A/N: I hope you guys are all safe and happy, and my greatest thanks to all of you guys for waiiting for this chapter. Here's the chapter that got annoyingly lost in cyberspace. Enjoy! x

Chapter 7

‘Oh, hi Lisa! It’s me Rose. I think we just confirmed that.’

‘So it is you?’

‘Yes it is me.’

‘Oh, ok, hi Rose! I think you dropped your phone when I ran into you before. The screens – um – cracked a bit. I’ll get you a new screen to make it up.’

‘Oh! No need to do that!’ said Rose, ‘It’s all good. I needed a new phone anyway,’ she lied.

Jennie, who was listening intently to the conversation, frowned. What do you mean? You told me that it was your new phone! She mouthed to Rose.

Rose ignored that silent remark.

‘Then at least let me drop off your phone at your place. Could you tell me the address of where you guys are staying?’

Rose drew in a breath. Did she really want Lisa to come to the dorm? Rose would make a complete fool of herself in front of Lisa if she did. And on top of that, Jennie would also be there to witness it!

‘Um – um, ok,’ said Rose, making up her mind and telling Lisa the address.

Once they ended the call, Jennie gave Rose a stern look.

‘Why’d you lie to her?’ she asked.

‘Well, I didn’t want her to go waste her money to fix up something I caused. I was the one who ran into her before and dropped my phone. I’m not sure why she’s blaming it on herself though …’

‘She clearly likes you,’ said Jennie.

‘SHE DOES?!’ exclaimed Rose, sounding a bit too excited.

‘Yeah duh. As a friend, obviously.’

Rose immediately shrank back into her shell.

‘Oh,’ she said. Then to quickly cover up her disappointment, she added, ‘Yeah, that what’s I meant. You see – um – I really want to be friends with her … and er, y-you didn’t take that the wrong way, did you?’

Jennie gave an awkward laugh. ‘No pfft of course not. Why? Were you intending something else? You don’t have a crush on her or something, do you?’

‘No No, of course not!’ said Rose. ‘Nothing more than a new friendship, that’s all.’

Jennie nodded, and made a mental note to make sure Rose did not fall any harder for this Lisa girl.

Why?

She could tell that Rose had a crush on Lisa. And for some reason, that made her jealousy bubble pop.

----

Twenty minutes later, there was a knock at their door and Rose ran up to open it. Instead of seeing Lisa however, she was greeted with one of her instructors instead.

‘Chaeyoung, you have a visitor waiting down for you in the lobby. Her name is-‘.

He didn’t get the chance to finish his sentence because Rose immediately bolted past him and headed for the lift. She called a loud “thank you” over her shoulder, while practically smashing the “down” button for the elevator.

The elevator probably sensed that Rose was in a mad rush because it took quite a while to reach Rose’s level. By the time it opened its doors, Rose was ready to scream with impatientness ( I don’t think that’s a word but who cares ). It reached the ground floor after a while and Rose jumped out. She looked around quickly trying to spot one particular thing:

The toilet.

Yes. She wasn’t actually in a rush to see Lisa (sorry if I played with your minds a bit). She was actually in desperate need of a bathroom because she had suddenly felt the urge to go while she was waiting for the lift, but she hadn’t been bothered to go back to the bathroom in her room.

Anyways, she found it, and quickly did her business. When she came out again, she was feeling much more refreshed.

Rose was walking over to the main reception desk when someone called out her name. Rose turned and saw Lisa running up to her.

‘There … there you are!’ said Lisa, panting quite heavily. ‘I’ve been looking for you everywhere! I asked your instructor if I could go up to your dorm to deliver the stuff, but he said he’ll go get you for me. And then when he came back down, he wasn’t with anyone so I was confused and started running around everywhere trying to find you.’

Rose felt so bad for causing Lisa to go through all that, but she still wasn’t sure if it was worth it if she’d came down straight away and met Lisa, but also accidentally pissing herself because she had desperately needed the bathroom.

‘I am sorry Lisa,’ said Rose, lowering her head. ‘I had to go to the toilet and – uh – I guess I probably should’ve come out to greet you first.’

‘Hey don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault, Rose,’ said Lisa smiling. ‘Anyways - um – here’s your phone …’

Lisa took out a medium sized paper bag and held it out to Rose. Rose looked inside and saw the box for the latest apple phone in the market. Confused, she took the box out, took the tape off, opened the lid of the box, and gave out a gasp.

