn’t know how she would react if any of the people that she knew came to her and asked her why her face was like that. Maybe she’ll release her anger to them, which she never wanted to happen.

So she hurriedly made her way to the rooftop as fast as she could.

The moment she stepped her foot on the rooftop of their school, she can already felt herself calmed down. The place always did the magic.

Maybe she could considered this as her safe haven, where she didn’t need to hid her feelings and just be her truly self. Where she didn’t need to always put up a smile on her lips and pretended as if her life was all rainbows and unicorns.

Seulgi heaved a deep sigh while her eyes stared at the clear sky. Now that she had calmed herself, she can’t help but thought of how silly the reason behind her frustration was.

It was when she was sitting at one of the bleachers in the gym that she accidentally heard some of her classmates at the front row bad-mouthing the girl that just transferred here a few weeks ago. Seulgi heard a lot of things from them, but to her dismay none of them were a good thing. She sometimes would just bit her bottom lip and left the cliques that had a particular liking to gossiping but this was where the line was stepped over.

Bae Irene was a .

Bae Irene was a .

Bae Irene thought that she was too good to even attempt to talk to others.

Seulgi didn’t even know where they got those informations from but this was just on another level of gossiping. As far as Seulgi knew, they do gossip but never to the point of insulting them, -shaming and swearing on them as if the said person was a criminal. They acted nice and sweet in front of Joohyun but Seulgi got sick in the stomach when she heard them talked like this behind her back.

Hypocrites, her pet peeve.

Seulgi felt her jaw clenched tightly. What if they were the one who was in Joohyun’s position? Would they still laugh obnoxiously like what they were doing right now?

And to add on her frustration, they were the same people that used to belittling Seungwan when they were in middle school. Freaking Min joo and all her minions, why did she had to be in the same class with her again..? Seulgi never really hate on other people but maybe she could reconsider it if it came to her.

Seulgi felt her blood boiled when she saw a smirk came to Min joo’s lips.

“What? Trying to be a hero again Kang Seulgi?” Seulgi clenched her fists and sent a glare to her. “Always act like a goody two shoes, mind your own business. It’s not like she’s your friend anyway.”

Seulgi was ready to bite back but she felt a hand grabbed her forearm.

“Calm down”

Seulgi snapped her head to her right only to see Sulli. The former noticed that the corners of her lips were curved into a frown too, but she didn’t think too much of it. Not when all she could think about was to retort back to the annoying girl.

Seulgi was known for the cheery and bubbly girl in the school, but she was known to get scary when she's angry too.

“Yeah calm down. You don't want to get detention again like you did in middle school do you?” Min joo said with a clear mocking tone.

“How about you shut your mouth now.” This time Soojung came to the scene, but her lips made a flat thin line with her eyebrow raised. “I can smell your bad breath from here.”

Min joo’s eyebrow twitched at this and her smirk vanished quickly.

“Bull” one of them replied.

“Yeah,” Min Joo arched her eyebrow. “Have you ever smelled your boyfriend’s odor? I’m not surprised though, he works in a dirty area and a BAR. No wonder he smells like crap.”

At this Soojung’s expression instantly hardened. But she was wise enough not to take the bait, although she can’t help but let out a scoff.

Seulgi opened before she can reply back. “At least he earns his own money unlike you who leech onto your parent’s money and spent it like there’s no tomorrow. Keep living your life like this and I promise you’ll be a dead fish in the ocean when you’re no longer a high school student.”

“Stop spreading false rumors if you don’t want that to happen to you either.” Seulgi pulled her arm from Sulli’s grip and turned away.

She needed some time alone. Seulgi wasn’t planning on making the situation worsen anyway.

±

“Look Seulgi.. Like I said, can you please just give me one more chance?”

“I don’t know Jun Seo, I ca-“

“Let me guess, you can’t give me the answer now right?” The boy said a bit frustrated as he ruffled his hair briefly. “You always said that Seulgi! Why can’t you just give a proper answer? You asked for some time and I gave you that. Is three weeks not enough for you??”

Seulgi bit the inside of at this, growing pissed as well.

“Do you think I can just forgive and forget about what you did that easily?” Seulgi felt her chest tightening “You freaking kissed that girl Jun Seo!”

“I already apologized for it!” He slammed his palm against the table, hard enough for it to tremble and Seulgi jumped at it.

Her heartbeat quickened rapidly, some uninvited memories played again inside her mind. The scene was just too familiar for her just to ignore them. Seulgi failed to let out the words she wanted to say.

She wished Sulli or Soojung were with her now. Unfortunately, he happened to come to her classroom when the two girls were out to buy foods from the canteen.

“That’s enough.”

