Kyungwon takes a deep breath. The cold air stings her sinuses, and she involuntarily brings a hand up to rub at the sensitive flesh of her nose.

 

Water rises, then gets back into the encompassing blackness, crests of waves reflecting the white of the moon. The sound is therapeutic. Kyungwon exhales, arms tightening around her clothed shins.

 

Her sneakers dig firmly into the sand, barely feet away from where the tide rushes in the furthest. They are really old grey Converses and are extremely beaten up, but it doesn't matter.

 

Being at the beach at night is something that she likes to do frequently. It's quieter, it's not broiling hot, and most of the times she'll have the whole strip of beach to herself.

 

She compromises her solitary state for the cold - but the problem is easily rectified by a thick shirt, jeans and a sweater.

 

Her watch beeps. She looks down at the digitised numbers on the face, glowing dimly in the dark. It's two am.

 

Saturday nights are usually not as empty - there's the token drunkards who'd stumble onto the sand after drinking at the twenty-four hour convenience store at the end of the road. But they leave her alone, and she leaves them alone, and she can continue her silent relaxation. Today the beach is, mercifully, empty.

 

The tide is a little stronger today, leaving foaming bubbles in the sand a little closer to the tips of her sneakers than usual.

 

The night breeze ruffles her hair, and she combs her fingers through the mass, straightening the wild strands. She looks up. The sky is splattered sparsely with stars; tiny white dots against an inky black canvas.

 

It's times like these where she finds comfort in herself. The daytime is tiring and her nerves are often frazzled, but being alone here allows her to dispose of those problems. At least, she disposes of them until the next day.

 

Today was particularly bad. She'd argued with her project teammates in Uni, and then she'd gone back home to receive a call from her Mom, where again she had to argue. They always argue.

 

There'd been a lot of quiet anger before she relented and started shouting, free hand gripping the fabric of her pillow tightly. There'd been some lone tears shed. She'd left the house fuming.

 

She's in the middle of her silent watching of the waves, wallowing in her simmering anger, when she hears the sound of sand being scuffed from under clumsy soles; she barely has time to turn before a dark mass deposits itself on her right side, about a foot away from her.

 

Kyungwon nearly curses, but she bites her tongue, heart thumping in her chest.

 

It's a person, thank God. A person in a black coat and dark jeans and with long, dark hair.

 

The moonlight illuminates the person’s face distinctly - or at least what Kyungwon can see of her side profile. The curve of the nose, the barely visible redness of the lips, the bangs falling into a half-lidded eye.

 

“Hey,” the girl says, voice high-pitched and lilting, but slurred. Kyungwon can smell the alcohol vaporising from her breath, which is definitely what drove the girl to talk to a random stranger sitting on the sand at two am. “Wha’re you doing here so - late?”

 

Kyungwon sees the bottle in the girl’s hand. The girl turns her head to look at her, and Kyungwon inhales, before exhaling slowly.

 

The girl looks around her age, maybe younger, she can't really tell. But she's really pretty, even in a messed up drunken state. Kyungwon squints. Her eyes are swollen, and her nose is a darker shade than her milky skin. Had she been crying?

 

“I could ask the same of you,” she says cautiously.

 

“Saw y’ sitting here and wondered why anyone would be here so late,” the girl says, slurring a little. But her speech is relatively clear for someone who can't open their eyes fully.

 

“You're drunk,” Kyungwon says, gently.

 

“Drunk?” The girl laughs, toneless and high pitched, “Yeah, I know. Of course ‘m drunk.” She brings the bottle to her lips, sipping. She barely even reacts to the burn of the alcohol, instead palming the bottle with her left hand, right hand pressed into the sand.

 

The foot of space between them is filled with a certain awkward energy that Kyungwon is certain only she feels. Can drunk people feel awkward? She doesn't know. But she certainly does. It's a new experience for her. She normally doesn't interact with many people at all, what more an intoxicated person.

 

Kyungwon wonders what happened to make this girl drink like this. She personally doesn't like alcohol. But she doesn't ask; it's none of her business to pry into others’ affairs.

 

The girl lets the bottom of the bottle come to rest the sand, face upturned towards the limitless sky.

 

She sees it in her peripheral; the crystalline droplets leaking from her eyes, of which the visible half is glassy. Kyungwon doesn’t know what to do or say, so she just sits tensely, arms wrapped firmly around her shins, chin resting on her knees. She isn’t good at comforting people. She can’t remember the last time someone comforted her. And, well, frankly, she doesn't know this lady, so it's really none of her business.

 

The crying goes on for a while. The girl doesn't cry loudly, but there's a certain melancholic intensity in the way her lips are firmly pressed together, her tears running free. Her shoulders shake slightly.

 

She hears the girl mutter obscenities under her breath, voice amplified by the alcohol. Then sniffles, and the girl wipes her eyes with the long sleeve of her coat. She sniffs again as she looks up and breathes out, scratching at her nose with her free hand.

 

Kyungwon looks at the stranger, with her swollen eyes and red lips and tear-stained cheeks and alcohol. She isn't a stoic person per se, but there's a certain delicacy in treating emotional people that she's sure that she lacks.

 

The girl breathes out again, cheeks puffing. “Life sometimes, huh?”

 

“A lot of times,” Kyungwon mumbles past the coldness of her lips. The girl laughs - though Kyungwon isn't sure if she'd understood her words - and she brings the bottle back to her lips. Some of the alcohol drips from the corner of , down her chin and down her neck.

 

She looks like an absolute mess, and Kyungwon wonders if that is what she’d look like as well, sans alcohol, had she been capable to showcasing emotion.

 

The girl tilts the bottle and holds it out slightly to Kyungwon, her half-lidded stare boring with a near discomforting intensity into Kyungwon’s. “Want some?”

 

Kyungwon shakes her head stiffly. “I don’t drink.”

 

“I should pro’bly stop,” the girl says, hiccuping once. The sound is, admittedly, adorable.

 

“You should,” Kyungwon says quietly. The girl contemplates for a few seconds, bottle swaying gently in her loosening grip. The bottle is nearly empty, and she passes it over to her right hand, sticking it in the sand beside her.

 

The girl coughs, and Kyungwon looks over.

 

“Maybe I should go get you some water?” She says, sneakers scraping at the sand as she tries to stand up. The girl reaches out, fingers - damn, they are long - seizing Kyungwon by her bony wrist.

 

“No,” she mutters, her grip weak. “Don't.”

 

Kyungwon sits back down, feet digging divots in the sand. They are quiet for a span.

 

The girl looks out at the line where the sea and the sky meet, exhaling a short breath. “Y’know how sometimes there's like - like a thing that happens, and you're just like, God, that hurts. M’ boyfriend of two years was cheating on me,” she mumbles, free hand pressing her bangs to her forehead. “Bastard.

 

“Thing ‘s, I kinda always had...some, some feeling, y’know? Y’ get them. I just - I just really hoped that it wasn't true. It wasn't even just anyone. It was my friend. My close friend. God.” She says drunkenly, digging her fingers into the sand. And the drunk rambling halts.

 

Kyungwon had always seen movies and dramas where the parties in a couple drink and cry themselves to sleep after a breakup. It's always been somewhat of a staple thing to her - but witnessing it in real life stumps her.

