20

This day was D-day. The wedding was not until lunch time but Eunhye was already at the hotel early that morning, in a hotel suite, calming down a nervous Jieun. The day's bride accidentally stepped on her own dress, making a tear on the gown.

"It's in the bottom, no one will notice it," Eunhye assured her friend. "The only people who know would be you and me."

"And the coordinator, seeing as I will have to pay for this dress in full," Jieun said just getting more freaked out by the minute. "I should have just bought my own gown instead of rent it."

"We've talked about this," she reminded her. "You're only going to be married once so there's no need to buy it."

"How do you know that? What if Baek Seungheon decided I'm not wife material and runs away to marry a mermaid in the Philippines instead?"

"Jieun," Eunhye said, exaggeratedly breathing in and out so her friend would follow her. "Just breathe. And know that before it came to that, I'll steal his passport so he won't be able to go anywhere."

"He'll need it for our honeymoon," the bride said, her train of thought already incoherent. Eunhye put her lips together, trying not to laugh. She was sure Jieun would be irritated if she pointed that out. Instead, she got her friend a glass of cold water to calm her down, continuing with the breathing techniques until the bride finally sounded like a sane person.

"I'm sorry for freaking out."

If her face was not full of make up, Eunhye would have pinched Jieun until her cheeks turned red. "I'm the only one here to see it, so freak out all you want."

"This is really happening...?"

"If you're having second thoughts, Jiho is one phone call away and you can use Chanyeol's precious as your getaway car. I'll handle Seon-oppa."

Jieun laughed, still a little nervous. The stylist came back and said it was time to do her hair so Eunhye stepped back a bit and decided to take a break from being the bride's maid. She needed to come down to the wedding hall anyway and check on things.

Weddings are too much work, she thought as she made her way to get herself a good cup of coffee. If she ever did marry, she'd probably just want to elope, go to some place where no one knew her and Wonwoo and then come back to Korea a year later without anyone knowing. Not caring too much that it would be romantic, she just wanted to get away from every one. Knowing her boyfriend, he would probably agree.

Realizing she was fantasizing getting married to Wonwoo, she stopped herself before her imagination went too far. She kind of felt like she would be jinxing it like the previous relationship she had.

As if he had some connection to her thoughts, her phone rang and it was Wonwoo calling. She answered it with her face flushed.

"I just woke up," he said, his voice reflecting his words. "We can go together."

"I'm already at the hotel," she told him. Then she relayed how Jieun woke her up around dawn with her wedding jitters and so she just went down there and decided to help. "Take your time preparing. I already told Yeol to pick you up."

"I thought Zico-hyung was picking us up?" Their neighborhood was out of Chanyeol's way to the venue, which was why at first Zico volunteered to carpool, using his brother's car (he sold his own car because his sense of direction was as bad as Eunhye's).

"It's Jieun's wedding day," she emphasized. "Do you think I would let him drive a car?"

"Good point." She could hear him getting up with a groan. "See you later, then."

******'

Weddings. Wonwoo did not think he was old enough to have friends that would get married but seeing the crowd he was hanging out with recently, it was a matter of time. This was actually a good thing, because the statistics of their country's marriage rate was very low, especially in the age bracket of 20's. With divorce rate high, as well, it seemed like marriage might have lost some of their meaning.

For someone who grew up in a loving family, his throughts were pretty negative, he realized. He grew up watching his father continuing to peel the shrimps for his mom, and seeing the loving look his parents gave each other when they thought no one was lookng.

Well, after living on his own (technically), away from his parents, he discovered the truth about relationships: that not all of them are magical. He sometimes wished he knew more about broken families whenever Eunhye talked about hers so he would know the right words to say to her. 

The sound of their doorbell pulled him away from his thoughts. He opened it and let Eunhye's two best friends in. Recently, he had grown closer to them, and they treated him like their little brother. Wonwoo, himself, was a firstborn, and he rarely socialized with his high school sunbaes, so he would sometimes feel awkward with how these two took care of him. Not that he was complaining. They sure do treat him a lot.

