There’s a galaxy in Jungeun’s eyes, and you can’t help but get lost in them.

Jungeun’s eyes are a deep dark brown and are the most expressive pair you’ve ever seen in your twenty-eight years of living. Her eyes are always so intense, making one feel as if she’s peering right into their very soul with her piercing gaze, and you think that’s why you can never keep eye contact with her. You’ve been friends with her for all of seven years, yet you can never maintain eye contact when it comes to Kim Jungeun.

Right now is not an exception, as you find yourself averting your gaze from her dark eyes which are looking right at you from across the room. You’re all at one of the clubs your group of friends frequent, celebrating Hyunjin’s recent engagement. And even though you and Jungeun are at opposite sides of the room, with her being on the dance floor while you’re currently sat at the bar and nursing you second drink of the evening, you still find your gaze gravitating towards her.

You think it’s unfair, how Jungeun could still look breathtaking and ethereal despite the dingy lighting of the club. She’s swaying her hips and moving her body alluringly on the dance floor, warranting the darkened and wanting gazes of everyone around her who’s watching. You’re no exception as you find your gaze fixated on her and her every move. You can’t tear your eyes away from her as she continued to dance without a care in the world.

That is, until your gaze catches hers and you find your breath catching in your throat. She’s looking at you with that gaze again – the one where it looks like she’s beckoning for you to come to her, one which you don’t really know how to explain but makes you feel all these various feelings that threaten to implode from your chest. You maintain eye contact with her for all of thirty seconds before you find yourself looking away once more, unable to contain the feelings her mere gaze could cause you. It , and you kind of hate yourself for being unable to hold her gaze for longer than half a minute as you down the rest of your drink in one go.

You wave the bartender down to your side of the bar, asking for another glass of your favorite drink as you figure that two would not suffice if you want to survive this evening. You thank the bartender with a quirk of your lips as he sets the drink in front of you, lifting the glass to your lips and taking a small sip as you find your gaze panning towards the dance floor again.

The sight that greets you is enough to put a rather huge crack in your already battered heart, one that makes you sigh in despair as you down the contents of your glass again. There’s that familiar pang inside your chest, making its presence known as you look on to the dance floor and see Jungeun, the love of your life, encased tightly in someone else’s arms. The music is obnoxiously loud and irritatingly rambunctious, but Jungeun has her eyes closed and is slow dancing with her best friend – if you can even call them that – to a tune that surely only the two of them could hear.

With a sigh, you stand up from your stool, your legs shaking a little – from sitting for too long or from the drinks you’ve consumed, you don’t know. You let your gaze roam all over the place, looking for Hyunjin so that you can tell her that you’re gonna go ahead and head home first. With your mood already dampened like this, you figure that it’s better if you just head back to your place and sleep this heartache off like you usually do.

You spot Hyunjin at one of the corner booths, arms around her fiancée and a huge smile on her lips as she talks animatedly with her free hand waving about. You find yourself smiling amusedly at this, because it’s a sign of Hyunjin being tipsy after a couple of drinks. Without looking back towards the dance floor, you make your way towards Hyunjin to say your goodbye before heading home.

Hyunjin greets you excitedly when you slide into the booth across her and her fiancée, and you greet back with an amused chuckle, taking the drink she offers you and downing it in one go. You then turn towards Heejin – Hyunjin’s fiancée – and greet her with a genuinely fond smile. Heejin smiles back, her eyes curving into those adorable crescent moons and her red lips pulling back to display rows of perfect pearly whites.

Heejin’s a beautiful kid, and you like her for Hyunjin because she’s good to Hyunjin and she’s good for Hyunjin. After losing Seungri to cancer five years ago, you’re really glad that Hyunjin has met someone as great as Heejin. The kid was able to bring back the smile to Hyunjin’s lips and the twinkle in Hyunjin’s eyes, so it’s a no-brainer that you’d like her very much for your best friend. It sometimes makes you feel conflicted though, because there are times when it makes you feel like you’re betraying Seungri somehow. But then you remember Seungri’s last words to Hyunjin, how she made Hyunjin promise to never stop living and to fall in love again, and it makes you stop worrying.

