Sei and Suyeon were sitting in the kitchen, waiting for the morning grocery delivery. It was awkward. They had both come out at the same time because they couldn't sleep and wanted to wait for the groceries so that they had something to do, and neither one of them wanted to go back to bed, because then it would look like they were trying to avoid the other one, so they ended up together in the kitchen, waiting for the grocery delivery while everyone else slept.

"So. . ." Suyeon said as she twirled a chopstick between her fingers, "you and Lucy."

Sei nodded.

"How's that working?" Suyeon asked.

"Good," Sei tried to say, only to have her voice come out as a hoarse whisper. She coughed and tried again. "Good."

Suyeon nodded. 

The silence dragged on. Finally Sei couldn't take it anymore - she got up and put on water for a cup of tea.

"You want a cup of tea?" Sei asked.

Suyeon nodded. She hated this awkwardness. She and Sei had become so close when Weki Meki first started. Suyeon had felt like she could talk to Sei about anything. Dating seemed like the natural next step. But then had come the demands of leadership and the reality of having eight members of a group living together. Suyeon had insisted that their relationship had to stay a secret and, well, look where that had gotten them - broken up and Sei dating Lucy now. Suyeon knew there was no way to go back to the way things were, but she at least wanted to get over this awkwardness between them.

"Here you go, unnie." Sei put a cup of tea down in front of Suyeon, steam rising from its surface.

"Thanks," Suyeon said, before lapsing into silence again.

Suyeon had drunk about half of her cup of tea when she couldn't take it anymore. "Sei," she said, putting the teacup down so hard that a little sloshed over onto the table, "I can't live like this anymore."

"Like what," Sei asked. She could tell that Suyeon was upset, but she didn't know exactly what form of upset.

"Like this," Suyeon said, pointing back and forth between the two of them. "I could always talk to you, about anything, and you seemed like you could talk to me. It was one of the things that first attracted me to you. But now. . . it's like there's a wall or a minefield or. . . something. We find ourselves in the kitchen at the same time and can't find a dozen words to say to each other. I feel like I'm walking on eggshells around you now; I never know what it's safe to say."

Sei sat silently, taking this all in. When she was sure that Suyeon had stopped, she began speaking, tentatively at first, but gaining confidence as she went on. "I'm sorry you feel that way, Suyeon. I think what it comes down to is you feel bad about the fact that I've moved on. I think you thought that I'd come back to you and give you another chance. And now that I didn't, you don't know how to deal with it."

Suyeon picked up her tea and took a sip. She looked across the table at Sei. "You're probably right. I guess I just always thought we could work things out."

"We probably could have," Sei said, "Except that your version of 'work things out' always looked like 'Sei gives Suyeon what she wants' and I just couldn't do that anymore. I'm happier now, and I hope you can find someone who gives you what you need. I really mean that. I want you to be happy."

Suyeon wiped her eyes. 'It's just really hard to deal with."

Sei reached across the table and took Suyeon's hand. "I'm sure there's someone out there who's the perfect person for you - it's just not me."

Suyeon nodded. She started to say something, but was interrupted by a knock at the door.

Lua and Rina were sitting on the couch talking, an unwatched drama playing to cover up their words.

"Have you noticed Suyeon?" Lua asked

Rina looked confused. "What about Suyeon?"

"She hasn't been herself the last few days," Lua said. "She seems sad about something, and distracted. She's just zone out in the middle of a conversation."

Rina nodded. "I had noticed that. I figured it was just she wasn't getting enough sleep because she always wants to be up early to bring in the groceries."

"That might be part of it," Lua said, "but I don't think it's everything. This is just over the last few days -" a look of dawning realization came over her face - "ever since Lucy and Sei started dating."

Rina looked confused again. "Why would Suyeon be sad about Sei and Lucy dating? They make such a cute couple."

"I don't know if you had noticed, but for a long time Sei had a crush on Suyeon."

"Really?" Rina asked. "I never noticed."

Lua nodded. "Oh yeah, big time. I noticed and I talked to Sei about it a bunch of times, trying to talk her out of it. I don't know if anyone else had noticed it or not. But remember the other night when we were talking about what sort of bangs would look best on Sei?"

Rina nodded. "I remember that. I still think she'd look best if she went back to her natural hair color and got a shoulder-length bob with the choppy bangs."

"Yeah," Lua went on, "well, that night while I was t Sei's bangs, she told me a story that Lucy had told her about how she imagined her first kiss would be, and she basically did everything but call Sei out by name! So I pushed Sei to start dating Lucy, and, well, what if Suyeon knew that Sei had a crush on her, and it made her happy and she was trying to get up the nerve to do something about it? I ruined Suyeon's happiness."

Rina patted Lua's hand comfortingly. "Maybe you did, but you also made Lucy very happy, and Sei seems a lot happier, so I'd say it was a win."

"For everyone but Suyeon," Lua said, her brow furrowed in concentration. "I ruined Suyeon's happiness, so it's my responsibility to make her happy again." She stood up.