 

She realises that she doesn't understand it. Much. How you could feel so intensely for a person that your separation would make you want to drink like this? Make you cry like this?

 

Kyungwon has never been one for much outward emotions. She hardly cries, and when she does it's only when she's past the point of controllable rage. But she supposes it's because she's never felt that much love from or for anyone either.

 

Such a strange concept. Falling in love with someone and having the person fall in love with you.

 

“I'm sorry to hear that,” she says, “but he's not worth your liver. No guy is.”

 

The girl manages a laugh, which cuts through the air like a high pitched chime. Kyungwon still isn't sure if the girl has understood anything she just said. She's never been drunk, but she's sure that the alcohol inhibits the ability to process things.

 

The girl’s head lolls forward, the tips of her bangs brushing in a gentle rhythm against her clothed knees. Kyungwon can hear her loud exhalation, and the sound of fingernails drumming against the glass of what she assumes is the bottle of alcohol.

 

Kyungwon supposes she understands the emotions someone would feel behind the intense need to drown their sorrows in alcohol. After all, she's flown into ineffable rages before, mostly revolving around her Mom.

 

She's tired of it. That's why she's living in Busan, miles and miles away from the capital city that teems with a contagion that she doesn't want to be infected with. But even here, freedom eludes her grasp.

 

The girl suddenly lies down on the sand, hands palm-down. Kyungwon realises belatedly that she's really tall - the soles of her shoes are almost touching the waves. Her half-lidded gaze is fixated on the arching dome of the sky, the stars speckling it, and the moon making its climb across. Her left hand - the one next to Kyungwon - is extended further than the other. A silent invitation.

 

Kyungwon lies on her back, hands extended. With nothing else to look at but the sky, she's caught up in the vastness of it all.

 

It's just blackness, but as encompassing as the sea seems, the sky is a million times more so. With such pollution fogging up their skies she can only see the few stars. Like insignificant specks on a never ending canvas of black.

 

Few as they are, they shine brightly. She supposes that makes up for it.

 

She feels something touch her pinky and freaks a little, but when she realises after a momentary scrutiny that it's the girl’s own pinky.

 

“Nice t’ meet you,” she says.

 

Kyungwon turns her head slightly in the sand. The girl’s still facing the sky, her milky skin nearly glowing in the moonlight, eyes nearly closed. Kyungwon wonders how much she's actually seeing. Her lips glitter, tainted by the touch of alcohol. She looks more serene than anything else.

 

“Nice to meet you too.” Kyungwon faces the sky, watching the little spots of white and the waxing moon creep across the blackness. She’s aware of the pressing of their pinkies, of the sand under her palms.

 

It's nearing three in the morning, and she stays awake, watching the stars.

 

-

 

She'd stayed, until the night reached its last straining minutes, and the sun finally broke above the horizon, bleeding orange into the waves. The beach is beginning to get more populated - joggers, early birds, coming to enjoy their Sunday.

 

She's sitting up, legs stretched out in front of her, hands by her side. She'd stayed up all night - she's done it enough that she's used to it, really - and only left momentarily to buy two bottles of water and aspirin from the convenience store.

 

The girl is still passed out on the sand beside her, the tip of her nose red, lips dry from the cold. Kyungwon had noticed the dryness ever since the darkness started fading. But, well, it's really none of her business.

 

She'd had some early daytime to observe the girl, whose features are now properly visible in the half-light. Kyungwon wonders how she's never come across this girl before; she's stunning even in her drunken state, and she certainly possesses a face to be  remembered.

 

Maybe Kyungwon could've just left to go home. She didn't have to stay with a girl who's passed out drunk and probably won't even remember who she is, but she stays anyway. She doesn't feel comfortable leaving a passed out drunk girl alone on the beach. It's against her ethical code.

 

So she stays, sipping water, watching the moon’s journey across the sky. Then the sun’s majestic entrance. Forever stealing the show.

 

It's only at a little past seven that the girl finally stirs from her unconsciousness, the inflamed red of the flesh around her eyes twitching as she squints against the slowly increasing sunlight.

 

She breathes out loudly from her nose, which she instantly rubs. Her eyes screw shut again, and a long-drawn groan escapes her lips.

 

The girl’s eyes open again, squinting in her general direction. Her entire face looks a little swollen from sleep, and Kyungwon finds it faintly adorable.

 

“Mmmmmh,” the girl says, squinting more intensely. Her eyebrows furrow, as though trying hard to remember what the hell is going on. Her fingers shift against the sand. She isn't screaming or running away, which is a good sign.

 

“Good morning,” Kyungwon says, tentatively.

 

“Mmmmh,” the girl says. She rubs her eyes with the back of her hand - her palms are dotted with sand granules - and tries to sit up. She winces, eyes screwing shut against the sun. Her voice is husky and cracks slightly. “Oh, my God. My head. My head.”

 

“I have water and aspirin here,” Kyungwon says. The girl dusts her hands off, apparently slowly regaining the barest sense of sobriety. She combs through her tangled hair, getting rid of most of the sand, eyes seeming to be permanently shut.

 

The girl swears under her breath, before trying to force her swollen eyes open. The swelling and the headache don't help at all.

 

“Please don't tell me I did something retarded last night,” the girl says, halting every few words to wince, accepting the aspirin and the opened bottle that Kyungwon passes to her. She swallows the pills and massages her temples. “Shouldn't have drunk. .”

 

“Well,” Kyungwon says, watching as the girl downs half her bottle mouthful by mouthful. She thinks about telling the girl what she'd spewed out, but ultimately decided against it. “No, you didn't. You just - talked a little.”

 

The girl caps the bottle, eyes squinted. “Oh, God. I'm sorry.”

 

“It's fine. Really. It was nice to finally be able to talk to someone.” Kyungwon says. It's a slip. She presses her lips together. The girl squints at her, perhaps not missing the way she phrases it. But she doesn't say anything, and they remain quiet.

 

The girl presses a hand to her forehead, leaning against her palm. She exhales.

 

Kyungwon checks her phone. It's on three percent, but it's seven fifteen and she needs to go back home to take a shower and eat something. And she has work to do.

 

“Hey,” she says, “I'll - um, I’ll be heading back now.” She doesn't know why she's telling this extremely hungover stranger anything; it's not like she has to report to the girl or whatever.

 

The girl looks at her through her squinted eyes and Kyungwon wonders if she's imagining the disappointed way her lips tug downwards. But she just nods minimally and says, very slowly, “thank you for the water and the aspirin. I'll repay you somehow, I don't have any money on me right now. And I left my phone at home.”

 

“It's okay, really. It's just a couple of dollars,” Kyungwon murmurs, scratching the back of her neck. She mouths the words awkwardly. “Take care.”

 

The girl eyes her, then smiles, barely showing two rows of whitened teeth. The smile vanishes behind another wince. “I probably can't. Thanks anyway, stranger.”

 

Kyungwon feels something akin to worry in her gut. She isn’t sure if this completely hungover girl can make it home by herself - but she supposes it’s none of her business anyway. And she really has to go.  

 

So she just stands and starts walking up the slight incline of the sand, sneakers digging into small dunes. She dusts her rear off as she goes.