Shaking yourself from your thoughts – you’ve been distracted from your real intentions for going to them – you take a subtle deep breath as you tell your goodbyes to Hyunjin. The younger woman pouts and whines a bit, but after some few whispered words from the woman beside her, Hyunjin eventually lets you go albeit a little sulkily. You chuckle and mess with her hair a little, which makes her whine more and swat at your hand, before standing from your seat with a soft thank you to Heejin who smiles back at you.

You bid the couple goodbye one last time, and then you’re on your way out of the club and into the chilly autumn night. You shiver at the first blows of the evening air against your skin, taking long, hurried steps towards the taxi bay just so you can quickly escape the cold breeze. The entire ride home is spent in comfortable silence as you have your forehead pressed against the cool glass of the taxi’s window, your gaze trained outside as your mind raced with countless thoughts about one Kim Jungeun.

OOOOO

You don’t see Jungeun or even any of your other friends for a few weeks after that night. You’ve been quite busy, and your presence had been requested at the aquarium at Busan to check up on some sick seals that needed immediate attention. Being one of the top aquatic veterinarians in the country, coupled with your inherent love for animals, you were off to Busan a few hours after you received the call.

Spending the past three weeks at Busan made you miss Jungeun, made you long for her smiles and her laughter and just her presence in general. It was the first time you’ve been away from Jungeun for that long ever since you’ve met, and it feels both relieving and suffocating at the same time. It made you a little sad too – who are you kidding, you were actually devastated – when Jungeun never called the entire three weeks that you were away.

It’s the first time you’re back in your apartment in three weeks, and the first thing that you do after depositing your things in the living room is head straight to your room and jump on your bed. You’ve had a rather exhausting day, so it’s no wonder that a mere couple of minutes after laying down on your bed, your exhausted body shuts down as you slip into a dreamless slumber.

You wake up hours later to the feel of something feathery light softly tracing over your face. Your eyelids flutter open and your breath catches in your throat when you're greeted by the sight of Jungeun's face a mere couple of inches from your own. There's an unreadable look in her eyes as she looks down at you, and her gaze is as intense as ever that it immediately sends your heart racing.

There's a moment spent in silence as the two of you continue to stare at each other. But you still can’t keep eye contact with her, so you're the first to break your gaze away, clearing your throat awkwardly as you feel your cheeks heat up in embarrassment.

You hear Jungeun let out a sigh before the bed shakes slightly with her movements. The corners of your lips turn down to a slight frown because you thought that she was moving to get off the bed. But to your surprise, Jungeun merely lies down on the bed beside you, burying her face into the crook of your neck and wrapping her arm around your waist.

“I've missed you,” she says against your neck, causing a shiver to run down your spine and your skin to break out in goosebumps.

You want to respond to her, tell her you missed her too, but you're reminded of the fact that she never bothered to call even once during the three weeks that you were gone, and suddenly your heart hurts once more. You want to ask her why, wondering why she never bothered to call if she really did miss you. You close your eyes to stop the tears from flowing, and you try to calm your breathing in the most subtle way possible just so she won't notice.

“Jinsol?”

“Hmmm?”

“I'm sorry.”

That makes you open your eyes to look at her. She’s pulled back a bit and is already looking at you. There's sadness in her eyes and her lips are curled into a wry smile and she looks so, so sad that it makes your heart hurt just seeing her like that. With a deep breath, you wrap your arms around her tightly and lean up to press a light kiss to her jaw.

“What are you apologizing for? You didn't do anything wrong,” you tell her with a slight smile.

She shakes her head gently, looking at you with her sad eyes, and it takes all of your willpower not to lean forward to capture her lips in a kiss. You reach a hand up, tucking some stray strands of hair that fell on her face on the back of her ear and flash her a cute smile this time. She just sighs at this, but the corners of her lips curl up into an amused smile as she shakes her head slightly at you.

“If this is about what happened at the club three weeks ago, then you don’t have to apologize y’know. As much as it , we’re not really dating and you’re . . . you’re free to like whoever you want to, Jungeun.”

You pause for a bit, your brows creasing as you remember the way Jungeun was encased in Jiwoo’s arms that night and how it hurt to see them be that . . . intimate, despite the setting. You remember heading home heartbroken and breaking down as you took a shower before going to bed that night. But you also remember your own words all those years ago, when you realized that what you felt for Jungeun was a little more than platonic. As someone who doesn’t like to live with regrets and what if’s, you’ve been honest about your feelings with her and your relationship with her had been quite complicated ever since.

