September 20th, 2013

Jessica actually fell asleep on Tiffany’s back on the way home.

It was nearing two in the morning and most of the girls were tired.

But in a good way.

Something about this night felt clearer and warmer than the rest. There was a quiet comforting and cozy air all around and the girls felt fears and worries that they had held close to their hearts for the past months slowly but surely unclench and dissipate into the starlit skies.

By the time they stood in front of their dorm apartment, Yoona was leaning heavily against Yuri, almost asleep on the tanned girl’s shoulder. Taeyeon, like Tiffany, was piggybacking Sunny, who also had fallen asleep, murmuring something about ‘stupid Hwang Miyoung’. Sooyoung had Hyoyeon and Seohyun on either side of her, both girls leaning into the gentle giant and trudging groggily along.

Like a stumbling herd of goats drunk on mead, the drowsy girls lurched uncoordinatedly into their dorm, those carrying others gently laying their passengers down in their respective beds before crawling under their own warm sheets.

Tiffany laid Jessica in her own bed and Seohyun, smartly perceiving that her two unnies would probably appreciate some alone time to cuddle and hold each other, stumbled into Jessica and Yuri’s room and slipped quietly beneath Jessica’s sheets, asleep before her head even touched her pillow.

Her skin cells needed to grow.

…

…

…

Tiffany sat on the edge of her bed, just watching Jessica sleep. She was about to gather her girlfriend into her arms and join her in the land of the Sandman when she felt that slight tinge in her side again.

Sighing, Tiffany went to the bathroom, lifting up her shirt as she went.

A few of the stitches had come a little loose, but they didn’t exactly warrant immediate attention if she refrained from huge movements or overexerted her body. Tiffany could see some of the blood had seeped through and stained her shirt, so she slipped her shirt over her head. Not wanting to alarm the other girls if they should see the bloodstain, she washed the stain out with warm water and soap before throwing the shirt into the hamper.

Then with practiced hands, Tiffany slapped on some gauze to prevent further loosening of the stitches, taped it up securely, and staggered back to the comfort of her bed and her loving girlfriend.

Jessica, even in her deeply slumbering state, turned instinctively towards the warmth of Tiffany’s body, and the two girls held each other loosely in their arms, their breaths shared like little chaste secrets between them.

And like that, they slept.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Come on girls! We need to catch up lost time! Once more from the top!”

The girls grit their teeth and continued on practicing.

Their seongsaenims were pushing them harder than ever to make up for the time they had spent waiting for Tiffany to recover. Even with ahjussi extending their deadlines, they were still very much pressed for time. So with sweat dripping down their faces and soaking into the shirts on their backs, the girls pushed on.

Tiffany grimaced.

Normally, she would have no trouble with this slave-driving pace, but she was still a little weak from the wound on her chest as well as the cut the doctors made to insert the chest tube. She could feel her lungs screaming out in pain, and she was pretty sure that trickle of wetness she just felt oozing down her side was not sweat.

Still, Tiffany normally wouldn’t give this much thought cause let’s face it, she has definitely worked through worse and she was pretty sure she was not in any life-threatening danger. But it was a different story if the girls were close by; if one of them were to see that telltale red stain on her tank top, they were sure to freak.

Much to Tiffany’s chagrin, she felt the wound distend even more with each wave of her stupid lollipop. If she were not so preoccupied with keeping her wound from completely opening up again, Tiffany would have complained about how incredibly childish it was to be waving around a lollipop at age seventeen. She growled a little in frustration and just wished for this practice to end so she could run to the bathroom and patch herself up with no one the wiser.

However…

…Tiffany was not as discreet as she had thought herself to be.

All the girls were on high alert, knowing that Tiffany was still nursing wounds and understanding that the stubborn thug would be more than likely to keep her pain to herself. They were expecting some sort of sarcastic diatribe concerning the girly nature of their new song ‘Kissing You’ to come spewing from Tiffany’s mouth. So when the thug remained silent and simply begrudgingly did as she was told, they knew something was up. And it didn’t take long for the first girl to spot the spreading spot of crimson on Tiffany’s blue tank top.

It would seem Tiffany had underestimated the girls.

They didn’t freak out.

Instead, they took matters into their own hands.

There was a sudden cry from Yuri before the tanned girl collapsed into a heap on the floor, clutching at her right ankle.

