Gyuri wakes up with a busted lip but a smile adorning her face nonetheless, the main reason for her good mood lying beside her. She takes in the numbness on her arm and she looks down to see her reason lying her head on her arm as her hand protectively shields her bedmate’s forehead. She feels the smooth plaster placed on the girl’s forehead, and a wider smile grows on her face.

She remembers what happened yesterday.

Yesterday,

Gyuri had come to a realization and that is that she loves the height difference between her and Jisun. If they’re going to test it without any cheating (Jisun hates being teased about her height that’s why she always wears heels or shoes with big soles), she is sure that her lips are at the perfect height to kiss the younger’s forehead. That thought alone makes her insides flutter as the imaginary pictures of her lips pressed on Jisun’s forehead floats in her mind. For some reason, it makes her giddy and happy. She finds it quite…weird. Nonetheless, it still brings happiness to her.

It’s an early Thursday morning for the girls, well, for those who are awake, at least.

Hayoung keeps herself entertained with her phone, looking up new clothes in a shopping app that she badly wants to share with her roommates, but with the thought of how late they went to bed last night, the second oldest refrains herself from it.

Seoyeon, who’s been rattled by Jisun’s clumsy steps on the second floor, opts to stare at the top of her bunk, wondering if she’s going to order food this early or ask either her Saerom unnie or Hayoung unnie to whip up something for her. She grabs her plushie and hugs it, now wondering if she’s going to go down and cuddle with Jiwon or just stay in the confines of her blankets.

Jisun, however, is already making productive progress as she steps out to the balcony, sunrays hitting her skin as she closes her eyes, stretching out her arms on her side, feeling the cool morning air.

After a few minutes of just breathing in and letting her skin adjust under the sun, Jisun returns inside and closes the sliding door, grabbing her bag from her bed, and goes down the stairs, unaware that she had awakened another member.

The third oldest waits as the almost silent footsteps pass by her door before tiptoeing out of her room.

Gyuri peaks from the corner as she watches Jisun slips her shoes on, already dressed to go out. Though Gyuri hated math back when she was in school, her eyes and mind can’t help but calculate the exact height the younger girl has as she stands up, finally finished with tying her shoelaces. Jisun feels eyes from behind and so she turns, surprised that Gyuri was already up. She smiles when Gyuri steps out of the corner, approaching her after she learned that she was spotted. “How come you’re already up? You usually don’t wake up until 10.”

“I heard you going down the stairs,” Gyuri says, stopping just in front of the girl. She blinks her eyes and stares at the girl’s outfit. “where are you going?”

“Gym. It’s my last day before I continue again next week.” Jisun turns the doorknob, already turning her back from the girl but Gyuri reaches for her free hand. Jisun looks back at the older and raises her eyebrows, confused as to why the girl stopped her.

Gyuri leans and pulls the door to close again, also grabbing Jisun’s other hand that was on the doorknob. She makes the girl face her and smiles. She pulls Jisun into a hug and closes her eyes, loving that feeling she always gets whenever the younger girl’s close to her.

“Is this a goodbye hug? It’s not like I’m gonna be away forever. It’s just 3 hours.” Jisun asks, chuckling when Gyuri only answers with a hum. Jisun returns the hug and wraps her arms around Gyuri’s neck, patting Gyuri’s head since she knows that the older girl likes it no matter how much she denies it.

Gyuri pulls away and stares at Jisun for a moment, looks down, and then frowns.

“What’s wrong?” If only Gyuri can tell Jisun how much she hates her shoes right now, she would. But she doesn’t.

Because Jisun doesn’t like it when she gets teased about her height.

And for Gyuri, Jisun comes before anything else, and yes, that includes her weird wish of being able to kiss Jisun on her forehead with their normal heights.

“Nothing.” Gyuri hums. She leans down and presses kisses on Jisun’s cheeks.

“Be safe, okay?” Jisun nods and smiles at the older girl again. She lifts her hand and caresses Gyuri’s cheek, gives Gyuri one last cheek kiss, and then slips out of the door. Gyuri stays in front of the door for a while, not until Hayoung peeps her head out of their room’s door and looks at her with a questioning face. “Who left? I heard the door close.”

Gyuri turns and faces the bread girl. “It was Jisun. She’s going to the gym.”

Hayoung stares at Gyuri for a solid minute before saying something after noticing the slight redness on the younger’s cheeks. “She kissed you goodbye, right?”  Hayoung raises her eyebrows with a teasing tone, eliciting a chuckle from Gyuri.

Gyuri nods. “Only on the cheek though.”