“I know being aware of my feelings for you can be . . . burdensome. It’s why I was hesitant to tell you at first,” you tell her with a slight smile. She looks like she’s about to say something but you stop her. You need her to understand that you had no other intentions than making your feelings for her known when you confessed. “I still ended up telling you anyway, so that’s that. But, you have to remember Jungeun, that even though I asked you to let me love you the way I want to, to let me make you feel how much I love you – thank you for that, by the way – it doesn’t mean you’re obligated to reciprocate my feelings.” It hurts you to say these words, but they’re the truth and you need her to know, to understand, that she has no obligations towards you whatsoever. You never wanted to be a burden to her in any way.

There’s another slight pause where you just smile at her, reaching up to cup her cheek gently and place a soft kiss against her forehead. Her eyes close when your lips press against her skin, and they remain closed even after you pull back. She’s really beautiful, and you find yourself just staring at her and drinking in every detail of her beautiful face. When Jungeun finally opens her eyes once more, you flash her one of your signature grins – apparently it’s charming, or so Kahei told you – before flicking her forehead lightly.

She yelps then playfully glares at you, causing you both to chuckle. It feels nice, being able to laugh like this with her. But the light mood doesn’t last long, not when the sadness is back in Jungeun’s eyes in the next instant as she looks at you with the most heartbroken look you’ve ever seen on her face. With a sigh, you let your thumb caress her cheek in soothing circles, wishing to take away that sadness in her eyes.

“It’s alright, Jungeun. I’m a big girl, and I knew what I’d gotten myself into when I confessed to you. You already have Jiwoo and Haseul to worry about as it is, you really shouldn’t be adding me to that list as well. I understand. You can’t really teach this guy,” you let go of her cheek to gently push a finger against her chest where her heart beats steadily, “who to fall in love with. I’ve long since accepted the fact that you only have platonic feelings for me. And that’s okay with me. We’re still best friends so you don’t have to worry, y’know.”

“Jinsol–”

“I’ll be fine, Jungeun. I’ll be fine.”

OOOOO

A groan leaves your lips as you plop face down on Sooyoung’s couch. You’re all at her place for your weekly “group bonding”, as the kids liked to call it, and everyone seems to have decided that it’s tease-Jinsol-night tonight. Everyone’s been relentless with their teasing since you arrived, and you’re starting to think that they’re only teasing you because you were the last to arrive. It’s not your fault that there was another sick turtle you had to take care of before you were able to leave the aquarium, thus making you late for about half an hour to this bonding thing.

There’s a chuckle right beside you and you groan some more when you feel someone playfully prodding at your . The chuckle turns to a laugh when you fall off the couch because someone decided to poke your side where you’re most ticklish. With a pout, you get up from the floor and sit on the couch sulkily, crossing your arms over your chest and turning away from the perpetrator who’s still chuckling at you. There’s an amused snort, before the spot beside you dips with the additional weight of the annoying kid who sits down beside you.

“Are you really sulking right now, Jung Jinsol?” she asks, amused, and you find yourself fighting the urge to smile at the sound of her voice. Hearing her voice never fails to make you feel happy, but she’s still being an annoying right now, so you won’t give her the satisfaction of making you smile.

“If you’re just gonna be annoying, leave me alone, Jungeun,” you tell her, still refusing to turn to look at her.

She snorts again then pokes your side once more, making you squeak and jump on your seat. This time, you turn around to look at her and send her the most menacing glare you could muster. It doesn’t seem to work though, because she just rolls her eyes playfully and calls you cute. You hate how a single word from her could make your heart flutter, and you turn away from her once more to hide the fact that your cheeks are flushed.

“Hey, Jinsol–”

She doesn’t get to finish what she was going to say because all your extremely loud and rowdy friends decided to join the two of you in the living room. Kahei and Sooyoung occupy the two single-seaters on either side of the couch, while Hyejoo, Yerim, Chaewon, and Yeojin all occupied the loveseat. Heejin and Hyunjin decided to just plop their butts on the floor across the couch, leaning against each other as they watched Yeojin and Chaewon argue about something. Haseul and Jiwoo remain the only two standing, and they’re both looking conflicted as they eye the only space left on the couch, the one beside Jungeun.

