Chaeyeon

“Well aren’t things interesting in our friend group.” Yujin commented.

Yena nodded, “It’s some A plus drama.”

“Fix it, Chaeyeon!” Eunbi yelled.

She covered her head with her pillow and groaned.

“Look, I didn’t want things to get to this point. I can’t be blamed like this.” she exclaimed.

Wonyoung commented, “I mean, there’s technically no one else to blame.”

“True.” Nako nodded.

She sighed, “Whatever.”

“To be fair, not everyone can have the picture perfect romance we have, Wonyoungie.” Yujin kissed the taller girl.

God those two were annoyingly adorable.

Hitomi muttered, “Damn couples.”

“Aww, it’s okay you have me Hidomii~” Eunbi squeezed the girl.

She ignored the loud yells of everyone and took a deep breath.

Why had her life gotten so messy?

One Week Ago

Minju

She walked next to Chaewon as they got off the bus.

“To think we’ve actually had a pretty chill couple of days.” Chaewon said. “But things are still so so awkward.”

That was an understatement. While they had been having fun moving through Japan, things in their friend group had gotten kind of awkward. Chaeyeon seemed to expertly be avoiding spending any time alone with her, Sakura, or Hyewon so she hadn’t gotten the chance to talk after her confession.

At the moment she and the rest of the school were at Osaka Castle touring around.

As she walked next to her most level-headed friend, Chaewon, she looked over at the front of the group where Chaeyeon was laughing with Eunbi over something.

Behind them Yujin and Wonyoung were being grossly lovey dovey.

It was bad enough that Yena and Yuri had reminded her of her sad singleness and now Yujin of all people was making her feel this way? Sheesh, she almost wished Annyeongz went back to there cute elementary school like crushing.

“Wait a second where’s Hyewon?” Chaewon asked.

They looked around and she wasn’t that surprised to see Hyewon at the food stand holding multiple skewers and eating happily.

“Is it good?” Chaeyeon asked with a smile.

Hyewon nodded, “Yup.”

“Here, if you want more it’s on me.” her crush handed some cash to the nice food stall owner.

If she thought she was jealous before, knowing that she and Hyewon had both fully confessed their feelings and seeing the two interact made it feel ten times worse. Sakura next to her had a similarly pained expression.

Naturally, they all seemed to wander around the area of Osaka Castle and she lucked out with Chaeyeon joining her in walking around the small ponds surrounded with cherry blossom trees.

“It’s beautiful here with all the cherry blossoms blooming.” she tried to ignore her knotted feelings.

Chaeyeon moved next to her, “Yeah it really is.”

For a few minutes as they naturally walked the path next to her, it didn’t feel like they were in some awkward love square or drama esque situation. They were just two close people that had known each other forever, enjoying something beautiful together.

“I’m glad that we could spend some time together.” she admitted.

Chaeyeon smiled, “Me too, things have been kind of different lately.”

“You mean awkward?” she asked.

“Well I did say different.”

She wondered if she should have just kept shut….no.

Just the thought of not finally confessing her feelings made her recall the suffocating feeling she had before.

Was there anything worse than not admitting your feelings for someone you were around a lot?

Hmm….

Maybe, being in love with your childhood friend who also had two other gorgeous girls after her.

Chayeon gently grabbed her hand, “Minju, no matter what happens you’re one of my best friends.”

“I know.” she nodded. “But can I be selfish?”

Her crush turned bright red, probably recalling a few days ago when she had said the same exact words and kissed her.

Whoo, seriously who would’ve thought she had the guts to do that? It just goes to show that you can surprise even yourself. That had been a really nice kiss too. Also her first kiss so she had nothing to compare it to but she’s sure it was pretty great.

Instead of a kiss she leaned her head on Chaeyeon’s shoulder and took a picture before her crush could react. When she moved away she couldn’t help smiling dumbly at the photo.

