July 31st, 2014

Taeyeon woke up and immediately felt the absence of the warm body pressed against hers last night.

She missed it.

Groaning slightly, she slid out of bed and plodded groggily towards the door and into the living room. There she found…

What the heck…?

The girls were gathered in a circle around the Christmas tree, staring down at…

Oh…gawd…at least they aren’t buck …and at least it wasn’t on the dining room table…

Taeyeon pushed the other girls away.

“Nothing to see here! Nothing to see here!” she chastised, using her leg to kick backwards while shooing the girls away, catching Tiffany on the foot, hoping to get the thug awake.

Tiffany jolted and rubbed her eyes drowsily, but she came to in an instant when she realized what was wrong.

You could always count on Tiffany to be one for quick reactions.

Without another word, she scooped the still slumbering Jessica into her arms and carried her into her room, closing the door gently behind her.

The girls were abuzz after that.

“Eww…now I’m not so excited to open my presents…”

“It’s carpet! It soaks in! It’s not even like we can clean it!”

“Unnie…why is there a wet patch on the fl–”

“NO SEOBABY! DON’T TOUCH IT!”

“Yuri-ah stop trying to grab your presents! We’re not even supposed to be opening them yet!”

“But I wanna see what you got me!”

“Oooh! COOKIES!!!!!”

“WHERE?!”

It was at this moment that Tiffany came back to the living room, this time dressed in shorts.

“Hey girls…sorry about last night. I’ll…uh…I’ll clean up the mess we made,” the thug said embarrassedly as she moved towards the kitchen to get a clean rag.

Taeyeon’s hand on her arm stopped her.

“As gross as this sounds, just leave it. It’s not like it’s anything particularly dirty anyways,” the shorter girl said as she dragged Tiffany to the hallway where they had some privacy.

“What’s up buttercup?” Tiffany asked inquisitively with slightly arched eyebrows. The thug actually knew what Taeyeon wanted to talk to her about, but she was going to make Taeyeon say it herself.

“Umm…uhh…” Taeyeon hemmed and hawwed, struggling to say the words that seemed to be jumbled around and garbled in .

“Come on kid-zombie. Any day now would be nice. I promised Jessi a pancake breakfast in bed. Would you really like to be the one to prevent Principessa Jessica from getting her breakfast?” Tiffany warned with a teasing Italian flourish in her tone.

Taeyeon shot Tiffany a glare, knowing the younger girl knew exactly what she was trying to ask but was torturing her anyways.

“Urgh! How did you know that Jessica liked you back?”

“Well at first it was pretty clear. Jessica made her intentions known to me very early on. But then we embarked on that ridiculous little deal of ours and then our relationship from then on was rather vague. Nevertheless, when I look back, Jessica left me many hints and did many things for me that I should have clued in on. All those sleepless nights where she coaxed me back to sleep after a nightmare, and you know how Jessica is about her sleep. All those nights she just lay there and let me hold her so I could sleep better, all those…those wayward glances and whispered assurances. I wonder how I never saw them earlier and made a move quicker than I did. But it turned out alright in the end and that is all that matters. When you are the one involved you never are willing to believe that that person really does feel that way about you.”

“Sunny…she…does she? Ummm…”

“What do you think dookong? What is your first instinctual answer?”

“Uhh…”

“Don’t think! Just answer!”

“…”

“KIM TAEYEON!”

“YES! Yes! She does!”

“…”

“Oh my gawd…she does?”

Tiffany just smiled surreptitiously and moved back towards the kitchen to give Taeyeon some time to think. The kitchen was now a warzone as the other girls were causing a huge din over the cookies.

“Who wants pancakes?” Tiffany yelled over the noise.

There was a sudden hush that fell over the dorm and Taeyeon swears she has never heard such blessed silence before.

And then the peace was over before it had even started.

The Hunger Games melee had begun.

“ME-ME-ME-ME-MEEEEEE!!!!!”

“UNNIE!!!! I WANT!!!!”

“MAKE ME A WHOLE STACK!”

“WOOOO!!!!!! PANCAKES FOR MY SYRUP!!!!”

“YAH! YURI-AH! STOP DRINKING THE MAPLE SYRUP!!!!”

“GET CH’UR IN THE KITCHEN WHERE IT BELONGS AND MAKE ME ‘DEM PANCAKES WOMAN!!!!”

That last part was screamed obnoxiously by none other than Hyoyeon and even the other girls seemed to have sensed that their dancing machine may have gone too far for there was a soft hush that fell over the group.

This silence was different from the one before, there was a slight hint of fear and apprehension in the air.

Tiffany approached Hyoyeon rather slowly, her face a mask of emotionless granite.

Hyoyeon shuffled backwards but to no avail. She was trapped between the kitchen countertop and a menacingly advancing thug.

The shorter girl began to mutter fervently under her breath, praying to all the gods she could think of to save her from Tiffany’s wrath…

…and then…

…like a wall of muscle had slammed into her…

…Tiffany cuffed Hyoyeon roughly around the head; her own head bent forwards, by Hyoyeon’s ear.

“Chocolate chip or blueberry?” the thug growled menacingly.

Hyoyeon was about to scream and beg for mercy when the content of Tiffany’s question finally reached her fear-muddled brain.

“Buh-buh-blueberry…?” the hesitant girl ventured, her voice shaking slightly.

Tiffany released Hyoyeon with a light pat on her head like one would to an obedient dog.

“Go fetch me my slippers and my morning paper Hyoraengi!” Tiffany called out sweetly behind her as she tied the apron around her waist and began to mix the batter.

“Guess I kinda asked for that one…” Hyoyeon said as she nervously massaged her neck.

“Yah think?” Sooyoung said with a smirk, her ravenous eyes never leaving the pan Tiffany hefted expertly into her hands.

Hyoyeon sulked and grudgingly went to take everyone’s drink orders in hopes of making up for her past transgressions.

She decided to play waitress for this morning.

By the time Hyoyeon had set out four cups of orange juice, two cups of apple juice, two cups of milk, and one cup of ma on the table, Tiffany was already flipping pancakes onto plates.

“Five blueberry and four chocochip pancakes!” Tiffany called out, setting her creations on the laminate countertop.

Hyoyeon moved to the counter and carried the plate of steaming pancakes to YoonYul, who were seated by the dining table with Yoona trying to wipe syrup off of a squirming Yuri’s face.

“Three blueberry and three chocochip!” came another cry.

This one went to danduo seated at the corner of the table, Sunny’s head resting on Taeyeon’s shoulder, her fingers twiddling and playing with Taeyeon’s own.

Taeyeon was blushing and she looked nervous, but no one paid them any mind. As far as anyone else was concerned, SunYeon was pretty much already together. They were old news.

“Six blueberry and five chocochip!”

This one went to their resident shikshin, who ripped into her stack of pancakes like she was serving in the army and had been served gruel for months on end.

The next to orders were for Seohyun and Hyoyeon herself.

Then Tiffany set to making hers and Jessica’s. When she was done, she set it on the tray along with Jessica’s orange juice and was about