Winter bit her lip as she stared at the snowflake pendant held in her palms. She liked Moon Bin; it was a fact now that she couldn’t deny. It was also a fact that she liked Moon Bin more so than she liked the necklace, and in a much different way than when she had fancied Eun Woo. While liking Eun Woo had felt like she was living in a wonderland, liking Moon Bin was like falling into a dark, deep, bottomless hole; she simply couldn’t stop thinking about him every second of the day. Even when she finally tore her mind away from him, bits of him would always somehow resurface into her mind, sending her into another wave of frenzy and emotional turmoil.

Now that she knew of the mutual feelings that they had towards each other, wasn’t the answer pretty straightforward: get together? That, in fact, was what Winter found as the most unthinkable option. Mr Yoon’s warning had stuck itself firmly at the back of Winter’s mind: Any failure to abide to or perform the instructions will result in appropriate punishments which will be decided by the supervising team. It was without doubt that the ‘punishment’ he had mentioned referred to expulsion from the company. If she were being honest, she didn’t mind leaving the company, but Moon Bin had gambled almost everything he had to fulfil his dreams, and his dreams lay here, in this company where he belonged. Winter would never risk putting all his efforts to waste or hurt Moon Bin in any other way.

After much deliberation, she had only come to one conclusion: if they were not allowed to date, then the only way was for Winter to end the feelings she had for him. And the best way to do that was to get away from him as far as possible. If she didn’t see him as often, she wouldn’t desire to have him and so the matter would be solved. She had put her plan into action the moment Eun Woo, Moon Bin and Winter had gotten off the train at Seoul the very next day. Moon Bin had offered to ‘take her home’, but she rejected his offer plainly and made her way towards Yu Ri’s house then, where she had been staying for the past four days. She had hoped the distance would do them both some good, but her plan had failed her miserably as she would reach out to touch the snowflake pendant whenever she missed him, which—currently—was that very moment.

“I think I like Rocky,” Yu Ri blurted out suddenly, cutting through Winter’s thoughts.

“What?” Winter choked.

“The thing is… I think I’ve liked him for a while now, but I just didn’t realise it.” She confessed, pursing her lips in thought. Winter gulped, her lungs contracting as if they lacked oxygen. I know exactly how that feels. “It wasn’t love at first sight. I think it must have started from the first task when he was my mentor, when he gave me sweets and told me I would be fine when I was stressed,” Winter thought back to the night where it had been raining heavily, when she had sent the urgent text message for help and how he had appeared to her like magic, carrying a spare umbrella for her. “… when he had said I looked best being myself,” No, you look pretty, that’s all. She hadn’t realised it then, but that curious sensation in her chest was actually her heart fluttering from his words. “—how I was always excited to see him in the company…” She clearly remembered the moment of pure elation when Moon Bin had appeared from his bedroom the night he came back and how she had thrown her arms over him, so glad that he was there.

“… I think that’s when I knew I liked him,” Yu Ri finished, looking at Winter as if she was expecting a response.

“When?” Winter found herself saying, purely out of curiosity.

“When I realised that he is always in my head, how I always want to see him when he’s not with me, how I still want to see him when he is with me.”

Winter closed her palm around the snowflake pendant consciously. , I’m ticking all the boxes, she thought inwardly. To Yu Ri she only said, “What do you plan to do about it now?”

“I don’t know… maybe confess?”

“Confess?” she questioned, outraged. That is the last thing I will do! “B-but both of you are tied by the company’s contracts! You know you’re really not supposed to date—”

“I know,” Yu Ri said, evidently sullen. “But what else am I supposed to do? I can’t keep silent and hope my feelings will just disappear.”

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