‘But – but this isn’t my phone!’ she cried.

‘Well your actual phone is here ...’ said Lisa, taking out a phone that was cracked badly. ‘It was so battered up that the people who repaired the phones said it was pretty much not worth it trying to fix it. So I – um – decided to just get you a brand new phone altogether. Do you … do you not like it?’

‘No, No! It’s beautiful. I love it! But it just doesn’t feel right taking this brand new phone that you brought, when I was the one at fault at the very beginning! I should’ve been looking where I was going …’ Rose mumbled.

‘Oh it doesn’t matter, Rose. It wasn’t your fault. I blame myself for colliding into you and the damage that it caused to your phone. If your worried that stuff on your old phone didn’t get transferred to the new one, it’s ok. The people at the apple store were kind enough to help do all the transferring and stuff. Please just take the phone Rose. I want you to have it,’ said Lisa.

‘Oh ok. Ok I will. Thank you so much Lisa. Is there anything I could do for you in return for your lovely kind act?’ asked Rose.

‘Um … no there isn’t anything. It’s all good. But is it possible if you could come and meet me outside this hotel after school tomorrow? That is, if you have time, of course.’

Rose thought that was a brilliant idea. She hadn’t yet thought of the fact that Lisa was implicitly asking her out at that very moment.

‘Sure! I’m pretty sure I’ll have time,’ said Rose.

‘That’s great! So … I’ll see you tomorrow after school, yeah?’ asked Lisa, giving one of her irresistible smiles.

‘Yes, yes. See you tomorrow!’ said Rose.

Then at that moment, Lisa leaned in and wrapped her arms around Rose.

Rose was so taken aback by the gesture, that she almost toppled backwards. Luckily she regained her sense and hugged Lisa back.

They stood there hugging each other for some time.

Two of the boys, who were also part of the exchange program, walked past them and looked at the pair hugging with a weird expression on their faces.

‘Isn’t that the girl from that school we’re staying at?’ the smaller one asked his friend.

‘They’re both from the school, dummy,’ his friend replied. ‘The one holding the bag is Rose. I know her cause she’s in my class back in Australia. Isn’t the other girl the “girl crush” of the school  or something? Her name’s Lisa, I’m pretty sure. I think I overheard some of the guys talking about it and how they were jealous or something. I sorta feel the same. Y’know, there’s quite a few cute girls at the school were staying at. And Rose’s kinda cute too, y’know…’

‘Er – well let’s just say you and I have different tastes in girls. And, yeah I think she is the “girl crush”,’ said the smaller one. ‘Ooh! Looks like some romance blossoming!’

‘Whattya mean?’ his friend said.

The smaller one jerked his thumb back. ‘There still hugging. We walked past them, and they were hugging. We’re now already outside the doors, and they’re still hugging! Look for yourself!’

His friend looked, and indeed Lisa and Rose were still embracing each other.

‘Huh … maybe they are a thing. I mean, I don’t ever recall Rose dating anyone back in Australia.’

‘How would you know?’ the smaller one teased. ‘Been doing some research, have you?’

‘Oh shut up!’ his friend said. ‘I’ve been in her class 5 years in a row, and I’ve never seen her talk to a single boy. She mostly hung around girls.’

‘Are you now judging her gender?’ the smaller one asked. ‘I’m kidding dude,’ he said, after seeing his friend raise his hand to slap him. ‘Yeah who knows. They might actually be dating. Wanna go tell Tae bout it? I think he’s got a crush on Lisa. Won’t he be heart-broken when he finds out she’s taken, haha.’

And those two boys went on their way, to tell their friend Tae about it (who was, btw, heart-broken at the news), who told his whole friend group, who told all their friends, and by the end of that day, half of the students who went to that high school knew about this girl called Lisa and this girl called Rose, and what they had between them.

Of course, when information is passed through so many people like that, the information is changed and altered when passed from one person to another, and everyone ends up getting slightly different information. And that’s exactly what happened in this case. The only difference is that the two boys who started the whole rumour didn’t even get their facts right.

Lisa and Rose weren’t a thing. Well, at least not yet, anyway.

But once they find out about this rumour that’s been spread about them in less than 12 hours, will Lisa and Rose’s relationship actually be able to blossom?

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