Min-Ji walks away without looking back. She felt stupid for letting her emotions explode like that, and she was hurt. *Yonghwa knows nothing, that stupid fool. What does he know?* She thinks defiantly, but it doesn't stop the pain from her reopening scars. "Bastard." Her eyes burn, and tears threaten to fall. She doesn't understand why he was so mad at her. Why would he care when they are just a fake couple? Is he just messing around with her?

The bell of the ice cream parlor rings as Min-Ji enters, and she realises just where she had come to. When she ran from him she didn't really think about a destination, all she wanted was to get away. At seeing her Ilhoon comes out from behind the counter to greet her.

"Hey! Where's Mi-Sun? Did she not come with you today? You guys always come together, I was surprised-" he stops when he sees her hurt expression and a tear fall. He frowns, and then brings her to an empty table and sits across from her. Gently he holds her arm and looks her in the eye, worry apparant on his face. "What happened?"

Uncomfortable, Min-Ji looks out the window away from him. ashamed her show of weakness to the boy. "Nothing, you don't have to worry about me." she chokes out, a lump in making it more difficult.

Sungjae comes from the back room and sees the twos' pained faces and frowns, also. *Maybe a banana split on the house will cheer her up...* he thinks to himself and then gets to work.

"Don't tell me it's nothing, you're crying? Who made you cry?" Ilhoon asks her seriously.

Min-Ji just shakes her head and closes her eyes, trying to hold back any more of her salty tears. The lump in is too big for her to speak, and she doesn't want to to tell him what happened. For many reasons. She can't just tell him that her fake boyfriend brought up bad memories. She would have to tell him about the past, also, and she isn't close enough to him to start talking about that.

Knowing Min-Ji isn't going to give in, even in her weakened state, Ilhoon sighs and gives up. As he stands up Sungjae comes walking over and puts down a banana split on the table, smiling.

"On the house!" he says, smiling.

His sudden loudness surprises Min-Ji, who had just been staring out the window and she looks at him and then the ice cream he had just put down in front of her. She frowns, but then takes the spoon and starts eating. No matter what mood she's in, there's always time and room for ice cream. Especially if it's free.

*She frowned at ice cream? At least she is eating it.* Sungjae thinks, and then looks at Ilhoon questioningly. But Ilhoon just shrugs, and gives him an "I don't know" face.

"Hey..." the two boys look at Min-Ji curiously, wondering if they are going to tell her what's wrong, but get something completely unexpected. "Do you guys consider me your friend?" she says quietly, embarrased to say it. 

*They probably don't. We only talk when I come for ice cream.* she frowns and eats a large spoonfull of her sundae.

The boys look at her dumbfoundedly. "Of course." they both say, and instantly she looks up at them in surprise, spoon still in .

"Really??"

"Well, duh. Why wouldn't we?" Ilhoon says like it's obvious, and to him it was. They had known each other for years, even if they had never really hung out outside the parlor.

"Silly Min-Ji-ah. I think someone is a little a little slow~" Sungjae jokes, but stops when he sees her sharp glare at him and looks away. "I should get working..." he wanders off.

"Did you think we weren't friends?" Ilhoon asks. Min-Ji's face gets hot. She didn't. She just thought they were aquaintances, knew each others name and chit-chatted when they saw each other but nothing more. But then again, she doesn't really know what friendship is. Not at this age, childhood friendship is different and that's all she's known. Yet, she still didn't want him to know that.

"Of course not. I just wasn't sure if you thought the same way." Ilhoon easily read through her though, he saw her face pinken slightly before she said that.

"Mhmm." He smirks. "Well now you know, but why all of a sudden?"

"You don't need to know." She shoves another scoop in .

"But we are friends, we can tell each other anything." He smiles.

"Is that really what friends do?" Min-Ji says under her breath, but Ilhoon catches it and frowns.

*Is she really this clueless? Has she never had friends before?* "Friends are there whenever you need them, you can tell them anything and they will help you through the tough times."

"Unless they're fake. Then they will laugh at you behind your back and tell everyone your secrets. Pretend to be nice untill they turn around and stab you in the back."

Ilhoon tries to think about what she said. Did this happen to her? Is that why she is so unsure about friends? "Min-Ji, tell me what happened."

She looks at him, unsure, but when she went to get another scoop of ice cream it was empty and she sighed. "My family is the only one that knows this, and we haven't talked about it in a long time. Sit down."

I learned how to do the bar~ teehee!