After we were finally seated at the newly opened café, I shot Tiffany the question that had been burning in the back of my mind since the day prior. “Fany, why did you set Sica and I up yesterday?”

              She looked at me, confused. “What do you mean? Didn’t she tell you?”

              I pursed my lips in thought. “I mean, she did tell me, but I thought about something she said and realized something: most people wouldn’t allow her girlfriend to go on a date with someone else, much less an ex and friend who is in love with said girlfriend.”

              Tiffany smiled gently in response. “I don’t know. I’m not going to lie, I felt uneasy all of yesterday, wondering if I made the right choice and afraid that you would leave me for her.” I had to stop myself scoffing from both not wanting to interrupt Tiffany as well as finding the notion ridiculous. “But ultimately, she’s my friend; not only that, but I also still felt guilty for suddenly leaving her in high school, even if I knew it wasn’t my fault. I thought that if Jessica’s love for you went unresolved, since she was your best friend, it would just put strain on your relationship, especially since you’ll be in America together. You know, I found it funny but also endearing that you couldn’t notice your best friend falling in love with you after all that time, but it only took me more or less our first meeting on the beach to figure it out,” she said, laughter in the edge of her voice.

              I frowned in protest. “What do you mean? How did you figure it out so quickly?”

              “Well, you complimented her swimsuit on that day, right? When you did that, she looked away: it was that action that hinted at it for me.”

              “Oh…” I tried to process her words, to understand her thought process, but just found myself unable to. “But that could mean anything, right? Like what if she had something in her eye, or what if something interesting caught her attention in her peripheral vision? Why would you interpret it like that?”

              “Well, sure you can consider things like that, but to me, it was more likely that she didn’t want you, her longtime friend, to see her embarrassed reaction to the compliment that she had never received before. Plus, you’re just a really lovable person,” she explained. However, my perplexed expression probably gave away my thoughts: did I say all of that? “Well, I knew she was your longtime friend because of how excited you were when you saw her and I knew you never complimented Jessica on her swimsuit before because she complained that you never went shopping for them before.”

              “How do you remember that?”

              Tiffany simply smiled, replying, “Every day I spend with you is precious, so of course I remember them all.”

              I couldn’t do anything but chuckle, trying my best to mask my rapidly increased heartbeat. Tiffany was just really good at doing this, wasn’t she? “Oh look, is that them?” I said, looking over at the entrance to the café to a group of three. Tiffany followed my gaze, and as the trio walked closer, it became clear that the taller of the trio was a male. “Oh, never mind.”

              “No wait, behind them,” she said, me standing back up. Sure enough, behind that trio was another trio of people who had noticed us in turn and were waving frantically—or at least, two of them were. The third—Seohyun—was walking with them, trying not to look embarrassed at her unnies and failing miserably.

              “It’s Taeny!” Sooyoung exclaimed as soon as she got close to our table.

              “Hi Sooyoung, Sunny, and Seohyun,” I said, standing up and bowing in greeting.

              “Come on Taeyeon, there’s no need to be that polite, I thought we were friends,” Sunny said as the three of them shuffled into their seats on the other side of the booth.

              “Ah, sorry.”

              “It’s ok; more importantly, how have you been? This is our first time all being together since you two got together, right?”

              “Yeah, how—”

              “Unnie, I’m going to just stop you right there,” Seohyun interrupted the excited Sunny, who just pouted in response.

              I giggled in response, entertained as always at the trio’s dynamic. “Thanks, Seohyun.”

              “We’ve kissed but nothing more,” Tiffany replied anyway, causing my face to flare up.

              “Fany!” I muttered, trying to stop her, to no avail.

              “It’s a shame, too, because I’ve never seen Taeyeon in anything less than a swimsuit, and that was before I could enjoy the benefits of her being my girlfriend.”

              I buried my face in my hands, the heat in my face burning uncontrollably bright. It was always like this: just when I thought I had it under control, Tiffany would do or say something that made me like this. Honestly though, that wasn’t the only thing that was giving me a red face—the thought of Tiffany in a micro-swimsuit or of her without one, the thing she was hinting at, was overwhelming my brain.

