Line 49 (Chapter 7)
Title: Line 49
Pairing: Yulsic, Taeny, Hyoyoung, Yoonhyun, one more to be revealed
Rating: G - NC-17
Genre: Drama, romance, angst, high school AU
Summary: The struggle is different for everyone; we all take different measures to deal with our problems. Friendships are created and tossed upside down, love is found, love is lost, and trust is formed and betrayed as these nine girls find their places in each other's lives.
Chapter wordcount: 8,334
Prologue
Chapter 1: "Would you have said paranoid or socially retarded, I would have done a dance of joy."
Chapter 2: "Line 49 for homo- and bisexual youngsters."
Chapter 3: "Do you know what kind of relationship Jessica and Yuri share?"
Chapter 4: "A real fight? With like claws and stuff?"
Chapter 5: "You were acting like a crazy person today."
Chapter 6: "Do you even know my name?"
- 7 -
Tiffany was the first to wake up the next morning, when she sun was beaming in through the window in an offensive manner. She groaned at its bad manners, pulled up her duvet over her messy hair and dragged herself off the couch. She walked over to the window, pulled the blinds down, and watched in half-hearted amusement as the rest of the girls woke up from the sound it made.
"No," Sooyoung mumbled, "no", rolling over on her stomach and pushing her face down into the couch. Hyoyeon raised her head and looked around the room with squinted eyes, before she too leaned her face against the couch. Jessica and Sunny stirred without opening their eyes, while Seohyun and Yoona, who got hours less sleep than anyone else, didn't move a muscle.
Tiffany sunk back down on the couch between Yoona and Sunny. "Morning, girls," she said hoarsely, pulling her fingers through her hair.
"No," Sunny and Jessica said in unison. They sat up and stared at each other.
"Morning," Taeyeon then chimed in, before Hyoyeon did the same. She had stopped clinging on to Sooyoung, and moved as far as she could out to the edge without falling down. Sooyoung herself laid deadly still, taking up a lot more space than she needed to. "Did anyone else have any zombie dreams?" Tiffany asked.
"No, but I'm living mine right now," Sunny said, heavily sitting up and letting her short bangs cover her face. Taeyeon scoffed, shoving her cold feet in under Sunny's butt, trying to warm them up. Sunny looked like she barely noticed.
Yoona, who was lying right in the spot where the sun shone in beside the blinds, suddenly opened her eyes, blinked a few times in confusion before starting to roll back and forward on the couch. "What is this hideous light?" she groaned, hiding under the pillow.
"That's the sun," Jessica dead-panned.
"Well, it needs to stop."
Tiffany shook her head fondly behind Yoona's back, and turned to Sunny and Taeyeon. "Would anyone like some breakfast?"
Indistinct mumbles greeted her from all around the room. She licked her lips once; her own mouth was still numb from yesterday's ungodly amount of popcorn. Breakfast seemed like the least thing she'd want. "How about some ice cream?" she added.
Sooyoung sat up instantly. "Tiffany, you look stunning this morning," she said, hopping closer to Taeyeon and looking at Tiffany over Taeyeon's shoulder. Hyoyeon directed a slap at her back.
Tiffany laughed, rubbed her eyes, pulled her hair back into a pony tail and slowly got up off the couch. The rest of the room, barred the two youngest, eyed her steps with interest. "Ice cream it is, then," Tiffany said, and Sooyoung raised her hands in joy. They walked out of the room, limbs cracking and necks aching.
"When the eight of us and Yuri rule the world, the first thing I will do is ban mornings," Seohyun mumbled into her pillow.
Sooyoung emptied her bowl of ice cream in a hurry. The ice cream was fantastic, as ice cream usually is, but for the moment, that wasn't the only reason. She was trying to still the worry that burned and ached at the pit of her stomach; it felt like she had been punched. Hyoyeon was eating her ice cream silently while alternating between staring down into her bowl, looking carefully at Tiffany or out the window. Not a glance towards Sooyoung.
