Day 72

“You’re already so good at everything?” Minju said with what sounded like a disappointed voice to Sakura.

“Well, it’s only thanks to you,” Sakura said, immediately praising the other girl, but it did not seem to make the girl any happier. “What’s wrong?”

“Ah, don’t get me wrong. I’m happy that you’ve picked up everything so fast, but it’s just that, well, I don’t really have anything left to teach you about makeup.” Minju’s face somehow remained beautiful despite visibly pouting. Or it may have just been Sakura’s personal bias that every expression the girl made was pretty.

“Oh, is that it?” Sakura laughed. “I still have a lot to learn. I think I still need a lot of help with what to do with this.” She pointed to her hair which she had kept styled the same way since she was twelve.

“Well, it’s not like I know how to cut it for you. I’m not much better at knowing what styles are good either,” Minju sighed.

“Well, maybe we can learn together? You know what I’m like. I’ll probably just go to the same hair salon I’ve gone to since I was five if I don’t have someone to help me.”

Minju seemed to perk up at this. “That’s true. And even if you did go to a new place, you’d just mumble and ask for a simple cut.”

Sakura couldn’t deny Minju’s observation. Despite the words sounding disparaging, it made Sakura feel slightly giddy that she had gotten close enough to Minju that the girl both knew what her personality was like and could say it so directly. “And if I’m not there you’d let the person do whatever they wanted since you can’t say no.”

Minju rolled her eyes but didn’t disagree. After a moment, she looked at Sakura with a suppressed giggle. “This is nice.”

Sakura didn’t have to ask the girl what she meant by it. She agreed most definitely that sitting here with Minju and spending time in each other’s presence felt really good. “Even if there’s nothing for you to teach me, I still want to meet with you like this when you have the time. Maybe, we can learn together about the things we don’t know.” Sakura wanted to hit herself for adding the last part. Why couldn’t she simply have left it at her wanting to spend time with Minju?

“I’d love that. I’ve saved a bunch of Youtube tutorials on simple hair styles. We can look at those next time,” Minju said, smiling widely.

Sakura sighed as she participated in her favorite past time in class. Staring at Chaewon. While she had congratulated herself earlier in the morning with how she and Minju had been progressing, she was left feeling stumped about Chaewon.

Things had been going better than Sakura would have ever hoped for this year. Before, she would have been happy if her crush simply knew that she existed. However, Chaewon not only knew Sakura existed, but even nearly talked with her every day.

They still hadn’t managed to progress to a first-name basis relationship though. Outside of that one time in gym, Chaewon called Sakura’s first name and dared her to do the same, neither of them really tried again. The girls both agreed that it felt weird and reverted back to Miyawaki and Kim, albeit without the -san honorific. I guess that’s something at least.

Sakura watched as Chaewon smirked to herself. The girl must be thinking of something other than classwork. Sakura knew she had it bad when she found it fun even to guess what the girl could have been finding funny. A second later, she found herself staring face to face with Chaewon. They sat there for a few seconds looking at each other before Sakura found herself making a silly looking smile. The other girl smiled back in response.

What was that? Sakura found herself slightly dumbfounded by what had just happened. She was caught staring and she didn’t look away this time. What’s more, the object of her affection, had smiled back.

There’s a perfectly logical explanation for this, Sakura told herself. They could be considered more than acquaintances and classmates by now. Friend was probably a little bit of a stretch but seemed better than nothing. Friends looking at each other during class and smiling was normal. She and Yena and Chaeyeon often did that.

She didn’t know why she didn’t turn away this time. The only thing that Sakura could think of was that she had been disarmed by the look on Chaewon’s face. The smirk from before was still there, but she’d raised an eyebrow in a quizzical fashion. It was different from the glare that she often had at the start of the year. Some say that familiarity breeds contempt, but this did not seem to be the case at all. The more Sakura got to know Chaewon, the more she understood the girl did not find her staring to be creepy; only curious.

