This plan was not fool-proof. 

She knows it. 

Wendy knows it. 

Hell, even Sooyoung, who’s a good twenty meters away, could see and knows it. 

Her back is planted against the cool bricks of the gymnasium building, the shadow casted by the tall structure shielding them from the unforgiving sun. Her chest is skittering about, the knowledge of being caught in the act of peeping not helping her keep her laughter at bay. 

"Can you shut up, Seulgi!" Comes Wendy's harsh whisper from against the red bricks. Her face may be squashed against the building, but Seulgi's certain the girl is blushing from her forehead to her toes.  

She would admit that the situation was not the best outcome they, meaning Wendy especially, could have asked for. It did not help that the shrill sound of the coach's whistle indicated a quick break of the afternoon practice. Which could only mean one thing, and that thing was heading right towards them. 

At the sound of thundering footsteps leaving the court, Wendy turns to look at her alarmingly. "Run?" She asks, as if that wasn't their only option. 

"Run." 

And that's how Seulgi and Wendy spent their Thursday afternoon after school. Cooking up a plan to catch a glimpse of Wendy's new crush of the month, being caught blatantly staring through the doors by said crush, then hightailing it out of there. 

Seulgi can bet her bottom dollar that they were seen sprinting off by the entire team, but she won't tell the other girl. She's still mumbling about the supposed trauma the whole event has left her with. 

She'll save it for their break later at work when the girl least expects it. 

🏐🏐

Third stale cafeteria nugget down, and Seulgi's beginning to pity the sad display that is Wendy's forgotten and empty looking tray. The first one she took was because she wolfed down her own share and was still hungry. The second one was on impulse for getting away with the first one. And the third one was to cement her theory that her best friend was too busy staring at a tall somebody across the lunchroom to take notice of her diminishing food. 

Seulgi would be downright lying if she said her hands weren't itching to snatch up her chocolate milk too. 

"Y'know," she slides the cold french fry into , "It's like you want to get caught. Is that," she fake gasps behind her hand, dipping forward over the cool, steel table to lean closer to Wendy before whispering, "is that your kink?" 

Finally grabbing her friend's attention, she has to hold her stomach from laughing too hard that it starts cramping up, because Wendy's cheeks are crimson in embarrassed fury and she throws the first thing her hands could get a hold of, and that happened to be her last and only nugget. When she looks down at her now empty tray, then back up to Seulgi still laughing but behind her tossed ammo between her teeth, she's absolutely furious. 

"Did you touch my ing nuggets?" 

🏐🏐

She doesn't believe in it, but maybe this is karma for stealing Wendy's nuggets. Maybe the God's looked down and said enough was enough at her proud display of greed and gluttony. Because there was no other explanation as to why she was now on the floor with her head throbbing, ears ringing and her already poor eyesight giving a new meaning to blurry. 

Did a grenade go off next to her head? 

Wendy is above her, eyes so wide that through Seulgi's terrible vision they looked like floating ping pong balls. is going a million miles a second, but as hard as she tries to focus on what she is saying, nothing but muted mumbles could be heard. A hand presses into the area just above her eyebrow and Seulgi has never felt a pain so intense ripping down behind her right eye. 

Scrunching her face up in utter agony, she slaps away at Wendy's hands, whimpering her obvious displeasure. The sudden pulsating discomfort snaps her out from her muddled state, because now Wendy's loud voice caked in worry reaches her eardrums. 

"Oh my god, are you okay? Is that blood? Seulgi! Can you hear me?" 

"I'm so sorry! Is she okay?" 

"Dude, you got her right in the face!" 

"I think you broke her face." 

"Stop it you two, you're not helping." 

The different array of voices drown out Wendy's. The bickering was bad, but what made it worse was that darn whistle going off. 

Screw it. Seulgi prefers the grenade over that whistle any day.  

🏐🏐

"I reckon it looks badass." 

"I reckon it doesn't." 

"Well I reckon I could pull it off." 

"Seulgi," Wendy is looking at her like she's the definition of dumb. That stupid has never had a meaning until her eyes landed on her. Her eye roll was supplied by sheer exasperation, she could imagine the two balls rolling on her bedroom floor right now with how hard and exaggerated the action was. "No one can pull off a black eye." 

The veins in her right eye are less red and angry now. It's initial puffiness has gone down, but what was originally pink and swollen has turned into a blob of black and blue, with an undertone of purple, splotched right around the entire area of her eye and the top of her cheekbone. Her fingers gently hover over the sensitive area, and call her a baby all you want, but the residual heat from her tips has her flinching. 

Wendy frowns at her. 

So Seulgi smiles, because that's what she does in ridiculous situations such as this. "I reckon I can make it work." 

🏐🏐

The stares from other students she can handle. Even Wendy turning into a helicopter parent she can handle. To be honest, she enjoys being doted on, but she would never outright say it. What she cannot handle is being on the other side of blatant staring from a certain sports team. 

"Y'know," she ducks her head down to be hidden away by Wendy's, "I get why you got caught the other day." 

"We," Wendy emphasises, "we got caught." 

Waving her hand to dismiss the notion, Seulgi continues. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why we got caught the other day." Wendy nods for her to continue, happy that the blame was theirs to shoulder. "Having beady eyes on you gets the body tingling. I think it's a basic instinct kind of thing." 

"What do you mean?" 

"Well, having the entire school staring at me and my black eye is creepy and all. But, having your predatory googly eyes set on her must have Sooyoung's innate flight mode pinging." 