 

When she reaches the road, she stands up straight and stretches, feeling her tense muscles loosening. The feeling of the hard gravel is strange under her soles after so many hours spent on soft sand. She looks back once. The girl is still sitting on the sand, hunched over, facing the pale blue of the sea, the breeze ruffling her long hair .

 

Then she turns and crosses the road, which is devoid of vehicles, and begins her usual solitary journey back home.

 

She supposes that this is how life is designed to work. At night, when everything slows down and she can breathe, it's easy to find herself entranced by the beauty of subtle moments. She remembers - the rather pathetic number of stars, the moon, the drunk girl lying beside her, somehow managing to keep Kyungwon from drifting.

 

She supposes that this is nothing very special - just the usual sky, just the usual stars and moon, just a stranger.

 

It's like waking up from a good dream. The good dreams always seem to be too brief; then it's waking up to face the bleak world again, left with a barely memorable taste of happiness.

 

Kyungwon reaches her house in ten minutes. She unlocks the door, puts her sneakers on the floor beside it, and walks in.

 

There's projects to be done. There’s the five packets of instant ramen in her kitchen to be consumed. There's more shouting, more getting angry. It's a never-ending cycle of repression.

 

Everything is still a tarnished work in progress, and Kyungwon can't afford to allow herself to be distracted by the moments that don't matter.

 

-

 

“Kyungwon.”

 

The aforementioned individual doesn't look up from her laptop screen. The thousands of words on her documents reflect feebly off the lens of her wire-rimmed glasses.

 

“Kyungwon,” the voice whines.

 

“Kang Yebin,” Kyungwon says, hand pressing to her jugular, “I’m trying to get something done here.” She indicates the overheating specimen on the table, which she's sure will end up burning a hole in the worn wood.

 

“You've been doing stuff for the past two hours, there's no one to play chess with,” Yebin’s lower lip pokes out. Kyungwon regards her with undisguised disgust.

 

Kyungwon is generally friendless, because people tend to be intimidated by her height and her tendency to glare when she's otherwise expressionless. Kang Yebin is an exception, because 1. She's Kyungwon’s younger cousin, and 2. She's pretty much friends with everyone.

 

“I know you graduated from high school and , but you really have to stop pestering me,” Kyungwon groans, relenting. She's tired anyway, and she can't stand seeing Yebin doing that traumatizing pout. (She'd once done the oppa-ya song, to which Kyungwon threatened to seal with duct tape)

 

“You're so asocial,” Yebin sighs, leaning her chin on her palm. Her long brown hair is tied up in a ponytail because of the unbearable heat. “Just like your mom.”

 

Kyungwon inhales, rubbing her eyes. “Don't talk about her.”

 

“Oh yeah,” Yebin casts her eyes downwards for a second, clearing , before she looks up. “Sorry.”

 

“I'm here in Busan because I wanted to leave that life, remember?” Kyungwon taps her pencil on the tabletop, sounding out some baseless rhythm. She stops her mindless tapping and points the eraser end at Yebin. “Don't try me.”

 

They're quiet for a few seconds. It isn't awkward between them - it rarely is.

 

It's just the familiar sound of the labouring blades of Kyungwon’s ratchet old stand fan as it struggles to provide a decent air circulation through the room. The sound of her laptop whirring quietly. The faint sound of her neighbours talking.

 

“Oh, so,” Yebin says, breaking the momentary respite, “one of my schoolmates from high school is holding a barbecue at the beach on Saturday night. I don't have a plus one yet, so do you want to come with?”

 

“Didn't I say not to try me?” Kyungwon replies, mirroring Yebin’s position with her palm under her chin. She spins her pencil with her free hand. She sighs as she speaks, “you know I can't talk to people. I don't like talking to people.”

 

“It's not like you try,” Yebin mumbles. It's true, so Kyungwon doesn't dispute.

 

“What about Eunwoo or Kyulkyung?”

 

Yebin rolls her eyes. “They're invited too, so they have to bring their own plus ones.”

 

“Don't roll your eyes at me, punk. Who do you think you are?” Kyungwon scowls, but Yebin knows that she's just being playful.

 

“Kyungwon.”

 

“What?”

 

“You don't have to talk to anyone if you don't want to. But it'll be good for you to go out and mingle a little. You know, have some fun. Just because you're here to escape Seoul doesn't mean you can't enjoy yourself.”

 

Kyungwon contemplates her words. She supposes that Yebin speaks a lot of truth, most of the time - Kyungwon has just developed the rude habit of not listening to her cousin. She spews as much as she does sense.

 

It wouldn't hurt to go and mingle and stuff. But she's honestly lazy, and she just hates overly populated areas, and this barbecue sounds like it's going to be extremely overpopulated. A recipe for disaster.

 

“And,” Yebin adds conspiratorially, “there's free food and drinks.”

 

Okay, scratch that. A recipe.

 

“Ugh,” Kyungwon closes her eyes, exhales, “you know just how to win me over, don't you?”

 

Yebin’s smiling deviously like the little devil child she is. (She isn't actually a child; they have an of one year, but Kyungwon’s nearly a head taller than her cousin, and Yebin can really act like a kid sometimes)

 

She knows that Kyungwon can't resist food, mainly because she lives on instant ramen and convenience store onigiri. So anything that isn't those two staples will normally lure Kyungwon out of her hibernation cave.

 

“So are you going to come with me?”

 

“Fine,” Kyungwon says in partially mock exasperation, “fine, but I'm going to to regret this when we actually go there.”

 

Yebin grins, eyes curving. “Yes you are. But thank you.”

 

“You just don't want to seem uncool because you don't have any other friends to bring with you,” Kyungwon mutters, which she knows is a clear lie, because Yebin has a huge number of friends. A real social butterfly.

 

“Yeah, yeah,” Yebin waves her hand dismissively. “So do you want to play chess?”

 

“You're going to beat me again anyway,” Kyungwon sighs, but it's taken as an affirmation. Yebin springs up, lithe little body disappearing to find the chess set from one of her drawers.

 

“If I beat you you'll have to talk to one of my friends!” Yebin yells from the room.

 

“Oh, come on. I never win!”

 

“You can try,” Yebin reappears, holding the ancient chess set in her hands, the devious smile plastered on her impish little face. Kyungwon, not for the first time that day, wonders why she hangs around this monster.

 

“If you try to set me up with some pubescent high school guy again, I will murder you.”

 

“No guys, I promise. You'll just have to say hi,” Yebin says, pouring the chess pieces out onto the table. Kyungwon already knows she's going to regret this, as she often does when she's around Yebin.

 

“I don't like my chances,” Kyungwon says, watching as Yebin expertly sets up the chessboard. She pushes her laptop close and sets it aside, closer to the fan’s straining cool air.

 

“I'll introduce you to Kyulkyung, she's a really really nice kid,” Yebin says, tongue poking out slightly as she arranges the pieces. Kyungwon gets the white set, as always.

 

“You're scary when you wager on chess,” Kyungwon sighs, already resigned to her fate.

 

Yebin looks up at her, her evil smile widening. She's done with setting up, and the glint in her eye is worrying.

 

“White goes first.”

 

-

 

“Honestly, don't look so tense, you look constipated.”

 

Kyungwon just makes a noncommittal noise at the back of . They're reaching the beach already, treading the well-worn path that she always takes to go there. But even from the road she can see the mass of people there, and the smoke rising from the barbecue pits. There's a gentle pulse of music.