With a sigh, you get up from the couch – hearing a soft hey coming from Jungeun, yet ignoring it – before taking purchase of the armrest of the single-seater couch that Sooyoung is occupying. Jiwoo and Haseul finally move to take a seat, with Jiwoo sitting to Jungeun’s left while Haseul occupied the space by Jungeun’s right. You refuse to turn around to look at them, because giving up your place beside Jungeun hurts enough as it is. Seeing her being sandwiched between the two people she likes will just be like pouring salt to the wound.

There’s a hand resting against your thigh the next instant, and when you look down you see Sooyoung looking at you with worried eyes. You can only sigh, your lips curled into a wry smile as you shrug your shoulders in response to her unvoiced question of ‘are you alright?’ There’s nothing you can really do about the situation, Haseul and Jiwoo are the ones who Jungeun likes, so you can only accept things as they are and try to move past the heartbreak and loneliness.

The younger ones, bless their clueless souls, are none the wiser of the tension that’s brewing among their four older friends. You could only look at them fondly when Yeojin and Chaewon begin whining that they’re hungry. Usually, during nights like this one, you all either have Sooyoung, Kahei, or Yeojin cook your dinner or you all have food delivered to whoever’s place you decide to hang out. But Hyunjin, Chaewon, Yerim, Hyejoo and Yeojin are craving for Japanese food tonight, from their favorite restaurant that’s at least a twenty-minute drive from Sooyoung’s flat, one that doesn't have a delivery service yet.

You volunteer to go grab food for everyone, because Sooyoung, Haseul, Jungeun, and Jiwoo don’t really feel like going out, and even though they’re full-grown adults already, you’ve never been comfortable with any of the younger ones going out at this time of the night. Kahei volunteers to go with you, but you refuse and make her stay back, in case the others get hungry while waiting for you to return with the food. Besides, Kahei’s the only one who the kids listen to without any sort of protest, so it’s better to make her stay back to keep everyone from creating too much ruckus.

You’re already on the way out when Jungeun calls for you, stopping you in your tracks. With your brows creased and a question on the tip of your tongue, you turn around to face Jungeun but you’re met with a hoodie being shoved to your face. You take the piece of clothing with a soft ‘thanks’ under your breath, and a smile lifts the corners of your lips when you realize that the hoodie belongs to Jungeun. It’s her favorite hoodie, the one that you gifted her when she graduated college, and she’s never let anyone else borrow or wear it since.

There’s a faint blush on Jungeun’s cheeks as she refuses to meet your gaze, keeping her eyes trained on the ground as she kicks at the hardwood floor with the soles of her sock-covered feet. It’s kind of refreshing, seeing her be this adorable, because Jungeun has a repulsion with anything that has to do with her being cute. But she’s being adorable right now that you can’t help but pinch her cheeks. She groans and swats your hand away.

“Awww . . . so you do worry over me. Thank you, Jungeunie,” you tell her with a -eating grin, to which she responds with a roll of the eyes.

“It’s cold out and your dumb forgot to bring your jacket again. I’m only giving that to you so you won’t get sick. God knows how much more annoying you get when you’re sick,” she says, but you don’t get offended in the slightest because you know this is her own way of telling you that she cares about you.

With one last smile and thank you directed at her, you finally head out of the apartment to drive to that Japanese restaurant that’s located at the other side of the town. Your trip is spent in comfortable silence as you drive along the mostly empty streets, with your favorite group’s latest album playing softly in the background. With how free the streets are, you manage to arrive at the restaurant a little under twenty minutes, but a groan slips past your lips when you see that there is no more space for parking nearby. With a defeated sigh, you’re forced to park two blocks down the road at an area that’s a little darker and less populated.

Wanting to go back to your friends as soon as possible, you jog the two blocks towards the restaurant and head straight to the counter, listing off your friends’ orders from the top of your head. With how much you’ve ordered, you’re not surprised that your food takes a little over ten minutes to prepare. You take a seat near the counter and wait patiently for your order, scrolling through your phone as you waited. As you scroll through your Facebook timeline, you see that Hyunjin’s favorite bread place is having some two-for-the-price-of-one promo and you make a mental note to drop by on your way back to get your friends something from there as well.

