[CONTENTID1]New Year's Eve and Neon [/CONTENTID1]

[CONTENTID2]"Are you going to stare at me all night? It's very near midnight, you know." [/CONTENTID2]

[CONTENTID3]

To make it up to Youngjae, she and Serin were taking him to this favourite restaurant for dinner. It was a pasta-centric restaurant where the portions were so massive you didn't need to eat anything else for days. Yeseul could only manage to go there once every few months, and often didn't eat pasta for weeks afterward. But it was Youngjae's favourite place, so she went anyway.

Since she'd gone to Serin's immediately after Chanyeol and Baekhyun left, not saying a word to her parents, the silence at the front door was long and awkward when she came to get her brother. Yeseul was just glad it was a Wednesday, and although her Mum had the day off of work, her Dad still had to go into the office. The silence was a little more bearable when it was Miyoung, because Yeseul didn't feel the innate desire to shout at her.

She kept on reminding herself that her mother was trying to accept her, and that it was her Dad that exacerbated the negativity. If anything, her Mum just wanted to understand her own daughter better, but she had no idea how to go about doing that.

"Will you be coming home tonight?"

"I don't know."

"Will we see you before you go back to university?"

"Probably. I have things here to take with me."

Youngjae came to the door then, jacket on and beanie tugged over his hair. He squeezed past their Mum and down the steps, already at the gate before Yeseul or Miyoung had said anything else. "Well, have a nice time."

Yeseul nodded, turning to follow Youngjae off the property. Serin was waiting outside, hands stuffed in the pockets of her duffle coat. "Evening, sir," she said to Youngjae.

He laughed. "Evening, madame."

The restaurant was on a street littered with cafes and miscellaneous shops, selling everything from yarn to athletic wear. They went inside, and the early hour allowed them to get a table fairly quickly. Youngjae sat with Serin on one side of the table and Yeseul sat on the other, directly across from her brother. He was eagerly examining the menu, but they all already knew he'd be ordering the fettuccini alfredo.

"Why aren't you coming to our house tonight?" Youngjae asked, after they'd ordered.

"Yeseul and I already have plans, darling," Serin said.

"What plans?"

"Remember Baekhyun and Chanyeol?" Yeseul asked.

Youngjae threw her a look. "Of course I do, I saw them yesterday."

"All right, well, we're going to be hanging out with them and a few other friends of ours."

"Why can't I come?"

"Because the place we're going isn't for kids," Yeseul said.

Youngjae frowned. "That's unfair."

"Sorry, buddy," she said with a shrug. "I don't make the rules."

He sat back in his chair, arms folded over his chest, bottom lip stuck out in a pout. "I don't care, anyway. All my friends are coming to Mum and Dad's party so I don't need you there."

Yeseul met Serin's eyes, both of them fighting smiles off their faces.

Yeseul and Serin sat in the taxi passing all the other equally dressed up Outer Seoul residents, all on their way to parties and events in the city. They had spent the last hour in Serin's bedroom deciding what was rave and weather appropriate wear, and Yeseul was still adjusting to the result of that. She kept on tugging on the hem of the red velvet dress Serin had loaned her, thankful that she'd put on a pair of shorts underneath, it made her legs look longer and matched her burgundy lipstick, so she'd agreed to forego her dress ban for the night.

But what concerned her more than the fact that the hem of her borrowed dress kept riding up was that Serin had admitted to harbouring a crush on Baekhyun.

It was a strange idea, since the two of them couldn't be more opposite. Baekhyun was like a bubble of energy, and Serin more calm and composed. What had drawn her to him, Yeseul had no idea. But she'd recently been wondering if that was just how it was, if there didn't always need to be an explanation or a cause. Perhaps attraction didn't need to be a thing you could explain with words, like 'he likes books' or 'she plays tennis' or 'they're both fans of naps,' but something that you felt, and the rest of the stuff came later. Yeseul had been attracted to plenty of people she knew nothing about, people she knew too much about, those she liked and those she didn't. But there were some things that, despite the attraction, couldn't be overlooked. She knew what those qualities were in herself that people didn't like, and she knew what it was in Baekhyun that made him unfit for someone like Serin.

"Even though you know all about his life?" Yeseul asked suddenly, because she couldn't wrap her head around the concept of Serin liking Baekhyun. Her friend just sighed, and it was enough of an answer. "You've seen how many girls he takes home. How he doesn't call. Even then?"

"You're my best friend, Yeseul, it's not like I think any less of you for being at romance."

"Hey," Yeseul protested, though she knew Serin had a point. "And it isn't romance. It's . Baekhyun doesn't do romance. I don't think his brain is wired that way."

"We're opposites, I know," Serin said. She slid down in her seat, head leaned back causing her top to ride up. She'd opted for black leather jeans and a filmy silver top. It was almost like the two of them had switched styles to welcome in the new year. "He only knows and I only know romance."

"You're not going to try and like ... reform him, are you?"

Serin scoffed. "I'm not an idiot."

"I know you aren't, I just wanted to ... okay," Yeseul shrugged, folding her arms over her chest. She had on her wool jacket to combat the cold – there had even been some snow earlier that day, but Yeseul hoped that the weather would hold out for when she was wearing a dress and no tights. "I wouldn't mind it if you did, he needs to be taught a lesson on how to properly treat women."

"You're hardly qualified to be criticising Baekhyun," Serin said, but her tone was light. "Do you want to talk about Areum?"

Yeseul frowned. "Who's Areum?"

"Pretty girl, tall, pink hair–"

"Oh. Right. Thank you, I understand."