 

“It's going to be fine,” Yebin sighs, tapping Kyungwon gently on the cheek. “Just chill and eat chicken wings on the side if you want.”

 

They cross the road. Kyungwon has her hands in the pockets of her jeans, mostly because she wants to stop herself from fidgeting too much.

 

The sky is already beginning to get streaked with orange and pink, the impending darkness making the atmosphere of the approaching barbecue seem more intense. Kyungwon swallows.

 

They reach the large throng of people, where Yebin is immediately greeted by a number of people who Kyungwon can't name. Yebin has a firm grip on her wrist. She's dragged to the center of the throng, where she sees who she assumes is the host of the barbecue: this guy who looks half Asian half something else and is talking really loudly. Yebin mentioned his name, but Kyungwon already forgot.

 

“Hey Vernon,” Yebin says, smiling. The dude sweeps his long fringe out of the way.

 

“Oh, hey Yebs! Thanks for coming,” Vernon says, grinning. He looks at Kyungwon. “Your friend?”

 

“This is Kyungwon. Kyungwon, Vernon,” Yebin squeezes Kyungwon’s wrist, and the other girl shakes Vernon’s hand. She didn't need the squeeze. She may be asocial but she certainly isn’t rude.

 

“Enjoy yourselves!” Vernon says, before he is roped away by a hollering Seungkwan. Yebin drags Kyungwon away again, closer towards the smoking barbecue pits of high interest.

 

“Joo Kyulkyung!” Yebin yells, and a very pretty girl turns from eating a drumstick, her face lighting up when she sees Yebin. Kyungwon wonders how it'd feel like having someone look at her like that.

 

“Yo,” Kyulkyung says, bumping Yebin on the shoulder with her fist. Her voice is high pitched. She looks up at Kyungwon. “Hello! You must be Yebin’s cousin!”

 

“Kyungwon,” she says feebly, feeling the vibrant energy radiating off of Kyulkyung’s entire being. She gets what Yebin means about her friend being a beagle - this Kyulkyung is really bright and bubbly. It's quite a stark contrast to herself.

 

“Hi! I'm Kyulkyung, or Jieqiong, anything works. Do you want some food? Nunu’s guarding the grill with Juyeon,” Kyulkyung laughs - she has a pretty laugh too - and lets Yebin take a bite of the hotdog on her paper plate.

 

“Food sounds good,” Kyungwon says. Yebin accompanies her to the pit, where she sees a chubby-cheeked blonde individual standing by the grill, flipping chicken wings with a pair of tongs. A taller individual stands beside her, gnawing on a hotdog.

 

“Yo MC Nunu, my cousin is hungry,” Yebin says, slapping her friend hard on the back.

 

“Oh my God, Kang,” Eunwoo wheezes. “You're a piece of . Hi, Yebin’s cousin.”

 

She proceeds to stack a surmountable pile of barbecued meat on a paper plate, along with a pair of wooden chopsticks. She hands the towering plate to Kyungwon with a grin.

 

Yebin slaps her on the shoulder, nearly causing a chicken wing to fall from the top of the pile. Kyungwon curses.

 

“Okay, I've introduced you to my friends. You're free to go be emo in a corner if you want. Just text me if you really want to leave, okay?” Yebin’s wearing grey contact lenses, so Kyungwon is a little disoriented looking down into her usually brown eyes.

 

“Um, okay,” Kyungwon says, and Yebin grins before returning to join Eunwoo at the grill.

 

Kyungwon contemplates the steaming pile of food in her hands, before taking careful steps down the slope of the sand, feeling the comfortingly familiar graininess of the granules under her foot. She'd been forced into wearing her fancy sandals.

 

She settles on a spot fairly near the throng but far enough to not have people tripping over her, propping her plate on her knees as she eats.

 

It's kind of peaceful on her own; she's occasionally approached by Yebin and her friends, who'd give her plate refills and serve her more cups of Sprite. Otherwise, she's just sitting and eating, watching the sun setting. It's a familiar scene that she never grows tired of.

 

She's eating a chicken wing, legs stretched out in front of her, trying not to let her sweater sleeves be stained by chicken sauce, when she sees something dark cover the sand in her right peripheral.

 

She turns. It's a girl, holding a paper cup and squatting in the sand beside her, staring at her with a very familiar pair of intense brown eyes.

 

“Hey,” the girl says, their eyes meeting, “I'm sorry, but we've met before, haven't we?”

 

It's her. Kyungwon feels her pulse spike from the thrill of recognition. Her voice is the same lilting, high-pitched one. “We have.”

 

The girl is dressed in an off-shoulder red top, a thin black choker, jeans, and half of her long hair is tied up, the rest flowing free around her shoulders. She looks like someone out of some magazine.

 

The girl squints, “Last-”

 

“Two weeks ago,” Kyungwon says, speaking fast and low. “The - the weekend. You were drunk.”

 

There's a moment where they just stare at each other, and the air seems to crack with some sort of underlying electricity. Then the corner of the girl’s lipsticked mouth quirks upwards, and her hand extends out.

 

“Kim Minkyung,” she says, “nice to meet you, stranger.”

 

“Kang Kyungwon,” Kyungwon says after a short pause, grasping her hand firmly. Minkyung’s long milky fingers wrap snugly around her hand. “Nice to meet you. Do you maybe want to um,” she looks at the squatting figure, “sit?”

 

“Yeah,” Minkyung says, sitting, long legs stretched out. They sit in an awkward silence, in which Minkyung watches the last of the sun disappear under the waves and Kyungwon eats her chicken wings. Then Minkyung clears . “I thought your side profile seemed familiar from afar.”

 

“You were so hungover I'm surprised you remember,” Kyungwon mutters.

 

Minkyung doesn't look at her. “You’re pretty hard to forget.”

 

Her words sink into another span of silence. Kyungwon is glad for the creeping darkness, because she's sure that her face is completely, utterly red.

 

“So,” she says, clearing herself, “are you here for the barbecue?”

 

“Yeah. Couple of my friends dragged me here,” Minkyung says. She snorts a little. “Sorry to bring this back again, but I must clear this up: I'm not an alcoholic in any way, and I should've just eaten a sleeve of thin mints to get over that ratchet boy.”

 

Kyungwon, to her own surprise, laughs.

 

“For someone who isn't an alcoholic, you have an amazing tolerance,” she says.

 

“Thin mints over ruining my liver,” Minkyung says wisely. Kyungwon remembers her own words - she smiles, but she isn't sure if that's what Minkyung’s thinking about too.

 

“Are thin mints really enough to get over someone you loved that much?”

 

Minkyung pauses, then exhales, the small smile not leaving her face. “Well, no. But they lessen the damage a little.”

 

Kyungwon doesn't mean to bring the atmosphere down - she apparently just has the skill to do so. It's probably her inherent lack of social skills and EQ that makes her total friend count a grand number of one. She wonders if she'd asked too much.

 

“Sorry,” she says, quickly, “I - I suppose I just don't really understand, because I've never been in love with someone - and no one’s been in love with me enough - enough to warrant this.”

 

Minkyung waves her off. “Don't apologise, it's really okay. The alcohol was a bit much for just a breakup. But it was my first real relationship, and I think I was hurt and angered more by the indignance that he cheated than the fact that he didn't love me as much. The love fades after awhile, you know?”

