Chapter synopsis: Chorong faces a bridge she’s been trying to avoid for a while now, and realises she has to cross it.

//

“You look horrible, why is that?” Bomi asks as she gets up from her bed to see Chorong moving about in the room, preparing for class. Chorong’s eyes looked tired, her lids seemingly heavy, and her face drained of colour. “Hm? Oh, I just couldn’t sleep well last night,” Chorong replies. “Why didn’t you just get into my bed?” Bomi snickers, not knowing how hard it is for Chorong to even look at her right now. Under normal circumstances in the past, if either of them had any trouble sleeping, it was an unwritten rule that they could slip into the other’s bed and sleep there. It worked great and they’d sleep nice and snug under the blanket. Last night was nowhere near normal circumstances for Chorong, and for obvious reasons, she couldn’t just snuggle up against Bomi in her bed and go to sleep.

The older girl stops in front of the mirror to tidy up her appearance. “I didn’t wanna wake you,” she manages to reply, her eyes fixated on her own face in the reflection, so she doesn’t have to look at Bomi while lying to her. It felt weird, they never had to lie. Watch each other lie to other people, maybe, but never to each other.

//

Changsub was walking Chorong to her next class like he did sometimes if their timetables lined up. “You okay, baby? You look sick,” Changsub comments. He’s always been so vocal with the concern he had for Chorong. “Yeah I’m fine, just tired,” she shrugs. Another lie, and it’s only been a few hours.

Changsub reaches out to hold Chorong’s hand as they walk through the school hallway, past the lockers and classrooms, and her heart almost stops – not because it’s romantic, but because she has half the mind to remove her hand from his hold. She’s not mad at Changsub though, she’s mad at herself. Was she cheating on him emotionally? Chorong couldn’t believe herself, and she didn’t want to. She doesn’t let go of his hand though, in fact, she holds on tighter.

When they’ve reached the classroom door, Changsub is about to leave but Chorong grabs his arm to stop him, then with her hands placed on his shoulders and a slight tiptoe, she kisses him on the cheek. “Text me when you can,” she says before she turns to enter the class. If Changsub was surprised by the sudden sweet gesture, which he is, he doesn’t show it. Chorong isn’t a huge fan of public displays of affection, especially in school since she was class president and all. So it was a little unusual that she willingly kissed him in the school hallway like that, but Changsub doesn’t dwell on it and walks to his class cheerfully.

Chorong, however, does dwell on it as she takes her seat in class. Did she do that out of guilt? God, it’s like she can’t even control her actions anymore. Chorong feels bad and she doesn’t even know why. She loves Changsub, but not the same way she did all those months ago. She still cares for him and likes him as a person, but maybe not so much as a boyfriend. Did that make her a bad person? People fall out of love all the time, right? Perhaps that’s what was happening to her too. Oh, what was she even thinking? Everything’s currently just a whole mess to her.

She has to talk to Eunji.

/

At lunch, all five friends were at the table together when Changsub walks past to go to his next class. He glances to the table and gives Chorong a dashing eye smile, which she returns without hesitation. She really has to figure out what she’s doing with Changsub before someone gets hurt. Eunji looks up at the right second to catch Chorong smiling at her boyfriend and something about it just doesn’t sit right with her ridiculous theory. Maybe that’s all her theory was – ridiculous. Chorong was happy with Changsub and it seems like they’re more than great right now, so maybe Eunji had got it wrong. Or maybe it was just a dumb case of infatuation that Chorong had with Bomi. She could’ve just been confused for a short while. It made sense, why else would she still be this close to Changsub? Chorong wasn’t a cheater, and Changsub was a sweet boy, she wouldn’t do that to him.

What really puzzles Eunji is what happens next. Bomi reaches for Chorong’s drink on the table but before the baseball captain can lift it, Chorong snaps at her, “Don’t you have your own drink?” It’s sharp, and even their friends are taken aback by the sudden unfriendliness. “O-oh, sorry,” Bomi stutters and blinks, processing what just happened. Chorong has never cared for Bomi taking her stuff, she’s always encouraged it – giving Bomi a spoon of her rice, a bite of her ice cream, a sip of her drink, even if Bomi had her own.

Maybe she’s just having a bad day, Bomi thinks.

And if Chorong thought her day couldn’t get worse, let’s just say she was wrong.

Class was dismissed early because the teacher had a meeting to attend to. Chorong trudges back to her room alone. She just wants a break, a break from reality, a break from her life so she can forget everything for a while, but at the same time, she wants to solve everything, she wants to fix things. What exactly did Chorong want to fix? Well, she wasn’t too sure about that. She wasn’t too sure about anything at this point.

Chorong opens the door and with one step into the room, instant regret washes over her. As if the first time in the library wasn’t bad enough, she sees Bomi and Naeun making out, again. This time it’s exponentially worse because they’re on Bomi’s bed, in the room she shares with Chorong. This was supposed to be their space. Now there’s Naeun all over her bed and it’s a revolting sight to Chorong. Naeun was in a black bra, straddling Bomi, her hands on the captain’s shouders and neck. The kisses were open and heavy but as soon as Bomi heard the click of the door, she pulls away from the kiss, snapping her head to the sound. That’s where she sees Chorong step in, and that’s as far as she makes it into the room.

“, Chorong,” Bomi scrambles off the bed, gently pushing Naeun off of her in the process, “I thought you had class, I’m sorry. We can leave.” She gets up to walk to the door and Chorong catches a glimpse of a topless Naeun on the bed rolling her eyes. “It’s fine, I have somewhere to be anyways,” Chorong says and she closes the door before Bomi can respond or even reach her. The sight was gut-wrenching, and she tries to ignore it; she tries not to think about it. She tries.

Chorong didn’t really have a plan, but her feet moved like they were on autopilot. She was walking somewhere without a care for her surroundings and before she knew it, she was knocking on Eunji’s door. The door opened and showed Eunji with her glasses on, she had been studying. “Chorong, hey, what’s up?” She didn’t expect to see her.

“Can I come in?” is all she says.

“Yeah, of course,” Eunji opens the door wider and steps aside to let Chorong in. Eunji’s room is modest and humble like the owner. Definitely smaller than Chorong and Bomi’s but