"Where are you going?" Rina asked.

"I can't do this by myself," Lua said. "I need an unnie's help."

Rina looked perplexed. "Which unnie?"

"I'm not sure," Lua said. "I think I'm going to need to talk to Yoojung and Doyeon."

"You want me to come with you?" Rina asked, leaning forward to stand up.

Lua shook her head. "No, this is something I've got to do myself. I'll be back in a little while."

Rina flopped back on the couch, idly looking at the drama. She knew Lua, and she knew that now that she had this idea in her head, she wasn't going to rest until she "fixed things," whatever that ended up looking like. In the meantime, all she could really do was stay out of Lua's way and hope she got over this obsession soon. She probably would - Lua was sweet, but she had the attention span of a toddler.

Sei, Lucy, Doyeon, and Yoojung were playing mahjong when Lua came up and whispered something in Yoojung's ear. Yoojung stood up. "Guys," she said, "I'm sorry to break up the game, but I've got to go take care of something." She and Lua rushed back to their bedroom. 

Doyeon looked after them, then looked at Sei and Lucy. "I'd better go see what's going on - see if I need to keep Yoojung out of trouble," she said, before getting up to follow them.

"Well, so much for our game of mahjong," Lucy said, idly grabbing the tiles and starting to build a tower out of them.

"I'm sure we can find something to do," Sei said, smiling at Lucy. When Lucy didn't return her smile, she leaned forward and looked into Lucy's eyes. "Is something wrong?"

Lucy swiped at her tower, knocking it down and scattering tiles all over the table. "It's nothing," she said with a sigh.

"It doesn't seem like nothing," Sei said, reaching out and taking Lucy's hand.

Lucy pulled her hand away. "I heard you and Suyeon talking this morning," she said. "Were you ever planning to tell me that you and Suyeon had dated? And fairly recently, from the sounds of it?"

Sei sighed. "I'd hoped I wouldn't need to," she said. She looked around. "Can we go back to your room and talk about this in private?"

Lucy stood up and stalked off to her room, leaving Sei to follow along in her wake. Once they were in Lucy and Rina's room, Sei shut the door behind herself and went to sit on the bed next to Lucy, who scooted slightly away so that they weren't touching. "Okay, talk," Lucy said.

Sei took a deep breath and took some time to compose her thoughts. "Yes," she said. "Suyeon and I dated. From right after Weki Meki debuted until just a couple of days before you and I got together. But she didn't want anyone else to know, so there wouldn't be any drama in the band. She didn't want anyone to think she was playing favorites because I was her girlfriend. So what it amounted to is I got actually to be her girlfriend for just a few minutes a day. She was never there when I needed her or wanted her."

"So, what, you couldn't have her so you decided to go out with me?" Lucy asked scathingly.

Sei shrank in on herself a little bit. "It seems like that, but it wasn't like that at all. When I found out you were interested in me, I realized I had a chance for something better, that I was worth more than Suyeon was giving me. So I broke up with her, then a day or so later started going out with you. I didn't want to be cheating on her, and I didn't want to be with you when I was still with her. I waited until I was free before I came and talked to you."

"Sei, please leave," Lucy said quietly. "I need to think about this and figure out exactly how I feel about it, and I can't do that with you here."

"Okay," Sei said quietly. As she backed toward the door, she said "I just want you to know that I really care about you and I would never want to hurt you and-"

"Just leave!" Lucy shouted.

Doyeon scowled at Yoojung. "I suppose now that you've got Lua on your side in this campaign to get Suyeon and Elly together, there'll be no talking you out of it."

Yoojung smiled her most endearing smile at Doyeon. "Just think how nice it will be! Everyone in the band will be with someone and no one will be left alone!"

"I just don't think it's right," Doyeon said, shaking her head. "If Suyeon and Elly wanted to be together, they'd have gotten together by now. I mean, they've only been sharing a room for three years!"

"Maybe they just don't know they want to be together," Yoojung said. "But if we-"

"By 'we,' you'd better mean you and Lua," Doyeon interrupted. "I want no part of this, and I'm seriously considering going to Doyeon and Elly and telling them what you're planning."

"Awww, don't do that!" Yoojung pleaded. "Look, just let us try. If they get together, they get together. If they don't, they don't. But I don't think it's right to leave them there, both obviously wanting someone, each perfect for the other, and have it not happen because none of their friends tried to help them."

Doyeon sighed. "Okay, fine. Try it. But if you see it's not working, back off. If it looks like you're not doing that, we'll be talking about this again."

Yoojung grabbed Doyeon and hugged her tightly. "I knew you'd come around and see it my way!" she said.

"Now wait," Doyeon began. "I never said-"

"Whoever was playing mahjong!" They could hear Elly's voice reverberating throughout the whole apartment. "You'd better come pick up the tiles if you want dinner tonight!"

Doyeon started to head out to the kitchen, but Yoojung stopped her. "I've got this," she said. "You just relax."