 

Kyungwon doesn't know. Her love has never faded as much as it just never existed. Well - except for Yebin, she couldn't really care for anyone else.

 

“Not really, but I'll take your word for it.”

 

Minkyung eyes her. “Two years is enough to test a relationship. I kind of felt less for him. Feelings stagnate.”

 

“Then it wasn't ‘true love’,” Kyungwon says, making air quotes with her right hand, left propping her plate up. “Was it?”

 

“No, it wasn't, but first relationships rarely are,” Minkyung says, sipping Sprite from her paper Mulan cup. (Kyungwon doesn't know who bought these cups, but she approves)

 

Kyungwon is surprised that she feels comfortable around Kim Minkyung. Minkyung seems like someone who can make small talk flow seamlessly, which fills in the void of Kyungwon’s social awkwardness. And it's refreshing that she isn't intimidated by Kyungwon.

 

“Thin mints over alcohol,” Kyungwon says, nodding.

 

Minkyung looks at her, at the beige sweater and the jeans and the fast emptying plate and she says. “Well, I don't know why no one would fall in love with you, given your fantastic way of consuming an entire pile of chicken wings.”

 

Kyungwon knows it's meant to be a joke, but there's a warmth that prickles across her cheeks nonetheless.

 

“Thanks.”

 

Minkyung laughs. It’s getting cold, but Kyungwon feels warm.

 

“Really though, your appetite is almost surmountable to mine.”

 

“Really,” Kyungwon says. Minkyung doesn't look like someone who'd eat as much as she does, but then again, she's cousins with a tiny food warrior.

 

“Really,” Minkyung says, tipping her cup and sipping. Her eyes curve gently, the corners of her lips lifting. “Maybe really will be our always.”

 

They both laugh, and Kyungwon feels more of the warmth spread. It's been a long time since she'd last had such a comfortable conversation with anyone other than Yebin.

 

“How old are you?” She asks, deciding that it wouldn't be too invasive. She's curious.

 

“Twenty-one,” Minkyung replies, her eyes glinting in the half-light. “You?”

 

“We’re the same age,” Kyungwon’s eyebrows lift a little, mirroring Minkyung’s, and the latter snorts quietly. Kyungwon sets her empty plate down and picks her paper cup up.

 

“Huh. And I thought you were older than me,” Minkyung says, her eyes boring into Kyungwon’s with that same intensity. She smiles and speaks hurriedly before Kyungwon can. “Not that I'm saying that you look old, you just act more mature than me.”

 

“I think you read my mind.”

 

“You're pretty and youthful, don't get me wrong,” Minkyung says, and Kyungwon wonders how she can make such compliments flow so smoothly. Kyungwon could never.

 

“It seems you happen to be in the habit of complimenting people,” Kyungwon notes.

 

The corner of Minkyung’s lips drags upwards in a lazy smirk. “I only compliment people who deserve my compliments.”

 

“Wow, do I feel special,” Kyungwon says monotonously. Minkyung laughs and nudges her playfully, leaning slightly against her side before moving back in place. The contact is momentary, but it's enough to make Kyungwon flush.

 

“Just so you know,” Minkyung says, fingertips drumming silently against her paper cup, “I mean my compliments when I say them.”

 

The intensity makes Kyungwon believe her.

 

They sit in now comfortable silence, and Kyungwon opts to, instead of looking at the sky as Minkyung is doing, look at Minkyung herself.

 

Perhaps Minkyung wouldn't have caught her eye particularly along the street. Sure, she's really pretty, but there's nothing very striking about her features that make them memorable. It's a simple sort of pretty. Kyungwon understands it well; she herself blends into the crowd easily and doesn't stand out.

 

It's interesting how only a personal experience can allow someone to truly remember a person. A glance across the street wouldn't have stuck with her, but she's glad that she’s found Minkyung beyond the glance.

 

“Hey, look,” Minkyung says, hand raised to nudge her, turning her head slightly.

 

She catches Kyungwon staring, and the small smile that finds its way onto her face makes Kyungwon flush again.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Aw, were you staring at me?”

 

Kyungwon glances away, thankful that it's too dark for Minkyung to see her overheating cheeks. “No.”

 

“Pfft, whatever. Look at that,” Minkyung says, pointing at the sky. Kyungwon looks up. There's the moon, and a single star. “Sad, isn't it? It's just one star tonight. I think it's lost.”

 

“So what, all its star buddies are running away to Pluto?”

 

“They probably saw how disgusting and pathetic we humans are and ran away,” Minkyung says.

 

“I like how we're personifying stars.”

 

“Was I not satirical?”

 

“I think it was less satire and more cynical. But the personification is strangely succinct in a childish way.”

 

Minkyung smiles. It's wide and bright. “I like us.”

 

Kyungwon is really glad for the gathering darkness, because she's certain she's red enough to spot from miles away. Minkyung plays her words like an expert puppeteer, and Kyungwon is finding herself much more intrigued by the performance than she'd expected.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Okay,” Minkyung drags one leg up, leaning backwards with both hands in the sand. Her cup is teetering precariously on the edge of a pile of sand. “Tell me about yourself.”

 

Kyungwon exhales. There's going to be a lot more talking than usual tonight.

 

 

 

 

“Kyungwon!”

 

Said individual turns her head around questioningly at the voice that calls out her name. It's Yebin - Kyungwon realises with a little start that she'd completely forgotten that Yebin was the reason that she's even here at all.

 

“Yebs,” Kyungwon says. It's nearing eleven, and people have already begun to leave. She sees Yebin cast a look at her companion. “Ah - this is Minkyung. Minkyung, this is my cousin, Yebin.”

 

“Hi,” Minkyung says, standing up. She towers over Yebin, whose eyes boggle for a second before she composes herself.

 

“Hey,” Yebin smiles, “Thank you for keeping my cousin company.”

 

“You're younger than me, stop talking as though you found me a babysitter, you little devil,” Kyungwon scowls, standing up as well. She's basically almost the same height as Minkyung - maybe just barely shorter, so they look like a pair of giants next to Yebin.

 

“It was my pleasure babysitting Kyungwon. We had very intelligent conversations,” Minkyung replies, and though it's too dark to see her smile fully, the smile is clear.

 

“Oh my God, both of you are devils.”

 

“Nice,” Yebin fistbumps Minkyung. “Anyway, we can leave now. Nunu’s having a severe food coma and Kyulkyung is dragging her home, so I guess that's our cue too.”

 

“Oh - yeah, okay,” Kyungwon dusts her off awkwardly.

 

Yebin glances at Minkyung again, then back at Kyungwon. “I'll meet you at the road, I'm going to go say bye to some people first.” She proceeds to turn and trudge back up the sand, soon being swallowed by the still sizable crowd of people.

 

Minkyung looks at Yebin’s retreating back, before saying, “ah, so that’s the one cousin you're close to.”

 

“Yeah,” Kyungwon stuffs her hands in her pockets, puffing her cheeks out slightly. “She's the only family member I can stand. I mean - besides her parents, her parents are angels.”

 

Minkyung hums. She's probably noticed - not for the first time that night - the way Kyungwon doesn't like talking about her family. But she doesn't comment further on it. “Before I forget. Let's exchange phone numbers?” She smiles, and Kyungwon would swear it's almost bashful.

