As the tall, tanned and ever so beautiful member of the track-and-field team had dragged her chair over and plopped herself down beside Jessica with a blinding, megawatt grin, Jessica knew that she would need some time trying to get used to this. Even though, it already seemed like the tanned brunette was already more or less getting the hang of this… ‘thing’— their newly formed friendship.

Ever since that day when they had shared Jessica’s textbook during English, it was almost as if a bridge had formed between the two of them. A connection. 

They talked, exchanged some words (and smiles) and during that short period of time, she had also came to the short conclusion that Kwon Yuri was probably the nicest thing that had happened ever since her transfer. She was probably the first and only person to not turn her nose up and speak to her in that condescending manner Jessica had come to love with a massive eye roll. It was refreshing and real sweet of her. But that was that.

After that whole episode, Jessica had initially thought that everything would resume back to normal (with her being back to the invisible wall that everyone would ignore). But what she didn’t expect was for the Black Pearl to actually come up to her and invite her to join her for lunch, albeit, rather meekly. 

Upon, overcoming the initial surprise, Jessica had assented to her invitation, thinking it was probably a ‘one-time’ sort of thing. But no. Yuri had returned to her the next day. And the next. And the day after next. 

It pretty much took Jessica a week to realize that this… might be a permanent thing after all. Though occasionally, Sooyoung, Yuri’s best friend, would tag along as well. Not that Jessica minded. Anything beats having lunch alone in class with only the scenery from her window-seat as company. At least she was nice and friendly like Yuri, so that was definitely an added plus.

But then again, lunch was usually just something between Yuri and herself. Sooyoung tended to disappear every now and then, which struck Jessica as odd, since the tanned duo were known best friends and ‘inseparable’ since the beginning of time. Well, at least till now.

“Sooyoung’s not joining us?” asked Jessica, peering over the tanned brunette’s shoulder, puzzled.

Yuri waved her off flippantly and shook her head. “She’s probably having lunch with Kim Taeyeon from next door.”    

Jessica pursed her lips. Were they having a fall-out of some sort? 

Almost as if having read Jessica’s mind, Yuri had added in quickly. “Not that we’re fighting or anything…” She pursed her lips, blushing suddenly. “Just that she loves meddling around...” She trailed off, lowering her voice and muttering something that sounded a lot like ‘love life’ but Jessica couldn’t be too sure. Either way, she merely shrugged it off without much thought. 

Soon enough, they began to fall into the pattern of small talk as they spoke about almost everything under the sun. From intimidating teachers to annoying seniors. From the latest buzz of Korean celebrities to their favorite pop idol groups. Though, frequently, they did managed to stop to take some bites of their lunch every now and then.

After spending slightly more than a week having lunch with Yuri, Jessica had decided that she quite liked talking to her. She was nice, funny and was just very easy to talk to in general. Granted, they did have their awkward moments every now and then; with some nervous fidgeting (mostly on the Black Pearl’s part) and the occasional slightly longer than usual pauses. But that was okay and understandable with their fledgling friendship. 

Biting at her lip to stifle the bubbling laughter that was threatening to spill at something funny Yuri had said earlier, Jessica had tried to refocus all that playful energy by lightly nudging the brunette with a frisky, ‘Yah!’

Yuri merely flashed a crooked grin in response, shrugging offhandedly before resuming her recount of the prank she had pulled on one of the seniors in the track-and-field team. 

All the while, Jessica would watch her, eyes never once straying away from her face. With half an ear on Yuri’s flowing, husky voice, Jessica took to studying the ever-shifting features that were laid out in front of her. 

The way her brows would move up and down animatedly with the flow of the conversation. How the spark in her eyes swirled, glowed, burning just little brighter every now and then. That cute little wrinkling of her nose when she did a disgusted expression at something and the way the corners of her lips would lift and curl while her cheeks dimpled into that beautiful, beautiful smile of hers.

Jessica felt her heart gave a sudden hitch.

“-ca… Sica. Jessica!” The frantic waving in front of her jolted Jessica as she gave a dazed blink, her vision refocusing onto the worry-stricken face in front of her. 

“Y-yeah?”

“You just zoned out on me completely.” The Black Pearl frowned and paused musingly for a second or two. “Is there something on my face? You’ve been staring for the past five minutes.” Yuri wagged her eyebrows teasingly, flashing her usual winsome grin that was accompanied by her complete set of pearly white teeth.