              “Oh, then we should go to the beach right after this!” Sooyoung suggested.

              Before I could reject the suggestion, Sunny interjected. “I already had plans after this, actually.”

              This caused Sooyoung to frown. “Aw, you’re no fun.”

              “You should already know this,” Seohyun scolded the taller woman, “especially considering all that time spent figuring out when we were all free.”

              “Wow, you guys are really busy, even during the summer, huh?” I said, having spent the majority of the previous summer break resting and traveling as a request from my parents to take a personal break. “What have you all been up to?”

              “Well, I have a part-time job at a Burger King and do some voice acting gigs as well as volunteer for a daycare center,” Sunny revealed.

              “I got casted as a side character for a drama and am working at that, although most of the shoots are at night,” Sooyoung said.

              “I’m working for an internship at Samsung,” Seohyun concluded.

              I was speechless: I more or less expected Seohyun to be doing something, although working at such a big company was still pretty insane, but to hear the dynamic duo doing so much caught me by surprise. It wasn’t that I expected them to be lazy slackers, but they were more talented and hard-working then they let off: surely it wasn’t easy for Sooyoung to secure her role and work nights nor easy for Sunny to juggle all those activities simultaneously.

              Tiffany wasn’t as impressed as I, replying, “Wow, you guys are going all out this summer again, huh? How’s your internship going, Seohyun?”

              “Oh! It’s going great!” an ardent excitement burned in her eyes as she replied, Sooyoung and Sunny stifling their laughter in the background. “It’s been a great opportunity to learn how—what?” she stopped when Sooyoung accidentally let out a chuckle, Sunny hitting her in response.

              “Yah, don’t interrupt her,” she said, clearly muffling her own laughter.

              “What’s so funny?” Seohyun whined, hitting Sooyoung in kind.

              “Hey, why’s everyone hitting me today?” Sooyoung said, bringing her arms in defensively.

              “Maybe because you’re an easy target,” Sunny suggested.

              “That’s rude,” Sooyoung frowned.

              “Seohyun, continue,” Tiffany said.

              She nodded and resumed. “I learned a lot about how big companies handle working in a team, and especially how they handle the distribution of tasks and what communication methods they use when doing a team project. It’s really eye opening.”

              I could do nothing but sit there with a motherly smile and listen to her gush about her internship experience. She always seemed so mature and composed, yet it was instances such as these that reminded me of the fact that she was younger than us all.

              “Aw look, Taeyeon’s just giving you this motherly smile,” Tiffany pointed out.

              “Oh, sorry, I—”

              “Forget your own parents, Seohyun-ah, we want to adopt you as our own child,” Tiffany claimed, her arm around my back.

              I half-laughed, half-scoffed, Seohyun replying in a similar fashion. “What are you saying? She’s only one year younger than us,” I said.

              “That’s a lot,” she pointed out.

              “…Be quiet!”

              Everyone else burst into laughter, Seohyun especially looking at me with an apologetic gaze. I smiled back at her, trying to convey ‘it’s-ok-I-was-joking’ in my eyes, which thankfully was successfully communicated to her in her knowing nod.

              “So you guys have thought that far into your future? Are you going to adopt any kids?” Sunny asked.

              “Isn’t that a bit too far into the future?” I responded.

              She shrugged. “Well I don’t even have a boyfriend yet I already decided that I’m going to have four kids, so I don’t think so at least.”

              I didn’t know whether or not to be more shocked that she made such a declaration or how casually she stated it. “Well you’re weird, unnie,” Seohyun replied with an equal amount of casual-ness. Perhaps it was a well-known fact among the other three that Sunny had such ambitions? It might explain why Sunny was still single, despite having such a nice body: it was probably hard to find a man who wanted the same thing Sunny did.

              “How is that weird? Is it weird to love children? Taeyeon, is that weird?” she turned to me suddenly, putting me under a spotlight.

              “Uh, um, I don’t think so, I mean if you want that many children then you can, but—” I halted my stammering there, realizing my next words would definitely be embarrassing if I had said them aloud.

              To my dismay, Sooyoung finished the sentence for me anyway. “Yeah, but how are you going to give birth to that many children with such a small body?”