The night they had spent just holding each other was the happiest and most alive Sooyoung had felt in a long time, and she thought Hyoyeon was there with her. Now, in the light of day, from the way the other girl was acting, it seemed like nothing but a big misunderstanding. Like Sooyoung was the one doing the holding, and Hyoyeon was only there because she couldn't say no.
Was that really it? Had Sooyoung misunderstood everything? She felt almost perverted; like some sort of hugging rapist. The ache in her stomach grew heavier.
She excused herself to the bathroom when she felt tears prickling in her eyes. Walking out into the hallway, she hid her face from Seohyun and Yoona, who were dragging themselves out of the living room to get a taste of the ice cream before it all went away. The bottom floor bathroom was occupied, so she hastily skipped up the stairs to look herself into the upper floor one.
She barely made it two steps outside the bathroom before two pairs of hands grabbed her violently and dragged her into Tiffany's room, slamming the door shut. Her tired mind thought for a second it's Hyo, she's going to tell me what's going on, oh god something is going to happen now, but when she stumbled into Tiffany's bedroom and turned around to see her kidnappers, they turned out to be none other than Taeyeon and Sunny. She sighed and stared at them in the bright morning light.
"What are you two even doing?" she asked.
"We wanted to talk to you," Sunny replied from the edge of Tiffany's bed.
Sooyoung frowned. "Are you going to torture me? Whatever it is, I swear, I don't know," she said sarcastically, wondering what exactly her friends were up to.
"No torture," Taeyeon said with a grimace. "We just wanted to ask you about..."
Sooyoung's brain clicked, and she looked down with a knowing smile. "This is about Hyoyeon, isn't it?"
"Right," Sunny nodded honestly. "You like her, don't you?"
Sinking down on the wooden chair by Tiffany's desk, Sooyoung sighed heavily. She knew her friends had probably known about her feelings from the very first day. She was truly terrible at hiding her crushes, so denying it seemed like a waste of energy. "I do. What about it?"
Sunny exchanged a look with Taeyeon. The latter leaned against the door frame. "You two seem to have gotten a lot closer, and quickly," Sunny stated. Sooyoung shrugged.
"Yeah. So what?" She felt strangely defensive, and not at all liking where the conversation was going.
"You know we don't have a problem with you liking a girl," Sunny continued. Taeyeon squirmed a little by the door. "But it's just... We're a little worried."
"About what?" Sooyoung sighed.
Sunny hesitated for a moment. "Please don't take this in the wrong way," she then said, "but have you thought this through?"
Laughing unhappily, Sooyoung frowned. "Thought this through? It's a crush, that's not really a thinking deal."
Sunny reluctantly nodded. "I don't mean anything bad against Hyoyeon," she said, looking over at Taeyeon who hurried to shake her head in agreement. "But you know... how things usually end when you get feelings for someone."
Sooyoung looked away with a bitter expression, hurt that two of her best friends would remind her of what she considered to be her greatest weakness. At least right then. "What's your point?" she asked unhappily.
"We just want you to be sure of what you're doing, so that the whole Donghae story doesn't repeat itself," Taeyeon chimed in. Sooyoung rolled her eyes. "It'd be a shame if you guys fell out like you and Donghae did, and Hyoyeon couldn't hang out with us anymore..."
"I know the story," Sooyoung interrupted, remembering all too well how her short-lived relationship with Donghae had ended. She had almost forced herself to forget it. “Do you think I found it any more fun than he did? Don’t you think I hurt just as much over the loss of everything I had with him?”
Taeyeon and Sunny kept silent for a while, exchanging nervous glances. Sooyoung pretended not to notice.
"If Hyoyeon would turn out to like you back," Sunny said hesitantly, "have you thought of the consequences of getting into a relationship with her?" Sooyoung stared at her in confusion. "I mean, she's a girl..."