The wait is over soon enough and you thank the waiter who hands you your food as you stand up. Whistling to the tune of your favorite song, you head back to your car with your food in hand, your stomach growling a bit at the smell of the food that wafts to your nose. When you reach your car, you fumble with your keys because it’s a bit too dark and your idiotic self forgot to wear your glasses again. You’ve been so occupied trying to fit your key into your car’s keyhole that you failed to notice the two people slowly creeping towards you.

The key finally shoots into the keyhole and you make a sound of victory, your lips pulling up into a wide grin as you reach to open your car door. What happens next goes by in a flash. One moment you’re opening your car door, and in the next, something hits the back of your head really hard that it makes you see stars. The bag of food in your hand goes crashing to the ground as it slips past your fingers, the force of the impact enough to knock you down to the ground face-first.

You think you hear men’s voices talking rapidly near you, but you’re getting dizzier by the second and it feels like your head has been cracked open with the way it hurts. Your vision starts getting blurry and it feels a lot like being submerged underwater as you begin to fade in and out of consciousness. You can make out the sound of a shrill ringing in the distance, sounding very much like your ringtone, and then everything goes black.

OOOOO

It feels like you’ve been unconscious for a very long time, but when you come to, the very first thing you do is howl in agony. Your head feels like its burning and your throat feels scratchy and parched, with your screaming only worsening the situation as you cough uncontrollably mere moments after waking up. Your coughing is accompanied by sobs as you begin to feel the pain seep throughout your body. You thrash around, screaming and sobbing because its all just too much and you just want the pain to stop. You can’t even bring yourself to open your eyes with how much everything just hurts.

You hear voices around you, some muffled and some clearer than the others, yet you can’t decipher what they’re saying. There are hands trying to hold you down, trying to keep you still, yet you struggle against them. The pain is too overbearing and you can’t focus on anything else besides it. Something sharp pricks at your left arm, and it makes you scream louder because it burns. God, how it burns, and you sob even harder as you try to beg anyone who’s listening to make the pain go away.

The prickling feeling is gone in the next moment, and you finally stop thrashing about when you feel the pain start to subside slowly until it completely goes away after a couple of minutes. Your body finally goes lax on whatever surface you’re lying on, tired and already on the verge of slipping back to unconsciousness. It’s only now that you notice the sniffling sounds around you, wondering where they’re coming from. You don’t dwell on it much anymore though, because you slip back into unconsciousness not long after.

OOOOO

The next time you come to, it’s quiet around you, with the constant mechanical beeping to your right being the only sound you can hear. You feel a bit lightheaded and disoriented, slowly opening your eyes and wincing at the bright lights that greet you. There’s a constant pounding in your head though it’s only subtle that it doesn’t really bother you at all. When you’re finally able to open your eyes fully, you spend a couple of minutes just lying there and letting your gaze wander about.

Everything around you is white, from the ceiling to the walls, to the tiled floors, and to the bed covers, blankets, and pillows on your bed. Everything smells strongly of antiseptic, and the constant beating from the machine – which you now know is a heart monitor – leads you to the conclusion that you’re in the hospital.

You don’t remember what happened though, can’t remember why you’re here in the first place. Heck, you don’t even remember who you are or what your name is. Your last thought makes you bolt up into a sitting position, sending your mind into a frenzied panic because holy ing hell, why don’t you remember anything at all? You hear the heart monitor beep like crazy, but you’re too busy having a panic attack to give a damn. What the is happening? Why can’t you remember a damn thing?

Your panicking is abruptly interrupted by the door to your room suddenly bursting open. A group of four people, including someone in scrubs, rush into your room and head straight towards your bed. You look at them with wide, panicked eyes, because you don’t recognize – you don’t remember – any of them.

The heart monitor keeps beeping like crazy and it’s getting harder to breathe, with everything around you beginning to spin as you feel light-headed once more. The person in scrubs – a nurse – approaches you with a syringe in his hand, the sight of which sends you into a full-blown panic because . . . what the hell is he going to do with that? Your frantic gaze lands on the three other people who entered with him, who decided to stand back a couple of feet away from your bed and just watch as the nurse try to get you to calm down. They’re looking at you with tears in their eyes, but you have no idea why. Are they looking at you like that because they’re pitying you, or are they looking at you like that because they’re people important to you and genuinely care and worry about you?

