Hwang Eunbi thought she must be going mad.

Here she was at the club for the third night in a row, doggedly abusing her liver and most definitely not looking for a certain pole dancer who had inexplicably pulled a Cinderella on her the other day. Not that she was that much of a connoisseur for Disney metaphors, no, but when one of your friend's price for rewatching the Harry Potter movies with you each time was a Disney marathon, one inevitably picked up a few things. At least Yerin never complained about either of their movie choices, despite having full complaining rights as snack provider on movie nights. Sojung would have loved to join them more often too, but work kept her away for long periods of time.

But back to the point at hand. Eunbi didn’t understand what went wrong. They had definitely been getting along on the dance floor - boy, that girl was kinda wild - but all of a sudden Eunbi found herself abandoned on the dance floor in between songs. She didn’t even know what she did wrong. One moment they had been all but grinding against each other - not something she would admit to Yerin, ever - and then suddenly Yuna freaked out and ran off when the song changed. Eunbi had been left alone on the dance floor; hot, bothered, and confused as hell.

She might have needed a very cold shower when she got home that night. In her grumpiness, she didn’t even check on the birthday twins until late evening of the next day. Yerin had been hungover - no surprise there - and apparently had no memory of Eunbi’s moment of gay panic the night before, which the dancer was happy to not remind her of.

Yewon, on the other hand, did remember the phone call, and was a lot more nosy than Eunbi had ever imagined her being. The dancer retaliated by demanding details about the strip club excursion, which only just managed to shut the younger artist up. Sort of. Eunbi had the feeling Yewon wasn’t telling her something, but if it got her to shut up about ‘the cute girl at the club’, she’d let it slide.

And so, that led the dancer to pretty much stalking the club in the hopes of seeing Yuna again. Not that she would ever admit it to herself, but she had been a little worried at the sudden change of expression on Yuna’s face, hurt and betrayal written all over her, like a wounded puppy left out in the rain. Eunbi had tried to fish more info about Yuna from the bartender, but apparently even he didn’t know much about her, only that she came in irregularly, performed, and left after a couple of drinks each time.

That didn’t leave her much to work with, which meant Eunbi started coming back to the club nightly ever since, drinking a lot more than was probably recommended. She just had a big payout from the last job, she reasoned, so she could afford to let go a little. Eunbi didn’t tell either of her best friends about her little encounter, not wanting them to worry.

Well, more like she didn’t want to deal with Yerin being dramatic about it. She could just imagine the older girl being all “if you were gay why weren’t you attracted to me first?”. Eunbi rolled her eyes at the thought. Yerin was almost disgustingly confident in her uality, something the dancer was secretly envious about. She had gone out with a few boys before but always broke it off before it became serious. Whereas Yerin had pretty much announced she was gay at their first meeting and then tried to hit on her almost immediately afterwards. It had been a very interesting experience, and definitely didn’t start them off on the right foot for their friendship, but somehow they had bonded over something else completely different. Eunbi smirked at the memory. Turns out beating up smarmy idiots was a great bonding activity, and once the two of them realized they had a similar sense of humour, it had been the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Thinking about her friends helped a little. Eunbi sighed into her drink. She could take up Yewon’s offer to talk about it, but first she wanted to figure out if it was just some kind of fleeting infatuation. One didn’t immediately come to terms with being gay right away. She wasn’t Yerin, who had known since she was about five that she preferred pretty girls over handsome boys. Eunbi hadn’t had to think about who she was attracted to, she pretty much just assumed she was straight just like everyone else.

Besides, Eunbi didn’t believe in love at first sight. That was just in the movies. She could understand attraction to someone good-looking, but falling in love right away? Call her a cynic, but she was wary about stuff like that. She could admit that she was attracted to Yuna, and that they had chemistry on the dance floor, but was that enough to make her gay?

She even tried dancing with other guys the last couple of nights, but had been bored almost instantly. It was fun dancing with Yuna, just enjoying the beat without having the distinct impression that her partner wanted in her pants. If anything, Eunbi was probably the one whose hands had been wandering a little more than was necessary, but we don’t talk about that.

Hwang Eunbi wanted to be over this already, but she could get no closure until she saw her mysterious pole dancer again. Not even Angkko could cheer her up properly the last few days, and her pup was usually a good distraction from everything.

This is the last time I’m coming here to look for her , Eunbi promised herself. They were strangers, she had no obligation to check on someone she barely knew. The dancer raised her glass to her lips, but a sudden hand slid over her wrist, stopping her from drinking.

“You shouldn’t drink so much.”

Eunbi froze. The voice that had haunted her dreams was right at her ear again. Turning around stiffly, Eunbi came face to face with the smiling face of one Choi Yuna, who appeared slightly apologetic for interrupting so abruptly.

“I’m sorry if I’m being too forward…” The tall girl hesitated and let her hand fall, but Eunbi’s body once again moved before her brain did, catching Yuna by the wrist and trapping her in place. No way in hell was she letting the girl run off again.

“Is that all you’re apologizing for?” Eunbi demanded, knowing she was being pushy, but the alcohol she had imbibed before Yuna’s appearance made her bold. Yuna winced visibly.

“...sorry about running off the other night.” Eunbi almost couldn’t hear her mumble, but she had yanked Yuna closer earlier in her attempt to stop her from leaving. The end result was that Yuna was about half a step from ending up in Eunbi’s lap, but Eunbi magically managed to not notice for the moment. Alcohol was a beautiful thing sometimes.

That moment didn’t last very long, however. Eunbi swallowed nervously at the doe eyes now inches away from her face. Yuna seemed to sense her sudden hesitation, because the same eyes started sparkling impishly with a mischief that spelled trouble in flashing neon letters.

“Hey, I gotta get ready for work now.”

Eunbi nodded reflexively, loosening her hold on Yuna’s wrist as if it burnt her. Letting go, of course, didn’t actually change the distance between the two currently. She really should have thought of that earlier. Hell, maybe actually thinking at all would be great in this situation. Was it too late to rewind back to a few minutes ago?

Hwang Eunbi promptly short-circuited when Yuna leaned in again to whisper into her ear. What was it with this girl and her habit of doing that? She needed to stop. Honestly, it was so unfair.

The dancer’s ears were still burning when Yuna skipped off with zero guilt about what she had just done. Eunbi scowled in the general direction where the other girl left, but anyone with eyes could see that her lips were twitching in a futile attempt to suppress a grin.

Wait for me, I’ll make it up to you later.

Yup, Eunbi was so screwed. She couldn’t wait.