Live, Laugh... Love?

[PG-13]

(pt1)

~Live~

“Unnie-yah,” a young girl with an adorable pout whined, “come on, I’m getting bored of this, let’s go get our nails done!”

“Hayeon-ah~” the older one mimicked her, “you know your aegyo doesn’t work on me, right?” she continued nonchalantly. It only made her fingers curl.

“But Taeyeon unnie~~~”

“Ah, okay, whatever, let’s go, I’ll never find that cap anyway,” Taeyeon put the cap she was holding back on the shelf, and stepped out of the shop together with Hayeon. “But really, I don’t get it though. Why would you spend money on a nail artist when I can do the same thing for you? I practiced a lot recently, you know.”

“But you still couldn’t do the one I want.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve seen your stuff, unnie. You’re not that good yet.”

“Thanks,” Taeyeon scoffed. “You’re such an encouraging little sister, seriously,” she playfully smacked the back of Hayeon’s head.

“I know, unnie, you taught me well.”

    Taeyeon could only grin at this.

“Whatever, I’m not paying for someone to get mine done.”

“Stingy unnie.”

    Once they arrived to the nail shop, Hayeon showed a picture of what she wanted to the nail artist unnie, “Hey, I totally could have done that too!” Taeyeon grumbled silently to the girl afterwards, and she sat down in a chair nearby a little grumpily to wait for her sister’s nails to get done.

    She started playing on her phone but then a voice suddenly interrupted her.

“I’m sorry, are you here with an appointment or just waiting for someone?”

    Taeyeon stopped the game quickly before looking up at the source of the deep, slightly husky voice.

    But when she did, it felt like her words got jumbled up in her brain. The girl standing in front of her… was beautiful.

“Uhm— ah. Juh,” she felt her heart beat out of her chest and it was weird, really, really weird because she couldn’t recall such an intense feeling for anyone else before. And she didn’t even know this girl.

    She laughed and Taeyeon literally felt like she was paralyzed, looking up at the thousand-watt smile of the girl in front of her.

“You okay? I was asking if you’re just waiting for someone or if you have an appointment with me.”

“I uh… I’m just waiting for my sister,” Taeyeon finally managed to blurt out. ‘You’re soooo pretty.’

“Oh, okay, I meant, like if you were waiting for your nails to get done with an appointment or without.” ‘Stupid Taeyeon.’ “I forgot to bring my schedule with me today and I know I should have a little gap around now but… ”

“Ah, I mean… if you’re not busy now then maybe… ”

“Apparently I’m not,” the girl smiled again. “I’m Tiffany by the way,” she introduced herself, dropping all formalities and stretching out a very nicely manicured hand to Taeyeon.

“Taeyeon.” Taeyeon shook the soft hand and she felt a sudden jolt run through her.

“I’m sorry? Tae-hyun or Tae-yeon?” she asked back as the two sat down at her little desk.

“Tae-yeon,” the other girl repeated.

“Oh-kay, Taeyeon. So, what would you like to get today?” she motioned for her to put her hands on the table. “I see you have some pretty stars right now,” she took Taeyeon’s hand into her own. ‘Can it just stay there forever? Please?’

“I don’t know, I’m thinking… gel nails? Different colors on each?” Tiffany nodded. ‘Yeah, that should take long enough. That’s why I never really do that at home.’ “And, umm… some cute patterns in black on them, maybe. There could be stones, too.” ‘Anything just to make it take longer.’

“Okay, what kind of colors, first of all?”

    Taeyeon examined the palette of choices and because she seemed to like pastel colors mostly, Tiffany recommended to pick only two instead of making them all a different color so as not to make it look chaotic. Her nails were almost like claws they were so long and there was some very bold 3D nail art on them, pink flowers, to be more exact. But Taeyeon didn’t want to go so bold, so she just chose a fairly short extension to the original length of her nails and a simple pattern that’d look good in black: some cute paw prints.

“So, are you a high school student?” Tiffany asked as she began to remove Taeyeon’s previously applied nail polish. The girl still couldn’t get over how Tiffany was holding onto her hand.

“Umm… no,” Taeyeon felt herself blush. Everyone always thought she was younger. Tiffany was probably only barely a year or two older than her. “I’m in my third year at college, actually.”

“What. Oh, sorry, I—Wow, you look… young.” Tiffany glanced at her again.

“Yeah, I know, everyone always tells me that,” Taeyeon sighed.

“You say it like it’s a bad thing, everyone always thinks I’m older than I actually am. Now that’s something you don’t wanna get almost every day,” Tiffany said. “But I guess that has its perks too.”

“Like?”

“Like getting to do stuff younger than you’re supposed to?” she smirked.

“Oh, you mean like drinking before coming of age and stuff?”

    Her smile widened. ‘Really, that smile… she’s so y, oh my God.’ “Yeah, stuff like that,” she said under her breath.

“So you used to be a rule breaker?” Taeyeon asked. This girl looked absolutely angelic to her but there was something coming from inside her, something about her aura that made her think twice.

“Who says I just used to be?” Tiffany glanced up again and Taeyeon’s heart stopped for a second as she caught her penetrating gaze.

“So you’re saying that you still are?”

“Rules… ” she threw out the cotton pads in the bin, “are there… to be broken.”