Jun Seo’s head snapped at the source of the voice and so did Seulgi. Joohyun was still sitting on her seat but with her hand grabbing onto his wrist. There was a slight difference with her behavior with the boy. Her eyes showed hardness, something that she gave to Seulgi the first time she called her with her real name.

“Who the hell are you?” Jun Seo’s pulled his hand away from her grip, looking at Joohyun up and down with his eyebrows furrowed before opening his mouth again. “Mind your own business.”

“I can’t when you’re disturbing my study and the class by being extra loud.”

Jun Seo clicked his tongue, now only realizing that all of their eyes were on him. He didn’t say anything back to Joohyun, instead he looked back to the raven haired girl.

“Fine. I’ll come back to you on Thursday, make sure to be ready to give me a proper answer.”

He didn’t wait for Seulgi to reply nor did he leave any room for her to protest. The boy simply left, not noticing the stricken look on Seulgi’s face.

Her head snapped at the hand waving in front of her face. She looked up only to see Joohyun, now standing beside her desk. She didn’t realize she was too into her own thoughts that she didn’t notice her surroundings.

“You okay?”

And this was the first time Seulgi can hear the concern coming from Joohyun’s mouth. It surprised Seulgi but it's not the bad kind of surprise. Her mind slowly can focused back onto the present.

“Y-yeah,” Seulgi stuttered, clearing afterwards.”Thanks for saving me from that situation”

Joohyun didn’t say anything for a moment but Seulgi can feel her staring at her. She felt Joohyun grab her hand and urged Seul to exit the classroom. Seulgi didn’t say anything, too surprised with Joohyun’s act that she just let herself getting dragged by her. They rounded the corner where there were only a handful of people there.

“Your hands are shaking.”

Seulgi immediately looked down to her hands and indeed, they were shaking. She stopped it by intertwining her fingers together. Only then that she realized she was sweating and her stomach felt queasy and she was hot, too hot.  

The fact that Joohyun pointed out her state like this made her heart beats quickened. In anxiety. She never showed her state like this in the school, ever. Cursed Jun Seo for triggering it when she once vowed not to ever shown it to anyone.

Joohyun’s eyes never left her face while Seulgi looked down at the ground, like there’s something interesting happening down there. Seulgi can’t help but felt vulnerable under her intense stare. It was as if she can see what’s running inside her mind.

And Seulgi decided that she didn’t like it, so she her heels and ran away. She let her feets dragged by itselves. She didn’t care if she left her bag in the classroom, all she could think about was to get away from anyone right now.

Seulgi never looked back, nor did Joohyun ever catch up to her.

—

Seulgi came back home with a frown. She flicked the lights on and the room immediately lighted up. Seulgi didn’t have any motivation to do the chores so she just settled with laying on the small living room couch, staring at the ceiling that was left unmaintained for years.

The apartment wasn’t luxurious. In fact, it was the opposite of it. It was just a plain apartment that screamed “not well kept”. There weren’t many equipments or furniture decorating the apartment as it wasn’t maintained well, there were some stained on some spots of the ceiling and if you walk on some spots, the floor will gave a creak.

“Stop being a lazy and help me!” the sound of glass shattering can be heard from across the room, while his booming voice echoed through the small room.

A bony finger pointed at her, bloodshot eyes glaring at her and profanities came out of his mouth like a river. Seulgi can only bit her bottom lip to stop them from trembling more.

“It’s okay, Seulgi. It’s okay” a tall figure hugged her in a warm embrace, rocking her back with his injured hand in an attempt to calm the crying girl.

“He’s gone”

Seulgi released a shaky breath when the sound of her apartment intercom rang like it’s been listening in on her thoughts, breaking her unwanted memories that played like a broken record in the process. The formerly trembling girl didn’t bother to move any inch from her position as she only stared at the blue light that flickered on and off from the intercom.

She knew who it might be, because only two persons called the landline.

Beep.

‘Hey, Seulgi. I’ll be coming home late for tonight. Apparently the store ran out of the night-shift worker so I have to fill up the empty spot. Make sure to eat before you sleep and don’t forget to do your homework. I left some food for you in the fridge this afternoon, just heated them up if you wanted to eat.’

Beep.

Seulgi heaved a heavy sigh after her brother’s voicemail ended. She guessed it’s another night spent alone. Actually, Seulgi worked in a café just a few streets away from her apartment but she really needed a day-off today. Thankfully her boss was understanding about it and her co-worker, Yeon Joo, lend a helping hand to her by covering her shift.

She fished her phone out when she felt a vibration from her right pocket, her eyes scanned the screen and she realized that Seungwan called her phone. Seulgi turned off her phone and put it aside on the small table beside her bed, not bothering to charge it. She was too drained to do it.

Seulgi left the television on for the remaining night. Though she knew she should have saved the electricity so she didn’t have to pay more for the monthly payment, but she needed the static sounds coming from the television more than ever, at