She should’ve realized it sooner.

She wasn’t shy when she refused to shower after her swimming lessons together with the other girls. Instead, quickly changing from her tight swim suit to her normal clothes before anyone could see her inside the changing rooms and showering home instead.

The reason why she never had a crush to discuss with her fellow classmates wasn’t because she was focused on her studies and didn’t have time for boys and going on dates.

She didn’t feel jealous because the girl she sat in class with in elementary school went on a date with her than supposed ‘boyfriend’ at that time.

The fact that she always secretly watched her older sister’s best friend when she came over to hang out wasn’t because she really wanted to be friends with her, but was to timid to talk to her.

Chaeryeong could think of at least 10 other incidents that suggested that her interest was never really around the popular boys with gelled back hair and expensive watches that looked to big on them, but rather the the girls they were dating. 

Yet, the seventeen year old girl refused to admit it. She went over and under to explain to herself why she didn’t find the male lead in a new drama attractive and why her eyes kept drifting towards the lead actress. 

Instead of facing the reality she turned around and ran back to the comfortable familiarity of her perfect middle class catholic life. 

Chaeryeong was always the ‘perfect’ child. Her grades were above average, almost never falling from an A, her gpa sitting at 4.3, placing her in the top ten of her grade. She never went to parties, instead opting to work on her homework no matter how hard her older sister, Chaeyeon, tried to get her outside the house with her. Together with her family she attended church every Sunday and prayed diligently. 

Her life was as exiting as a piece of paper, or at least that was what Yeji always said. Yeji was Chaeryeong’s best friend, and only friend in fact. They met in the first year of high school and stayed close since. 

Speaking of Yeji, she was going to be here at any moment and Chaeryeong was freaking out. Somehow she agreed on coming with her to a party that their senior, Park Jihyo, was throwing. Yeji told her to wear something y, but you wouldn’t find a thing that you could describe like that in her closet even if you’d turn it upside down three times. 

Luckily, or not really for Chaeryeong, her sister decided to step in and let her borrow one of her skirts which would go well with her shirt. Chaeyeon tried to put her in a dress, but Chaeryeong almost passed out when she saw how short it was. 

“Cherry! Yeji is here!”

Her sister yelled from downstairs and soon enough the girl herself was standing in front of her. She had a short black dress on with lace, her light but prominent eyeshadow matched in color, bringing out the girl’s cat like eyes, a feature she liked to show off. 

“Oh come on Chaer, this doesn’t scream y at all!” Chaeryeong scoffed.

“You know I don’t do y, you should be glad I’m even going with you, so don’t make me regret it even more than I already do.”

Yeji just laughed at her, grabbing her arm and heading towards the car waiting outside. 

“Hey Jeongyeon, nice dress.”

The girl behind the steering wheel smiled at her and started the car, heading towards the already ongoing party a few streets away. Yeji wanted to arrive fashionably late and who was she to refuse.

—————

Chaeryeong hated this. The feeling of sweaty people around her made her want to throw up. Someone spilled their drink on her and she lost count of how many people stepped on her foot or bumped into her without apologizing. Yeji disappear the moment they walked inside the house, probably to find Felix, her current crush. This left Chaeryeong stranded in the middle of everything she hated. Alcohol, people, loud and obnoxious music and once again people, a huge crowd of them, in fact, and she felt like they were up all her energy in a rapid pace. 

After what felt like hours to her, trying to push herself through sea of people that smelled like cheap alcohol, she managed to fight her way to bit quieter corner of the house with a open window that made it easier to breath, trying to recover from the nightmare she just went through. 

She stopped looking outside the window after witnessing a group throwing up session that included way to many people for her liking. Her new objective was to somehow survive the rest of the night clean and sober, one of those things already failed due to a lone red cup that flew at her from god know where a few minutes ago.

Luckily for her, she spotted a familliar face not to far away from her. Once she build up the courage to try and talk to the shorter girl, Chaeryeong actually found herself having a pleasant conversation with Choi Jisu, or Lia as she went by. They had a few classes together but she never talked to her before. However they bonded pretty quickly over their love for old Disney movies.

The conversation was rather short lived, as she was pulled away by already tipsy Yeji who dragged her towards a group of people she only knew by seeing them around school. 

Turns out they wanted to play truth or dare. But lacked a person so Yeji saved them by dragging poor Chaeryeong into it. 

She could recognize Jihyo herself and her boyfriend Daniel, Sana and Dahyun were sitting next to them, the infamous duo that almost everyone around school knew for their pranks and stunts to piss off the teachers and principal. There were a few unknown faces here and there, but a certain someone stood out from them. Shin Ryujin. She actually sat beside her younger sister Shin Yuna in Maths and Physics, but that wasn’t why she, and pretty much the whole school knew her. She was one of the only kids openly gay in the school, which would normally get you extremely bullied, like when someone saw Park Jimin kiss a guy and he had to leave due the amount of bulling he had to go through. But no one messed around with Ryujin, yes they talked about her behind her back, throwing insults left and right, but when they stood face to face with her that kept their mouth shut, because in the end they were scared of her. Together with Jeon Heejin, Ha Sooyoung and Son Hyejoo they created a clique of some sort that no one wanted to mess around with. Chaeryeong saw first hand what could happened if you pissed of Ryujin and trust her, it wasn’t pretty.

“Alright guys! We will spin this bottle and whoever it lands on will have to choose truth or dare! If they chicken out, they drink!”

And with that Jihyo spinned the empty soju bottle, starting the game that would once and for all change Chaeryeong’s life. If it was for the better or worse, she had yet to find out.

Chapter Management