Sakura watched as Yena returned to her desk out of breath. As soon as the lunch bell started, she ran to the front of the room and shouted a public service announcement regarding the election today, making sure that everyone remembered to vote. “I didn’t know you cared so much about school politics.”

“It’s our school. You should care about what’s going to happen for the rest of the year,” Yena said earnestly.

Sakura nodded. “I guess I shouldn’t really be surprised. You volunteer for a lot of things and signed up for a lot of activities.”

“I worked so hard to get in this school. I love this school a lot. I would have volunteered for class rep too, but Chaeyeon is more suited for it than I am.”

“She is very reliable. Her grades are amazing too. And everyone likes her,” Sakura agreed whole-heartedly.

“I was going to say, she’s more suited for it because she’s more like a mom,” Yena said, frowning. “I’m reliable too, and everyone likes me as well. My grades… well, they’re getting better.”

“Are they? Let’s see your last test scores,” Sakura said innocently with her eyes wide open.

“Uh, I don’t have them here. I brought them home.”

“Sorry,” Sakura giggled as she watched Yena grow more and more flustered. Am I becoming a sadist? Sakura couldn’t help but wonder. She really enjoyed teasing Minju and now Yena. It was like she awakened to something.

“Hmph,” Yena pouted.

“Speaking of grades though. This school was hard to get into. You must have done pretty well on the entrance exams if you managed to get in.”

“Yeah, I studied my off. It was a high-level school and I thought it would help me get into a public university which would really help my parents out a lot.”

Sakura gave Yena a warm smile. The girl was too precious for words sometimes. “Your parents are really nice. I talked with them quite a bit when I visited you.”

“Really? That’s the first I heard of that.” Yena had a panicked look on her face which made Sakura laugh.

“Don’t worry. They didn’t say anything embarrassing and I didn’t tell them that you were barely passing.”

“Thanks. They said they like you too. Actually, they ask about you quite a lot. They want to know when you’d visit next. I told them you were just delivering stuff because I was sick, but they seemed to get the idea that you would come again.”

“Well, they did ask if I was a friend when I was leaving. I said that I was, and they actually invited me to stay a little longer. That’s when they started asking a lot of questions about how you were at school. I may have exaggerated a little bit here or there, but I think I left a good impression on them.”

Yena had a pensive look on her face that was unlike anything that Sakura had ever seen on her. “They never ask me about school directly. They were surprised when I said I wanted to go to this school. I kind of knew they think I couldn’t do it. So, when I made it, while they were very happy for me, I think they were still a little worried that I wouldn’t be able to handle the course load here.”

“You’re a good kid, Yena,” Sakura said, surprising herself, as she reached out and pat the girl on the head.

“We’re the same age,” Yena said as she moved her head out from under Sakura’s hand and gave her a disgusted look.

“Actually, I’m older than you. You haven’t had your birthday yet this year. They showed me your photo album and I saw the dates on them.”

“Wait. You’ve seen my baby pictures? That means you’ve seen me ?” Yena shrieked.

“What did you think of the speech?” Eunbi asked Sakura after the debate between the candidates finished.

“I wasn’t really paying attention to the campaign up until now, but I really liked Wonyoung’s speech. I think she has a good chance,” Sakura said as she got up from her chair. She had been so mesmerized by how eloquent the younger girl had been that she had remained seated until almost everyone had left the auditorium.

“Yeah, I liked it too. I think her platform is a good one. I’ll be casting my vote for her. I just hope she doesn’t get backlash because of her name.”

“Her name?” Sakura asked, confused.

“Yeah, she’s the daughter of the school founder. Oh, right, you weren’t here for this year’s opening ceremony. She’d given a speech about her family and the school at the start of the year,” Eunbi explained.

“N-no, I never knew,” Sakura replied, slightly stunned at the news. The girl had said her last name was Jang, but Sakura had never connected that with the founder of the school. “I guess I did know that she was rich, but I didn’t know she was also related to the school in that way.”