              Instead of looking at Sooyoung, she turned her attention to me, looking hurt. “You were about to say that?”

              “N-No! I wasn’t—I mean, I was, but then I didn’t because—”

              Sunny wasn’t hearing any of it though. “Taeyeon, I thought I could trust you because I finally found someone else close to my height…”

              “Taeyeon’s taller than you by a centimeter,” Tiffany stated.

              “Only a centimeter?” Sooyoung interjected.

              “Isn’t that a lot for someone their height?” Sunny and I both just looked at Seohyun, who had innocently posed that question probably in response to what had previously transpired. Seohyun, noticing this, immediately replied with a quiet, “Sorry.”

              Sooyoung laughed, Tiffany patting the back of my hand. “I personally love that you’re bite—I mean, fun-sized,” she said.

              “When are we going to order, actually?” I inquired, diverting the direction of the conversation, pretending I didn’t hear what Tiffany was implying—or, about to imply.

              “Oh, I have my order already.”

              “Yeah, so do I.”

              “I know what I’m getting.”

              “Unnie, are you the only one?” I just stared at all of them in disbelief. How could they have had the time to decide what to get, and at a brand-new café no less? When did they look down at their menus in the midst of the completely off-the-wall conversation? “Don’t worry about it too much unnie, we’re all so used to this and have gotten used to deciding our orders in the middle of our conversations.”

              “Ah, really…” I said, closely fixating on the menu, “Fany, what are you getting?”

              “Ah, this,” she said, scooting the menu closer to me and pointing to an item on it, “the ‘strawberry-kiwi shortcake’.”

              “Ah, that sounds pretty good, I’ll get that too,” I decided, setting down the menu on the table.

              As Seohyun, who was seated on the edge of their side of the booth, tried to get the attention of a server, Sunny resumed the conversation, saying, “Well, do you have an answer? Regarding how many children you want with Tiffany?”

              “Um, I don’t—I haven’t really thought about that,” I said, turning to Tiffany. While I had done this more of an automatic reaction than anything else, Sooyoung and Sunny took it to mean something completely different.

              “Ooh, she’s differing to you Tiffany,” Sooyoung noted excitedly.

              “No, I—”

              “Hm, honestly, I haven’t really thought about it either. Wouldn’t children just get in the way of our private time though?”

              I immediately smacked her in response. “What are you talking about?”

              “Well, houses in America are big, right? So that won’t be a problem for you then,” Sunny offered. The short silence that followed was probably all she needed to surmise that this topic was a bit of a sensitive one for us, perhaps amplified by Tiffany’s dad’s offer three days ago. “Ah sorry, I just assumed that you would be going to America with Taeyeon, if not along with her for college, then eventually,” Sunny explained, “Sorry.”

              “Eventually, yeah. It’s just … I don’t know, I want to go with her but I don’t want to be a burden to her in her final year of college,” Tiffany said.

              The very idea of that perplexed me. Tiffany? Be a burden to me? If anything, it might be more of a burden to me if Tiffany wasn’t with me than if she was, although I’d never say that aloud. “I want you to come with me to America,” I admitted, unwilling to divulge more.

              “Aww, that’s so cute,” Sunny and Sooyoung said simultaneously.

              Tiffany was also smiling at my confession. “Well if that’s what you want, then I can’t help it can I? Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it,” Tiffany said, the waiter arriving at our table shortly after.

              “Are you ladies ready?”

              After placing our orders, because of how busy the place was, it took quite some time for our orders to arrive. By the time the waiter came back, tray of various cakes in hand, the conversation had taken quite a different turn.

              “Oh, by the way, do you want to hear an embarrassing—an endearing story of Tiffany’s?”

              I nodded frantically. Tiffany, however, wasn’t so keen on that idea. “Oh, then I think you’ll love to hear a story I have about Sunny then,” she countered.

              “Ok, that sounds fun, so how about this: everyone here tells an embarrassing story about themselves, and if at least two people agree that it doesn’t qualify, then that person must tell another one,” Sooyoung proposed. My mind immediately jumped to that incident back in high school with Leeteuk, Yeseul, and Yoona, even though I also immediately knew that story wasn’t the one I was going to be telling.

