“Do you like Jackson?”

                Haneul couldn’t hide her surprise and choked violently on her drink. Did I hear him correctly?

                Before her, Bambam raised an eyebrow at her in question. Immediately she shook her head and tried to regain her composure, taking a sip of her iced coffee to try and cover up how startled his question had made her. Still, from the way her eyes shifted from side to side frantically, Bambam saw through her façade and smirked.

“Wanna run that by me again?” she asked, trying for a short laugh. It came out sounding forced which only amused the man in front of her even more.

                He decided to humor her. “I asked if you like Jackson,” he repeated. “You know, if you like like him?”

                This time, Haneul managed to prevent herself from choking and instead began to laugh hysterically. Some people turned to stare while she slapped her thigh violently and laughed obnoxiously loud while Bambam’s smirk stretched into a full-blown grin. Noticing that he wasn’t laughing along with her, Haneul’s laughter quickly died down.

“…am I that obvious?” she squeaked out and grimaced at him.

“Would it make you feel better if I said no?” he teased, taking a sip of his own drink. This made her drop her head on the table with a loud groan.

                The two of them were hanging out in a café that he had said had the best lemon squares. Their organization meeting had just been cancelled last minute because the president  had a family emergency to attend to, which led to Bambam dragging her to the café after he had learned that she was a er for lemon squares.

                It was the first time the two of them had found time to hang out, just the two of them, in a long while. In fact, the last time was when she had vented about Jackson’s terrible habit of sabotaging her dates that time she was asked out by Jimin. Since then, she had become so much busier with her classes and him with his family business. The only time they ever saw each other was during their organization’s meetings, which left them very little time to catch up. Other than that, she would only hear about him when Jinyoung would complain about how much he missed his son and the occasional updates from Jackson and Mark who were in the same department as him.

                To think that, after all this time they haven’t seen each other, this was how it was going to go. With her embarrassing herself.

“This is so embarrassing,” Haneul grumbled with her cheek pressed to the table. “I’m a walking cliché, having a one-sided crush on my guy best friend!”

“Well, I don’t know about one-sided.” His statement made her look up at him with furrowed eyebrows. “But it can’t be that bad, right? It’s just a crush, like you said.”

                Haneul peeled her face off the table and slumped against her chair. “No, that’s where you’re wrong,” she said. “It’s really bad. This could change everything and make things awkward!”

                Bambam rolled his eyes. “Don’t be dramatic,” he scolded. “And this is Jackson we’re talking about. Just tell him. He’s not that immature and we all know he won’t do anything that’ll make you feel uncomfortable.”

“That’s what makes me worried.” She sighed, looking up at him with sad eyes. “What if it makes him uncomfortable and he doesn’t tell me because he’s scared to hurt my feelings?”

                He didn’t know what to say to that. For a moment or two, it was silent between them. She poked at the crumbs the lemon squares left on her small plate with her fork, trying to squash the fear that she had been fighting since she had realized her feelings.

                Bambam cleared his throat to catch her attention. “How long?” he asked. Haneul didn’t need to ask what he meant by that.

“I don’t know,” she mumbled. “When I was sick a week ago? Maybe long before that, I’m not really sure.” She sighed again. “I tried to deny it the first few days, but how can I ignore the fact that my best friend gave me butterflies and made my heart race?

 “I’m not even sure how it happened,” she continued, now full on ranting with her arms waving in the air. “I just started to notice small details about him like how he pouts like a baby when he tries to focus on something, or how he gets excited over cherry tomatoes. I get mini heart attacks every time he does something nice for me. It’s driving me up the wall!”

“Oh, gag me with a spork,” Bambam mocked, sticking his tongue out in disgust. “But, again, it can’t be that bad.”

                Haneul huffed and wagged her fork in the air. “But, Bam, he’s my best friend and the one I trust the most.  If I lose him, what’ll I do? For me, it’s okay to hide what I feel as long as I can stay by his side. Who knows? Maybe my feelings will go away eventually and it’ll all just be like a bad dream.” To try and lighten the mood, she sticks her tongue back at him. “But whatever, as if you could relate! You practically have girls falling at your feet the moment they see your glorious legs!” She wiggles her eyebrows jokingly.

                However, Bambam did not laugh. He smiled at her but his eyes, which were full of pain, told a completely different story. “Actually, I do know what that feels like,” he admitted, his eyes getting a faraway look. “And here’s the only advice I can give you: some risks are worth taking, especially if it involves a person you love.”

                That night, as she was preparing to cook herself some instant ramen, she was surprised by a knock on her door. Haneul dropped the egg she was holding and glared at the door, telepathically conveying her anger at the person on the other side.

“Haneul-ah, open up!” came a voice she was all too familiar with. “I come bearing gifts!”

                Cussing under her breath, Haneul shut the stove off. She abandoned the mess on the floor and stomped to the front door. “This better be good, Wang,” she hollered as she opened the door. “I wasted a perfectly good egg because of your loud !”

                When she fully opened the door, she was greeted with huge white plastic bag with the logo of her favorite restaurant. A delicious scent wafted her nose, causing to water just at the thought of what was inside the bag. Jackson peeked over the bag, grinning when he saw bright expression and wide eyes.

“Is that what I think it is?” Haneul asked hopefully. “Please tell me that’s what I think it is!”

                Jackson raised an eyebrow at her, smirking. “Who do you think I am? Now hurry up, we wouldn’t want the food to get cold.” He then quickly pushed past the giddy girl and headed to the kitchen. He wrinkled his nose at the sight of raw egg on the floor. “God, Haneul, could you not be a slob for once?”

“I’m pretty sure we already established that it wasn’t my fault,” she countered, coming up behind him with a handful of paper towels. “But yours.”

                When she moved to kneel down and clean up the mess, Jackson grabbed the paper towels from her and pushed her aside. “Let me do this,” he said waving her away. “Just go set up the food.”

                Haneul felt her stomach flip and scolded herself for swooning over something so small. Biting her lip to hide a smile, she skipped over to the table and began to set up their food. As she did so, she began to recall her conversation with Bambam. Am I really just overreacting about this? I mean, she mused. It is just a crush, right? So why does it terrify me so much?

                She didn’t notice Jackson come up behind her until she felt his hands grab her cheeks from behind and squish her face together. She felt her heart seize and fought down the flush that was rising up her neck.

“I get you food and clean your floor,” Jackson began, moving her head from side to side. “Yet I don’t hear a single ‘thank you’ from you, ungrateful brat!”

“Thank you,” Haneul tried to say, her voice coming out muffled because of the things he was doing with her face. “You’re the bestest friend ever!”

“Of course, I am,” came his smug reply.

                Jackson immediately let go of her and moved to the other side of the table to sit down. She watched him with flushed cheeks, trying to look annoyed but, deep inside, her mind was a mess over his proximity just a moment ago. When he ignored her and began to eat, Haneul quickly followed suit by sitting down across him.

“What made you think about bringing me food anyway?” she asked, speaking with full of food. “I don’t recall calling you over or anything.”

“Something told me that you were trying to cook and I had to think of a way to save you from burning the apartment building to the ground.” Jackson grinned cheekily, bravely meeting her glare head-on.

“Se