“Are you okay?” Eunbi asked as she looked at Sakura. “You look a little pale.”

“I’m fine. I’m just a little surprised. I thought Wonyoung-chan would have told me about something so important.”

“Ah, this is the rich junior that you’ve told me about.”

“Yeah, I guess, she didn’t think we were close enough to tell me more about herself. I must not be important to her,” Sakura said and immediately regretted it. The words sounded bitter to her own ears.

“Kkura, I don’t think that’s true,” Eunbi said gently. As usual, the older girl was extremely perceptive about Sakura’s true feelings. “Sometimes, when we become extremely close with someone, we become afraid that it might end. We keep some things to ourselves because letting that other person know could change the relationship completely.”

Sakura looked at Eunbi and could see that she wasn’t really talking about Wonyoung. “You haven’t kept anything from me that you should be worried about Senpai.”

“Let me finish, Kkura. I think I need to explain myself a bit better.” Eunbi motioned for Sakura to sit back down on the chair and she did the same next to her. “I don’t think I ever apologized for not telling you that there was a chance I might have to quit the club earlier than expected. I thought you would take it badly and that you would no longer enjoy the time we had left together.”

“You were right though. I did take it badly.” Sakura was reminded how she had nearly hyperventilated at the thought of her senpai leaving the club.

“I didn’t tell you, not because we’re not close, but because we’re so close. I wanted to do everything in my power to maintain what we have. But I think it was selfish of me, because you would have been left unprepared for when I did leave.”

“I could never be prepared for that.” Of that, Sakura was sure. She looked at Eunbi and could see that her hands were trembling. She looked down at her own hands and could see they were doing the same thing. Impulsively, she reached out and held both Eunbi’s hands in her own, finding comfort in their shared nervousness. “I’d like to think I’m strong enough to handle it, but you know me too well.”

“Maybe not when we first met, but you are strong enough to handle it now. Ever since I found you and you found me, I’ve wanted to protect you and give you everything. But I know from watching you grow, that you don’t need anything from me or my protection anymore.” Eunbi’s grip on Sakura’s hand grew firmer with each moment as if finding strength in the words she spoke.

Sakura shook her head. “Even now, you gave me guidance and advice that I needed. I’ll never not need you. You said you’d come by even after you graduate. I’m going to hold you to that.”

Sakura followed Wonyoung silently as the girl dragged her by the arm to the roof of the school. As she left the auditorium with Eunbi, the youngster had popped up and excused herself before grabbing Sakura by the wrist like some TV drama heroine.

After they reached the roof of the school, Wonyoung opened it and gently pulled Sakura forward before closing the door behind them. The girl was in a frightful state as she looked at Sakura with downcast eyes. “Unnie, are you mad at me?”

“Why should I be mad?” Sakura asked patiently. She could see an image of Eunbi standing in Wonyoung’s place looking sad as she told her about how she might leave the club earlier than expected. She shook her head to clear her thoughts as the younger girl worked up her nerve to explain herself.

“We’ve known each other for a few months now and I never told you about who I am,” Wonyoung finally said as she looked down. “I never told you that my family founded the school and let you worry about why I was so busy everyday.”

“I know who you are,” Sakura said after she watched the contrite younger girl for a moment. She moved closer to the girl so that she could look up at the girl. Despite looking and behaving so maturely, Sakura knew that deep down the girl was still just a kid. “Your family is your family. You’re Wonyoung-chan. You’re the girl who calls me Unnie.”

Wonyoung leaned forward until her chin rested on Sakura’s shoulder. She didn’t hug Sakura as her arms lay limply at her sides, so Sakura took the initiative and did the hugging. “Unnie, when I first met you, I was so happy that you treated me just like any other first-year. You didn’t treat me like I was some Chaebol heir or as someone with authority. I thought that it was only because you didn’t know who my family was. As we got to know each other more and more it became difficult to bring it up.”

