Soooo….Now we know who to put Jihyo with in the story :)

Short establishing chapter.

Mina and Chaeyoung

Mina and Chaeyoung were very different people when looked at from an outside perspective.

Mina was the quiet, studious type. She never really spoke to anyone, let alone be apart of a large social group. While the other girls in her family were reasonably popular at school or at least part of larger social circles, Mina just wasn’t like that. When her sisters went out, she stayed in playing video games. If Sana had her friends over she would hide till they left, or if she spotted someone from class in the street she had been known to dive into bushes as a means of escape. What some may call it an embarrassing tumble into leaves and twigs, Mina called it an effective escape route. Worked like a charm if she was being honest and she didn’t wish to plan any other form of escape route. It served its purpose.

Chaeyoung on the other hand was an artist. She was daring and rebellious as well as sensitive in a way that nobody truly understood. Everything through her eyes got a different spin, to her the world was beautiful in various different ways and she attempted to capture this beauty in any way she could. The best example was her love of graffiti, the use of spray paints to make amazing pieces of urban art was something that appealed to Chaeyoung. The year or so she spent living on the streets had put her in contact with many taggers, who taught her the place of oppression and dystopia within the art form and it had always had a special place in her heart. Unfortunately, these same people were the ones who introduced her to petty crime as a form of thrill, now she was an adrenaline junkie - the type of adrenalin she could only get from running away from the police. She had brought home by police many times and Sang and Min-Jun didn’t know what to do.

If she continued to get into trouble she’d be taken away from them, put back into the care system until she was eighteen. Chaeyoung didn’t know that but Mina had overheard the conversation with the social worker. They had four social workers that came throughout the year: one flew over from the foster home in Japan to check on Momo, Sana and Mina, one was from the home Nayeon, Jihyo and Jeongyeon came from (though since Jeongyeon turned eighteen they only came to see Jihyo now), one flew in from Taiwan to speak with Tzuyu and the final was one Chaeyoung had been appointed after her old home closed due to the abuse. Mina had overheard Chaeyoung’s case worker telling their Appa’s that if they couldn’t control her, Chaeyoung would have to go to someone that could. After hearing that, the youngest Japanese girl decided to look after Chaeyoung.

She was a calming influence on the younger girl, with Chaeyoung now preferring to stay home and hang with Mina rather than go out raising hell with Somi. Even on the occasions she did, the fear of disappointing Mina by being brought home by police again led to extra care being taken for her not to be caught which everyone supposed was still a better outcome. The duo were extremely close due to this. Chaeyoung had invited the previously loner Mina to join her little group and let Mina open up to new people for the first time. Mina had calmed Chaeyoung enough so she could stay with the Kim’s, Mina may be closest to Sana (they are twins after all) but Chaeyoung was someone Mina valued a lot more than she could explain.

It was like they were soul-mates, originally not thought of in the romantic way. The original thought had been that they were destined to be friends and bring out the best in one another. They were cute and just clicked instantly in a way Mina hadn’t experienced before. If you couldn’t tell she didn’t really like people all that much. While the original thought had been more innocent as the duo grew up the feelings began to change. Now as Chaeyoung sat at the table opposite her, chewing her pen as her brow furrowed at the complex world of maths homework, Mina couldn’t help but feel her heart tremble a little. It had gotten worse since she’d dyed her hair blonde, Sana had leant her the hair dye and when Mina saw Chaeyoung an hour after she first entered the bathroom her heart genuinely stopped for a moment.

Chaeyoung didn’t know she felt like this - she couldn’t know.

She could never know that Mina thought about her more than she should, she never knew the way she made butterflies erupt in Mina’s stomach whenever she was around, that Mina got irrationally jealous whenever she would sneak out at night to go hell-raising with Somi. It could never be something that left Mina’s head, she would never say it out loud at all. It made her feel dirty, thinking of Chaeyoung that way. She was meant to view the girl as her sister, they were by all assumption related - maybe not by blood but all eight of them had the same Appas. To feel the way Mina felt was disgusting and wrong, she could only put it down to Chaeyoung being someone she was close to. It must have confused her head and made her think things that couldn’t be true.

But as she watched Chaeyoung chewing her pen, her eyes stayed on the lips wrapped round it. Vaguely she wondered what it would be like to kiss her, that is before the shame of what she was thinking filled her and she was forced to look away. What was wrong with her? It wasn’t like plenty of other people weren’t interested in her, Momo was constantly yelling at people in school for hitting on her sisters including Mina. She knew that she was conventionally attractive, she could get into a relationship if she really wanted to but whoever she was with couldn’t live up to the version of Chaeyoung she created within her mind.

“You okay?”

Even her voice makes me feel weak.

Mina looked up and sent her a tight smile, “Of course why?”

Chaeyoung shrugged, “You just looked really red all of a sudden.”

It was then Dahyun leaned over and touched Mina’s forehead, “You don’t feel warm.”

“I’m okay.” Mina reassured, prompting everyone to get back to their homework,

That was the other thing, the other reason Mina knew that things wouldn’t work out if she told anyone about this disgusting crush. She couldn’t deal with the competition, Somi was bad enough but Chaeyoung had quite a few suitors and despite saying she didn’t like the fourth member of their little group that way it was only a matter of time before the artist found her muse. Someone to write poetry about, draw sketches of, someone who’d make her feel the things she only ever heard in songs. When that time came it would kill Mina. Even though she would vehemently deny it, Chaeyoung was a hopeless romantic. She loved hard as most artists did, when someone caught her attention Mina didn’t know how she would handle it.

As she looked up from her homework once more she didn’t look at Chaeyoung but instead looked at the source of her turmoil. Mina knew heart eyes, she’d seen Sana make them enough and occasionally when no one else was looking Mina would spot that same look on others faces. She’d see someone staring at one of her sisters longingly and usually it would make Mina chuckle.

But whenever she saw Dahyun give that look to Chaeyoung her heart shattered in her chest.