And there it was again. That sudden throb in her chest and that fluttery warmth, which surged through her like electricity. And why were her cheeks heating up?

“I-I was just thinking.”

“About?”

That stupid pretty smile of yours. 

“Homework.” Jessica lied, and was glad that it had come out smoothly.

The Black Pearl pursed her lips into a small dejected frown with her eyes downcast and glum. She hummed despondently, “So homework is more interesting than me…” 

Jessica had immediately widened her eyes in alarm, shaking her head vigorously. “Y-you know that’s not true!”

A pause.

And Yuri instantly broke into a grin, her eyes twinkling down at her, filled with mirth. “Oh, really?” She asked, teasingly. 

Jessica sighed and rolled her eyes with a slight smile, knowing it for what it was— just a jest— and punched the Black Pearl lightly on the shoulder, “Well, aren’t you insufferable?” She quipped with a slight smirk.

“I’m hurt.” Yuri huffed, pouting as she dramatically clutched at her shoulder.

The Korean-American laughed. “Then should I kiss it better?” As soon as the words had left her lips, it had hung heavily in the air— like a veil of thick, smoldering smoke— making Jessica regret for ever uttering it in the first place.

The air between them was charged as the seconds ticked past in silence.  

“Would you?”  

Jessica knew it was meant to pass off as an innocent banter between the two of them. But for some reason, the serious glint in the tanner brunette’s eye and the faint pink hue tinting just the rim of her ears, said otherwise. This was becoming something… more?

And it was making Jessica nervous. An idle thought passed through her mind. 

Were they flirting?

Nah, that wasn’t possible… They were both girls.

Could it?

She nibbled at her bottom lip. Her cheeks were warming up again at the sudden possible prospect as she struggled to come up with something to break the awkward tension.  

“I was just kidding.” Yuri grinned, laughing light-heartedly, sending her a wink.

Jessica breathed a silent sigh, shoulders slumping, but her heart was still pounding furiously for some odd reason. She managed a smile up at the Black Pearl, ignoring the whirl of questions that were currently plaguing her mind.

“Well, if one day you come up to me with an injured finger, I just might.”

Yuri only flashed an enigmatic smile. “That’s comforting to know.” But the way she had said it, lacked its usual playful edge.

After that, they had delved right back into lighter topics, but each time Jessica had looked back into those dark inky eyes, she couldn’t help notice a certain indecipherable spark in them that looked oddly wistful for some reason.

--

“Ah, this is so boring. Stuck on cleaning duty again on a nice day out like this and with…” The annoying shrill of her classmate’s voice died off with a grunt and Jessica wasn’t the least surprise when she felt a pair of eyes, filled with disdain, boring into her skull.

She pursed her lips, soughed in deeply and did her sweeping silently; ignoring the dirty looks thrown her way. She could say the same to that classmate of hers, whose name she could hardly care less to remember. The girl practically looked like every other girl in class. Dark haired, fair with single-eye lid and painfully skinny. The only thing that set her apart from the rest was probably her annoying high voice of hers that made her sound like a banshee each time she spoke.

“Changnam-ah, let’s hang out afterwards, ‘kay?”

Oh god, shut up, Jessica screamed in her head, white-knuckling the broom’s end and was maybe on the verge of snapping the entire end off. She just wished this torture could just end already. 

It would end a little faster, if you would actually move a little faster, the voice at the back of her head chided and Jessica silenced it immediately with an imperceptible sigh, sweeping furiously.

“Changnam… Changnamie, you’ve been looking of the window for the past five minutes. What are you… Omo, isn’t that Kwon Yuri?”

Instantly, Jessica felt her ears perking up at the sound of that name and she couldn’t help but sneak a glance towards Screechy Voice who had dropped her ragged cloth and pail and was making a beeline to the window her buddy, Changnam, was at. 

What was Yuri staying back after school for? Oh wait. She did mention earlier that she had training today. Hmm…

“She’s been staring up at me since just now,” said Changnam with a smug smirk. 

“You lucky little—” Screechy Voice scowled, and Jessica fought the urge to snort. 

“She’s so cool…” Changnam sighed dreamily, resting her elbows on the sill of the window. “I can just stand here and watch her all day.”