Sakura rubbed her hand against Wonyoung’s back soothingly as the girl continued to talk. She felt angry at herself for feeling hurt when she learned the girl’s status. She could see why the girl had been scared to say anything if her immediate gut reaction was to feel sorry for herself for being kept in the dark.

“I really tried to tell you more about myself. I tried to hint at it when we were together by talking about how others treated me, but you never seemed to take the hint. I thought you would ask me about it when we went on our date, but you just took my bodyguards in stride like you take everything about me. I thought maybe that I was worried about nothing and should just tell you who I was. But I just kept thinking the worst of you. I’d understand if you don’t want anything to do with me.”

Wonyoung’s body shook in Sakura’s arms which made her hold the girl tighter. “I’m not angry. If I am upset with you at all, it’s only because I thought we were close enough for you to tell me anything. But I know that it is precisely because we’re so close that you had trouble telling me something that might change our relationship.”

“When you worried about me being bullied or not having friends, I felt bad that you were only thinking that way because you didn’t have the full picture. But I was also secretly happy that you cared and worried about me. Outside of my family, there’s never been anyone like you. I ended up not being able to do anything until it was too late. I knew you would know everything after today’s election.”

Sakura slowly moved away from Wonyoung so she could look at the girl in the eyes. Her expression must have given the girl courage to continue as she could hear Wonyoung’s voice become firmer the more she spoke her rambling thoughts.

“I brought you here wanting to apologize to you and expecting you to not want anything to do with me anymore. But I don’t want that. I want to continue to call you unnie and have you call me Wonyoung-chan.”

“Senpai, your eyes look a bit puffy,” Yujin said with a worried voice.

“Ah, it must be allergies or something,” Sakura answered vaguely as she pulled out a mirror to look at it.

“That was some debate. Can you believe it? A first-year won the school presidency. That’s pretty impressive,” Yujin crowed.

“Oh, she did?” Sakura asked, surprised, but elated for Wonyoung. She hadn’t even thought of checking the results after her talk with the other girl.

“Yep!” Yujin nodded enthusiastically. “She’s actually in my class. I thought she was a little stuck up before, but it turns out I was really wrong about her. She started opening up to some of us in the class and we’ve become friends with her.”

“That’s wonderful. She’s a really sweet kid,” Sakura added.

“You know her? I guess everyone knows her. Her family’s famous. But she never lords it over us. That’s what I like about her.” Yujin’s face turned sour as she looked at Sakura suddenly. She then turned and looked in the direction of the wall that separated their room and the music room. “Unlike your friend Nako.”

“Oh, no, what did she do?” Sakura asked. For some reason, Yujin didn’t seem to get along with Nako from what she could tell.

“After she got Yuri to join the club, she went and targeted all the cute girls in the class and asked them to join the music club. Word spread that if you were asked it meant you were cute.” Yujin nearly spat out the words.

Sakura winced and could guess that a certain someone wasn’t asked. “You know she probably didn’t ask you because she knows how extremely important you are to me.”

Yujin blinked, looking stunned for a moment, before her eyes narrowed again. “You’re trying to distract me and stop me from being annoyed by your friend. She asked Yuri and she’s important to you too.”

“Yuri’s different. She wanted to join the light music club. She only joined the art club because it let her use the music room when she wanted to. If she took you, she knows I would be completely and utterly devastated.”

“You’re not playing fair, Senpai,” Yujin said after trying to continue to stare daggers at the direction of the music room and failing. She turned to Sakura with a little smile.

“What?” Sakura asked, wondering what Yujin meant.

“What?” Yujin asked back as she looked at Sakura with disbelief on her face. “Never mind. I kind of understand that little squirt more now though.”

“Senpai, were you listening?” Yuri asked excitedly as she bounded into the room.

“Yeah, that’s why I’m just finishing up putting things away. I kept getting distracted by your music. You guys had a long practice session,” Sakura said, happy to see Yuri so happy as well.

“Yeah, Nako had to leave earlier due to her cram school today, but the rest of us managed to stay behind. We were really getting into it. She found some really good singers,” Yuri gushed over her new club members.

