Jihyo was sitting in class, watching the clock intently as her hand clasped around the small plastic bag of pills in her pocket. Seeing Mina earlier that day had her worried about the girl’s stomach; Mina would never ignore her so blatantly unless something was actually wrong. So, Jihyo went to the nurse’s office at lunch to get the girl some medicine and was determined to give it to her as soon as the bell rang.

The brunette began packing her belongings into her backpack hastily, despite the professor still scribbling chemical formulas across the board. When she looked back up at the clock, the bell started to ring and Jihyo was out the door in a flash.

The hallways gradually began to fill with rowdy students ready to leave school. Jihyo maneuvered her way quickly through the maze of hallways and before she knew it she had arrived at her destination: Mina’s locker. But the girl was no where in sight yet so Jihyo decided to stand look out on the opposite side of the hallway.

As she waited, the hallway grew more and more congested with people and she was beginning to catch the eye of a lot of them. Now, Jihyo wasn’t naïve; she knew that there’s been talk going around the school about Daniel asking her out and all these people staring at her right now had been a result of it. She could handle that, the stares. It was the people coming up to talk to her that she had a little more trouble dealing with.

     “Hey, aren’t you the girl Daniel asked out a couple days ago?”

     “Kang Daniel is so cute. You’re so lucky he asked you out.”

     “How did he do it?”

Jihyo just smiled courteously, nodding and chuckling awkwardly as she tried to ignore the growing horde of students around her. “Where the hell is Nayeon when I need her? Maybe she’d be able to distract all these people and keep them at bay.”

Mina was walking down the hallway to her locker when she saw a small crowd gathering right in front of it. Her forehead furrowed, “What’s going on?”

She slipped between the students toward her locker. The crowd shifted as she moved and her eyes landed on Jihyo at the center of the crowd. She was smiling but Mina could see the way the short girl’s jaw clenched. She felt her heart constrict at the sight. Mina knew that smile; it was fake, a cover up. Jihyo only smiled like that when she didn’t know what else to do. It pained her to see Jihyo, but it pained her even more to see the girl so distressed.

Jihyo turned and looked over, searching the crowd. Their eyes met and Mina saw all the anxiety melt away from the brunette’s eyes (“Her bright, pretty, sparkling eyes…No, snap out of it, Mina. Don’t start falling into her eyes now.”) and her taut jaw relax.

“Mina-ya!” Jihyo smiled as she called out.

The call brought Mina out of her trance. She quickly broke the connection and turned her attention to her locker, fiddling with the turn-dial lock.

“Mina-ya!” Jihyo tried again, waving to catch the other girl’s attention. The small group around her turned their heads to look at the apparent Mina, watching her dig through her locker. “Mina!” She waved her arm around more dramatically.

Jihyo lowered her hand as it dawned on her. She looked at the Japanese girl from head to toe. Her stomach didn’t seem to be hurting, in fact she didn’t look to be unwell at all. Was she choosing to ignore her? All apprehension melted away from Jihyo’s being and was immediately replaced with a fiery determination to get Mina’s attention.

“Yeah,” Jihyo raised her voice, projecting it to the point where it was bordering obnoxious, “Daniel asked me out two days ago in the quad.” Jihyo’s eyes dart over to Mina and saw her shoulders jerk up. “My friend, Mina, was there, actually,” Jihyo emphasized.

Mina whipped around look slightly annoyed. Jihyo took advantage of the contact and quickly tugged on her earlobe three times. There was no way Mina could ignore that. Jihyo looked at her expectantly but the girl just glowered back at her sourly.

     “Omg, really?”

     “That’s so cute!”

     “How did he ask you?”

“Um,” Jihyo wasn’t expecting Mina to not respond. She pulled on her ear again.

Mina just turned back to her locker. The crowd began to press even further in on Jihyo, flooding her ears with questions, blocking Mina from her line of sight.

     “Do you have any plans yet?”

     “Where are you guys going?”

     “What are you guys going to do?”

Jihyo ignored them and struggled to regain sight of Mina. She pushed through the horde of noisy students to get to the girl’s locker but as she looked around, Mina was no where to be seen.

Jihyo’s heart sank a little. Was Mina avoiding her after all? A burning sensation ignited in her stomach and her hands balled into fists, determination shining in her eyes. If Mina was avoiding her, then Jihyo was determined to know why. She couldn’t stand the fact that she might have done something that had hurt Mina. She considered the Japanese girl to be one of her closest friends.

With a growing resolve burning within her, Jihyo marched straight through the crowd to find Jeongyeon and Nayeon.

~

Dahyun found herself grinning when she heard the last school bell ring for the day. She hurriedly stuffed her notes and books into her bag. She was actually going to walk home with Momo, Sana, and Mina again! Two days in a row! She couldn’t contain how ecstatic she was; she skipped all the way to her locker.

The dark-haired girl swiftly opened her locker and quickly gathered her belongings, “Got to hurry so I can meet Chaeng at her class. I don’t want to make them wait for us too long.” As she moved to close the locker door, Dahyun jumped back, startled to find the short girl beaming behind it.

“Are you ready to go?” Chaeyoung asked eagerly.

“I can tell that you are,” Dahyun chuckled at the sight of her usually calm and collected friend practically vibrating with excitement. Chaeyoung immediately stilled, her cheeks glowing pink, and Dahyun couldn’t help but laugh again at how cute she was, “But yeah, I’m ready. Let’s get this show on the road!”

Chaeyoung perked back up and hooked her arm around Dahyun’s as they made their way toward the exit. “So, did Sana say anything else?”

“She said that Momo unnie and Mina unnie are down to go. And then she asked if we wanted stop by a convenience store or café on the way home.” The two girls pushed through the school’s main doors and descended down the front steps. Dahyun unlinked her arm and started rummaging through her bag, “But I already got them snacks and candy from the school st- OOF!”