"She's human," Sooyoung shrugged. "She's gorgeous. She's funny, she's smart, she's totally wonderful. Why would I care about what anyone else says?"
Again, Sunny fell silent. Taeyeon looked like she wasn't really sure what was happening. "I just want you to be absolutely sure," Sunny said slowly, "if Hyoyeon decides she wants to be with you... that you're sure what you're getting yourself into."
"And that she doesn't come to you only to become rejected," Taeyeon added. "We're worried about the hurt it could cause both of you."
Sooyoung's defensiveness melted away a little at Taeyeon's words. She had lost sight of it for a moment, but she knew they were always on her side, looking out for her. She sighed. "Well, I can't exactly tell the future," she said sadly, not wanting to deny her own worries that were still burning inside her, but not really wanting to confirm them either. "All I know is that I really like her, and... I want to be with her." A blush threatened to creep up on her cheeks, but she felt strong. Determined. And very much in love.
Sunny looked touched at her words for a moment. "Tiffany says Hyoyeon definitely doesn't need any more pain in her life."
Sooyoung scratched the back of her head carefully. The memory of the conversation she had had with Hyoyeon in that very same room flashed by in her mind, and her anxiety doubled in size. "What does she mean by that?"
Sunny shook her head. "I don't know. I was thinking you might."
Shifting her gaze between her two friends, Sooyoung shook her head. "I don't. But I hope I will, soon."
The three sat (or in Taeyeon's case, stood) in silence for a few seconds, all with different theories on Hyoyeon's life in their heads.
"She doesn't really say much, so it's hard to know," Sooyoung said mindlessly.
"That's another thing that worried us," Taeyeon said. "Because she's kind of silent, and mysterious, it might be the mystery that attracts you. When the mystery is gone, maybe the interest is, too."
Sooyoung smiled joylessly. She knew her best friend meant no harm with her words, but they still stung a little. She supposed it was because they had truth in them. "Well, if you never try, you'll never know," she said with a shrug.
"You're right about that," Sunny said. "Well, that was all we had. We should probably head back down."
Sooyoung got up from her chair and watched Sunny do the same. "You know, for someone who's never had a crush on anybody, you seem to have a lot of opinions on how they work," she said as they made their way to the door.
Sunny half shrugged, half nodded. "I probably think about it more than anyone who's been in love a hundred times."
"That's only because people who are in love don't think," Sooyoung replied. Taeyeon nodded slowly.
The three of them skipped down the stairs to the lower floor and found Tiffany, Jessica, Seohyun and Yoona in the kitchen, the four of them bended over the now almost empty package of ice cream, taking turns in taking microscopically tiny spoonfuls to share every last piece together. The two youngest looked like they were still asleep, and Sooyoung gave them a sympathetic look.
It took her no more than one second to notice that a certain girl wasn't there. She backed out into the hallway and looked into the living room, but she wasn't in there either. The anxiety burned in her stomach like a ball of fire.
She walked back into the kitchen. "Where's Hyoyeon?" she asked no one in particular, and Tiffany pulled out her spoon from her mouth.
"Her father came by to pick her up a moment ago," she explained, watching worriedly as Seohyun was about to flip the ice cream off the table. "Apparently they were going shopping." Sooyoung's heart sank.
"She went home?" she repeated. Tiffany nodded at her and pushed the pack back towards the middle of the table. Sooyoung turned and stared at Taeyeon and Sunny. She knew she shouldn't blame them, but she couldn't help it. Now she had to wait all the way until Monday to see Hyoyeon again, and she was afraid the nervousness would physically kill her. Sunny and Taeyeon both shrugged apologetically.
"I should get going soon too," Jessica said, finally giving up on the miniature piece of ice cream in the box. "I'm seeing Yuri later, and I really need to shower and... brush my teeth." She clicked her tongue with a sour expression. Yoona let out a suggestive "oooh" from her spot on the kitchen counter beside Seohyun, and Jessica threw her a glare. "Shut up."