The girls all feigned surprise and immediately flew towards the ‘injured’ girl. They had not planned this beforehand, but they all had one goal on their minds and their determination made them work smoothly together.

Tiffany, of course, was not in on the charade and was the first to reach Yuri, her over-protectiveness of all the girls making her uneasy and concerned. The thug had gently loosened the laces of Yuri’s shoe and gingerly removed Yuri’s ‘injured’ foot from its confines.

Of course Yuri vehemently assured the girls and their teacher that she hadn’t sprained anything and had just tripped because she was really really really tired. But Tiffany would have none of it and inspected the foot thoroughly herself before she was satisfied.

Their teacher glanced around the room at the nine girls, eight of whom suddenly seemed like they were ten times more exhausted than he had ever seen them. He supposed that the girls had had a rough few weeks and deigned to let them go for the day.

He bid the girls take good care of Yuri as well as themselves and then took his leave.

The moment he was out the door, eight girls rounded on the now astonished Tiffany. Yuri had jumped up and ran to get her bag where she had prepared a first-aid kit just for Tiffany for this exact purpose. Jessica was already forcibly yet gently removing Tiffany’s top, frowning when she saw the blood marring the side of her girlfriend’s torso. She felt a surge of anger at the crazy madman who had inflicted such a wound, but she ignored it for now and concentrated on tending to Tiffany. Seohyun had bounded up and immediately locked the practice room door, drawing the blinds at the same time to prevent anyone from seeing in. Sunny was holding a bottle of water to Tiffany’s lips to keep the girl hydrated.

Water was always a good idea in most circumstances.

Tiffany looked about her incredulously, having been totally caught off guard.

“We know you better than you think Tippany-ah…” Taeyeon said softly, shaking her head at the sight of the ripped stitches.

Yuri was back by this time and was preparing to open a new gauze packet to stop the bleeding.

Tiffany reached out a hand to stop her.

“I need to close up the wound first. Are there nylon sutures in there?”

Yuri nodded hesitantly, struggling to comprehend whether Tiffany was really suggesting to do what she thought.

Tiffany nodded her head pointedly towards the packaged sutures, patting Yuri’s arm lightly to get the girl to pass it to her. Yuri did as asked rather robotically, still tentative.

“Yuri, just hand me the entire first-aid kit please,” Tiffany finally said, judging Yuri’s dumbstruck behavior to be inadequate to help her.

Again, Yuri did as told mechanically with slightly shaking hands.

The girls were now gathered around Tiffany, kneeling on the dance floor, their eyes wide.

Tiffany reached into the kit and took out alcohol wipes. She was about to wipe down her wound when Jessica reached out a hand to stop her.

“Baby this is insane…we thought that it was just blood seeping through the wound. We didn’t think that you would actually need to redo your sutures. Let’s go to the hospital and let Jaesung oppa stitch you up,” Jessica said gently, her voice tremulous at the sight of what Tiffany was about to attempt.

Tiffany took Jessica’s quivering hand in hers and rubbed the hollow between her thumb and forefinger soothingly. She knew this always worked to calm Jessica down a little.

“It’s ok Jess. I’ve done this before. I know what I’m doing. Trust me.”

Jessica held on to Tiffany’s arm, the one holding the alcohol wipe. She stubbornly shook her head, eyes wide. People don’t stitch themselves up. It seemed rather aberrant and slightly off kilter to her. Not to mention Jessica hadn’t yet forgotten what it was like watching Tiffany get stitched up that day in the hospital. She had felt more and more queasy and nauseous with each dip of the hooked needle, boring into milky smooth flesh.

Tiffany dropped the alcohol wipe and held Jessica close, right by the brunette’s ears.

“You ask me what my dream is. You ask me what I would dream of doing, who I would dream of being…if I were to focus completely on myself. Completely selfish. Do you still want to know my answer?” Tiffany murmured into the hollow of Jessica’s ear.

These words were for Jessica alone. Tiffany had never spoken of her dreams to anyone since the night her parents were taken away from her in that fiery wreckage. She had thought about it in the years that followed, but with each passing day, life had bore down mercilessly on her, and that dream had since become a distant mirage, hazily visible, but never attainable.

So Tiffany had since locked that unattainable grail deep in the reserves of her darkest depths. Never touched. Never thought of. Never to see the light of day.

Until now.

Verbalizing her selfish desires, ones that she would have pursued had life been more kind, would only remind Tiffany of everything that had been snatched away. Another thing she had lost.