before starting this chapter off, i would like to say im really sorry for the delay for this chapter! everything's been sligtly hectic so i couldn't post the chapter last week. as an apology, i made the chapter twice as long as i would usually make it. please accept my deepest apologies for this.

with that said, this is a Chaeyeon-centric chapter that gives us a bit more insight into her past. Next chapter would be a continution of this one and then we'll jump back to Chaewon.

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Chaeyeon gets into her car, placing her forehead on the steering wheel in deep thought. Chaewon is in the backseat, fast asleep; all the day’s stress probably took a toll on her.

The request Chaewon asked of her shook her up more than she let on. She told the younger girl earlier that she was fine; Chaewon had looked at her in suspicion before shrugging it off.

“…I left them, Chae.” Chaeyeon whispered, “I don’t know if I can come back so easily.”

Taking out her phone, Chaeyeon dials a number she hasn’t seen in months, bringing the phone up to her ear.

“Oh, Jjaeyeon, what a surprise,” Chaeyeon feels herself shiver as she hears a voice she hasn’t heard in so long. “Why are you calling? As far as I remember, you quit the team.”

The girl sighs, running a hand through her blonde hair. “I know, I know. But I need one last favor from you guys.”

“Hm. That’s a very high demand from someone who said she was never coming back.” Chaeyeon thinks she probably deserved that, but as much as it is a high demand for her, she needs their cooperation; the job Chaewon asked her to do just can’t be done by herself.

“So, what does Lee Chaeyeon need our help for?”

“I think it’ll be better to meet up in person for this. It’s too risky to talk over the phone.”

“My, so bold~ Is it your place or mine?”

Chaeyeon feels a blush creeping up her neck. In her flustered state, she manages to reply, “I-i think it’ll be better at your place.”

She hears a giggle from the other end, no doubt amused at Chaeyeon’s stutter. “Okaayyy~, do you want the kids around to hear it?”

“Just you and I will be fine. I can’t show my face to the kids. At least, not yet.”

“…They miss you, you know.” Chaeyeon hears the way the person’s voice softens on the other line

Chaeyeon sighs. “I know. Tell them I miss them too?”

“Of course.”

There’s a pause in their conversation, only their breaths being heard. Chaeyeon decides to break the silence.

“I’ll see you later?”

“Un, see you later, you big bear.”

At the mention of the familiar nickname, Chaeyeon smiles, her heart fluttering. “Bye, Kkura-chan.”

Before the other could respond, Chaeyeon ends the call, clutching the phone to her rapidly beating heart.

Even after six months Sakura still has a tight grip on her heart. She really doesn’t know if she should even be surprised at this point. Looking over her shoulder, she sees Chaewon had rolled over and tucked in on herself, her back now towards Chaeyeon. Starting the car, Chaeyeon chances a glance at her cousin’s sleeping form one more time.

When she had first met Chaewon, the girl looked like someone who would no doubt become successful. She carried herself with a lot of confidence, and even at a young age she oozed charisma; Chaeyeon was slightly intimidated by her, if she was to be completely honest.

But after getting to know her better, she found that Chaewon was just like her, a child forced to grow up just a little bit faster than the rest. What made them different however was that Chaewon had a bit more stress on her shoulders as the heir to her father’s (then) small company.

That made a sense of overprotectiveness surge in Chaeyeon; she wanted to protect the younger girl at all costs, treat her like she was her own sister. She guesses this is where her loyalty for Chaewon stemmed from and how she would do anything physically possible for her baby cousin.

Noticing that Chaewon’s house is coming up, Chaeyeon slows the car down to a stop. Carefully, she opens the door to the backseat and lifts the younger girl up, doing her best to not wake her up; she knows how absolutely a pain in the Chaewon is when woken up, especially when drunk.

She places Chaewon down on one of the many chairs littered on her patio, quickly fishing for the spare key in her pockets. Opening the door, she carries Chaewon again, going up the stairs with as much care as possible so that the younger girl wouldn’t jolt around in her arms.

Chaeyeon enters Chaewon’s room, lying the redhead down onto her bed and tucking her in. She adds a small pat on the head for good measure.

“Goodnight, Chaewon-ah. Sweet dreams.” She whispers, closing the door quietly.

-----

Pulling up at a nearby 7-11, Chaeyeon checks that all the doors on her car are perfectly locked before heading inside. She scans the store, noting that there are quite a number of people despite it being one in the morning. Her eyes finally land on a short-haired figure sitting at the far end of the store, looking out of the glass windows.

Chaeyeon’s heart catches in , and suddenly she wants nothing more than to run back to her car and drive home as fast as possible. Wiping her clammy palms onto her jeans, she slowly approaches the girl who hasn’t noticed Chaeyeon’s entrance into the shop. She clears to announce her presence.

“Ahem...”

Sakura tears her gaze away from the window to look at a very awkward-looking Chaeyeon whose eyes are looking at everything in the store except her. Sakura’s eyes light up, abruptly standing up from her seat. She approaches the taller girl who still looks as still as a statue.

Chaeyeon eyes every move the girl makes from her peripheral vision, her own stuck to a pair of trashbins at the very back of the store. She sees Sakura come to a stop in front of her and, oh, her heart suddenly feels like fleeing from her chest. Gathering every bit of courage she has left (everything else was used to convince herself to meet Sakura alone), Chaeyeon shifts her gaze to meet Sakura’s own.

Suddenly she’s eighteen again and had laid her eyes on the other woman for the first time; when she had just been looking for people to recruit into a small team of specialists. Sakura looks like she hadn’t aged a day since then, her eyes as big and round as ever, her skin fair and light, her hair still soft and silky to the touch.