A person coming up the stairs bumped into Dahyun’s shoulder, knocking her bag out of her hands. Snack bags and notebooks littered the ground. The dark-haired girl gripped her shoulder and whipped around bowing, “Sorry!”

Chaeyoung turned back, pointing her finger menacingly, “Hey! Watch where you’re going!”

The tall figure turned around, their long flowing hair flipping over their shoulder (Wait, why was Chaeyoung so fixated on this person’s hair?) Their eyes met and Chaeyoung instantly recognized the person to be the same girl she had seen in the cafeteria earlier that day. It was hard to forget eyes like those. The short girl lowered her hand, in awe of how pretty the girl actually was. And very tall.

“I’m so sorry! Are you okay? I should’ve looked where I was going. Did you get hurt?” Dahyun gave the girl a quick up-down to check that she was okay, then noticed that she hadn’t responded to her questions in any way, just stared back at her blankly. Suddenly, the tall girl bent down and started to pick up the dropped contents of Dahyun’s bag.

“Oh my gosh, is she really okay? Actually now that I get a really look, I don’t recognize her. Maybe she’s a foreign exchange student or a transfer?” The dark-haired girl crouched down to help.

“Are you okay? What’s your name?” Dahyun looked at her encouragingly, as she asked simpler questions and spoke at a lightly slower pace.

The tall girl kept her blank expression as she stood up straight, holding out a blue notebook with a couple of packets of jellies and chocolates on top of it, “Yes, I am okay. My name is Chou Tzuyu.”

“Oh, good, I’m glad to hear you’re not hurt. My name is Dahyun, by the way. Kim Dahyun.” Dahyun stood back up too, taking the notebook from the other girl’s grasp and smiled, “Thank you for helping me pick all this up! So, Tzuyu, huh? Are you new here? I haven’t seen you around. What year are you?”

“Yes, I am a transfer student. I am from Taiwan. I am a second year.” Tzuyu’s response was almost robotic. Dahyun would have believed her to be an android if it wasn’t for her cute muddled pronunciation.

“I’m a second a year too!” Chaeyoung stepped forward, smiling. Tzuyu’s eyes moved from Dahyun to the short girl as she reached to grab her hand, “I’m Son Chaeyoung. Nice to meet you, Tzuyu. We can be friends if you want! I can show you around!”

The corners of the tall girl’s mouth upturned slightly and Dahyun thought she saw something like a sparkle flash in her eyes. The dark-haired girl smiled. Chaeyoung had that effect on people, making them feel warm and welcome. Dahyun should know; she had, of course, experienced it first hand.

“Yes,” Tzuyu shook the shorter girl’s hand with a slight bow of her head, “I would like to be your friend.”

Chaeyoung’s dimple revealed itself as she smiled but before she could respond, a high voice called out to them from outside the school gate, “Chaeyoung-chan! Dahyun-chan! Where are youuuuuu?”

Chaeyoung immediately spun around, seemingly searching for the voice’s source. She spotted Sana waving at them with Momo and Mina peering over her shoulder. When she turned back around, she gave Dahyun a look of urgency and grabbed her arm to start running over.

Dahyun chuckled at Chaeyoung’s keen response to Sana’s call. The dark-haired girl smiled back at the tall girl as Chaeyoung dragged her away, “Right, sorry, Tzuyu. We have to go now but we should definitely hang out sometime!”

“It was nice meeting you Tzuyu! Catch you later!” Chaeyoung called out behind her, waving.

Tzuyu gave a small smile and raised her hand in farewell. Her expression fell blank again though as she stared on, watching the pair meet up with the three high schoolers waiting for them at the gate. She took note of the way Chaeyoung ran straight up to the girl with long light brown hair and how said girl greeted her warmly with a pat on her head.

“Who was that?” Mina asked, looking back at the main building of the middle school as the tall girl turned to walk away.

“Just this pretty girl we ran into,” Dahyun grinned at the prospect of gaining yet another new friend, “She’s a transfer student.”

“Oh, pretty, eh?” Momo nudged Dahyun mischievously.

“Not as pretty as Sana!” Chaeyoung interjected.

A strange silence befell the group and, out of the corner of her eye, Dahyun thought she saw Mina smirk before Momo burst into laughter.

“Sana? Pretty?” Momo sputtered, “Yeah, right!”

“Shut up, Momoring.” Sana stepped toward Chaeyoung and cupped her face, “Aw, Chaeyoung-chan, you’re so sweet. Your cousin –and Momo over there- should take a page or two from your book.”

The middle school student felt her ears heat up instantaneously.

~

Nayeon’s brow knitted together as she advanced toward the school’s main doors distractedly; she couldn’t get the image of Momo’s face out of her head. “How in the world could I have done that to her”

She was so deep in thought she almost ran into someone standing in the hall. Her eyes trailed up from the ground, “Whoa, sorry, I-” Nayeon stopped mid-sentence when she saw who it was.

Jennie.

“Hey, Nayeon-ie, how’s it going? I missed you at lunch.” Jennie’s voice dripped with saccharine.

“Oh, yeah, sorry, I was catching up with Jihyo today.” Nayeon tried to side-step around the other girl, avoiding solid eye contact for as long as she could, but Jennie blocked her escape.

“That’s okay,” Jennie sidled up to Nayeon’s side and linked their arms, “We can walk home together again.”

The older girl instinctively froze at the contact. Out of all the students that followed her around, she had to pick Jennie to walk home with yesterday. Something didn’t sit right with Nayeon when it came to her; she had to end this before the other girl got any ideas.

“Actually, I was thinking…I want to walk alone today.” Nayeon slowly unhooked her arm from Jennie’s, taking a