Something pricks at your right arm, distracting you from your panic attack as you train your gaze towards the nurse who had injected you with the syringe he brought with him. When he pulls the syringe back and disposes of it properly, he’s quick to grab your hands and rub soothing circles on the back of them with his glove-covered thumbs. He tells you to take deep breaths, tells you to inhale and exhale with him, and you try your best to follow his breathing pattern.

It takes a while, but you’re finally able to calm down with the help of the nurse and with the sedative finally taking effect. When your heartbeat finally returns to normal, the nurse makes you lie down as he tells you that he’d go out for a while to get your doctor to check up on you. You nod your head groggily, the sedative making you sleepy by the second, and then he’s out of the room, leaving you alone with the three women who have never taken their gazes off you ever since they entered.

You wanted to sit up again, talk to them maybe. Because your head is just so full of questions right now, questions that you’re hoping they know the answers to. But you’re slowly losing consciousness again, so all you can manage to let out are unintelligible grumbles before you finally succumb to another dreamless sleep.

OOOOO

A deep voice making a loud wailing noise is what pulls you from unconsciousness this time, your eyelids slowly fluttering at the sound. There’s a collective ‘shush’ from multiple people from all around the room, before another voice – one that sounds like chiming bells and everything beautiful – reprimands in a hushed tone.

“Don’t be so loud Yeojin! You’re going to wake her up!”

‘It’s a bit late for that,’ you think to yourself as you finally open your eyes, squinting against the room’s bright lights as a curse falls from your lips. There’s a gasp beside you, and suddenly everyone in the room with you turns silent. With a groan, you try to sit up on the bed to see them better, but your muscles are still weak and can’t communicate properly with your brain so you just fall back on the bed with another groan.

Huffing in frustration, you try to sit up again but your muscles and brain still won’t cooperate with you. But unlike the first time, there are a pair of hands that catch you this time, helping you up into a sitting position and even going as far as to put pillows against your back so that you’re sitting more comfortably. You turn towards the person who helped you to thank them but your breath catches in your throat when you finally see their – her – face because, holy , she’s just so pretty? Her auburn hair falls past her shoulders in waves, with the bangs covering her forehead making her look pretty and adorable at the same time. You find yourself getting lost in her doe-like eyes and the pink hue that’s slowly coloring her cheeks.

A couple of minutes pass with the two of you just staring at each other wordlessly. She’s looking at you like you’ve grown another head, but you can’t even bring yourself to mind because you just can’t look away from her. The moment ends much too soon for your liking though, because someone awkwardly clears their throat, forcing you to break eye contact with the pretty woman beside you.

Turning towards the culprit, you see a pipsqueak who looks barely past her teens standing a couple of feet away from your bed, looking at you with a raised eyebrow. Your own brows furrow at the expectant look she’s pinning you with, like she’s expecting you to say something, but you have no idea what. You let your gaze roam around the room, trying to avoid lil pipsqueak’s intense gaze, and it is only then that you realize that the two of them are not the only people in the room with you.

There’s a pair of brunettes sat by the windowsill and judging by their proximity and the way they hold hands like their lives depend on it, you figure they’re either really, really, really close best friends, or a couple. Four people are currently sharing the lone couch in the room, and you scan their faces one by one. The left end is occupied by a tiny pretty blonde who looks like a doll, and beside her is a dark-haired girl with cat-like eyes. Beside the brunette is a purple-haired girl who’s grinning at you brightly, and beside her is another brunette who’s currently smirking at you. At the other side of the room, there are another three girls who are sat side by side on monobloc chairs.

The girl at the right, with her brunette hair barely going past her chin, is smiling at you warmly and looks genuinely happy to see you awake. The one at the left, who has dark, wavy hair with hints of burgundy, is beaming at you and you can’t help but smile, thinking how much she and the purple-haired one could brighten up anybody’s day with their smiles alone. The last one, the girl sat in the middle with ash brown hair, is looking at you with a gaze so intense that you feel your blood rushing to your cheeks.