 

She pulls her phone from her pocket and hands it to Minkyung, who passes her phone over in return. Kyungwon takes a second to remember her number before typing it in. She rarely has to give people her number.

 

Minkyung’s smiling more widely when she passes the phone back. Kyungwon looks at her screen and snorts. Minkyung had saved her own number under ‘Minkyungie<3333’

 

“Just plain old Kang Kyungwon, huh?” Minkyung asks, sounding reproving.

 

Kyungwon shrugs. “It's your phone, change it as you please.”

 

Minkyung exhales an amused breath, tapping the power button on her phone so that her screen goes black. She smiles, “Nice to meet you, Kang Kyungwon.”

 

The phrase, Kyungwon is certain, was mentioned by Minkyung before. Maybe when she was drunk? She can't remember. “Nice to meet you too, Kim Minkyung. I have to go.”

 

“Okay,” Minkyung takes a step back and gives a small wave. “Bye.”

 

Kyungwon looks for a moment more at Minkyung’s face, barely visible in the dimness of the night, before turning and walking back to the road. Yebin is there, waiting.

 

“Pretty, tall, nice voice, good humour,” Yebin says by way of greeting, her smile mischievous as she counts off her fingers, “you caught yourself a big one.”

 

“Please,” Kyungwon scoffs, “are you interested in her?”

 

“I think I would be in any girl of this calibre, really, but you two look way too cute for me to interfere,” Yebin coos, dodging a swipe from Kyungwon’s sweater-pawed hands as they walk. Darn tiny one is fast.

 

“She just broke up with her boyfriend,” Kyungwon emphasises the word clearly, looking with her usual unimpressed face at her overactive cousin. “Like, heteroual, might be looking for a rebound?”

 

“Oh, we've heard those stories a million times. Hetero blah blah etcetera, pretty girl comes in, bam, gay,” Yebin says confidently. “Might also be looking for a rebound, but do we care?”

 

“No.” Kyungwon avoids her cousin’s nudge. Loose gravel crunches underfoot as they walk up the road. She provides no further explanation, and it seems like Yebin is satisfied with her answer, because she remains blissfully silent through the rest of the journey.

 

Kyungwon sees Yebin back home safely first, then traverses the few blocks back to her own home.

 

It's silent and still when she gets home, as it always is. She's used to the stillness from the lack of life. There's memories within these walls, but it's really just a house. It's always cold when she sleeps, however high she cranks the old heater.

 

But that night it feels particularly warm when she lies down on her bed, scrolling through Twitter (she barely has any mutuals; she only uses it to find out what's happening everywhere) and her phone chimes.

 

It's just two messages, but she suppresses a small smile before turning the lights off.

 

Kyungwonnn

good night;)

 

-

 

It starts from daily texts, then sometimes calls, and arrangements to meet at the beach. Kyungwon is pretty awkward about it at first, but gradually she manages to ease into it.

 

Minkyung is easy to talk to. Even Kyungwon is surprised at how easily their personalities can mold together.

 

Meeting at the beach on the weekends is a routine now. They'd sit on the sand a couple of feet away from the pulling waves. Sometimes they'd talk about small things that happened, but mostly they just keep quiet and enjoy each other’s presence.

 

It's what the texts are for - for filling each other in on a daily basis. Minkyung is someone who keeps the conversation flowing seamlessly. It's comfortable even from the start.

 

Minkyung, Kyungwon finds out, is attending the same university as her (which doesn't come as much of a shock, considering the fact that it's the best university in Busan), but they're studying different majors in buildings far apart from each other. Which explains why Kyungwon has never seen her before the Night Of Drunk Regrets.

 

“I live around the area,” Minkyung had said, the wind nearly snatching the words from too forcefully, when Kyungwon had revealed where she lived.

 

“That much I deduced, but I'm just surprised that I've never seen you before,” Kyungwon said.

 

“Maybe you did. We just don't remember glances,” Minkyung had met her eyes then, and Kyungwon had looked away, still rather unable to handle the intensity in her gaze.

 

The beach meetings are carried out at sunset or just after it. They somehow have some sort of magnetic force that allows them to gravitate towards each other. Regardless of where one is seated, regardless of how dark, the other can always find her.

 

They became fast friends - Minkyung, for some reason, likes Kyungwon’s occasional shyness and her sarcasm otherwise. She'd admitted that upon becoming friends with Kyungwon, she'd started hanging out less with her acquaintances from Uni.

 

“They're still friends with my ex anyway,” Minkyung exhaled, “I may be a snake, but I'm a hypocritical one, so I don't like befriending snakes. They can choke.”

 

Kyungwon had nodded approvingly. “Loving the attitude.”

 

They’d eventually gotten around to meeting each other on campus, despite the abominable distance between their majors’ buildings. They’d go for a sandwich or study or just sit and laze, and then Kyungwon would usually have to put her long legs to good use to get back to class on time. On days where their ending times are similar, they’d go home together.

 

Minkyung lives with her parents, and sometimes Minkyung’s mom would insist that Kyungwon stay for cookies. Afternoons like those make her weekdays feel less ty.

 

 

 

 

The first time Minkyung came over, she’d caught Kyungwon completely by surprise.

 

“Good morning, sunshine! We have a spiffing day ahead of us!”

 

Kyungwon had gawked at the sight of Minkyung standing in her doorway in denim shorts and a plaid shirt, with round glasses perched on her nose bridge and plastic bags in her hands. Then she’d remembered that all she was wearing was a really skimpy tank top and running shorts and her hair looked like a rat’s nest, and she’d nearly slammed the door in her face.

 

“God, how-”

 

“You told me your address, and the chicken wind dial is really easy to find,” Minkyung said breezily (Kyungwon knew she should’ve taken the stupid wind dial down but she’d probably break her leg). She’d then taken it upon herself to sweep into the room and appraise Kyungwon’s hole of a house.

 

It'd been a little awkward. Kyungwon wasn't used to having anyone over besides Yebin. Her house is always empty, and she's used to it.

 

“I don’t like cleaning.” Kyungwon said feebly, embarrassment making her cheeks red.

 

“Oh, my God, I can’t believe you live in a pigsty. I’m going to cook some food for lunch, and we’re going to clean this.”

 

“No, no, you shouldn't be-” Kyungwon had protested, but Minkyung insisted. Kyungwon didn't understand, and it was rather upsetting. Why did Minkyung care enough to cook and clean with her?

 

Minkyung had then been appalled to find Kyungwon’s precious storage cabinet of instant ramen, clucking her tongue before getting to work. Kyungwon, by force, just sat around and watched, because if she touches anything in the kitchen there’s a high chance something will catch on fire.

 

After serving up a meal Kyungwon can only dream of ever cooking by herself, Minkyung had broken out the old dustpan and broom and set her sweeping. She'd complained about how yellow her wallpaper is and how many rats she'd have scurrying under her floorboards if she doesn't clean.

 

So Minkyung’s first time over had been spent eating, cleaning - which Minkyung enjoys for some strange reason - and talking. There'd been no comments on the lack of family photos. No weird looks. Just talking, and for once, Kyungwon felt that her house was more like a home than ever before.

 

-

 

It's several months into their friendship that Minkyung finally asks about her family.