The cute surprised look on Chaeyeon’s face, her dumb lovestruck smile, and the beautiful cherry blossoms falling around them made it perfect.

Of course, because it was her something had to go wrong. The tree above them thought, whelp time to ruin Minju’s moment.

All the flowers on the cherry blossom tree above them fell off in a huge heap on to them, completing breaking their cute moment.

When she opened her eyes she couldn’t help laughing at Chaeyeon who was covered head to toe in cherry blossoms and looked absolutely adorable. Annoying but prettily, the cherry blossoms continued to fall around them. It kind of made her feel like she was in a rom-com or something.

She grinned, “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.” Chaeyeon couldn’t hide her smile.

From the corner of her eye she saw Yujin was furiously shaking the base of the tree and realized that her mischievous friend had been helping her out the whole time. When Yujin met her eye, the tall girl motioned for her to kiss Chaeyeon.

It was definitely tempting…

Before she could even decide what to do Chaeyeon gently brushed the cherry blossoms out of her hair and gently pulled her into a tight hug.

“Sometimes you’re so ridiculously cute that I don’t know how to react.” her crush admitted.

She squeaked out, “Meep.”

What the freak was a meep? She had to get her crap together here.

Chaeyeon laughed and patted the top of her head. God, she could feel her face turning bright red.

“Wanna head back to the castle?” Chaeyeon asked.

She nodded and they wordlessly slowly walked back and somewhere along the way she picked up the courage to grab Chaeyeon’s hand.

Sakura

If there was one weakness she had it was that she had horrible sea sickness. You might ask, why does it matter if you have horrible sea sickness it’s not like you’re at sea?

Which was true YET here she was on a huge ship cruising along the shoreline of Hakata. Why? Because Eunbi wanted to do a dinner cruise. Whoever thought it was a good idea to have a meal on a moving boat when so many people like her got sea sick was a sick sick man.

Anyways, that was her explainer on why she was at the back of a large boat throwing up into the ocean. The sea sickness and finding out things she really wished she hadn’t wasn’t making her in the best mood.

She ran to where the bathroom was and wasn’t too surprised when she saw Yujin and Wonyoung sitting on a couch cuddling up to each other. Ugh so adorable.

Before she could walk past them to get to the bathroom she paused when the name of her crush came up.

“Yeah, I know I probably shouldn’t have but I gave Minju a heads up that Hyewon had confessed and that Sakura had in a kind of roundabout way.” Yujin said.

Wonyoung raised an eyebrow, “Is that a good idea? And I think kissing someone multiple times is a pretty clear sign that you like them.”

“I don’t know but Minju has always had my back and her and Chaeyeon reminds me of us.”

“How?”

Yujin sweetly kissed Wonyoung, “Well because they’re childhood friends and I think you and I can agree that childhood friends are very compatible.”

“You’re so stupid.”

Her words were teasing but Wonyoung couldn’t hide the happy expression on her face.

And while she might normally groan at the adorableness of the new couple in front of her, she was more focused on what they had been talking about.

She had kind of suspected it but knowing for sure that Hyewon and Minju had confessed was something else.

Geez, sea sickness and finding out she was last place in the race to Chaeyeon’s heart…..great.

“Hey Sakura are you alright?”

Speaking of her crush.

“I’m fine.”

That wasn’t very convincing when she had to turn away to vomit off the back of the boat.

Chaeyeon commented, “Usually, when someone says they’re fine it means the opposite.”

“I just get sea sick really easily.”

“Aren’t you from here?”

Yes, she understood the irony of getting seasick easily when she was from the sea port city of Hakata.

Chaeyeon backtracked, “Sorry, I noticed that you looked sick during dinner so I got some seltzer water and found some medicine that might help with your seasickness.”

“Oh.”

She accepted the water and medicine, inhaling both to try and get better quickly.

As she finished her water, she felt Chaeyeon soothingly rubbing circles in her back and she was reminded of how sweet the girl was.