Serin smirked. "I'm not judging you. She got over it, eventually."

"That was, like, six months ago. I was dating Eunha."

"But you didn't have to deal with it for the next two months, because she wasn't in half of your summer semester courses."

"I'm sorry for that. But I did have a girlfriend!"

"That doesn't mean you can just be rude to people. This is something we're working on, remember?"

Yeseul folded her arms over her chest. "I didn't think I was that rude. I was being nice, even. Telling her she should move on. It was the right thing to do."

"You shouted at her in the middle of a crowded room. Yeseul."

"I don't remember that."

"Because Eunha had made you do shots."

"Now that I remember. They were body shots." Serin groaned, and Yeseul sensed the need to explain herself better. "Look, the way I see it, it's worse to drag someone along and let them think you're something you're not or that the situation is different than to be a little ... blunt with the facts. I know I could work on the delivery better, but the truth is that I'm doing people like Areum a favour when I tell them I'm not the one they're looking for."

"Why not?" Serin asked quietly. Yeseul leaned her head back and gazed at her friend, examining the soft pout on her lips and the crease between her brows. "Why aren't you the one they're looking for?"

"I get the feeling we aren't talking about Areum anymore."

"Don't deflect, Yeseul."

She sighed, looking past Serin and out the window. The snow from earlier was still coming down, but wasn't laying. It would probably turn into rain eventually; there was hardly ever snow in the city. "People ... a lot of them want something I can't give. I tried with Eunha, and for a while there I thought I'd actually found someone who understood me, so I let myself relax. But it turned out the person she wanted was the one I'd been trying to be, and not the person that I am."

"You haven't let her go yet, have you?"

"It's not that I haven't let go, it's that she's the only basis of comparison for relationships that I have. Other than her, my longest partner was Lee Kiseong, and that wasn't even a thing, really."

"But you told me comparing was a bad thing."

Yeseul was really starting to hate how long the ride into Seoul was. If she'd known Serin would want to have a deep conversation on their way to a race, she would have tried to make an excuse for going to meet the guys earlier. "It can be. But you're bound to learn something about yourself by comparing all the people you've dated and how things have ended. If there's a pattern, it's not like you should just ignore it, right?"

"What's the pattern?"

"You know what the pattern is. You're the only person I talk to about this stuff."

"Maybe I do, maybe I just want to hear you say it."

Yeseul's mouth twisted into a scowl. "I don't have the emotional capacity for a proper relationship. There. Happy?"

"No, because it isn't true."

"I really don't need you to tell me that it's all in my head right now."

Serin forced Yeseul to loosen her arms, then grabbed her hand and pulled it on her lap, lacing their fingers together. "Fine," she said, adopting a casual expression. "But it is all in your head."

"Oh, off."

Rather than continuing to get Yeseul to admit things she didn't want to admit, Serin let them ride the rest of the journey in silence. Yeseul was still thinking about her friend's crush on Baekhyun, and how they were their way to meet him, and how strange it was to think that someone as lovely and wonderful as Serin could like an idiot like Baekhyun. It wasn't that he was intellectually stupid, just that he lacked in some important social skills. Yeseul might have been a , but at least she was upfront about it. She wondered if she'd ever have to punch Baekhyun to defend Serin's honour, and hoped it wouldn't come to that. Part of the reason he got away with being such a douche was that he really was a nice person overall, and it felt wrong to hit him, even if he deserved it.

When they arrived at the arranged meeting place, halfway between the place the guys were staying and the party venue, Yeseul was unconsciously analysing all of Serin and Baekhyun's movements. When Baekhyun gave Serin a peck on the cheek, she checked for any sign of blushing or lingering, and saw none. From what she knew of her friend, Yeseul did not expect her to remain cool and unbothered.

Then again, she had hid the crush for who knows how long and Yeseul had never noticed.

"You're thinking very hard there, Seullie."

Yeseul scowled at Chanyeol, who had the audacity to wear all black. The only thing that wasn't black was his beanie, which was electric blue. She didn't know who wore beanies to raves and thought it was a good idea, but somehow Chanyeol managed to pull it off without looking like a idiot.

Even if they'd had a heart-to-heart, he was still Park ing Chanyeol, bane of her existence. Yeseul was not about to let that go, but found that she liked how he was grinning again whenever she glared at him.

She was sorely regretting not having a drink before she left, because they'd fallen into pairs as they walked. Kyungsoo and Sehun were somewhere far behind sharing a spliff, and Yeseul might have gone and joined them, but Serin and Baekhyun were walking together and she didn't want Chanyeol to go and ruin that. While she might not have trusted Baekhyun at all to treat Serin properly, she figured she might as well give Serin – and Baekhyun – a chance to get it right. But doing that meant she was stuck with Chanyeol.

"Has um ... has anything happened at home?"

"Since you saw me yesterday?"

"Yeah."

"No, I've been at Serin's most of the time."

"That bad, huh?"

"It was never very good."

Chanyeol placed his hand on her spine, slowly sliding it down and coming to rest against the small of her back. "Give it time."

"It's been two years," she muttered.

"During which you were still a kid in their eyes, and then you moved away and you've only seen each other a handful of times," Chanyeol said. "Problems don't get fixed over the phone."

Yeseul could feel his thumb brushing back and forth through her dress, and found it hard to focus on anything else. She didn't know when Chanyeol's touch had become a comfort, or a distraction, and couldn't decide whether or not it was a bad thing. "I want to fix it now," she said quietly. "I didn't before. But it needs to get better. Not just for Youngjae, but for all of us."

"That