Ha Sooyoung. She’s supposed to be the logical one, the cool one, the calculated one. Always calm, collected. No one’s seen her break under pressure - from always ranking high in academics or when she’s performing with her dance crew.

Unfortunately for her, something is breaking that facade she’s unknowingly built for so long.

But, why? One might ask.

Two words. Or, a name to be more accurate.

Kim Jiwoo.

Damn her. What’s her business coming into Sooyoung’s life, messing up her life, out of nowhere?

Sooyoung hates this feeling. Palms sweaty, heart beat racing, mouth drying up — sympathetic mode on full alert. But it’s not like it was triggered by a lion about to viciously attack her.

Nope, quite the opposite in fact.

A lion might be the opposite of how one would describe Kim Jiwoo. She’s small, she’s cute (understatement of the year), and really the embodiment of a person that just lights up the room whenever she’s there. She’s so endearing, she even got the nickname “Chuu” - like an onomatopoeia for the squeals a lot of people let out when Jiwoo speaks to them.

——
The first time they met really caught Sooyoung off guard. She did something that’s very much unlike her. It’s like logic did not exist anymore, and before she knew it, her feet and mouth were already moving towards its own goal, unstoppable.

Sooyoung got hired to be an extra for some web drama. She’s modeled before, so it’s not like this was that big of a deal. On the set, while waiting for staff to let her know what to do next, her eyes catches a girl standing in front of an elevator. She was wearing a simple t-shirt and jeans, a cap slightly hiding her face. Maybe it’s curiosity, but Sooyoung moves a little bit closer (really, just a tad) just to see this stranger’s face better. 

She’s cute.

The first words that come into her mind. But it’s not a big deal, it’s not like she hasn’t seen cute girls before. Something feels different though. Sooyoung doesn’t know who this girl is, nor what she’s doing here. She does look a little timid, a little shy; like she’s unsure of where she needs to be. After a few seconds, Sooyoung gets pulled away from her thoughts when she hears the elevator ding, signaling its arrival.

For some reason, Sooyoung’s fight-or-flight mode turns on. Her head spewing thoughts of, What if I don’t see her again?

Her feet take a few quick strides, in the direction of the elevator, and things happened very, very fast. The last thing Sooyoung was clearly conscious of was seeing the girl step inside the elevator.

The next series of events, Sooyoung swears, it’s like her spirit left her body and just watched her own physical body do what it did.

Thud!

Her hand slams almost a bit too hard on one side of the closing elevator doors, force just enough to keep the elevator open. Breathlessly, she says, “..Can I get your number?”

Right after she hears her own voice say those words, only then did Sooyoung truly realize the exact situation she was in, what she has truly done. She wanted the floor to swallow her up.

It took almost all of her courage (and she has a lot), to look up, slowly, starting from the girl’s Stan Smith’s all the way up to her eyes.

Jiwoo looked a bit confused, but that quickly disappeared. Her face breaks out into the brightest, biggest smile (Sooyoung swears she’s not exaggerating), and wow, Sooyoung didn’t think she was capable of swooning, but this might be a first.

“Sure!” The girl giggles. The door starts closing again, so Sooyoung just by reflex steps inside. What have I done?

 “Are you here for the shoot too?” Sooyoung wishes Chuu wasn’t looking at her, because she swears she’s red as a tomato. Sooyoung just diverts her eyes downwards, suddenly, her feet seem incredibly interesting.

She takes a deep breath, in a futile attempt to calm herself down a bit (really, it seems impossible at this point). “Yes, I am.”

A few seconds of silence, then Sooyoung feels a nudge on her arm. She looks down, and she sees a phone being shoved towards her. “Here you go! Just give me a missed call so I can save your number too.”

They exchange numbers, and the day becomes progresses quite peacefully from that point on. Except, by the end of it, Sooyoung realizes she’s made a huge mistake. Well, two actually:

1) Jiwoo is definitely NOT quiet (the girl definitely can run her ears off any day).

2) She realized her heart can do things she didn’t know it could before (like backflips, it felt like).

——

It’s been three days since they met, and Sooyoung hasn’t texted Jiwoo nor given her a missed call. She forgot to do so on the same day, and now it just feels weird to do it after so much time has passed.

