“Hey babe” Changsub gives Chorong’s hand a soft squeeze, “you wanna grab dinner tonight? My treat!”

“Oh you don’t have to-“

“Don’t worry, I want to! What about your favourite dakbal?” Changsub beams at her endearingly. Chorong looks at her boyfriend, breaking into a smile of her own. Sometimes Chorong doesn’t appreciate how he flashes his charming smile to just about anyone, but it’s a trait she adores greatly and would never want to change about him. She’s lucky to have him and she knows he would say the same for her too.

Changsub is a sweet heartthrob. He’s in the Basketball team and well-liked by practically everyone. They’re the same age, albeit he’s a few months older. Changsub has a heart of gold, which is what made it so easy for Chorong to fall for him. He was always kind to people, not the stereotypical snobbish popular boy, and Chorong loved his warmth. (She never understood why girls were so fond of “bad boys”.)

//

Bomi was headed to the Baseball room before her training. (Every co-curricular activity club or team had a designated room for their students.) She was in a navy blue dri-fit shirt that had the school crest printed on the front left chest and “BASEBALL” printed in white on the back. Bomi walked as she held her trusty glove in her hand - she was the team’s pitcher, and a superb one at that.

“Hi, sorry, do you know where the Art room is?” Bomi hears a girl ask. She stops in her tracks and turns to face the owner of the pretty voice, only to see a girl she doesn’t think she’s seen before. A junior, she presumes.

“Oh, I’m headed to a room near it, just follow me” Bomi gestures for the girl to walk with her.

“So, you’re joining the Art club?” Bomi asks. Social butterfly striking a conversation with someone she met seconds ago, typical Bomi. “I just joined this week” Naeun says cautiously, like she was scared, almost like a child talking to a stranger. But Naeun somehow musters up more courage to continue sharing, “I was told to find a club to join and I like to paint so... here I am!” She ends her sentence with a slight jump and Bomi grins at the returned friendliness.

“You’re here” Bomi points to a door they were nearing. It had a metal plate stuck around eye-level with the words “Art Room” engraved in black.

Naeun fiddles with her fingers and glances between the floor and Bomi. “Thanks” She gives a slight bow to the senior. “No problem” Bomi smiles as she returns the motion of respect. Just as she’s about to turn and head to the Baseball room, she hears the pretty voice again. “I didn’t get your name!”

At the sudden implication to introduce herself, Bomi grins and her eyes turn into crescents.

“Yoon Bomi”

“Son Naeun” she says, without missing a beat.

“Hope to see you around, Naeun. I better get going now, I have baseball training” Bomi explains and Naeun smiles as she turns to open the door of the Art room. Before Bomi reaches her own club room, she thinks about the girl she just met. Son Naeun. She seems nice.

//

Chorong hasn’t seen or talked to Naeun in a week since she first gave her the school tour. But it seems Bomi has.

The five friends are seated together at a table again and Chorong thinks about their seating arrangement. She wonders if it was a bad choice to sit right between Bomi and Eunji, with Hayoung and Namjoo on the other side of the table. She listens to them bicker like children about whether “Kit Kat” was spelled with a hyphen or not. Bomi, a person of dramatic nature, was currently having an existential crisis finding out there was never a hyphen. Her crisis gets interrupted when she hears a familiar voice call her name, “Hey, Bomi”.

Nauen stands by Bomi’s side of the table, giving a slight bow to everyone seated there before facing Bomi again. She’s a new student, and a junior at that, so she’s been rather respectful to everyone and anyone she interacts with. Social hierarchy is a real thing, and it’s not any less real in schools so she wants to get on everyone’s good side while she still can. (She doesn’t realise that like a third of the student body fawns over her visuals on the daily.)

“Oh hey, Naeun! What’s up?” They haven’t spoken since their meet cute so Bomi has absolutely no clue what Naeun would be here for, and by the same token, Chorong had no idea how Bomi and Naeun even knew each other.

“Uhm.. Do you have training again this Thursday?” How does Naeun know Bomi has trainings on Thursdays? Chorong squints her eyes just a little as she tries to find a connection.

“I do” Bomi nods.

“Well, I was wondering… if you’d like to have lunch with me? I have my art thing too and you were really nice the other time so I just thought we could grab a bite, yknow?” Bomi hands Naeun her phone, “Yeah sure, put your number in, I’ll text you!”

The moment Naeun was out of earshot, Eunji starts “So-“ but Namjoo eagerly cuts in, “Bomi, you have a lot of explaining to do” and Hayoung follows, “Yeah you idiot, who’s that pretty girl and what’s the deal between you two?” Damn these kids. To be fair, Chorong was curious too but she kept mum and waited for Bomi to speak.

“She’s Naeun, and we’re friends” Bomi shrugs plainly. She doesn’t understand why the three of them were being so animated.

Lucky for the class president, Eunji asks the question Chorong’s been asking herself since Naeun even came over to talk to Bomi. “And how exactly do you two know each other?” Bomi tells them the story from last Thursday and this time, the youngest at the table asks another important question. “So this lunch on Thursday - is it a date?” Chorong smiles at this, of course, because she’s happy if her best friend has finally found a girl that interests her. “Does this mean I won’t hear you whine about being lonely anymore?” Chorong jokes and Bomi playfully punches the older girl’s arm, “I’m kidding!”

“I doubt she was asking me out as anything more than a friend” Bomi brings her right