Haseul thought it was a little weird that she got a day off as soon as her first day of work ended. But she wasn't complaining: it meant that she had a consistent schedule, every week working the same days, and that she had a little break to process her new job. 

Other than the ual harrassment in the morning, her first day had gone wonderfully. She'd had, like, three meals (during the slow hours Allison just stuffed the girls full of food), Heejin and Hyunjin had taught her how to properly run food from the kitchen to the customers (instead of just her cleaning tables the whole shift), and she got to know Heejin and Hyunjin a little bit. Her first impression, from what she could tell, had been completely wrong: Heejin and Hyunjin were super nice, and definitely not intimidating. All in all, she had definitely lucked out with this job. 

Haseul's grandmother was excited, but nobody was more excited than Yeojin (partially because her cousin got a cool job, partially so she could get discounted food from the restaurant). But, Yeojin was also excited Haseul had the next day off: Haseul could tell her fears of her being gone all the time were put to rest. 

And of course, they were using this day off to go to the beach. 

By this point Haseul didn't really feel the need to sleep in much any more, since she didn't have much to do at night so she finally slept early, and every day she was getting up early. So when she was dressed and ready to head to the beach, she threw open her door: but Yeojin wasn't standing in front impatiently. 

"Yeojin?" she called down the hall. The tiny ten year old burst from her door, looking at Haseul with just as much confusion as Haseul was looking back at her with. 

"You're ready? Already?" 

"Yup!" Haseul answered proudly, stepping out with her hands on her hips. 

"Huh." Yeojin walked over and Haseul followed her to the doorway, grabbing all of their usual beach supplies and flip flops before heading out. "You're finally starting to get onto my schedule. Maybe this whole job thing was a good idea." 

Haseul smiled at that as the odd pair walked down the middle of the road, like always. She was really excited: it had all been fun before, but now today at the beach, and this evening just relaxing in her room, would be all the more sweet now that she couldn't do it every day. 

Haseul turned to look at her ten year old cousin. Haseul's hair was black, naturally so, as was the rest of her family's. Yeojin was the only one with lighter hair, more of a fairly fair brown shade. Haseul figured it was from spending all of her childhood at the beach, out in the sun. Also, she had seen Yeojin do that age old trick of putting lemon juice in the hair and sitting out in the sun to lighten it, and Yeojin definitely smelled like lemons every day. Haseul held in a chuckle; she could imagine that as soon as Yeojin got a bit older (and grandma allowed it), Yeojin would start dyeing her hair. 

One thing that Yeojin did have that was just like the rest of their family was her height. Literally everyone in their family was short, men and women. Haseul was even taller than her mom, and not all that much shorter than her dad. Haseul had been 5'2 since she was twelve and had not grown an inch since. Poor Yeojin was 4'0 and ten; if she was to follow Haseul, she only had a few more growing years left. Haseul wished her the best of luck, in that department. 

Haseul was one hundred percent sure Yeojin was going to grow up pretty. But that didn't matter one bit, in the future but especially not now. She was an undeniably cute kid though, even in that space in time between child and teenager, dressed in her matching minecraft hoodie and shorts, her favorite electric orange swimsuit underneath. She had a cell phone and a cheese plate package in her frog backpack but she also still kept toys in there. Haseul knew that sort of in between stage well, but Yeojin was handling it with grace, far more than she herself had. 

She was smart but smiled a lot, and was bright and actually funny, as not irritating as a ten year old could be with a personality as loud as Yeojin's. Haseul knew that there was somberness somewhere in Yeojin's heart. Just coming here, it was obvious she had quite a bit on her shoulders for a ten year old, not to mention the trauma that must have been the very first of Yeojin's memories. But Yeojin didn't show it. In fact, there hadn't even been a glimpse at it since Haseul had arrived. Haseul wasn't sure what to feel about it. 

Haseul just hoped Yeojin always kept her spark. 

Yeojin finally noticed Haseul absentmindedly staring at her and made a face. "What?" she whined. 

"You're a good kid." 

"Ugh, shut up." 

Haseul chuckled and Yeojin slowly joined her, the two falling back into that beautiful, comfortable silence they'd established once again. 

Haseul turned her eyes from her cousin to world around her. It was stunningly sunny today, as it almost always, not even a cloud in the sky. The light reflected some, not all of the windows lining the road. Most of them were a little dirty, their houses painted long ago: blues and greens and pinks, muted with age, but it was so much better that way. She could see people's art on their walls and inside their houses, through the windows, the kind of art people did themselves, that maybe wasn't the prettiest, but they could be more proud of it than any distinguished artist's print. The screen doors were dusty and as the girls passed, dogs barked and windchimes chimed and the sound of waves brushing the shore carried over from a little distance and dreamcatchers attached to the tops of porches blew in the breeze. An older couple waved hello as they passed, dressed in their swimsuits and button up shirts, all the way ed, rocking back and forth on their porch. Sand littered every corner and crevice, the drains and the doorways. Everyone had a lawn but no one tended to it. The natural plants grew as they wanted and it looked pretty, it looked right. 

She was sure her mind had never been clearer than this summer; the scent of the sun and ocean air just kinda did that. 

Haseul was desperate to know how this almost perfect little town was completely trampled by tourists, at this point.

"Where are you going? We're here!" Yeojin called, shaking Haseul from her thoughts. 

"O-oh, sorry." 

"Hurry up!"

She followed her cousin down the shaded path, sandwhiched between the two houses. 

"The lady was selling lemonade yesterday. But you missed it." 

That genuinely did make Haseul a little sad. 