"Where do you live?" Sooyoung asked, feeling the need to go home as well, if only sulk in loneliness. For a moment she imagined herself being the one going home to make time for her girlfriend, but she pushed the thought out of her head as quick as she could. It left a bittersweet sense of regret and excitement in the back of her throat.
Jessica gave her only a brief description of her neighborhood, but it was enough for Sooyoung to know they weren't going the same direction. Jessica lived by a few blocks of cheap apartments, majority of which were used by students with low to little income.
"We're almost neighbors then!" Sunny exclaimed. Jessica looked at her in surprise. "I live there too, only a little further east, closer to the public baths. Maybe we can walk together?"
Sooyoung walked over to the kitchen counter where Seohyun and Yoona were sitting, and leaned silently against the cupboards with her arm on the youngest's lap. Seohyun gave her a questioning glance, but Sooyoung ignored it.
Jessica looked hesitant for a moment, but eventually nodded. "I guess, sure," she said.
Seohyun hooked her arm with Yoona's. The two were laughing about something unspeakable, something only they knew, completely ignoring the other five girls' existence in the room.
Sooyoung couldn't help but wonder what the hell was going on with her life.
"So, you live alone, too?" Jessica asked as she walked with Sunny in the half-hearted sunshine. There was something a bit off with sunny Sundays, Sunny thought, like the day hadn't quite understood the rule for Sundays. Sundays were supposed to be depressing, where you just wanted to hide under your bed sheets, and the weather should comply.
"I do," she agreed, pushing the Sunday thoughts out of her head. They were never very pleasant anyway.
"How come?" Jessica questioned, and Sunny thought she for some reason sounded like she was trying very hard to sound casual. She assumed it was just awkwardness (and boy was she used to dealing with that), especially since their fight in school. Hoping it would go away if she just kept talking, she tried to think of an answer.
She shrugged a bit. "Nothing much really happened in the town where I used to live," she stated. "My parents still live there, though, and it's not very far from here."
"So you're easily bored?" Jessica asked, and Sunny wondered for a moment if she was truly interested.
"I guess," she said, never really having paid much attention to that quality of hers.
"Me too," Jessica agreed with an excited smile. Sunny returned it, but she thought to herself how wrong the other girl was about that.
"So how about you? Why do you live on your own?" she hurried on before silence had a chance to fall.
"Parents," Jessica mumbled after a beat. She half shuddered and half shook her head, and her blond hair shone as it swung rapidly from side to side over the back of her bright jeans jacket. "I couldn't live with them. Actually, it's a little funny. They used to live here, and I wanted to move away. But when I told them that, they wanted to move too, and I immediately changed my mind to stay," she continued. Sunny swelled a little with joy that the other girl would open up even that much to her. "They moved pretty far though. I don't speak to them often, unless I need money."
Sunny couldn't help but feel it sounded a little sad, but Jessica showed no signs of regrets about it. "Why not?" she asked carefully, feeling more and more at ease around the other girl, but not enough.
Jessica shrugged again. "I don't know," she replied simply. "They don't even know that I'm in a relationship with..." she paused, glancing very indiscreetly sideways towards Sunny, before continuing, "someone."
Frowning, Sunny gave her a questioning look. "You're talking about Yuri, right?"
Jessica looked at her in surprise for a moment before bursting into laughter. "Right," she admitted.
"Everyone already knows," Sunny laughed along with her.
"Ah," Jessica said, holding her hand over her heart and looking very relieved. "It's still kind of nerve-wracking... making new friends and having to tell them about me and Yuri." She gave Sunny a dark look that still held some traces of nervousness. "I mean, it's not like we hold back when we're in public," she continued and Sunny nodded; she had seen more kisses between the two than she had ever bargained for, "but you never know how dense people can be about this stuff. To some people it's so common for girls to hold hands and kiss that they could never imagine us being in a relationship." She sounded bitter, and Sunny scoffed a little.