“Do you think they’ll stay in the club?” Sakura asked. Nako may have seemed strategic in her recruitment of new members. She targeted good singers and asked all the cutest girls. It became somewhat of a status symbol to have been recruited by Nako among the first-years. In reality, Sakura knew that Nako didn’t have the slightest ulterior motive in mind with how she conducted her search. The girl simply loved cute idols and therefore she looked for cute girls.

“I think they’re having fun. Tryouts are still going on, but Nako’s pretty much just going to keep anyone that manages to stay for three sessions,” Yuri answered.

The one advice that Sakura gave Nako about running a club was to make sure that the people she did get to join actually wanted to be there. It really didn’t matter how large the club was if everyone enjoyed themselves. “I’m glad to hear it. It looks like using you as the poster girl for the club was the right idea.”

Yuri blushed and gave Sakura a small smile. “I don’t think I helped much. I’m pretty quiet in class and nobody really talks to me much aside from Nako and Yujin. I think people really just like Nako.”

“You’re not giving yourself enough credit. Those girls were amazed by your voice as much as I was. They all wanted to sing with you. I could tell when I went to the first session and watched them.”

Yuri’s smile dropped suddenly as if remembering something distasteful. “Senpai, speaking of that first session. You were watching the new girls a little too closely in my opinion.”

“What do you mean?” Sakura asked nervously, wondering if her ogling had been caught.

“I don’t think you blinked the entire time,” Yuri accused.

“I just didn’t want to miss any of the performance,” Sakura explained half-heartedly. The girls were all amazingly cute and pretty. Her friend had some good taste.

“I was the lead vocal, but you kept staring at everyone else but me.” Yuri glared at Sakura for a good amount of time.

“You want me to stare at you?” Sakura blinked as she tried to understand Yuri’s point.

“Argh, Senpai, you’re frustrating,” Yuri declared before she huffed and turned around, storming off.

Sakura was so deep in thought that she barely heard someone calling out to her. “Hitomi?”

“Finally, I was calling you from the gate,” Hitomi said as she slowed down from her run. Sakura was always impressed with how Hitomi almost never seemed winded. The girl had stamina for days.

“Sorry, I was just thinking about how hectic a day it was today,” Sakura apologized.

“Don’t worry about it. Are you going home? I’ll walk you part of the way with you.” Hitomi moved to walk beside Sakura.

“No, I’m stopping at a restaurant nearby. My classmate is meeting me there. We’re celebrating her club’s recent win in a tournament.”

“Oh, I see,” Hitomi said. After a moment of silence, she looked at Sakura innocently. “Is this a date?”

Sakura nearly stumbled at the word ‘date.’ “No, why would you ask that? We’re just friends.”

“Oh, I see,” Hitomi said again. After another moment of silence, she looked at Sakura with the same innocent look. “How come you never celebrated with us when we did well at tournaments in middle school?”

“Did we really do anything work celebrating?” Sakura asked, slightly bewildered by the question. Their previous school never placed in anything that she could recall.

“We achieved personal bests each race,” Hitomi said matter-of-factly.

“Ah, no, you’re right. Those were achievements to be proud of,” Sakura conceded to her junior.

“Well, there’s an upcoming track meet. The first-year ace I was telling you about and I decided to talk to our seniors about the possibility of first-years running. There was some resistance to the idea at first, but the third-years who have never experienced much success helped us convince the rest of the team the merits of fielding our best team regardless of their age.”

“Wow, really? I’m really proud of you for standing for what you believed in.” Sakura turned to Hitomi and gave her a pat on the back.

“If I get to run and can post a personal best time, do you think we can celebrate together? You were the person I looked up to the most and it would mean a lot to me,” Hitomi said as she looked up at Sakura.

“Ah, I feel so underdressed,” Sakura said nervously as she looked Chaeyeon up and down. The other girl had gone home and changed out of her school uniform and was wearing a pretty strapless dress.

