Jimin's POV

She found Minjeong by the same old tree. She was sitting with her head down while hugging her feet close together. 

"Minjeong-ah."

She didn't look up. "Leave me alone."

"No. It's already late and it's dark out here so I'm not going to leave you alone. Plus, your mom and Aeri's really worried about you."

She huffed.

.Jimin was through with it. Maybe because she's fed up with Minjeong's distant facade ever since she came back or maybe it all started when Minjeong suddenly stopped talking to her. The dam ing broke.

"Stop being a and open up to people, Winter! Why do you have to put up this wall and scare people off?"

"Well, you're no different, Karina. You always pretend like everything's fine with you when its not. You always say yes when people ask you things but I know it scares you."

The two were now looking at each other intensely; Jimin still standing while Minjeong was looking up at her. 

"Yeah and what's wrong with that? I'm helping other people."

"You help people so much you're forgetting about yourself. You don't decide for yourself because you always think about what other will say."

Jimin paused. Why, this kid! She guessed it was true but... whatever! It was supposed to be her!

"How about you huh? You scare people off but we both know how big of a softie you are. You put up this tough-girl-don't-care facade when I know deep inside you care."

The other girl huffed. "I never cared about anyone's opinion of me but-" She huffed for the second time, turned away from Jimin then muttered. "Whatever."

Jimin sigh defeatedly. She sat beside Minjeong and softly said, "Your mom and sister cares about you, Minjeong-ah. I care about you. Why won't you let people in?" 

There was a minute of silence that passed. Jimin was already deciding to let Minjeong be ready to share when she wants to but then the other girl spoke. 

"If people really cared then why did they left me with dad?"

It was so softly spoken and full of vulnerabillity that when Jimin turned to the young one, she had the immediate urge to hug her. But she didn't know if Minjeong wanted that. She was panicking. How do you ing answer to that? Most of the time she knew what to say but this was Minjeong. She didn't know why it made a difference but she didn't know what to do. God, I freaking at this. 

"Dad had another family. Mom and unnie were in Korea. I was alone and I didn't know what to do."

For a moment, Jimin was full of guilt. She remembered how she was so hurt by Minjeong not acknowledging her that when the other girl left, she got even with not contacting her and waiting for the young one to do the first move. But it never happened. And now she knew why. Because that time, the latter was fighting a battle on her own. Jimin thought, maybe if she tried harder she could've been there for her. But then doublethinking Jimin thought, it was no one's fault either. It couldn't be helped that there were just bound to be victims of situations and people were allowed to feel what they feel. 

"I'm sorry you felt that way, Minjeong-ah." She didn't want to give her reasons for everything that happened because she wanted Minjeong to just let everything out. She was hurting and it was okay. Sometimes we don't need reasons for everything. Jimin was no doctor but she believes that the greatest therapy was to feel; be human and embrace every emotion. 

Ah it.

Jimin hugged Minjeong. The young one, in turn, got shocked. 

"I'm here now. You don't have to be alone."

She felt the other girl return her hug. Minjeong later inched her face towards Jimin's neck and the latter softly brushed her hair. They stayed that way for a while. Hearts close to each other; beating simultaneously.

Ahhh. How she missed her Mindeongie.

One minute they were peaceful and the next thing that happened was a blur. Minjeong was already standing and screaming. "A ing lizard fell in my back! God why did it have to be a ing lizard!"

Minjeong has herpetophobia; a fear of reptiles. Jimin laughed.

"Yah! Why are you laughing? You know I have a phobia with them!" She hesitantly went back to Jimin's side, inching closer because of fear of encountering a lizard again.

"Don't you think it's funny? You have a fear of reptiles yet you're as cold-blooded as them."

Minjeong glared at her. She laughed even more.

Minjeong's POV

The lizard easily went off Minjeong's mind the minute Jimin started laughing. She got distracted with the fact that they were only a few inches apart and she had the priviledge of looking at older girl's face upclose while she was laughing her heart out. Winter have always secretly found her to be beautiful. Her favorite feature about the girl's face was her eyes; her cat-shaped hazelnut eyes who can both turn y and cute at times. Right now they were slightly chinky and sparkling. Her other favorite feature is her heart shaped lips. She can't count how many times she's been drawn to them every time Jimin does her habit of pursing her lips whenever she's going to do something or is thinking hard. And there's also her mole which is just perfectly Jimin's. If it's not obvious yet, Jimin's face is her favorite among everyone else. Except, of course, her face. She had all this overwhelming thoughts in her head so she didn't know what the happened when she blurted out,

"You have beautiful teeth." 

was a ing traitor.

Jimin's POV

Jimin had a problem. Minjeong changed after that fateful night. She didn't know if it was for the better or not because now she Jimin was confused. 

Her first change was that she was slowly letting people in. Giselle told Jimin that they got quite closer now and Minjeong was already talking to their mother more than before. Minjeong also gained a friend, in the name of Ningning. 

Giselle and Jimin were so shocked when they saw the two hanging out while waiting for them; Ningning was afraid of Minjeong after all. So it was a sight to see her being silly while Minjeong was rolling her eyes at her.

"Is the world ending? Why are you two together?" Giselle asked. 

"Ning, are you being held against your will?" Jimin mouthed at Ningning but she smiled sheepishly when she felt someone looking at her and saw that Minjeong was glaring at her. 

"Kidding!"

The second change was that Minjeong now became attentive to Jimin. And very protective.  

There was one time Byeongkwan was waiting for her after class because they had to talk because he was also an officer from the engineering department and they had to work with something for an upcoming program. 

Minjeong suddenly dropped a drink in front of them. "Drink this."

"What is this?" Jimin knew it was a milktea. What she wanted to know was why did Winter suddenly wanted to give her one when she didn't ask for it.

"There was an extra drink. I don't like matcha."

"Yey, this is my favorite! Thank you, Minjeong-ah. Byeongkwan and I will just talk for a while."

"I'll wait for you in the corner." She didn't forget to glare at Byeongkwan when she left. In fact, she didn't forget to do that all throughout their meeting that Byeongkwan scaredly whispered, "Isn't that Giselle's sister?"

"Yes why?"

"Why is she more protective of you than her own sister?" They turned their gaze towards Winter and Byeongkwan immediately leaned away from Jimin because the subject they were talking about turned even icier. "I think maybe let's just talk this over in the groupchat."