Wendy hurls a nugget at her and Seulgi happily picks it up from her lap and pops it into her amused mouth. 

🏐🏐

If she were to be honest, she knew this was coming. What with the constant staring, and the fact that she's sporting the fattest bruise on her face, Seulgi knew this confrontation was going to happen eventually. But now stuck in said situation, it was plain awkward and there was only so much accepting of apologies as she could offer. 

"Really, it's okay." 

In front of her is the culprit behind her nearly losing an eye. The ball collided with her face with such force that her right eye took a trip around her skull like a pinball let loose. 

"I just- that bruise looks gnarly and it's my fault the ball even flew your way-" 

"-know, but it's okay-" 

"-before I knew it you were on the floor-" 

"-fine now-" 

"-didn't register until Sooyoung knocked me upside the head-" 

"-heal in no time-" 

"-held your head like you were shot-" 

"-it a week or so-" 

"-really should get my spikes better-" 

"Okay! As much as I love you two not letting each other finish their sentences, but we have practice and she said it's okay like ten times." 

The back of her culprit's uniform is clutched in a girl's hand, a slight tug issued to try and coerce her to stop her blabbering apology. The girl's uniform is bright red with small outlines of black accentuating her number and name, a contrast to the team's mainly black uniform with the use of red in reverse. Odd, Seulgi thinks. Odd too that the girl seems to be a head or two shorter than the rest of the team. 

"But Joohyun, I haven't finished my apology!" Her culprit whines. 

"Your apology is hurting her more than your offskew spike." 

Seulgi smiles at the obvious jab. Maybe she wasn't hiding her discomfort as well as she thought she was. Then again, being cornered in her seat after class by a towering athlete wasn't her ideal way of being apologised to. 

"Byuli, was it?" At the girl's nod, Seulgi continues. "I'm not going to lie. This bruise," she waves her hand around her right eye, "hurts like a ." When the girl frowns, Seulgi gives her a soft smile, "but it wasn't your fault because you didn't mean it. So really, it's okay." 

"But-" 

"It's okay," she tries again, touching the girl's arm to shake her out of her upcoming, endless speech. 

A heavy sigh leaves the girl, her eyes are downcast and it takes Seulgi a good second to realise they were trained on her hand. Not wanting to cause another awkward situation, she drops her slight hold, and physically sees the girl sigh yet again. 

"If you say so." 

"I've said it ten times," she looks at the girl behind Byuli and laughs at the grin tugged on her lips. 

🏐🏐 

"And you didn't tell me!" 

"They ambushed me, Wendy!" 

"You should've stalled until I came back." 

"It's not my fault you take the world's longest piss." 

"That's besides the point! You're a useless wingman is the main issue here." 

"Stop being dramatic, your eye candy wasn't even there." 

Wendy pauses for a second, mulling her thoughts over. "Well, knowing her teammates wouldn't have hurt. Working from the inside, Seulgi, ever heard of that?" 

The walk to the bus stop across their school has never been longer, she groans. When she told Wendy about what happened she didn't expect to be interrogated like she committed high treason against the girl. She had instead wanted some sort of sympathy at being crowded over by some of their school's volleyball team. 

"They were late for practice anyways." 

"If you're already late what's the difference if you're a little more so." 

"Just because you're always late to doesn't mean everyone is." 

"I just don't see why not take your time. Late is late. There is no early late," Wendy has begun her spiel, one that Seulgi has heard many times before that she just tunes her out now. 

"You of all people should know. Your flavour of the month is their captain. Last time I followed you on your stalking session, she was yelling to the depths of hell, I bet the devil himself pissed his pants." 

"It was hot, you've got to admit." 

Leaning against the bus stop's graffitied plexiglass, Seulgi turns to her friend in complete disgust. She's starting to question if they see the same thing during these stake outs as Wendy likes to dub it. Apparently 'creepy Wendy hours' was too much, but Seulgi likes to think the girl was in denial. 

"Wendy, at one point she was smacking the balls at their heads." 

"I know something else she co-" 

"Okay! That's enough of this topic for the day. I want to keep my lunch in my stomach, please." 

"One day, Seulgi. One day when you appreciate a woman, you'll understand." 

"I appreciate women just fine." 

Wendy only sighs while shaking her head like she was dealing with a lost cause. "I mean when you really appreciate them," there's a glint in her eyes when she turns to look at Seulgi, her left eyebrow twitching to drive what she was inferring home. 

"Stop trying to convert me or something." 

"I'm just saying, it's a darn shame." 

"What is?" 

"If you really tried, like reached deep down in yourself, you'd make an amazing lesbian." 

Seulgi just laughs. They've broached this topic before, what with Wendy making her her wingman and all, but her friend's never really outright said why she always dragged Seulgi around in all her courting, if you could call it that, shenanigans. But there it was, out in the open. And yes, she confirms, it sounds just as ridiculous said aloud than between the lines. 

"I don't think that's how uality works." 

"Well, sometimes you don't even know it until you do." 

Seulgi smiles at her friend, genuinely happy that the girl has finally accepted herself so confidently to even speak like this comfortably and in public no less. Two years ago was another story. So, she nudges her friend, and shares a warm smile, "you'll be the first to know." 

Seulgi was the first person to know when Wendy was ready to come out, that entire night was charged with anxious energy, shy glances and stuttered sentences. It was that night that lamented the depth of their friendship. It would only be right that her best friend would be the first to know too. If that day ever comes, though.