Chapter 6: The Calm

It had been a pretty uneventful week for Wheein, and with rehearsals, vocal practice and Yongsun taking up all of her time (not that she was complaining about the latter), she was looking forward to some quality time with her best friend, so when she turned up at Hyejin’s house and was met with a welcome beer and warm hug, Wheein couldn’t contain her happiness.

“What are you smiling at, creep?” Hyejin asked as she closed the door behind her friend and eyed her suspiciously. Wheein only smiled wider.

“I’m just excited!” Wheein said, taking a long gulp of beer and slipping her shoes off, only to be stopped by Hyejin’s hand on her shoulders.

“Ok but you’re gonna get more excited in like ten steps, so please calm down so you don’t have a heart attack once you get inside, Wheein-ah,” Hyejin said with a laugh and Wheein tilted her head like a confused puppy.

“Is this the secret Ahn thing you wouldn’t tell me about?” Wheein asked and Hyejin nodded with a mischievous smile and took the girl’s hand, leading her into her living room and giggling at the girl’s disbelieving gasp.

“Jung Wheein, meet Ahn Onsoon,” Hyejin said proudly, and Wheein looked up at her friend with a pout and wide, teary eyes.

“This was your emergency? You got a tortoise?” Wheein asked incredulously, letting out a hearty laugh of relief when Hyejin nodded and she realised that the time she had spent over the week worrying about the possibility of having more obstacles or difficulties to face because of Hyejin’s secret had all been for nothing. “Are you crazy?”

Hyejin shrugged, then reached into the rather enormous tank and gently pet Onsoon’s shell. “He’s so cute,” Hyejin cooed when the creature began to stretch out his neck in satisfaction, prompting Hyejin to scratch him softly.

“When did you get him? And why?” Wheein asked curiously, recalling the way her friend had always been adamant about not having anything other than plants relying on her for care or attention at home.

Hyejin stopped petting Onsoon and gestured for Wheein to move, then grabbed her beer as the two slumped onto the couch and Hyejin kept an eye on the tank in the corner of the room.

“Do you remember Mr. Son? From upstairs?” Hyejin asked and Wheein nodded, easily recalling her best friend’s neighbour from the handful of times she had met the man when he was gifting Hyejin whatever homemade delicacy he had cooked that week.

“The man who made you like kimchi?”

Hyejin nodded. “His kimchi is still the only kimchi I’ll eat.”

“So what about him?” Wheein persisted when Hyejin sat quietly with a docile smile on her face, clearly reliving some kind of epiphytal kimchi experience she had had.

“Ah. Well…he knocked on my door the other night, the night before practice, and he was really upset. Like almost crying, Wheein-ah, it was horrible. So I asked him what was wrong and he said his nephew had decided to move him into a retirement home because he couldn’t afford the rent anymore, and that he didn’t know they didn’t allow pets until a day before he was due to leave. So he asked me if I could look after Onsoon until he could find somewhere permanent for him, and of course I said yes.”

“So you have to give him back?” Wheein asked, her lips jutted out in an exaggerated pout and Hyejin shook her head.

“I only spent an hour with him Wheein-ah and we just clicked. He’s my style, we really vibe,” Hyejin said dreamily as she looked over to where her little guy was sluggishly making his way to his bathing pool. “So I called Mr. Son and offered to have him permanently and he was really happy about it and so am I,” Hyejin finished with two thumbs up and a goofy smile and Wheein threw her head back in laughter at her friend’s dorky antics.

“I should’ve known you would enjoy the company of a tortoise. Now that I think of it, you have very similar ways of life.”

Hyejin nodded, taking Wheein’s words as a compliment and bringing her can of beer to her lips. “He’s really changed my life already. I can’t go anywhere without thinking about what he’s doing or how he’s feeling.”

“Aw, your motherly instincts have kicked in,” Wheein said with a laugh.

“I know you all tease me about not being resposibile enough for a pet but I really take good care of him,” Hyejin said quietly and Wheein looked at her in surprise.

“I know you’re capable, he looks so happy already,” Wheein reassured the girl and Hyejin smiled appreciatively.

“Hey, talking about looking happy…you’re practically glowing Wheein-ah, Yongsun must be doing something right,” Hyejin teased with a mischievous smirk and Wheein couldn’t stop her cheeks from warming at the thought of the woman she’d spent almost every night with.

“She’s…yeah. We’re happy,” Wheein nodded and Hyejin let out a content sigh as she put a hand on each of Wheein’s shoulders and leaned in to look closely into her eyes.

