Eight.

“Myungsoo!” a leggy brunette called out as she ran towards Myungsoo. You guessed this was probably the girlfriend he was supposed to meet. “Are you okay? I saw some people gathering outside the café. Were you hurt?”

Myungsoo wrapped his arm around her petite waist and pulled her close to give her a kiss. “I’m fine, Woori. My friends were the ones who fell.”

“Oh,” Woori stretched out her hand. “Hello, I’m Go Woori. Myungsoo’s girlfriend,” she said, enunciating every syllabus in the word ‘girlfriend’.

You cast Myungsoo a side-glance and shook Woori’s hand back, introducing yourself as his neighbor and university friend.

Dongwoo offered his hand next. “Jang Dongwoo, Myungsoo’s buddy.”

Woori nodded thoughtfully. “Myungsoo tells me a lot about all of you. You…” She studied you from top to toe, causing you to shift uncomfortably. “Especially.”

Myungsoo turned Woori to face him. “Baby, I already told you, she’s just our very good friend,” he said with a small sigh.

She grinned. “I know, just making sure.” She linked arms with Myungsoo and led him to the table where her belongings were.

As you followed behind, you felt a strong arm envelope your shoulders. “Hey,” he said softly. “You alright?”

You looked down on the floor. “Maybe we shouldn’t be here.”

Dongwoo looked at the couple. Woori was now all over Myungsoo, oblivious to the cross stares of the café patrons. He frowned and ushered you towards the cafe door. “Yes, we should probably go somewhere else.”

***

“Did you see her eyes?” you asked incredulously. “She looked like she was going to eat me alive if I went any closer to Myungsoo.”

Dongwoo laughed. “I’m glad you’re feeling a lot better now.”

You whacked him on his shoulder. “Why are you laughing at my expense?”

He caught you by your wrists so that you wouldn’t inflict any more pain on him. “I’m just glad that you’re fine.”

As you opened your mouth to speak, a gust of wind blew and a speck of dust flew into your eye. “And now I’m not.” You winced as your eyes flew shut. “Why do such things always happen to me?!”

“Stay still,” Dongwoo ordered. He let go of your wrists and gently pried open your eye with his fingers. It took him a couple of blows before you felt like the particle was gone. “Better?”

You blinked a few times before your vision became clearer. “I’ll survive.”

You two continued on your walk along the street and came across a small barbequed meat restaurant. As if on cue, when you caught a whiff of freshly-barbequed meat, your stomach grumbled.

“Already?” Dongwoo raised his eyebrow at you.

You shrugged. “Think my stomach’s on overdrive after all those days of irregular meals at school.”

He grinned. “Well, shall we then?”

You nodded enthusiastically and pulled him into the restaurant before he could say another word.

***

“Ajumma, one more serving of ribs please!” you called out, much to Dongwoo’s amazement. “What? These marinated ribs are really good.”

Dongwoo shrugged and went back to grilling the remaining pieces of meat left on the plate in front of the both of you. “My girlfriend’s so about her diet; we never get to eat like this. I’ve almost forgotten that girls can have hearty appetites too.”

“Oh.”

The Ajumma walked over with the plate of ribs and an additional bottle of coke. “This is on the house, for ordering so many plates of meat,” she said as she put the bottle of coke down onto the table.

You took the bottle-cap opener and pried open the bottle cap with ease. “That too,” Dongwoo pointed out. “She never does things like that.”

You wanted to bang your head against the table. You didn’t like it when any of the guys made girlfriend comparison, and even more so with Dongwoo, because you actually liked this guy before.

“So… How come we’ve never met her?” you asked, avoiding his sight.

“She doesn’t want to.”

You looked up and stared at him, perplexed.

He took a gulp of the coke and cleared his throat. “Let’s do this another day okay? I don’t really want to talk about this now.”

You frowned.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly and twisted his couple ring around his finger.

You turned your attention back to the grill where the ribs lay almost-cooked. You flipped it over one last time, made sure it was well-cooked and put it on Dongwoo’s plate.

“Eat.”

And that was the last you spoke of his girlfriend for the whole meal.

A/N: Surprise, another character map! I know the map is quite a spoiler for the future chapters, but Myungsoo is not the lead, so I thought it was okay. All their girlfriends WILL be introduced by name eventually because I like giving a face to my characters. So far we have Dongwoo and Sungyeol's not revealed yet...

And apologies for the short chapter! As always, comments are most welcome! I'm highly curious, which camp (Dongwoo or Hoya?) is everyone on for this story? I'm severely undecided! :x