              “Wait, why do I have to do this? I’m just a bystander,” Seohyun insisted.

              “Well, don’t you want to hear embarrassing stories from your unnies?” Sooyoung offered.

              “I don’t need to listen to your embarrassing stories, I just need to be around you two.”

              Seohyun had initially said that with a straight face, me bursting out into laughter both in response to her words and at the shocked, offended faces of Sooyoung and Sunny. A second later, Seohyun also burst into laughter, leaning onto Sooyoung and placing her hands on her arm. Sooyoung, however, leaned away with a mad look on her face. “I’m sorry, you set yourself up so well for that one though,” she said, defending herself.

              “That doesn’t mean you had to take it…” she replied in a playfully hurt manner.

              “Yah, stop leaning onto me you giant,” Sunny complained, trying to push Sooyoung off her.

              Sooyoung stood up in response to this. “Fine, I get it, you don’t want me to be here. I’ll just move to the other side.”

              Seohyun laughed again, pulling her back down into her seat. “I was kidding, I’m sorry, I’ll even share a story of my own.”

              This seemed to please Sooyoung enough as she happily nodded and clasped her hands together. “So, who wants to go first?” When we all looked at Sooyoung, the inciter for this whole ordeal, a shocked expression donned on her face. “Me?” she pointed to herself.

              “You suggested it,” Tiffany said.

              She shrugged and put down her fork. Just then, a cascade of guilt crashed upon me when I realized what was about to transpire: everyone here was about to bare their souls, create laughter at the expense of their own shame. Even if I was being dramatic about it, Tiffany and Jessica had done exactly that in front of me already; yet here I was, in my own shell, proclaiming that my secret was somehow superior to theirs, that it was more important for me to keep my own secret and withdraw into my own protective bubble when they had already let me into theirs? Who was I to assert that?

              “So, this happened quite a while ago, back when I was five or six years old, maybe. At that point in my life, I had already taken an interest in acting, partially due to my mom. My first audition was for a chicken commercial; they needed a child to make a complete family, and I was among the many who showed up for the audition.

              “When I walked on stage—well, it wasn’t really a theatre stage, it was more like a studio with a plain-colored backdrop, a standard lighting setup and a bunch of cameras sat in front of a production crew. Anyway, while I was waiting for my turn, the plan I came up with was to just eat it normally because I already really liked chicken.”

              Giggles were already coming out in short bursts from everyone else, me included. Sooyoung was either doing a good job not showing her embarrassment on her face or just didn’t feel much in the first place.

              “When I told my mom my plan, she immediately shot it down because she knew that it wouldn’t be enough. I just thought that she just didn’t understand, so I just agreed to do what she told me to do verbally but thought to myself that I would prove her wrong. When it was my turn, I did everything else she told me to do: ‘Hi, my name is Sooyoung and I’m five years old. Also, I’m from Gwanju, thank you for having me, I hope you’ll take care of me’,” Sooyoung said the last part in a high pitched, slightly pinched voice, eliciting laughter from everyone else.

              “When it was time to do the actual thing, I did exactly what I planned: I just ate the chicken normally, exaggerating somewhat because I thought it would be funny. For context, most other children took one or two bites and that was it: however, I almost finished the entire wing before the director stopped me.”

              At that point, everyone else was already laughing: Seohyun was doing the same thing as before, leaning on Sooyoung and lightly slapping her arm, Sunny leaning against the window with a hand on her stomach, Tiffany and I leaning against each other. Sooyoung had a grin on her face, but at this point, I could clearly see the slight red tint of embarrassment on her cheeks.

              “After I got back to my mom, instead of scolding me, she just laughed and told me to try harder next time. It was only then did I realize how bad of an idea that was, and actually I’ve never auditioned for another restaurant or done any scenes with food since then.”

              “Oh my god, that’s so funny,” Seohyun commented, sitting back up straight.

              “I can’t believe you actually did that, you haven’t changed a bit,” Sunny noted.

              “Oh really? You know what, how about you go next?” Sooyoung countered.

              “What?”

              “The person who just told the story gets to choose the next person, I just decided.”

              “That makes sense,” Tiffany added.