 

“Why do you never talk about them?”

 

They're lying on the sand, spread eagled, looking at the meagrely speckled sky. Kyungwon’s eyes are swollen and her nose is red - not for the first time. Minkyung knows there's some relation.

 

Kyungwon takes a moment to collect herself. She'd gotten so angry just now that she couldn't even speak. Just hung up and stormed down to the beach.

 

“I was born out of wedlock. God knows where my dad is right now. My mom is in Seoul, filthy rich, thinking constantly that I'm a failure of a daughter. I used to stay here in Busan with my maternal grandma - well, time passes, but I can't bear to leave even if I'm staying here alone. I mean, there's Yebin, but she has her own life. My mom gives me allowances every month and they always come with some call to remind me that studying musical theory won't get me anywhere. She never visits. Too ashamed of me.”

 

Her entire soliloquy is delivered without pause, in a robotic voice. She feels nothing besides the simmering rage in her gut. She's used to feeling nothing about it.

 

There's silence for a moment. “Jesus.” Minkyung begins. “That's...messed up.”

 

“Right,” Kyungwon puffs out a breath. The night air is becoming increasingly colder, and her breath mists into a fog that dissipates in seconds.

 

“Thank you for telling me. If you ever need someone to rant to, I'll have a pint of cheap vanilla ice cream ready for you.”

 

Kyungwon feels Minkyung’s fingers touch hers, pads of her index and middle fingers rough with sticking sand granules. She smiles, though she isn't sure if Minkyung can see it. It doesn't matter anyway.

 

“I'm glad I met you sometimes,” Kyungwon says.

 

“Only sometimes? I'm disappointed,” Minkyung says, and Kyungwon can already imagine her pout. But their hands remain touching, and they lapse into a comfortable silence, just listening to the sound of the waves.

 

-

 

Kyungwon constantly wonders why Minkyung befriended her. She's pretty stoic, quiet, and way less cool than Minkyung’s old friends. But Minkyung would always dispute, saying, “they're all vapid asshats. Still friends with my ex. And you're cool, shut up.”

 

And perhaps it may come off as annoyingly insecure, but Kyungwon can't help it. She'd always had this mental state ever since she'd realised that the reason why she isn't like the other kids with parents is because her own parents don't want to associate with her.

 

“Sorry,” Kyungwon would mutter. Minkyung would give her a mockingly exasperated sigh.

 

“Stop apologising,” she'd say, poking her in the forehead. “We’re friends. Also, I thought you got over your emo phase already.”

 

“I didn't have an emo phase,” Kyungwon said, “and get your damn foot off my pillow, you turd.”

 

“There's the Kyungwon I know!”

 

Minkyung never fails to make Kyungwon smile even after a long day where she's sure she'd be unable to smile for the next century. It's a talent she has - or maybe Kyungwon just likes to smile around her.

 

They'd hang around in Kyungwon’s place (she'd picked up the habit of cleaning after herself, courtesy of Minkyung’s constant complaints of the amount of germs she has festering on her walls). Minkyung particularly likes to inhabit the whole of Kyungwon’s bed, exiling her to the floor.

 

It's annoying, but some of it is endearing when she sees Minkyung passed out on her bed taking her frequent power naps. Only some, but of course she'd never admit it out loud.

 

Her house used to be just a house, an empty husk that only thrived when Yebin was around. But with the new pictures of her and Minkyung and Yebin on the shelves, the hair clips Minkyung keep leaving behind like some bread crumb trail, the windbreaker Kyungwon forgot to return her and the extra Apple cable labelled with a smudged ‘KMK’, Kyungwon realises just how different everything feels.

 

It's been months. Six? Seven? Eight? She can't remember. But Minkyung’s left little bits of herself around Kyungwon, as though Kyungwon needs any more reminders that Minkyung is now close to being a permanent fixture in her life.

 

-

 

“What the hell is this?”

 

Kyungwon studies the shell Minkyung placed on her palm - if it can even be considered a ‘shell’. It's really misshapen and encrusted with some strange mossy, barnacle-y looking substance.

 

“It's an accurate representation of both our friendship and you,” Minkyung says seriously. “Strange and ugly.”

 

“Oh, my God. That is spot on.”

 

Minkyung dabs. Kyungwon is impressed.

 

“Okay look, I'm just kidding. We don't judge by looks in this house. Clearly this shell has been through hell and , but it still pulls through. Ugly and strange, but it pulls its damn way through. A representation,” Minkyung’s long fingers touch the shell, palm resting against Kyungwon’s. “Of all of us, isn't it?”

 

Kyungwon studies the shell for a few moments in the silence that follows. Then she says, with a slow nod, “finally you say something that isn't stupid.”

 

Minkyung cranes her neck forward, affronted. “Hey, I say plenty of things that aren't stupid!”

 

Kyungwon laughs, fingers closing gently around the ugly shell. “You look like a peacock when you do that.”

 

“A peacock?”

 

“Yeah, because your neck looks weird and so does your face-” Kyungwon sees the livid fire in Minkyung’s eyes, before hurriedly adding, “but you're also pretty, like a peacock, haha!”

 

Minkyung huffs and pushes her cheek with her index finger. “You're an idiot.”

 

“A peacock and an idiot, a match made in heaven,” Kyungwon says.

 

“Please shut up.”

 

“Yes Ma’am.”

 

-

 

The sky is particularly endowed with stars tonight.

 

They walk down the beach from the convenience store, Minkyung sipping from a bottle of milk and Kyungwon eating strawberry Pocky.

 

Kyungwon’s feet slip easily into divots in the sand. The right sole of her sneaker is falling off, which Minkyung had about, and which Kyungwon had lifted a shoulder in response to.  

 

They settle somewhere in the centre of the strip, leaving the usual feet of space between their shoes and the sea before sitting down. Both of them are tired, so for a while there's no conversation.

 

Minkyung sips until Kyungwon hears the sound of her straw on air. She places the bottle on the sand beside her. “Imagine if we'd never met that night.”

 

Kyungwon offers her Pocky. Minkyung takes one. “Why would I want to do that?”

 

“Just food for thought.” There's a clean, short sound of a Pocky stick snapping.

 

Kyungwon contemplates. She supposes that, well, there wouldn't be much to imagine, because she'd still be going to the beach every weekend and spending most of her time alone like she always did. “Well, life would've a lot more.”

 

Minkyung smiles, half of the strawberry coated stick poking out from between her teeth. “Yeah. It really would've.”

 

“Honestly, this part of Busan isn't that large. We'd probably have met many times along the streets at some points in our lives. Just looking, but not really seeing,” Kyungwon says. She lets Minkyung take another Pocky.

 

“I refuse to believe that I'd be capable of walking past you without even noticing how decent your face is,” Minkyung cooes.

 

“Stop flirting with me, peacocks shouldn’t flirt with humans,” Kyungwon says, teeth glinting in the darkness when Minkyung’s hand connects with her upper arm, shoving her roughly to the side. Minkyung’s lower lip juts out.

 

“I'm complimenting you and here you are calling me a peacock,” Minkyung groans, “you , honestly.”

 

“It's probably by pure masochism that you're still friends with me at all,” Kyungwon agrees amiably. Minkyung gives her a mock scathing look.