The way she’s looking at you makes you feel so flustered that you can’t keep her gaze for more than half a minute, breaking eye contact with her and redirecting your gaze to your hands resting on your lap. Your heart is still racing from that girl’s gaze and you’re confused as to why your body’s reacting like this with a simple gaze. There’s a moment of silence as you try to gather your thoughts, wondering who these people gathered in your room are. And this is one hugeass room too, how are you able to afford this? Who’s paying for your medical bills? How long have you been staying at this place? Your thoughts are interrupted when one of the girls clears their throat again.

“So . . . Jinsol . . .”

You lift your head at the voice, and you find your gaze locking with the short-haired woman sitting close to the door. She’s still smiling warmly at you, and her smile is surprisingly comforting as you feel some of the tension slowly easing from your body. You can’t help but smile back, despite not knowing anything about her, because her smile feels familiar. There’s a snort to your right and when you turn to look, the brunette who was smirking at you earlier is now glaring at you.

“You idiot! You made us worried for three whole ing months, Jung Jinsol!”

You flinch at her tone, debating whether you’re the one she’s talking to or not. But her glare is directed straight at you so there’s that. You laugh awkwardly, wincing as you hit a sore spot when you rub the back of your neck. You perk up when her words register in your brain though, because she called you by a name.

“Who’s Jinsol?” you ask a bit hesitantly, prompting raised eyebrows from everyone inside the room, including the goddess beside you. This makes you pause, looking at them one by one skeptically. “W-what? Did . . . did I say something wrong?”

“Stop joking around Jinsol. You’re not fooling us,” the taller brunette at the windowsill says, her brows now furrowed much like everyone else’s.

“I’m not fooling around! I swear!” you tell them quickly, desperate for them to believe you because you’re telling nothing but the truth. “So, my name is Jinsol?” you ask after a brief moment of silence, a bit glad that you now at least know your name.

Nobody’s answering your question. They’re all just looking at you with frowns on their lips and furrowed brows. It makes you feel conscious, so you train your gaze on your lap once again, playing with your fingers and waiting for someone, anyone, to break the silence that’s now surrounding all twelve of you. Your anxiety spikes when minutes pass by in agonizing silence, until the woman beside you reaches for your hand – the one that’s not hooked up on an IV drip – and intertwines your fingers together. You lift your gaze to look at her, and you find yourself feeling dreadful at the worried look in her eyes.

“Hey, Jinsol,” she starts, her grip on your hand tightening slightly. It brings a small comfort, the feel of her warm hands in yours. She really is beautiful, you think distractedly, as you find yourself admiring her doll-like face. You shake yourself from your daze when she starts talking again. “What’s my name?”

Her question catches you off guard, and you find yourself tensing up because you have no idea. She feels familiar – all of them do – like you’re supposed to know who they all are, but your mind’s coming up with a blank no matter how hard you try to recall. With a shaky breath, you shake your head, your shoulders slumping in defeat.

“I . . . I don’t . . . I don’t know. I don’t remember.”

You pause slightly, looking at her, at all of them, with pleading eyes. You feel frustration bubbling in the pit of your stomach, because they all now have that broken look in their eyes as they look at you, as they realize what you’ve come to realize that second time you woke up. The tears finally spill from your eyes and your shoulders shake from trying to contain the sob that wants to escape past your lips.

“I don’t remember anything.”

OOOOO

A/N: Hello. So, I haven’t been able to write for a while because I’ve been suffering from writer’s block. This is the first story I’ve published in weeks, and it’s also my attempt at trying to get past this stupid block. I also think that my writing is trash so I felt kinda embarrassed to publish my works. Still, this plot won’t really leave me alone so I ended up writing it down and publishing anyway. I think this will either be two or three chapters in total, depending on what I do end up writing. I have this fic planned out to the end. I originally planned on making this a bit shorter but I just can’t seem to write fics that are shorter than 3k :(

To those of you who know of my other story (Saudade), I’m sorry but I hit a block with that one and I’m putting it on hold for a while until I get my motivation for it back. I’m sorry for making any of you wait for long.

Also, pls talk to me on twitter lol. I want to have mutuals I can talk to about loona and fics/aus ideas. All the ideas that pop into my mind are angst and it’s the only category I don’t totally at so it would be great if I can talk about other ideas with people lol. Sorry, I think I’m kinda being desperate.

Anyway, hope you all have a good day. I have exams this week so the second chapter to this might get published either next week or the week after that.