Chanyeol held out something behind Wonwoo, as if checking his size. "Good, this would surely fit," he muttered. He also saw what Wonwoo was wearing. "Na-uh. You are not wearing that."

Wonwoo glanced at Chanyeol and then Zico who sat down on Mingyu's bed looking only half present. He realized his button-up shirt and slacks were obviously not comparable to the suits they were wearing.

"I knew you were going to do this so I brought you one of mine."

Wonwoo ped the covered suit that Chanyeol brought, and saw the brand. "I can't wear this."

"It's an old one," the guy shrugged. "I wore that some time before I went into service. It's a bit small for me now. You can keep it."

"But this seem too much, I'm not the one getting married."

Chanyeol rolled his eyes and took the navy blue coat off of the hanger and put it over Wonwoo's shoulder. He also took out a light grey tie from the cover's pocket and handed it to him. "This, you'll have to return to me."

Wonwoo looked at his reflection from Mingyu's whole body mirror. His pants definitely did not match the coat. As if reading his mind, Chanyeol handed him the trousers that did. While he changed, the older guy looked around the room. On one of the shelves, he picked up a hair wax and opened it. He took a sniff and gave an approving nod.

"That's not mine," Wonwoo told him when Chanyeol took a dollop. He bent down when Chanyeol gestured him to. 

"I'm sure Mingyu wouldn't mind. Are you wearing contacts later?"

"I can't. Dry ey--"

"Dry eyes syndrome," he finished for him. "Seriously, you and Eunhye need to do a DNA test. You might be related."

"She has it too?"

"What does she not have?" Chanyeol muttered. He put the wax on Wonwoo's hair. Then, he took a comb and started styling his hair. "Are you going to wear those glasses?"

Wonwoo showed him a couple of his spares.

"This one's better." He gave it to him to put on and went on working with his hair. "Maybe we get Eunhye to believe in marriages when she sees you looking like a groom."

Wonwoo pressed his lips together.

"Don't you dare blush on me," Chanyeol warned him. "It's disgusting."

"I'll wait in the car," Zico announced. He got up and left before any of them could say anything.

"Is he okay?" Wonwoo asked, genuinely concerned when Eunhye's other best friend tried to open the door by pushing it instead of pulling, and ending up cursing when he got how it worked and finally managed to let himself out.

"Would you be okay if it's Eunhye's wedding day and you're just a guest?"

He shook his head. That was definitely not a good thing to put in Wonwoo's head. He was sure he would end up imaginining different scenarios around that thought later that night.

"Then, no, he's not."

*****'

She only planned to help Jieun until she got her makeup on then she could go back to being just a guest but Eunhye found herself with Jieun's little brother by the entrance, welcoming guests and organizing the non-monetary wedding gifts. She could not turn down Jieun's master of ceremonies dragged her because the person assigned was running late.

Eunhye did not think it would be as packed, since she knew Jieun only had a handful of people that were close enough to be invited, but she forgot to take into consideration the couple's parents who seemed to have invited all of their friends. The good thing was that most of them went directly to the buffet because they were not really included in the reserved tables in the ceremony area. Every single turn she made, she could think of a dozen ways to improve this system with a software design but she was too busy to even catch up with her own mind.

Also, it was not just Jieun's friends she got to meet. She was reminded of her past with Seungheon when she had to take gifts from familiar faces from back when Seungheon was in the university. His close friends, Nam Woohyun, Ahn Jaehyo, and Choi Taejoon came in a bunch and at what she was doing.

"Are you here to sabotage his wedding?" Woohyun asked, pulling her away from Jieun's little brother.

"No, he's capable of that all on his own."

Taejoon, who was also her own high school sunbae, laughed aloud at that comment as he put his envelope in the dropbox. "Should we check his quarters and make sure he didn't run off to the Cebu again?"

Eunhye took something out of her purse and showed it to them. "Already did that. I have his passport as hostage until the end of the wedding."

They entered the wedding hall laughing.

A breathless Bae Suzy was running towards her, and as it turned out, she was the one supposed to be doing this thing Eunhye was stuck with.

"Eonni!!!" Suzy said. "I'm really sorry. My car was pounded by mistak