              Sunny turned to her. “You’re next then, Tiffany.”

              Tiffany shrugged and sat back up straight, me following suit. Knowing that Tiffany was after Sunny and realizing it was extremely possible that Tiffany would pick me, the prospect of which caused me to ponder the story I would tell. The same incident jumped into my head, but even despite understanding what everyone else had sacrificed, there was still a sort of mental wall that blocked my willingness to divulge the story. I hated that I was such a coward: what was wrong with me? Sooyoung shared such an embarrassing story, even to me despite not knowing me too well.

              “Hm … so this didn’t happen that long ago, it was during the start of high school. I’m not sure if Sooyoung knows this story, but I haven’t told Seohyun and Tiffany this for sure.

              “I went to a friend’s house one day, and she had a younger sibling—a baby, at the time. Before, they wouldn’t let me go over because the baby was too young, but after some convincing, they finally let me go over and play with the baby for a bit.

              “Now, I think you’re the only one who isn’t aware of this Taeyeon, but I really love working with babies and children. I was an only sibling, so that kind of thing was always a pipe dream of mine; I used to pressure my parents to give me a younger sibling to take care of, and still do from time to time, offering to take care of the baby myself. Of course, they would always refuse, saying that they would feel bad if they didn’t take care of a baby they didn’t have time to care for.

              “I was really excited when I got this chance, maybe as excited as Seohyun when she got accepted for Samsung’s internship or her first day there.” Seohyun reached over Sooyoung to hit Sunny, which she dodged, simply shooting the younger woman a cheeky grin. “When I got there, I greeted the parents first of course, and after some time, they finally let me hold the baby.

              “Now, just a bit of context first so that everything makes sense: at that point in high school, my … um, chest, has already grown to just about how it is now, and the family’s mother was also pretty well endowed. The shirt I was wearing that day happened to be relatively low-cut shirt, but it didn’t show any cleavage.

              “When I went to go hold the baby, it went well at first: I knew how to properly hold babies since I watched online videos and practiced with dummies, so it wasn’t an issue for me. The baby seemed to be relatively comfortable, but as I was being handed the baby’s bottle, because I had to lean forward, the baby latched onto my chest and pulled down my shirt a little and pressed his face into my bosom.”

              I, as well as Seohyun, had to stifle a surprised laughter, Tiffany and Sooyoung letting out a short burst of chuckles. “It was sort of awkward because the baby was like, really attached to it, you know? Like, he had his little fingers wrapped around the top edge of the shirt and was like, really desperately trying to pull it down. I didn’t want to just stop him because I was afraid I would hurt him, so I just relied on their mother to remove him from me, who was apologizing profusely but also sort of laughing. I’ve been careful of my choice of shirt when dealing with babies, and even young children, since then.”

              “You’re just bragging,” Sooyoung accused after Sunny finished her narrative. “I don’t accept it.”

              “What? How was that bragging? Does anyone else think that?” Sunny said, and when no one else voiced the opinion, she shrugged and said, “Well Tiffany, as promised, it’s your turn next.”

              Sooyoung sighed but turned to Tiffany anyway as she prepared her own story. “This was alluded to before, but this is about Lee Jongsuk and his first interaction with me. I don’t think I ever told the specifics of this story, I just vaguely mentioned it before.

              “It was pretty much my first week working as the official bartender for the bar; I say this because before, I worked at the bar with my manager sometimes when it was less busy so I would get actual experience with being on the job and socializing with people, which was something I was terrible with at first, partially due to my previous ‘job’ and an association in my mind between those kinds of places and bars and also because I had sort of forgotten how to properly socialize with people over the years.” I grabbed Tiffany’s hand, forgetting for a brief moment the context that this story was being told, those few words piercing my heart: ‘forgotten how to properly socialize with people over the years’. Once again, I realized how hard it must have been for Tiffany to endure all that she has, and once again I cursed my inability to help her. “It’s ok Taeyeon,” she said, her being the one reassuring me for some reason, smiling gently. I nodded and let her continue.

              “Oh my god that’s so cute,” I barely caught Seohyun whispering to Sooyoung, who agreed with a nod.

              “Because of this, my first experience dealing with Jongsuk was … well, I’ll just tell everyone.