“You’re fine. I just felt like going home and changing. I knew you had club and I didn’t have anything else to do while I waited for you to finish,” Chaeyeon waved off Sakura’s comment.

Best friends can admire each other’s bare shoulders, Sakura told herself and gaped at Chaeyeon’s flawless shoulders. That was a part of the body she never knew that she was interested in before.

“So, did you miss me while I was away?” Chaeyeon asked conversationally while they waited for their order.

“I barely noticed. You were only gone a few days here or there the last few weeks. We still saw each other a lot when you did come to school,” Sakura replied nonchalantly.

“Oh, really? You know we probably have to get a new exchange diary. Those days we didn’t meet, you wrote a lot and drew a ton of pictures.”

“I normally doodle in my other book, but since I had the exchange diary open, I drew there. I only wrote a little more than I normally do. I thought you might be interested in all the fun stuff that was happening while you weren’t here.” Chaeyeon’s latest goal seemed to be to try and get Sakura to admit she was lonely without the girl. Normally, Sakura would have admitted it, but the way her best friend cackled gleefully made her want to play hard-to-get.

Chaeyeon laughed as if she were impervious to Sakura’s cold words. “Well, did you bring it?”

Sakura sighed and reached into her bag. The girl had liked some of her doodles so much, that she requested a personalized one for doing well in the competition. “Here,” Sakura said and handed the drawing over unceremoniously.

Chaeyeon went quiet as she looked at the frame. She slowly and carefully held the frame in her hands before taking her time to admire the drawing. Sakura grew anxious by the second as her friend remained quiet. Finally, Chaeyeon looked up and smiled. “It’s perfect. Thanks. Did you also make the frame? It looks handmade.”

“There were some materials lying around the art room. I just put some stuff together,” Sakura said, shrugging.

“Well, I brought you something too. It’s not much, but I think you might like it. I noticed that you’ve been wearing more makeup recently, but you usually don’t like wear lipstick.”

Sakura held out her hand as Chaeyeon plopped something into them. She brought it up to her face and saw that it was tinted lip gloss. It was in her favorite color; pink.

“I think you should be able to get away with this at the school,” Chaeyeon said, with a hint of the nervousness that Sakura displayed earlier.

Sakura waved Chaeyeon good-bye as she walked away in the opposite direction. When the other girl was out of her view, Sakura started off herself. She reached for her phone and noticed she had missed a message while she was eating dinner.

[Kwangbae: I think I’ve been friend-zoned.]

[39Kura: Friend-zoned? Why’s that bad?]

Kwangbae’s text came within seconds. It looked like she was waiting by her phone for Sakura’s answer. [Kwangbae: You know when someone doesn’t see you as a romantic interest and only sees you as a friend.]

[39Kura: I know what it means. I meant that I don’t see it being a bad thing. I’d kill if people I liked saw me in a friendly manner.] The term ‘friend-zoned’ had always irked Sakura. Friendship was a wonderful thing and it didn’t deserve the negative connation such a term brought to it.

[Kwangbae: But I want to be more than friends. This !]

[39Kura: What’s wrong with starting out as friends? Every relationship needs to start somewhere. I think at the end of it, if you’re best friends with your partner, you’ve got it good.]

[Kwangbae: No, you’re right. Baby steps, I have to tell myself. All the others didn’t go well because they didn’t know what I was really like when we’re alone.]

[39Kura: That’s the right attitude. Like I told you before, if she gets to know the same Kwangbae that I know, she’ll love you just as much as I do.] Sakura found that she had no trouble slinging words like love around when she didn’t have to actually say it with her voice.

[Kwangbae: You know. I kind of feel bad. It seems like I’m always coming to you for advice and I’m always the one talking about my love life. I might be the worst person to talk about these things with, but how are things going on your end?]

Sakura laughed out loud and had to look around to see if anyone heard her. [39Kura: What love life? I’ll be sure to ask you for help whenever that ever happens.]

