“are you okay?”, Mina looked at Jeongyeon who sneezed a lot, a little worried.

“i’m okay..”, he rubbed his nose. “just got a cold. Maybe i’m too tired lately. Just more rest and i’ll be okay”.

“i told you to just stay at my place. The rain didn’t even stop until this morning. You must be drenched”, she crossed her arms.

“i can’t. It’s just the two of us, people will misunderstand”, Jeongyeon answered nonchalantly. He was busy with his kimchi stew.

“but i don’t mind with people’s thought”, Mina took some meat from her soup and gave those to Jeongyeon’s soup.

Jeongyeon lifted his head up, meeting Mina’s eyes, dumbfounded.

“what??”

Mina cleared . Suddenly the air felt awkward. She tried to divert their conversation.

“ehm, so... how about Nayeon? Is she in Seoul, too?”, she’s back eating her own soup, not meeting Jeongyeon’s eyes.

“oh. Do you remember her, too? Actually she’s studying at SNU too, psychology major. We live together...”, Jeongyeon answered, a little taken aback by the sudden turn of conversation. But he just ignored it.

“you two live together?”, Mina snapped her head towards Jeongyeon. “So, are you two together now?”

“No, actually she’s dating Momo. You must know Momo, right?”

“eh, Momo? Hirai Momo who’s in my department?”, Mina was clearly surprised by the news.

“yeah, that Momo. Actually we three live together. We have known each other since high school”, Jeongyeon answered, with a little pressure in the word ‘three’ to avoid misunderstanding.

“aaah, so, are you kind of single right now?”, Mina asked him back, a relieved tone apparent on her voice.

“well, yeah”, Jeongyeon blushed a little ,”don’t know why i’m still single for so long. Maybe i’m not really attractive”, he joked. It was all lie, and Jeongyeon – eventhough he was a little dense sometimes – knew that there’s one or two girls in a month who came to him suddenly and confessed that they liked him.

“you’re always attractive for me”, Mina said quietly, her head lowered even more to her soup.

Jeongyeon heard her words, but he chose to be silent.

‘Open your heart, Jeongyeon-ah. Maybe that’s the only way for you to move on from Nayeon’, Jihyo said to him, when he’s forced to finally confess about his feeling about Nayeon to Jihyo. Sometimes ago, Jihyo cornered Jeongyeon when the two of them went out together on their weekly get-together, being ditched by Momo and Nayeon who went to amusement park. For Jihyo, Jeongyeon was like an open book. She had been suspicious of him ever since three of her bestfriend lived together. Jeongyeon would asked her out after her class, or when she refused he would plead to her to allow him to just play at her house, then went home when it’s already late – or when she’s tired of him and just kicked him out from her house. The possibility of Jihyo liking Jeongyeon, or the other way around-  is almost 0%, because first : Jeongyeon always since middle school and she really hated that kind of boy; and second : Nayeon confessed to her that Jeongyeon was her first love. But Jihyo – proved to be the best of bestfriend for Nayeon, and to not make Jeongyeon, Nayeon, and Momo felt awkward at each other – never disclosed Nayeon’s biggest secret to them.

“are you currently dating someone, Mina-ya?”, Jeongyeon decided to asked her the important question.

Mina looked up to his face slowly, an unreadable expression plastered on her face. Then she shook her head quietly.

“great! I don’t need to worry then when i want to ask you to hang out together”, Jeongyeon smiled sincerely.

Suddenly Mina felt hot, her face blushed hard. She couldn’t help to lower her head again, holding back a smile.

------------------------------------------------

 The summer season passed by quickly. The leaves slowly turned into red, brown, and yellow hue, the air became cooler, and suddenly everybody on street had put on their coats to keep them warmer.

October 31st is Nayeon, Jeongyeon, Jihyo, and Momo special day. They wouldn’t come to any halloween party, but just prepared their own party because Jeongyeon’s birthday coincidentally fell on November 1st. They would started their own Halloween party a little late and kept the party going on until 2 a.m next day to celebrate Jeongyeon’s birthday, then ended up with them having sleepover together.

Jeongyeon tightened his own black long coat, waiting for Mina at the little park outside her department. Jeongyeon decided to bring Mina along to their BFF halloween party and his birthday party, because Mina insisted to be the first one to celebrate Jeongyeon’s party together along his bestfriends. They had been spending time together during summer, and they grew closer inevitably. Sometimes Jeongyeon brought her along to his weekend date with Jihyo or Momo, but never when Nayeon was present. Once he ever had brought Mina along to his bestfriends weekend date, and it ended up with Nayeon got badmood throughout the day and made Momo had the longest and hardest day ever. Momo finally went to apologize to Jeongyeon and pleaded him to not bring Mina along when Nayeon was present because Nayeon said (or maybe reasoned) that their BFF weekend date was supposedly just for the four of them to talk about things that couldn’t be talked to other people. But Momo added that it was fine with Momo or Jihyo, so it was okay for them to bring Mina along as long as Nayeon was not present. Jeongyeon was dumbfounded by Nayeon’s childishness, but he agreed as long as Momo stop apologizing over and over again.

Jeongyeon just hoped that Nayeon would understand and didn’t make the fuss out of it tonight. There’s nothing personal to be talked about at the party anyway.

Eventhough Jeongyeon and Mina had grown closer, they weren’t official yet. Their bestfriends knew that neither of them had confessed to each other. Jihyo and Momo often nagged to Jeongyeon and urged him to just confess and to not to be afraid, that she wouldn’t reject him. Nayeon, on the other hand, just stayed silent and pretended to be busy with her phone when the topic of Jeongyeon’s love life came up. Jeongyeon and Momo just assumed that she behaved like that because of their agreement of not to meddle with each other relationship, but Jihyo knew better than anyone. Often Jihyo thought that Nayeon hadn’t been over her first love yet, but when Jihyo cornered Nayeon alone, Nayeon just denied – a little bit too strongly according to Jihyo – and said that Jeongyeon’s love life was not her business.

“Did i make you wait for too long?”, Mina suddenly appeared in front of Jeongyeon, holding her violin’s case on her right hand. “I told you to just come inside”.

Jeongyeon smiled, shook his head.

“No, it’s barely an hour. I love to see the foliage too”, he stood up, then grabbed Mina’s violin case. “come on, let me take you home first. And grab some dinner before coming to the party”.

Mina just nodded and smiled warmly.

“what do you want to eat, Jeongyeon-ah?”, Mina asked him.

“anything is okay. How about you?”, Jeo