Of course Jimin just had to return to that darned coffee shop.

It's been a week since the first time she's gone to Espresso Yourself with Yizhuo — it's been a whole week since you embarrassed yourself in front of that pretty cashier lady you're totally crushing on, a sneering voice sounded in her head. Jimin shook her head to rid herself of the embarrassing memory.

So, as someone who wanted to examine the coffee shop — and not as just someone who wanted to stare at her crush and giggle to herself like she was back to being a silly high-schooler — she decided to pay a visit to Espresso Yourself again. This time, without Yizhuo. In Jimin's opinion, Yizhuo was far too loud and talkative for her liking, preferring the serenity of coming alone without an overly talkative companion with her. Of course, this was not meant to be a jab towards Yizhuo — Jimin would even kill just to protect Yizhuo, who she viewed as a younger sister — it's just that she wanted some peace and quiet today; she wanted to read her book in silence as she drinks from her warm cup of hot chocolate or tea and absolutely not coffee .

But that was also part of the problem. Drinking coffee was the whole point of visiting the coffee shop this time so that she can show Aeri that she's a coffeeholic and that she absolutely does not hate coffee. So much for trying to impress a pretty cashier girl you've met only once, she thinks to herself gloomily.

Pushing past the misty glass doors, the doorbells jingling as she does so, Jimin inhales the familiar scent of coffee brewing behind the bar.

To her disappointment, she doesn't see Aeri behind the cash register. In her place was a grumpy-looking girl with jet black hair, seemingly bored as she took the customers' orders quietly. Clicking her tongue disappointedly, she falls in line.

The line went by surprisingly fast; all of the customers looked petrified for some reason, Jimin assumes that maybe it's because the girl handling the cash register looked somewhat intimidating, her aloof aura making Jimin shiver slightly out of fear.

"Welcome to Espresso Yourself, I'm Hyunjin, what can I do for you?" asked the unfamiliar cashier in an almost robotic voice when it was Jimin's turn, dark brown eyes piercing through Jimin's soul as she stared at Jimin with a bored expression on her face.

"Where's Aeri?" Jimin blurted out, ears reddening when she realized what she had just asked. Great. It's the second time you've embarrassed yourself at this place.

Jimin's sure that she offended Hyunjin — honestly, who wouldn't be offended by something like that? — with the way Hyunjin raised a brow at her question, the atmosphere around them suddenly feeling darker and tenser as Hyunjin glared at her for a few more seconds before disappearing behind the 'Employees Only!' door. Jimin waits. Impatiently , of course. She doesn't like the way she's already starting to get dizzy from inhaling too much caffeine as she waits for her.

After thirteen seconds, Aeri — Jimin could feel her heart beating erratically in her chest — emerged from behind the door.

"Hey! What would you like today?" Aeri asks with a sweet smile, small whiskers forming under her crescent-shaped eyes. Jimin blushes, looking away as she tried to distract herself from Aeri .

"Oh! Uhm, I wanted to try out that drink you guys advertised outside on the board last week…? It was a latte…? Or was it an espresso…? Or both? Am I right?"

Aeri blinked, the gears in her head making an effort to understand what Jimin was referring to, her lips shaping into a small 'o' when she realized what Jimin meant, the 'o' immediately curling into a bright grin.

"You remembered that?" asked Aeri with a certain twinkle in her eyes. Jimin wonders if it were possible for a million stars to reside inside Aeri's pretty, brown eyes. She shakes the silly thought off.

"Y-Yeah… My friend also wanted to get the same drink last week but…" She glances up at Aeri, who was listening intently. She blushes at the rapt attention being given to her, scratching her ear. 

"Uhm, but she was too busy that day…? So, dramatic as she obviously is, she wants me to- er, try it out for her so that it wouldn't go to… vain? "

That was a good enough reason, right?

Jimin scoffed at her own voice in her head. 

She really could not, for the love of God, make a decent, believable lie.

To her surprise, Aeri chuckles lightly and nods, as if she had understood the sputtering, bumbling mess that was Yoo Jimin. 

"Got it. I'll have it ready in a few minutes." Aeri winks at her and Jimin doesn't think it was possible for her ears to go redder than they already were - oh, but they do. The cursed traitors.

Nodding and smiling weakly at her, she waddles away, sitting at her and Yizhuo's table from last week. She likes it here, because the farther away she was from caffeine, the less sick she would feel. And to be frank, Jimin did not like the image of getting woozy and letting her stomach reject the drink on the brightly-lit streets of Seoul with concerned and (mostly) disgusted gazes from passersby on her like she was some sort of animal at the zoo who was allergic to or despised whatever she had tried to digest.

Jimin was growing a lot more nervous as the seconds ticked by. Now that Yizhuo wasn't with her, she can't launch her ultimately genius plan of making Yizhuo order the hot chocolate for herself and the Latte Extreme-presso for Jimin and