“You look like you’re in love,” Hyejin said seriously, and opened to rebut the statement but couldn’t find any words of refusal. While she knew she wasn’t completely in love with Yong just yet, she couldn’t deny that she was close to beginning to walk that path. Hyejin pulled the girl into a tight hug, ruffling Wheein’s hair as she spoke softly. “I like seeing you this happy. Just make sure you keep your heart in line with your head.”

Wheein nodded against the girl’s shoulder, not taking offence at Hyejin’s words purely for the fact that she had often been in complicated relationships where her feelings misaligned with what she actually wanted, and resulted in many sleepless nights exploring her true feelings with Hyejin.

“So, where’s your girl tonight?” Hyejin questioned after she pulled away and downed the rest of her drink. “You’ve been attached at the hip lately.”

“I sent her on a date with Byuli-unnie,” Wheein said, and Hyejin’s brows shot up in surprise. “I realised how we’ve both been neglecting you two and I knew that if I didn’t send Byuli over that she would just spend the night working on her youtube channel or something else unsociable.”

“You sent Byul-unnie to her?”

Wheein nodded. “I gave her a giftcard so she could take Yong-unnie to her favourite restaurant and make sure she eats properly because she never seems to cook when I’m not around,” Wheein mused, and Hyejin laughed teasily at her friend.

“Yah, I didn’t know you were such a romantic Wheein-ah,” Hyejin said and Wheein shoved the girl playfully.

“I’m not! I just wanted to do something nice…I don’t know,” Wheein said, embarrassed that she hadn’t realised just how sweet her actions had been. “Anyway, you can’t talk to me about being romantic when you’ve got a mystery man picking you up from every practice now,” Wheein challenged, folding her arms and enjoying Hyejin’s flustered look.

“He’s not a mystery man,” Hyejin said quietly, reaching for Wheein’s beer when she realised her own was empty. “And he only picked me up because he was passing through,” Hyejin shrugged as she took a long sip from the can.

“If he’s not a mystery then tell me who he is,” Wheein said and Hyejin bit her lip and avoided Wheein’s eyes before muttering under her breath. “Huh? Louder please, Hyejin-ssi.”

“It’s just Jae-wook oppa,” Hyejin said, wincing when she heard Wheein gasp and let out a long sigh.

“Hyejin-ah. Really?” Wheein asked, hoping that she’d misheard her friend, but Hyejin only shrugged. “I thought you were done with him?”

It was Hyejin’s turn to sigh now. “We’re not back together, not that we were ever really together before. But we’re just…we missed eachother. And he’s trying really hard this time, Wheein-ah. He really is.”

Wheein sighed, recalling how besotted Hyejin had once been with the producer, and how heartbroken she had been when he had told her that he wanted nothing more than to “chill” with the girl, resulting in Hyejin developing a very unhealthy love for alcohol and a considerable lack of motivation for music or anything other than the man she had fallen for. It had been a struggle to break her out of it and make her realise that as much as she was trying to convince herself that she was happy with their arrangement, being friends with benefits wasn’t enough for Hyejin, and thus resulted in a painful night spent clinging to Wheein and questioning why she was never good enough. Wheein shook off the uncomfortable memory and looked seriously at her friend, brushing her hair out of her face and tucking it behind her ear.

“You know I’ll always be in your corner, whatever decision you make, but I never want to see you hurt again the way he hurt you. You deserve so much more than what he did to you,” Wheein said softly, and Hyejin nodded knowingly.

“You’ll always mean the most to me,” Hyejin said with a small pout, tears suddenly making her eyes glaze over as Wheein outwardly cringed.

“Yah, what are you doing?” She laughed, watching as Hyejin whined at her own emotions. “How many beers have you had?”

“Maybe this many?” Hyejin held up three fingers on one hand and two on the other, counting and recounting with intense concentration. Wheein shook her head fondly.

“No wonder you’re all mushy,” Wheein said, bringing her own drink to her lips and finishing the rest of it in an effort to catch up to her friend. They sat quietly for a moment, both knowing that their lives had taken strange turns recently, yet happy that their own dynamic hadn’t changed at all. They were still the best of friends and neither of them would have it any other way.

Wheein’s phone buzzed with an incoming call, and she answered without hesitating when she saw the caller ID.

“Eomma,” Wheein hummed, and Hyejin looked up excitedly, pulling on Wheein’s arm and trying to get near the phone.

“Hi gorgeous,” Hyejin drawled loudly, forcing Wheein to put the phone on speaker and the sound of her mother’s laugh echoed through Hyejin’s living room.

