Sinb has always been a nervous wreck around Yuju. Most of the time, she just laugh so unnecessarily loud whenever she sees Yuju passing by that even Yerin, who is incredibly shameless, finds herself suffering from secondhand embarrassment. But sometimes, humiliating situations occur. 

Like the time Sinb tried to look cool by leaning her elbow casually on her locker, but missed and flopped facedown on the ground right in front of Yuju. And the time she almost burned down the science building because she was too absorbed in peeking at Yuju at the other table instead of paying attention to the smoking Bunsen Burner. Long story short, the whole school had to go through an unneeded fire evacuation. There is also the time Sinb accidentally tripped over her nonexistent shoelace in art class and fell on something soft. The 'something' was actually Yuju, who ended up underneath Sinb on the ground, and Sinb landed with her two paint-covered hands planted on Yuju's white shirt. Who wears a white shirt on painting day anyways? 

But kind Yuju is still kind, and never laughs at her or gets angry at her. When she reaches out to help pick Sinb up, the latter always relishes how warm and soft her hands are. And that makes Sinb love her even more.

Though Sinb may not love Yerin and Umji as much this morning.

"WHAT?" Sinb screeches, horrified. "You gossiped about my crush while Yuju was right next to you? And you didn't even notice?" 

The other two can only cower from Sinb's rare show of rage.

"Well...she didn't seem to mind it." Umji says meekly.

Yerin jumps in, trying to defend her favourite donsaeng. "Yeah! She even smiled and said hi to us right after."

Sinb glares at her. "How am I supposed to face her now? This is so embarrassing!" She wants nothing more than to go crawl into a trashcan and wallow in garbage, because that's exactly how she feels like right now.

"It's not like you haven't embarrassed yourself enough in front of her already." Yerin points out.

Sinb musters up as much as hatred as she can and tries to burn Yerin with her eyes, but Yerin quickly grabs Umji and flees.

"UGHHHH!!!"

                                     ********

The day ends uneventfully, but Sinb can't seem to erase away the thought that Yuju might know about her undying love for her. Even worse, Yuju might purposely avoid her now that she knows why Sinb is always so flustered around her.

Sinb buries her face into her comforter and howls out a muffled but torturous cry. Yuju will never be hers, not when she's probably scared away already.

The girl jolts up. No, she can't just lie here and whine uselessly. She needs to clear her head. Sinb grabs her jacket and scarf and run downstairs.

"Mom, I'm going to the park. I'll be back before midnight!" Sinb rushes out the front door before her mom can catch her.

                                   ********

As Sinb rocks back and forth on the swing, she takes a deep breath. 

"Why am I so worried?