“Hmm,” Taeyeon felt a thrill at the girl’s words. She herself has never really been much of a rule breaker. What’s more, she was quite the opposite. She liked rules because they made life easier and more harmonic in her opinion. But somehow, the concept of doing bad things, things that would break the rules of society, seemed like an awesome idea as long as they involved Tiffany in it.

“So what are you studying to become?”

    Taeyeon hesitated for a second before answering. ‘Well, this’ll sound good after what we’ve just talked about… ’ “Teacher.”

“What?! You?! You’ll look more like a student than the students themselves,” the redhead chuckled.

    Taeyeon didn’t know what to say to that so she just watched as the other girl was filing the surface of her nails one by one. She was really quick… a little too quick for Taeyeon’s liking.

“You’ll be a cute teacher though,” Tiffany mumbled, “So what are you planning to teach then?”

    Taeyeon didn’t even have the time to blush properly before Tiffany threw another question at her.

“Sorry?” ‘Dammit, I can’t concentrate if you’re gonna be like this.’

“I said, what subject are you gonna teach?”

“Oh, Arts. And Music.”

    Tiffany halted her movements to look up at her apprehensively. “Nice,” she nodded slowly with a grin. “Just promise me you won’t become one of those boring teachers that just give out instructions for 45 minutes and then act like they’re almighty and sh*t.” Taeyeon was a bit surprised by the word usage but she understood what she meant.“They annoyed me sooo much back in school.”

“I’ll try not to.”

    Taeyeon stared at the other girl’s interlaced bracelets.

“So you’re good at drawing and painting and stuff?” Tiffany spoke up again.

“You could say that.”

“Ever tried doing nail art?”

“Yeah, I’m not that good at that,” Taeyeon half-lied.

“You play any instruments or anything?”

“Yeah, a few.”

    Tiffany obviously waited for Taeyeon to continue.

“Umm, I can play the guitar… ”

“That’s hot,” Tiffany mumbled absentmindedly, focusing on her work on Taeyeon’s nails.

    Taeyeon’s stomach flipped a little. “Used to learn some violin and piano… ”

“Ooh, the classical ones. I used to take flute.”

“Oh.” ‘Wow, Taeyeon, you’re such a good converser, really.’

“Yeah, I liked it a lot… but I probably couldn’t play a note anymore, I’m way too rusty for that,” Tiffany put down the pink nail buffer. “But I like singing.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

“So what kind of music do you listen to?”

    And the conversation went on like this as Tiffany did her thing and Taeyeon relaxed around the beautiful nail artist more and more as the minutes passed by. She found out a lot about Tiffany, for example that she was the same age as her and that she wasn’t planning to take on any other studies in the near future because she really liked being a nail artist. She didn’t have a boyfriend but apparently, she was dating quite frequently. This, Taeyeon concluded from the times Tiffany accidentally slipped in something about a date or a ‘random guy’ that she’s seen once or twice. She also revealed that she moved to Korea from the US when she was fifteen and that that’s when her ‘rebellion’ really started. She wasn’t really happy with the strict rules of the traditional Korean society and she didn’t care much what anyone thought of her. She explained that she didn’t think of herself as a bad girl or a rebel necessarily, she was just doing what her heart told her to do, and ‘if someone doesn’t like that, so be it.’

    Taeyeon was absolutely stunned by this girl. It was like finding a new flavor of ice-cream, a flavor she’s never smelled, never tasted, never swallowed before and from the way that flavor looked, she could only assume that that flavor had to be the best she’d ever have the chance to try in her life.

“Unnie, didn’t you just tell me that you can do everything these unnies can and that I shouldn’t pay for something like this?” Hayeon’s voice interrupted the two older girls’ conversation. Tiffany raised an eyebrow at Taeyeon.

“I… uh… was just joking.” ‘What the heck, Taeyeon, really, that’s the best you can come up with?’ “And I was bored, Tiffany-ssi here was free so… ”

“Right,” Hayeon stared at her weirdly. “Anyway, look. At. My. Naillls!!” She stuck her right hand in front of Taeyeon’s face so that the latter had to pull away a little further.

“Cool, that looks pretty.”

“Thanks, I think so too. I made a wise choice not letting you do it, right?”

“Sure, Hayeon, it looks really good,” Taeyeon said as her sister threw her arms around her neck from the back and leaned on her slightly as she watched Tiffany work on.

    They stayed silent for a while after that, and a few minutes later Hayeon decided to wait where Taeyeon was waiting for her earlier, while Taeyeon’s nails were getting finished.

“So,” Tiffany started, “you thought it was a bad idea to pay for getting your nails done?”

“No, it’s just… my sister’s aim seems to be to annoy the heck out of me today.”

“Oh really? But you said you could do it just as well? You told me before that you weren’t that good.”

    Taeyeon tried not to gulp and give her nervousness away as she attempted to get out of this. “Like I said, my sister was just being annoying and I was a little stupid about it, I guess… You’re much better than what I could do any day.”

“Thanks. But I still don’t believe you.”

    Taeyeon sighed. “Okay, I really… I really thought it was kinda… you know, I just thought I could do it. Obviously, I couldn’t. That’s it. I overestimated myself.”

“So are you the arrogant type?”