“I’ll pay for it”

Joohyun looked up from her wallet only to see Seulgi handing her a cup of hot coffee and Joohyun raised her eyebrows at it but nevertheless accept it, although a bit hesitantly.

“..What do you mean?” Joohyun asked, putting the cup on the counter table carefully, still hadn’t put her wallet back inside her bag.

“Umm..” Seulgi let the corners of her lips curved into a small, shy smile. “I want to repay you for your help two days ago.. I’ll tell you more in a bit after my shift ends.”

Joohyun was confused, but she nodded her head anyway. Taking the cup of coffee with her as she sat at the unoccupied table at the corner of the room, beside the large window where she can see all the activities going on outside.

She didn’t wait that long for Seulgi. After the latter removed the apron from her and bowed to her seniors and co-workers, she brought her bag and a beverage on her hand for herself. Seulgi settled to sit across from her, leaning on the soft couch after a long day of school and work and her body thanked her for it.

Seulgi didn’t waste much time on getting to the point.

“I broke up with him today.”

Seulgi fidgeted with her hands. When Joohyun didn’t say anything, she proceeded to talk.

“It didn’t quite end in a good note, unfortunately. He was a bit.. upset about it. Said that it doesn’t make any sense why I gave up on our relationship so easily, but he shut his mouth when I said that I caught him kissing the same girl back then.”

“That’s the right thing to do.” Joohyun nodded her head encouragingly as she sipped on her beverage while Seulgi let out a smile at her.

“Thank you. For the advice and all, I mean”

Joohyun glanced at her before averting it down again. “It’s nothing”

“Why did you tell me all that stuff?”

“What do you mean?”

“Back then at the rooftop.. I thought that you hated me?”

Joohyun shrugged. “You seemed like you need a wake-up call.”

Seulgi chuckled at this. She wasn’t sure why she laughed at it, it wasn’t even funny but guess the truth in that sentence got her. “You didn’t answer my question though..?”

Joohyun was silent for a moment.

“I did.. I did dislike you. Back when you called me by that name”

Seulgi nodded, already knowing that based on her behavior towards her back then. And the simple question that she itched to asked for a long time came out; “Why?”

But Seulgi didn’t get any answer to that question as Joohyun only shrugged. She shrugged while Seulgi tried to study her expression. Unlike most of the time, this time the former showed another hint of expression, although Seulgi had to observe her with extra effort than with other people. And she understand that Joohyun wasn’t ready to talked about it. They weren’t even close with each other too anyway, at least not yet.

So Seulgi did what Joohyun wanted, to drop the topic.

“Do you like the coffee?”

Joohyun looked up at her, a tiny smile crept up to her lips and Seulgi felt her own lips curved into a smile too, although hers was the wide kind of smile.

“Yeah”

Then it was silence for a while, not the bad kind of silence but the opposite of it. It was the comfortable one. Seulgi sipped on her coffee after blowing on it and her mind roamed elsewhere. The view of Joohyun smiling that time back when they were on the rooftop didn’t leave Seulgi’s mind and she wondered why Joohyun rarely smile.

She wanted to see it more, so Seulgi told her to.

“You should smile more, it’s beautiful” Seulgi complimented her genuinely. She really thought it was.

Seulgi noticed the slight twitch of Joohyun’s eyebrow and she smiled at it. She just realized that Joohyun talked a lot more compared to the first few weeks she know her, not that she was complaining. Joohyun expressed her feelings more and Seulgi can’t help but felt happy about it. Baby steps didn’t matter, slow and steady didn’t matter.

“You sweet talk a lot”

“Do I?” Seulgi hummed. “I’m just saying what I’m thinking. You said I should be more honest with myself right? Well I am now”

Joohyun’s cheeks tinted with the littlest hint of red color, and Seulgi laughed when she felt a kick from underneath the table.

±

“”

Sulli turned her head at Seulgi, eyebrows furrowed while Seulgi only stared at her with wide eyes in horror.

“What?”

“Is Mrs Choi going to give the test result today?”

“I think so..?”

Seulgi groaned and burried her head to her arms. She knew she was going to fail the exam even before she do it. Of course, it’s because she didn’t managed to learn the materials, not when her time was consumed by her work and loads of shifts from her part time job.

And she guessed it right, for when her name was called and she was walking towards the teacher, the latter looked at her with a disapproving look.

Seulgi could only let out a guilty smile.

“24 out of 100. That’s the lowest score you’ve ever got in this class, Seulgi”

And the one who got the lowest score in the class too, apparently.

Seulgi took the paper that was handed to her while her other hand rubbed the nape of her neck in habit. She too, didn’t expect to get the score that low. It was kind of embarrassing for her, if only the score weren’t said out loud for the whole class to hear, maybe she won’t be this embarrassed.

“Yeah, I’m sorry..”

 “Maybe you should pay more attention to class rather than sleeping on your desk.” The teacher sighed, before looking past her. “Then it can’t be help..”

Seulgi tilted her head in confusion. “Pardon..?”

The bell rang at the exact moment, and the teacher dismissed the class, except for her.

And Joohyun.

Joohyun was called to the teacher’s desk and she had the same confused look like Seulgi’s when she walked to them. Seulgi shrugged her shoulders when Joohyun sent her a silent question.

“Irene, I’ll need you to teach Seulgi in math. Sorry if this will take your free time from you, but you’re the smartest one in math so I figured you can help her in improving her score. You okay with it? If not, I can ask others”

Seulgi glanced at the girl beside her discreetly after the teacher had finished the talking. She let herself let out a smile when Joohyun accepted it without any protest.