“I know really. I wish I could be her…” Another dreamy sigh to add in to the list of Jessica’s growing annoyance.

Rolling her eyes at the two starry-eyed girls, Jessica silently made her way to one of the open windows that was closest to her. She peered out of the window and instantly felt a wave of déjà vu washing over her. 

Sure enough, Yuri was standing right there in the school’s blue track uniform with a towel draped over her neck. Her hair was in a slight mess, but it was tied up in a loose ponytail and the flushed afterglow of her strenuous training was still ever present on her cheeks. When their eyes finally met—just like the first time— Yuri had lit up into her usual winning grin.  

Jessica snorted, smiling back at the Black Pearl.

Seriously, the only person who could still look so ravishingly gorgeous despite being all sweaty and disheveled was none other than Kwon Yuri herself. 

Jessica’s train of thoughts had instantly crashed, the minute she had heard two ear-splitting squeals coming off from her side.

“Omo, she smiled. She’s smiling at us, Hyejin-ah!” 

“Yes, I know, I know. I can see that!”

With that, the two best friends then took to waving out of the window; occasionally squealing and gasping like any other annoying schoolgirl. Which, Jessica might add, they were.

Eyes still trained onto the Black Pearl and making sure that she was still having her attention, Jessica sighed, pointed to the girls who were a couple windows down from hers, and shook her head with an exasperated roll of her eyes.  Finally, she pointed to her temple and did a loopy movement with it.

The Black Pearl laughed; eyes flickered to the ‘crazy’ pair fleetingly before falling back onto Jessica once more, nodding and grinning.

Just then, a slighter taller, tanner figure— Sooyoung— had tapped Yuri on the shoulder. Even though Jessica couldn’t hear a word Sooyoung was saying to Yuri, the quick gesture back to the running tracks was more than enough for Jessica to understand what was going on. When their short conversation had ended quickly, Yuri had turned to look back up at Jessica once more.

Tracing the direction of Yuri’s glance, Sooyoung was soon looking up at Jessica as well. At that point, she thought both Changnam and Screechy Voice were going to pass out from all that hyperventilating.

“Oh my god, Changnam. Today’s our lucky day, Choi Sooyoung’s looking up at us too!”

“She’s smiling too, she’s smiling!” 

Shooting Jessica a friendly smile and patently ignoring the two rather ‘enthusiastic’ classmates of Jessica’s, Sooyoung gave a small wave and turned back towards the Black Pearl, nudged her in her ribs and said something to her that suddenly caused her to blush. Chuckling, Sooyoung finally walked off into the direction of the running tracks.

Yuri had pursed her lips pensively while watching Sooyoung go. And then, she finally glanced up at Jessica, smiling. She reached into her track pants and whipped out her phone, typing something quickly into it. When she was done, she held her phone up, pointed at it and mouthed off something in Jessica’s direction.

‘Check your phone.’ 

Jessica blinked and scrambled for her bag that was placed in a corner. Searching for her phone with shaky hands, she realized for the first time the lack of shrieking and squealing and wondered if the two had finally passed out or something. However, upon retrieving her phone and swiftly making her way back to the window, she had noticed her two classmates staring back at her curiously under their heated glares.

‘Wait for me after you’re done? Let’s go back together.’

Grinning at the text message that was sent to her by the girl that was standing, looking hopefully up at her from the ground floor, Jessica nodded and flashed her the universal sign for  ‘okay’.

With one last megawatt smile and a nod, the Black Pearl sent her a wave and jogged off towards the running tracks.

Watching her back disappear off around the corner, Jessica released a soft blissful sigh, hands gripping the end of the broom, she had turned to return back to sweeping but was frozen in place by ferocity of the glares shot at her by her two classmates. It almost felt like they held more disdain and loathe than usual.

“What are you looking at?” Screechy Voice barked. “Get back to work, you lazy punk.”

Jessica shrugged, taking her broom off to the other corner of the room, not without catching one last hateful remark from her classmate, Changnam, she supposed.

“I can’t believe that stupid mute. Having lunch with Kwon Yuri…” 

Ignoring the annoying duo, Jessica found herself counting down the seconds before she was done with cleaning duty and could finally see Yuri again. Inwardly, she tried hard not to ponder too much over why her heart was racing with excitement and anticipation over going home with Yuri.

That was something for her to think about some other day. 

Just... Not today.



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