Sooyoung almost gets mad a how illogically nervous she is about sending her a text. But she knows, she needs to do something about it because it’s ALL she could think about the past few days, and it’s started to affect her productivity - having to check her phone, unlock it, then re-lock it before sighing and putting it away again (only to repeat the cycle 10 minutes later).

Get your together.

She starts composing a message, but isn’t quite sure which of the 10 variations she has thought of was the best one to actually send. Really, it’s starting to get ridiculous.

With a deep breath, and eyes shut tight, she hits send, the message simple: “Hey Jiwoo. It’s Sooyoung. How have you been?” Except, Sooyoung must have pressed something else, because at the end of her text, yep, there it is in it’s yellow smug glory - a winky face.

. . . Oh my god, please no.

Her fingers start fumbling, trying to see if there was a delete message option, or a stop sending option, or a punch me in the face option—

Then, she sees the 3 dots signifying that Jiwoo was typing up something in response. Sooyoung never felt as close to death before.

The first text was actually a mad emoji. Sooyoung’s heart stills.

“Why did it take you so long to text me?! I didn’t have your number so I couldn’t do it first”

Okay, for now she’s okay, Sooyoung thinks. The winky face has been ignored into oblivion, and she can more carefully and with eyes open definitely this time, muster a reply.

“I’m sorry, I got really busy with school and dancing”

“It’s okay! I’m so happy you finally texted! But wow, you dance?”

Stop beating so damn fast, you stupid heart.

“Yes, I do, with a dance crew” 

“Wow! But I should have known, you have the vibes of a dancer”

 Sooyoung can’t help but smile. She takes a lot of pride in being a dancer.

“What makes you say that?”

“Oh ya know~ you’re cool and pretty like a lot of dancers”

Sooyoung choked. This girl, seriously, is doing things to her.

She didn’t really know how to reply to that, she was still taking some time trying to get over the back-handed compliment. She gets another text, however.

“Are you free to hang out tomorrow afternoon?”

Actually, she’s not. Her schedule is pretty busy, top student by day, and dancer by night. But, all that doesn’t matter much anymore.

“Yes, I am.”

——

It took Sooyoung entirely too long to get herself ready today. It was a very, very important day. She eventually decided on wearing a simple crop top t-shirt with some high-waisted jeans. Fingers nervously drumming on the table, as she looks out the window from her seat at this new cafe her and Jiwoo decided to meet at. She looks at her phone to check the watch every few minutes, and she realizes Jiwoo was just about to hit the 10-minute mark for being late.

Is she ditching me? Sooyoung swallows nervously. She’s waited four days too long to see her again.

“Hi!” Sooyoung gasps in surprise at the sudden greeting. Jiwoo in her entirely too cute outfit of a sweater and jeans greets brightly as she takes a seat in front of Sooyoung.

“Sorry, did you wait long?” Jiwoo looked a little disheveled, cheeks a bit flushed like she was rushing to get to the cafe.

“Oh, not really,” a lie, she’s been waiting here almost 30 minutes, “...are you okay?”

Jiwoo nods animatedly. Gosh, this girl is really just an anime character that jumped out of a manga and straight into the real world. “My audition ran a bit late, I’m sorry!” Jiwoo pouts, and Sooyoung is internally screaming.

“Audition? What for?”

“Ah, well I’ve been trying to find another company to take me after my last didn’t quite work out. I want to be an idol someday!” Jiwoo says, with a face-splitting grin. Sooyoung can’t believe how positive this girl is. It’s really quite contagious (and not just because she’s so cute).

“I’m sure you’ll find one soon. Those companies have no idea what they’re losing if they don’t take you. You’re perfect to be an idol.”

Sooyoung realizes maybe she said too much and made things awkward when the other girl didn’t say anything right away. But she looks up, and she almost wishes she didn’t, because Jiwoo is looking at her with so much gratitude and warmth it makes Sooyoung’s heart pound.

“...You really think so, Sooyoung?”

It just hits Sooyoung then, that no matter how bright the other girl is, she’s also had her fair share of hardships. Pursuing the life of a celebrity is definitely not an easy task. Sooyoung gets a sudden urge to protect Jiwoo; she wants to take care of her, comfort her, make her smile all the time.

And maybe she’ll do just that.

——

Their first not-date went well, excellent, as a matter of fact. They spent almost 3 hours at the cafe talking about anything under the sun, bef