              “It was Friday, my first Friday working at the bar and also the first really busy night I experienced. I was already feeling a bit tired out from work, but when he came in, my first impression of him was pretty terrible, I have to admit. While there would come a few people who would look like or act like my old pool of clientele, none were really so bad to deal with that I had a panic attack or anything like that. However, when I first saw Jongsuk, the way he dressed and walked was so strikingly similar to my previous clients that I had to stop to take a few breaths for a second, reminding myself of what my new job was.”

              Tiffany took a small breath before shortly continuing, “Ok, so that’s all the context.”

              “What!?” Sunny and Sooyoung exclaimed, putting down their forks. “Why do you need that much context?”

              “Well, I wanted to make sure Taeyeon understood why I was about to act the way I did,” she explained casually.

              “Oh, it was for Taeyeon, huh…”

              Tiffany simply gave the duo a smile before resuming once again. “I was somewhat successful in calming myself, even after he took a stool at the counter. At that time, I only had a biased expectation of him, but that was more subconscious than anything else: otherwise, I didn’t really know what to expect, and therefore, when he first started hitting on me, I was really taken aback.” If it wasn’t for the fact that my other hand was holding a fork, I probably wouldn’t have noticed that my fist had clenched upon hearing that. I quickly loosened up those muscles before anyone else could notice and make fun of me for it. This is the past, I reminded myself. “The way I replied was something like, ‘oh, me? Um, sorry, I’m single,’ and then I realized what I said and added on, ‘oh wait! I meant, I’m busy—well, you can see, I guess. Um, sorry,’ and then just walked away without properly receiving his order.”

              Sunny and Sooyoung were busy stifling their laughter while I was just about doing the same thing, feeling bad for being on the verge of laughing at a problem that I also had from time to time. Was Tiffany exaggerating for the sake of the story? “And then like ten seconds later, when he realized I wasn’t making his order, he called me back and asked me for his drink again. I apologized profusely—I probably said ‘sorry’ five to ten times before going off to make the drink. When I was delivering the drink to him, I also almost spilled it on him, but fortunately, he caught it in time. He chuckled and called my stumbling around ‘adorable’, to which I just awkwardly replied ‘thanks’ and walked away. I think it was what broke it for him, and he stopped focusing on me and started focusing on another woman.”

              I chuckled, patting the back of Tiffany’s hand. “That’s so adorable, I wish I could’ve seen that,” I said, feeling a bit less guilty for laughing when Tiffany shot me a good-natured smile.

              “You know what, ordinarily I wouldn’t count that, but since you revealed that in front of your girlfriend, I’ll pass,” Sooyoung said in a very declarative fashion.

              “Oh, why thank you Ms. Sooyoung,” Tiffany said, laughing. “Next up…” when she turned to me, fear seized my heart, panic settling into my system when I realized I still didn’t know what story I was going to tell. Tiffany, picking this up, diverted her gaze to Seohyun. “Seohyunnie, your turn.”

              She sighed and nodded reluctantly. “Ok. Sunny actually gave me this idea, so this happened on my first day of my internship. I was really excited about my first day, as I already said, so I had prepared a bunch of stuff for that day. Just to give you an idea of how excited I was, I’ll just list out everything I can remember off the top of my head: I sent a lot of emails to my supervisor about various things, including stuff like specifics to their dress code or what I’m allowed and not allowed to bring; I also prepared a few miscellaneous things that I might need like my passport and a printout version of their letter of acceptance, my resume, and my laptop; the day before, my mom and I spent a few hours preparing my work outfit, her lending a few of her own business clothes since we’re about the same size; I mapped out my route to the building, including a few backup plans like finding convenient subway stops and nearby bike rental places; and a gift for my supervisor I prepared as well.”

              Sooyoung and Sunny were already laughing at this. “I bet your embarrassing moment will be something like forgetting to tie your shoelaces and tripping when you get to the receptionist desk.”

              Seohyun whined, Sooyoung laughing and agreeing, adding on, “Or maybe something like they don’t recognize you at first, even after you pull out your printout version of the acceptance letter, and then afterwards you learn that it was a test or they were just pulling a joke on you.”