She was happy that Joohyun didn’t thought of it as burden for her, just like what she said to Seulgi when they came back to their respective seats after the conversation with the teacher. But the only thing that bugged her was that tutoring her mean that they’ll have to use a place to do it and Seulgi didn’t want Joohyun to came to where she lived, which is her apartment.

She can’t.

“How about Saturday at your house?”

Seulgi her suddenly dry lips nervously, her mind thinking of a reason she can used to execute the suggestion.

“Uhh, it will be used by my brother. How about if I came to your house instead? I should be the one who came to you, regarding I’m the one that need the help.”

Joohyun was silent for a while, and Seulgi could only stared nervously at the unreadable expression on her face. Thankfully, it didn’t last long, for Joohyun sighed and nodded at her.

“..Okay”

±

The first time Seulgi came to Joohyun’s house was because of her bad grades and Seulgi can’t help but stared in awe at the house of the address.

The house was themed with grey cobble, with quite a spacey yard at the front. It was two floors high and even from afar, she can tell that the house cost a lot of money. It was the modern type of house, a bit simple yet unique-looking, in a good kind. A fitting house for someone like Joohyun.

She rang the bell and while waited for Joohyun or anyone to came, she observed the house again as it was pleasing sight to see.

Seulgi smiled when she saw Joohyun came out of the house and walked towards her with keys on her hand.

“Hey”

Joohyun glanced up briefly from opening the lock of the door.

“Hi”

“Sorry to bother you” Seulgi said when she walked inside the property. Her eyes widened when a dog came out of the house from the slightly opened door. She smiled widely when it jogged towards them with it’s tail wagging left and right and it’s tongue poked out.

“You have a dog??” Seulgi petted the golden retriever with the same excitement as the dog.

“Ah, yeah” Joohyun glanced at the opened door before looking back to her pet. “Her name’s cookie”

“Didn’t know you were the type to give a cute nickname” Seulgi glanced at the shorter girl when she didn’t get any response, and chuckled at the look on Joohyun’s face. “What?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Joohyun crossed her arms and Seulgi noticed the lifted eyebrows which only resulted her in letting out a short laugh, at the same time squatted down to be on the same level as the dog, only to be swarmed with from the dog.

Seulgi let out a squeal and turned her head away in order to prevent the dog from her face more but it only help a little. Seulgi laughed though, still petting her with excitement.

“I think she likes you” Seulgi heard Joohyun said from beside her, oblivious with the warm smile on Joohyun’s face.

Seulgi hummed, standing up and wiped the stains from the with her clothed arm. It’s always been her dream since she was a kid to have a dog as her pet. Unfortunately, it will not happen for a long time, based on her condition of living now.

When Seulgi entered her house, there’s no one else except for them. And cookie. They decided to study in Joohyun’s bedroom, which was located on the second floor. While they were walking there, Seulgi can’t help but appreciate the inside of the house.

“Sit”

Cookie sit obediently in front of Joohyun’s bedroom, still with her panting in excitement. Joohyun nodded in approval and petted it’s head before closing the door of her bedroom.

“So.. let’s get down to business”

“Isn’t it uncomfortable to study like that?”

Seulgi glanced up at the girl sitting at the rolling chair before smiling reassuringly.

“No, it’s okay”

They spent some time in silent. While Seulgi tried to solve the questions given by Joohyun, the latter was mindlessly rotating her body along with the rolling chair. Joohyun had already taught her some stuffs, and so, she decided to give Seulgi an assignment for her to finish it. If Seulgi can solve the questions, Joohyun will call it a day.

Seulgi had finished 5 questions out of 10, and she was stuck in no 6. She racked her brain but it seems like after her third attempt to solve it with various formulas, she can’t still find the answer.

“Ahhhh” Seulgi whined, ruffling her hair in frustration.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t get this problem..” Seulgi pouted. “Why does my brain freezes every time I see algebra”

Seulgi looked up from the book when she saw movements from her peripheral vision. The vanilla scent soon entered her nostrils when Joohyun copied her body position from beside her.

“Which question?”

Seulgi shook her head to focus again.

“Uh, this one”

“Mmm..”

Joohyun explained how to solve the question but she lost track of it when her eyes settled on the brunette’s face yet again. She can’t help it, this is the first time she was this close to Joohyun and her face was so close to her.

She knew that Joohyun was beautiful since the first time her eyes landed on her but this is the first time she can studied the girl’s face this close. The double eyelids, the brown in her eyes, the small mole-or what Seulgi liked to think as beauty mark- beside her right eyebrow. 

Beautiful.

She knew this wasn’t right. Her, staring at someone’s face much longer than she should. The quickening heart beats of her. Joohyun barely did anything and she was already like this.

Perhaps…

And her breath hitched when she met Joohyun’s eyes. She felt her face getting warmer, as she thought Joohyun caught her staring at her. Their close distance didn’t help Seulgi at all in calming her beating hearts.

“..Are you listening to me?”

Seulgi averted her eyes back to the book.

“..Sorry”

Joohyun sighed lightly after hearing the reply, closing the book gently at the same time. Seulgi help her in organizing the papers and stationary on the floor. “We’ll call it a day. We could continue to study in other days. Are you free on Monday?”

Seulgi hummed before sending her an apologetic smile. “I have a part-time job on weekdays, remember?”

“Then, I’ll wait for you to finish it.”

Seulgi was taken aback by it. She didn’t expect Joohyun to say that kind of reply.

“You mean you’ll wait until I finish my shift? But it’ll be late.. I don’t want to bother you”

“You can’t have a bad score