“Hi honey. It’s nice to hear your voice,” Wheein’s mom said brightly and Hyejin nodded in agreement, making Wheein nudge her.

“She can’t see you, dummy,” Wheein said with an eye roll and Hyejin’s mouth formed a small ‘oh’ in realisation as she replied.

“It’s nice to hear your voice too. Wheeinie never lets me call you anymore,” Hyejin said with a dramatic sigh.

“That’s only because you kept drunk-dialing her at 4am to tell her how much you love me,” Wheein said with a smirk and Hyejin scoffed in denial, before withdrawing from the conversation and slumping back into the couch.

“And I loved every minute of it,” Wheein’s mom replied, earning a smug smile from Hyejin. “But anyway, I need to talk to you about something, darling.”

“What’s up?”

“I had a visitor in the shop today…” Wheein’s mom said and Wheein could hear the hesitation in her voice.

“Was it him?” Wheein asked, her words tense as her eyes flitted to where Hyejin had crawled off the sofa and sat contently next to Onsoon’s tank, her eyes level with the tortoise. Hyejin looked back to her friend when she heard the concern in her voice.

“No,” Wheein’s mom replied and Wheein felt her body relax. “But it was someone just as unexpected. Did you know Nayeon was back in Korea?”

Wheein’s eyes met Hyejin’s in a panic, and the girl shrugged helplessly from her spot on the floor. “No...she came in the shop?”

“Yes. She said she needed to speak to you and had tried calling but thought she had the wrong number, but I told her you’ve had the same number since you debuted because you refuse to change your phone.”

“Ah,” Wheein said in realisation as she recalled the calls she had gotten throughout the week from an unknown number which she had blocked straight away as per Yongsun’s advice, the leader reasoning that anyone who needed to speak to Wheein that urgently should know her well enough to know that she doesn’t answer people she doesn’t know. “Did she say why she needed to talk to me?”

“No, she just asked if I could give you her number so you could call her. It seemed pretty urgent.”

Wheein sighed and accepted defeat. “Can you text it to me? I’ll call her tomorrow,” Wheein said, making Hyejin look at her in surprise. Long-gone was the girl who used to ignore her problems and distract herself until they got too big to handle alone.

“Okay. I’ve got to go, your father’s decided he’s got some hidden talent for baking and I can smell something burning again,” Wheein’s mom said exasperatedly and Wheein laughed, imaging the sight of her stepfather flustered and trying to mask the burnt smell like he used to when he would bake cookies for her as a kid.

“Okay. I miss you, tell Appa I miss him too,” Wheein said before feeling a weight on her back as Hyejin clambered carelessly over her until she was close to the phone.

“I miss you too,” Hyejin said and Wheein’s mom chuckled through the phone.

“I miss you both. Take care of each other,” Wheein’s mom said and the girls smiled at the familiar words Wheein’s mom had often said to them since middle school.

“We will. Love you,” Wheein said, ending the call when she heard her mom return her love and groaning when she realised Hyejin was practically sitting in her lap and smiling at her softly. “Yah, get off.”

Hyejin shook her head, moving her to make herself more comfortable and leaning back into Wheein before letting out a satisfied sigh. “No wonder Yongsun-unnie never wants to let you out of her sight. You’re pretty damn comfortable Wheein-ah.”

Wheein blushed at Hyejin’s words, and as if on cue, Wheein’s phone buzzed with a text from the leader.

Thank you for the forced company and free food. You’re very sweet.

Wheein smiled, knowing that while the woman’s words weren’t overflowing with affection and cute affirmations, it took a lot for the woman to outwardly express her feelings, and especially through text. Wheein typed out a casual reply with a request that the leader enjoys her night without worry, before turning off her phone altogether.

“So…Nayeon’s back?” Hyejin asked, although it sounded much more like a weighted realisation, and Wheein shrugged, resting her chin on her friend’s shoulder and focusing on the warmth emitting from her body. It was always surprising that the girl was able to feel like home to her.

“I don’t want to even think about what she’s got to say. But with my dad…and the blackmail…I can’t imagine it’s just a coincidence,” Wheein said, feeling unsettled yet stable enough to handle whatever was coming her way. She wasn’t alone this time, and she felt infinitely more content at the thought.

“I can be there when you call her, if you want?”

Wheein smiled and leaned her head closer to Hyejin’s. “Thanks. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“You’d probably be a lot less stressed,” Hyejin chuckled.

“Probably,” Wheein shrugged simply, before squeezing the girl tightly and offering a much more truthful reply. “But a lot less happy, too.”