And her smile, gosh, Chaeyeon could probably write a ten-page essay elaborating on why Miyawaki Sakura’s smile was something that needed to be protected and cherished at all costs and how it could give her energy even through the most grueling of days.

In other words, Chaeyeon was, and still is, irrevocably in love with Miyawaki Sakura.

“Chaeyeon?”

Snapping out of her daze, Chaeyeon refocuses her vision on the girl in front of her.

“A-ah, Kkura-chan.” She says, “I’m─um, I─ sorry about that.”

She can’t believe how whipped she is for the girl in front of her.

Sakura tries to hide a laugh behind her hand, amused at the flustered state Chaeyeon is in. Chaeyeon playfully shoves Sakura in retaliation, a smile making its way onto her face. 

She’s missed this.

Gesturing outside, Chaeyeon turns to her companion. “Let’s go?”

Sakura suddenly takes Chaeyeon’s arm, not at all caring that Chaeyeon is an absolute sputtering mess once again. She tightens her hold and points to the door of the 7-11.

“Let’s go!”

Chaeyeon can only look on helplessly as the shorter girl pulls her forward and out the door.

-----

They don’t say anything as they walk the short distance to an apartment complex across the 7-11. Chaeyeon belatedly worries about her car, but ultimately decides to let it be. It’s a fairly old model, nothing worth robbing.

Their arms are still linked and more than once has Chaeyeon thought that this whole thing with Chaewon and now with Sakura is all just an elaborate dream from the recesses of her mind.

They climb a set of stairs located outside of the building up to a fire exit with the exit light missing from its place. Inside the building, Chaeyeon surveys her surroundings and confirms that nothing had changed since she left.

The walls were still the same tacky color with the wallpaper peeling as it reaches the divide between wall and ceiling; the dent in the wall that suspiciously looked like a fist (it was Chaeyeon’s fault) was also still in its usual spot by the plastic plant.

Reaching a door with the numbers 394 on its faded wood, Sakura starts shuffling through her pockets. Her actions get a little bit more frantic every time her hands come out empty-handed. She turns to face Chaeyeon with a sheepish smile.

“Do you still, uh, have the key with you?”

Chaeyeon sighs and takes out her keyring, taking the smallest key on there and inserting it into the lock. With a turn and a click, the door to the humble little apartment swings open. They both enter, turning the lights on and leaving their shoes by the entrance.

She surveys the apartment, noting in surprise that everything looks just the same as they had left it. She runs a hand over one of the shelves, once again surprised that no dust had collected on the surface. Chaeyeon turns to face the only other occupant who was busy making tea in the kitchen, which looked absolutely spotless.

“You... kept the apartment quite clean.” She speaks up lamely, approaching Sakura.

Without looking up from her task of making tea, Sakura answers, “You would have gotten angry at me otherwise.”

At the admission, Chaeyeon can’t help but feel happy and somewhat relieved that she wasn’t the only one who had a hard time forgetting.

Making no further comment, she lets Sakura prepare the tea in peace and decides to go into the living room. Looking at the familiar surroundings, Chaeyeon feels like she’s being transported back in time to when things had been way easier; when she didn’t have to feel like everything was slowly falling apart and she’s left to pick up the pieces.

She walks over to one of the shelves in the room, picking up a picture frame that caught her eye. It was from when she and Sakura had visited Lotte World with the kids on their off-day. They even got Chaewon to tag along after much persuasion on Chaeyeon’s part.

Everyone was all smiles, eyes crinkling with absolute delight. The kids were at the back goofing off with funny faces with Chaewon looking at them in exasperated fondness. She and Sakura were at the front, arms linked and smiles so wide that their faces looked like they were about to be split into two.

Just looking at this one picture hit her with a wave of nostalgia, all of their memories together pouring in all at once. She’s missed them so much, missed her old life so much that she would trade anything to get back.

Her babies, her small little wards that she had recruited with Sakura’s help, she misses them just as much. She had treated them like they were her own children; she taught them everything she knows, took them out for outings with Sakura. Her friends told her that they looked like such a perfect and happy family.

She doesn’t know that she’s crying until she sees a tear drop onto the picture frame. She hastily wipes her eyes before Sakura catches her, doing the best she can to not let any trace of tears show.

“Chaeyeon,” she hears Sakura call. Turning around, she spots Sakura placing a tray with tea and an assortment of snacks on the coffee table. Straightening up, she follows Sakura as she takes a seat on the chair opposite Chaeyeon.

As Chaeyeon observes Sakura, she notices that her eyes were slightly red and her face looked puffy. Had she been crying?

“So, what was so confidential that we needed to talk here?” Sakura asks, leaning back and crossing her legs.

Chaeyeon gets into business mode, preparing to tell Sakura everything Chaewon had told her.

“I need your, and the kids’, help. It’s a job that the CEO of Kim Industries asked for herself.”

Sakura looks surprised by this information. “Chaewon? What could she possibly need for us to do? We don’t exactly have the cleanest record, you know. We have done some reputable jobs, but we’ve done as much questionable things as well. If the public finds out we did something for her, it could possibly ruin her image.”

Chaeyeon looks the other woman dead in the eye, conveying her seriousness. “If the public finds out, Kkura-chan. But they won’t, not while I’m going to be personally heading this.”

The older woman sighs, resigning to the fact that Chaeyeon is dead serious about this. She crosses her arms, “Okay, what is this job Chaewon needs done that she asked for us?”

“She wants us to erase Jang Heokjin’s existence.”