Hayoung steps out of the room as she realizes she has someone to talk to in this early morning. She shrugs. “It’s still something though, right?”

“Yeah.” Hayoung places herself on the couch, shuffling around to look for the remote, wanting to watch some good cartoons in the morning.

Gyuri follows Hayoung on the couch, settling herself a good distance away from Hayoung who continues to look for that darn remote. She hears her mutter Jiwon’s name under her breath, but she doesn’t pay her any mind.

Hayoung speaks her mind after giving up on her quest, quietly promising herself she’s gonna watch the marathon of cartoons tomorrow morning instead. “Then how come you look like you’ve been in abstinence?”

Gyuri chuckles.

“Something’s bothering me.” Gyuri confesses to Hayoung. The bread girl turns her body towards Gyuri. “What is it?”

Gyuri takes a few minutes before telling Hayoung what had been bothering her for weeks, ever since she joined them again. “I want…to kiss Jisun’s forehead.”

“Unnie, you want to what?” The two turn to see Seoyeon descending from the second floor, a pure look of confusion on her still puffy face. Gyuri sighs, not wanting to explain the reason why.

“I want to kiss Jisun’s forehead.” She repeats as Seoyeon sits on Hayoung’s other side and peeps over her shoulder, looking at Gyuri with the same confused look. She blinks and yawns for a bit then rests her head on Hayoung’s shoulder, about to speak but Hayoung beats her to it.

“So? Kiss her forehead then.” Hayoung says what Seoyeon has in her mind. The young panda nods her head in agreement but the lament on Gyuri’s face stays the same.

The puppy-eyed girl shakes her head. “I can’t.”

“Why??”

“You know how Jisun hates the height jokes. So whenever I lean in for a kiss on her cheek or any place on her face, she always either has her shoes on or she tiptoes, making her a bit taller for my taste.” Gaejookie pouts as she slouches on the couch, Habbang and Ddeoyeonie’s eyes on her. “I don’t want her to do anything. Our height difference is perfect the way it is.”

“Wait, so you want to kiss her on her forehead without her having anything on her feet or doing anything to increase her height?”

“Yeah.” Seoyeon stays quiet for a moment, feeling a bit like this was a deja vu happening to her. When she remembers what moment had her thinking, she faces her unnie again.

The panda girl points towards the Noisy Girls’ room. “Go ask Chaeng.”

Gyuri huffs, putting out her pout harder, the thought of sharing her dilemma with Chae unsettling her a bit. “Chaeng? What would Chaeng know about this?”

“She’s tall like you. I think she also had that dilemma with Nagyung but I can’t recall what happened.” Gyuri stops moving for a moment, thinking if she’s indeed at the same height as Chaeyoung.

She nods when she realizes that she is.

“She did? But Nakko’s not as…baby-sized as Jisun.” Hayoung and Seoyeon burst into laughter when they hear Gyuri’s description of Jisun’s height.

“I think we need to wake up Jiwon unnie, she’d want to hear you calling Jisun baby-sized because that would mean she’s not the smallest one out of us three.” Seoyeon tells the two after their laughing had ceased.

“Oh. You’re all up early.” Jiheon scratches her head when she sees her unnies all huddled up on the couch. She rounds the couch and jumps towards them and squeezes herself in the middle, joining her unnies’ giggles with her own.

“What are you guys doing here?” Jiheon asks after she had calmed down from all the tickles her Hayoung and Seoyeon unnie gave her.

“We were talking about Gaejookie and Jissen.” Seoyeon tells her as she gives the former girl sitting beside them a teasing look.

Jiheon frowns about the lack of details. “About what?”

“Gyuri hates it when Jisun wears shoes.” Hayoung blatantly says, unaware that she had misunderstood the girl’s dilemma.

“You…don’t want Jisun unnie to wear shoes?” Jiheon stares at her roommate with a weird look. “That…doesn’t make any sense.”

Gyuri shakes her head and tries to clear out Jiheon’s confusion. “No, Habbang misunderstood what I said. I hate it when Jisun wears shoes or when she tiptoes when I go for a kiss. Only for when I want to go for a kiss.”

“Why?”

“Because she’s taller and my lips won’t meet her forehead.”

Jiheon stares at her unnie for a moment before turning to her Hayoung unnie, then lastly at her Seoyeon unnie. “Is this what happens when you; get older? You worry about things like not being able to kiss your special someone’s forehead?”

Gyuri flushes red while the other two laugh at their maknae’s innocent question.

“Nah, it’s just a Gyuri thing.” Seoyeon assures the maknae, chuckling as the redness on the puppy-eyed girl’s cheek doesn’t die down.

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