              “No, its not~” she whined.

              “Let Seohyun talk,” Tiffany instructed, Seohyun smiling graciously as the other two nodded, smiles still plastered on their face.

              “On the day before, I made sure I had eaten breakfast, was wearing the appropriate clothes, had everything on me that I had planned on bringing with me, and even made sure to arrive a bit early. Everything went well at first: the introduction went well, my supervisor sort of chuckled at how ‘overprepared’ I was but said it was nice to see such fire from an intern, and we went up to the office space. It was when my supervisor was giving me a tour and we arrived at their break place—the place that had their coffee maker, fridge, microwave, and everything—that I finally realized: the tie I was planning on wearing was still on the iron, and when I looked down, sure enough, I wasn’t wearing it!”

              A lapse of silence followed, followed immediately by complaints from Sunny and Sooyoung, laughter erupting from Tiffany and me.

              “What? That’s it?”

              “That’s even worse than what we said!”

              “Yeah, you should’ve just used our version of the story!”

              “But that wasn’t what happened!” Seohyun protested.

              “It’s still funnier!”

              “Eei, that’s too boring. You should tell another one.”

              “What? But that was really embarrassing! I was the only intern not wearing a tie!”

              “Was it in the dress code?”

              “Well, no, but—”

              “Then it’s ok! I’m sure the supervisor was impressed with how professional you looked from being as overprepared as you were.”

              Seohyun turned to me. “Unnie, what do you think?”

              “I—” I stopped when something caught my corner of my eye, and when I briefly turned my head to look at it in an attempt to stall giving my answer, I regretted it immediately.

              Right there, not a few paces from our booth walked Yoona and Leeteuk, hand in hand, walking towards a table close to our booth. Unfortunately, we had already locked eyes, and knowing that it was now impolite to just ignore her, I stood up and put a smile on my face, waving at them. “Hi Yoona, hi Leeteuk!”

              “Hey Taeyeon! How are you?” she happily greeted me as she approached our table, “Are you with your friends right now?”

              The other four stood up, although I could feel Tiffany being a little more apprehensive than the other three with her squeezing my hand ever so slightly. “Hi, nice to meet you. I’m Seohyun,” Seohyun said, bowing politely.

              The others followed suit, Tiffany being the last to greet them. “Oh, it’s so nice to meet you all! My name is Yoona, I was a classmate of Taeyeon’s. This is my boyfriend Leeteuk,” she said, pointing to him, who bowed when introduced.

              “Hello, it’s nice to meet you all. I was also a classmate of Taeyeon’s,” he said politely. Whatever reservations I had before about sharing that story were now blown wide open: not only was guilt overtaking my conscious, but also a sudden, inexplicable burning desire to be freed from my past, the painful memory still fresh in my mind. It was something I had always pushed to the back of my brain, but whenever it resurfaced, it always stung like a fresh papercut. Before, I would just ignore it and accept it as a part of life, but seeing how Tiffany sharing her secret helped her as just about everyone else in my life, from Jessica confessing to me to Sooyoung, Seohyun, and Sunny sharing embarrassing stories for a bit of laughter, I came to realize something: strength didn’t come from the ability to hold all one’s pain within oneself, but from the willingness to let those close to you in on that pain.

              After a brief conversation, the couple sat down at their table while I, with the help of Tiffany, convinced everyone else to let me tell my story on the way back to their apartment.

              “So here’s my story. This happened a decent amount of time ago, back in middle school. I sort of have insecurity issues, but this wasn’t always the case: it was a specific incident that caused this, and it involved those two back there, as well as one other person whose name is Yeseul.”

Hehe, I had to leave you at that cliffhanger, huh?

Well, that’s how it is! This chapter is getting a little lengthy (for me, that is), and I felt like it would be more fun to end the chapter there than after concluding Taeyeon’s backstory.

What did you think? Did you find the stories from triple ‘S’ (that’s what I sort of how I refer to them in my notes about this story) and Tiffany funny? How about Seohyun’s ‘embarrassing story’? xD

Anyways, hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading!

P.S. check out my facebook page at https://fb.me/affkesujo :D I have a fun fact posted along with the chapter