 

“When we first met you were all timid and unable to talk properly, look at you growing into this fine sarcastic woman,” Minkyung says, lifting her sweater by the collar and dabbing the fake tears from the corners of her eyes.

 

They lapse into another silence, and this time Kyungwon uses it to remember. She does remember. The months ago when she was still abysmally shy, when she'd been unable to hold a proper conversation with anyone.

 

Then some tall drunk girl had barged rather haphazardly into her life, and Kyungwon had begun to realise what it was like being cared for.

 

She'd called life a tarnished work in progress - and it still holds true to this day. But on hindsight, perhaps the momentary distraction hadn't been as much of an unimportant one as she'd first thought it to be.

 

The stars had definitely aligned somehow; she could've walked past Minkyung hundreds of times without truly seeing her. But by some of fate their paths had collided, and instead of passing they'd bumped into each other head on. Kyungwon is certain that it doesn't happen to everyone.

 

Had she been lucky? Maybe. Maybe it wasn't just a of luck either. It's not every day that you come across someone who can impact your life so much.

 

Kyungwon realises that she doesn't like thinking of a life without Minkyung, of the life she would've continued living if their paths hadn't crossed as such. She can't think of a life without Minkyung in it.

 

She sniffs. Then she wipes her eyes, and she growls mutinously under her breath at herself, exhaling from . Jeez, she doesn't know why she has to cry now. This is so lame.

 

“Hey,” Minkyung looks over, alarm flaring in her eyes, “why are you crying?”

 

“Honestly,” Kyungwon says, using the pads of her index and middle fingers to press against her cheeks, catching the droplets of moisture that escape from her eyes. “I don't really know either. I'm just-” she sniffs again, dragging her hands away from her face. Her fingertips glint in the moonlight. “I'm just thankful that you're here.”

 

Minkyung looks surprised, but it fades into something Kyungwon can't really see. She clicks her tongue. “Look at you, you tall emo baby. Awww.”

 

She lifts her arms, uses the back of her hands to gently pat Kyungwon’s cheeks, smudging the tears against her skin.

 

“Don't take this into your stride, it's my hormones acting up. I would never cry over your existence,” Kyungwon mutters, though she sees the glint of the smile on Minkyung’s face. Damn it, why does she have to be so dang grateful that Minkyung exists? She'll never hear the end of this.

 

“Shut up, you drowned rat,” Minkyung laughs, “you're gonna make me cry too, then we'll both look like losers.”

 

“Oh my God, please don't cry too,” Kyungwon says, but she hears Minkyung sniff once, hard. “We’re so emo.”

 

“Correction: you're the emo one, I'm not crying,” Minkyung says, using her index finger to poke Kyungwon’s eye bags. They're quiet for a few seconds, during which time Kyungwon surrenders to her random crying bout and Minkyung focuses on wiping her tears.

 

“And, anyway, you're not the only one who's thankful, stop making this about yourself.”

 

Kyungwon laughs. “Really. I was just thinking about how thankful I am that we'd met that night.”

 

“You're so emo,” Minkyung repeats. Kyungwon can't see it in the darkness, but her cheeks are pink.

 

“Okay, look, whatever. Just - thank you.”

 

“Jeez, you're being so sappy today, Kyungwon. And I thought you were unable to feel any emotion other than anger, sadness and very occasional happiness. Should I be concerned?” Minkyung leans forward slightly to get a better look at Kyungwon’s face, the corner of her nail scraping at the droplet that just leaked from her left eye.

 

“Stop ruining the mood, my God,” Kyungwon complains. Minkyung’s high pitched, clear giggle cuts through the now tepid night.

 

“Look, you're crying while telling me how much you are thankful for my existence, how can I not tease you for this?”

 

Kyungwon blinks the tears from her eyes, scowling. But Minkyung’s smile is bright and clear, the tenderness obvious in the gentle way her fingers move, in the crescent curve of her dark eyes. Kyungwon feels go dry.

 

Perhaps it has been months, but she can never stop being awed at just how amazing Kim Minkyung really is.

 

“And anyway, I know for a fact that you'd do the exact same to me if I cried because you're my friend,” Minkyung says, the smile turning lopsided.

 

It's true, and Kyungwon admits it. It's just their dynamics - how they've always been and always will be. Endlessly mocking each other, teasing each other, but in the end still finding each other first in a crowded room, still falling into step with the other.

 

“It's my hormones,” Kyungwon says as a last protest. Minkyung rolls her eyes but snorts a quiet laugh. She retracts her hands and wraps them around her shins.

 

“Yeah, sure.”

 

It probably is just her hormones, because normally she doesn't cry over things like this. Kyungwon still barely shows this kind of emotion. Minkyung knows it's a discrepancy too, but well, the opportunity to give Kyungwon shouldn't be passed up.

 

Kyungwon rubs at her eyes to clear the last of the tears, before exhaling and watching the fog twist thinly in the air before disappearing.

 

They watch the sky for a while. It's nearing three, so the moon is past being overhead. It's relatively cloudless today, so the few stars that are up there are clearly visible. Kyungwon lets the cold calm the heated swelling around her eyes.

 

“You know,” Minkyung says, her eyes reflecting the dim light of the moon, “I'm also really, really glad that I decided to investigate the lone figure sitting on the beach even though I could've gotten assaulted. Meeting you...it wasn't just a coincidence.”

 

Minkyung tilts her head back down, her intense eyes staring directly into Kyungwon’s. It's been months, and her stare is just as piercing as it always is.

 

“I think it wasn't, either,” Kyungwon replies, sniffing, biting her lower lip to suppress her smile. The corners of still curve upwards anyway.

 

Minkyung sees it, and the side of lifts in a crooked smile. Kyungwon feels something touch her hand - she looks down, sees Minkyung’s fingers touching hers. Her gut loops as Minkyung interlaces their fingers loosely, both their hands rough with sand. But, God, it doesn't matter.

 

“I don't know how long this can last, but I hope it does. For a long, long time.”

 

Kyungwon isn't sure what ‘this’ refers to. But she supposes it doesn't really matter either.

 

“Was that a confession, Miss Kim?”

 

“No,” Minkyung says immediately, and when she sees Kyungwon’s smile she groans. “You're gross.”

 

“Just so you know,” Kyungwon squeezes their joined hands, “a long, long time sounds really, really nice.”

 

Minkyung can't help her smile either. She leans her head on Kyungwon’s shoulder, stretching her legs out in front of her, and Kyungwon feels her heartbeat in her ribcage.

 

Yes, she wouldn't mind spending a long, long time like this. Or maybe the rest of her life like this. Or even forever, she doesn't know. All she knows is that she wants to spend it with Kim Minkyung.

 

“Don't ever leave me alone, you piece of ,” Kyungwon mutters. It's soft, but Minkyung hears it.

 

Minkyung squeezes their joined hands. “I won't.” Kyungwon can't see it, but her eyes close, mouth pulling into a smile.

 

“I promise.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-

 

So much word vomit!! Okay I'm tired and I can't think of how to end it so yeah I can't deal rn but hello 2kyung fans

Just so y'all know I normally prefer...to write...angst...so yes 

leave some comments whee bye QQ 

Y'all can find moi on twitter @ moonfluffing hoi

lowkey for ninecube the rena to my kyungwon <3

 

-fluffsaur (finally writing something fluffy orz)