"Guess I'll have to come on all my days to make sure I don't miss it again." 

And with a few more steps, they were there. 

Our Beach. Haseul was no less stunned by it than the first day they'd came: the clean, clear, empty, shore, with its pure sand. She had no idea what laid at either end of the banks. And that water, cool but never too cold (as she knew from putting just her feet in that one time), clear and clean, just like everywhere else. She was terrified to keep a photo of this place, lest it gets spread everywhere, and too many people come and ruin its beauty. So she just tried to save the picture of it in her mind, to keep it forever. Haseul was sure she could do it. 

Her and Yeojin stepped into the soft warm sand, the ocean breeze filtering through her cozy button up, padding their way over to a good spot to lay down their blanket. Yeojin pulled out that cheese plate and a tiny container of three grapes, and Haseul sighed. 

"We should go to the grocery store again soon. Is that all the fruit we have?" 

"Yup," Yeojin answered. 

"We just went though!" 

"Come on! This is the first time in forever we have logical food in the house. Grandma and me have been snacking all the time." 

Haseul looked around as Yeojin got their snacks out of her bag. There was only one other group on the beach, a few older ladies hanging out in beach chairs, holding glasses full of cocktails, chuckling by the water. But Haseul noticed a lone figure come out from the entrance to the beach: a guy, dressed in red swim shorts the same color as Vivi's, walking towards the lifeguard tower. 

Haseul watched him as he began a short conversation with Vivi, finally looked at her crush: she hadn't wanted to be staring the whole time, she didn't want to seem desperate. 

But she knew she was as soon as her eyes landed on her perfect face that she was. A whole day without seeing her had kind of hurt, in a way. But seeing her now, she was reminded of her absolute prettiness. She matched that term in every sense of the word; everything she was, was soft delicacy. Her round eyes, gentle sloping nose, petal pink lips, small and gentle fingertips, standing just an inch or so taller than Haseul, dark brown hair, up in that ponytail with side pieces poking out that perfectly framed her delicate face. Haseul could just hear her soft, slow voice in her mind, and she could smell the scent of the ocean and cherry blossoms that radiated off of her.

Haseul noticed that the guy replaced Vivi in the lifeguard seat and Vivi came running down the steps, stopping with a small smile in front of where Haseul and Yeojin had settled themselves. 

"H-Hi!" Haseul stuttered. 

"Hi," Vivi answered with a shy little giggle. 

Yeojin looked at Haseul, then Vivi, then Haseul, then Vivi. "I'm...gonna...go...in...the....water...now...you kids have fun!" She threw a sly wink to Haseul before dashing for the waves. 

Haseul and Vivi watched her and chuckled a bit before Haseul turned back to her crush, a little confused. She cast her eyes to the lifeguard stand. 

"Oh, that guy? Me and my coworker agreed to split shifts now. It means sometimes I have to do his shifts at the touristy beaches, but now I can chill out here in the afternoon." 

"Oh, really? D-Does this mean you don't have to go back up in like five minutes?" 

"Yup! I'm free now." 

The two girls smiled at each other awkwardly for a moment before Haseul perked up. 

"Oh! Sit down!" 

Vivi slowly sat down on their blanket and Haseul sat beside her. 

"Where were you yesterday?" 

Haseul briefly and barely processed the fact that Vivi noticed her absence before speaking. "Oh, I got a job." 

"Congratulations!" Vivi genuinely answered. 

"Thanks." 

The two girls fell into sort of an awkward silence: not the awkwardness of incompatible people, just the awkwardness of not knowing the other, and being almost too shy to get to know them. But fighting through it, and enjoying their company anyways, because something inside Haseul told her it was worth it. 

Vivi turned to Haseul, a sort of nervous expression on her face. "Is there a reason you don't go into the water?" 

Haseul chuckled uncomfortably. "There's kind of a lot of reasons, actually." There were the ones that were legitimate: she wanted to keep an extra eye on Yeojin, and of course she couldn't swim. And there were the ones she knew were kinda stupid, like not wanting to be in just her swimsuit in public. But that was a little personal to share with Vivi. After all, how long had they known each other?

"Do you mind sharing them?" 

Haseul chuckled, again. "Well...the main reason is that I don't know how to swim." 

"Oh!" Vivi looked at her in surprise. Haseul guessed it was a rare thing to not be able to swim in a town like Egret Cove. "But didn't you say you came here as a kid?" 

"Yeah? And I would play in the water a little then. But I never went all that deep, and once I got to around middle school age, I stopped going in. So I kinda forgot everything I used to know, what little of that there was." 

Vivi nodded slowly, her cute ponytail bouncing. "Um...well...would you like to know? Since you're here for the whole summer and all..." 

Haseul thought for a moment. Yeah, she felt awkward in just her swimsuit...but was it worth not being able to go into the water ever? What if she ever felt comfortable in her swimsuit but couldn't get in because she never learned? What if one day she had friends and they wanted to hang out at the beach or a pool and she didn't know how? 

So...yeah. She did want to know how to swim. 

"I would, actually. I really would." 

Slowly, Vivi smiled at her. "I could teach you." 

Haseul's eyes widened. "I'd love that! I'd love it so much!" She answered before she could think. 

Who could be a better teacher though? Sweet Vivi, who was literally a lifeguard, who probably knew better than most people how to swim well. And of course, it just meant extra time with her crush, especially now that Vivi got more afternoons off. Yeah, she'd have to deal with the whole swimsuit thing...but she couldn't back out now, could she?

"Next day off, I'll teach you?" 

Haseul grinned at her. "Next day off."