[Kwangbae: I would be shocked if there weren’t at least a few secret admirers of you. You’re funny and kind. If you’re half as beautiful as your heart, you’d have suitors lined up wanting to date you.]

[39Kura: That’s a big if. I do have people I’m interested in, but honestly, I’m happy that they even know that I’m alive right now.]

[Kwangbae: That’s a great start! You’re always telling me to think positive. You should do the same.]

Sakura watched as Nako fussed about and finally settled on the bed beside her. The younger girl had decided to have an impromptu sleepover at Sakura’s house. “Are you finally ready for bed?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Nako said as she laid down beside Sakura.

“I’m really proud of you, you know?” Sakura said after a bit. She felt too wound up by the day’s events to be able to go to sleep immediately.

“I know. You’ve said it a lot,” Nako answered.

“I’ve been trying since the start of the school and have only gotten three recruits. Two if you don’t include Yuri.”

“You’re okay that I took Yuri from you, right?” Nako asked.

“It’s a bit too late to ask now,” Sakura said, rolling her eyes. “I want what’s best for her of course. She’s my first cute kohai recruit ever.”

“We both know that you could have more members if you were just a little bit more selfish. I could have been a member. You could have used Yujin to recruit more people. Sure, I got more members, but how many of them will actually stay? Only half stayed after the first tryout. I think another half will leave after today. We might have enough to barely become an official club when it’s all said and done. I think that Yujin and now Yena senpai are going to be loyal to you.”

Yujin had called Nako a social butterfly and Sakura had to agree. The girl had only met Yena for a short time and was already calling her by her first name just like she did with all the girls that attended each tryout. “Is there a reason you and Yujin don’t get along?”

“You noticed? I guess, probably, because we’re pretty similar people. I mean personality wise, not physically, of course,” Nako said before Sakura could make any snide comments about their physical statures.

“What do you mean by that? I think both of you make friends easily. I would have expected you two to make fast friends with each other.”

“Normally, yes, I guess. By similar, I think I was thinking more that we’re both pretty stubborn. I think we both said stuff the other didn’t take the right way and we’ve been stuck like this ever since,” Nako explained.

“That’s like me and Yena at first. I think we ended up resolving our differences when we realized neither one of us was trying to do or say mean things to the other person. It just came out that way. Now, we kind of laugh about it. When we do say or do something that irks the other person, it’s more like in jest than anything serious.” Nako was so quiet that Sakura thought the girl had fallen asleep. When she looked over at the younger girl, she could see her eyes were still wide open staring up at the ceiling.

After a moment, Nako turned her head so that she faced Sakura. “Well, I doubt me and Yujin can do the same thing. Even now, I think we’re both jealous of each other for what the other has.”

“She is tall, isn’t she?” Sakura assumed that Nako wished to be like Yujin. “She’s always complaining that she looks too masculine. I’m sure she would love to look as cute as a button like you are.”

Nako turned back around to the other way, presenting her back to Sakura. It looked like she was trying to get comfortable for sleep. “Well, sure, I might want some of her height. But what I really want is what she gets to do nearly almost every day.”

“Eat a lot and not gain any weight?” Sakura took a shot in the dark.

“That would be nice, but no, not that. And what she wants that I have, well, she’ll have to try in the next life.”

Nako’s answer suggested that Sakura was right and that Yujin would love to be reborn as a smaller girl. “I think it would be odd if she were a tiny girl. Her face wouldn’t match her body I think.”

Chaeyeon: *Sniff*

Sakura: Are you crying?

Chaeyeon: No.

Sakura: You know this is just part of the game plot, right?

Chaeyeon: I know.

Sakura: You know this is just a made up Wonyoung, right?

Author’s note:

Back home now from my vacation. The drought is real. Thought I might be motivated to write while they were on hiatus but I’ve been feeling very lethargic. I just need to know that things are fine with the girls. Hopefully, we’ll hear from them soon.

Let me know your thoughts!