"So you think I'm daft?" she said, half amused.
"No, no," Jessica hurried, turning towards Sunny and walking sideways along the road.
"I sure hope not," Sunny laughed to show she wasn't all that serious. "I have on occasion been told I'm very emotionally intelligent," she mumbled, thinking back of her most recent conversation with Jinjeong at Line 49. Jessica gave her an odd look. Sunny felt herself sinking into a puddle of too deep thoughts for the Sunday morning's sunshine, and she clawed her way back to reality, uncomfortably aware that Jessica was observing her carefully. "H-how long have you guys been together?" she stuttered out.
"About four years," Jessica replied, holding her suspicious look for a few more moments and answering the question as if on reflex. "We got together even before my parents moved away."
Sunny widened her eyes. "Four years, and they still don't have any idea?"
Shaking her head, Jessica gave a smile that spoke of both victory and shame. "We never even needed to sneak around a lot. It's weird, you know, but I don't think my parents ever suspected anything."
Sunny nodded, not even really sure if she understood. "Don't you ever get thoughts of telling them?" she then asked. It sounded so off to her that Jessica could be in a loving relationship for years and years and her parents would have no idea - even though Sunny wasn't that close with hers, they would be the first to know if she found someone, no doubt about it.
Jessica looked at her as if she was insane. "No, no," she said, shaking her head and looking scared of the thought. "I mean, what would be the point? They're not really in my life anyway. Seems unnecessary to destroy something that isn't really that stable to begin with." For a moment, Jessica's defenses fell, and Sunny swore she could see a sadness glimmer around her dark eyes.
"But they're your parents," Sunny stated, immediately feeling ridiculous when Jessica gave her a confused look. "You don't think they'd take it well?"
Jessica shrugged. "I don't know, I haven't thought about it much." The sadness was gone, replaced by something that was meant to be - but only resembled - arrogance. Sunny knew at once that the other girl's careless attitude was nothing but a show. At least she hoped it was.
Something told her Jessica definitely thought more about her parents than she let on.
"What about if you and Yuri get married someday?" Sunny asked, smiling when Jessica immediately turned a bright pink at the thought. She gave Sunny a smile which she fought to keep from reaching her eyes and shrugged again.
"Yuri isn't very fond of the thought of marriage," she explained.
"She's not?" Jessica shook her head.
"Hm," Sunny said, a little surprised, but not knowing why. "Well, a lot can still happen, right? You guys are only 18..."
Jessica nodded, again without saying a word.
They walked for a while in silence, both in deep thought. The warmth and careful wind that caressed the grounds of their small town soothed Sunny's mind. She was happy that her fight with Jessica didn't turn out to be bigger than it was, and she genuinely liked the other girl. But there was so much about her that Sunny couldn't figure out; small things and actions that kept Sunny on her toes whenever she was around. She didn't like when she couldn't read other people's intentions. She definitely hated it when she didn't understand why people did or said things, and with Jessica, it was like she was never sure. It seemed to her that Jessica was like a wounded animal, like someone who had been shot but was too proud to say anything, and just went about hiding her injuries.
After their fight, it seemed like she knew her inside out. Like all the cards were on the table, though they barely knew anything about each other. She knew almost nothing about Jessica's past, her interests, likes or dislikes, but she felt almost sure that if someone asked her how Jessica would react to something, she would know it instantly. Almost like Jessica had told her some big secret about herself through getting angry with her over nothing - and maybe, Sunny thought, you could tell a lot about a person from what they get angry about.
But there was something else as well. Something that weighed down heavier and heavier on Sunny's mind, consuming her day's happiness little by little. She wasn't sure what it was or where it came from, but it was unmistakably, undeniably there.
Something was eating away at her heart.
Jessica didn't know how it happened. She really had no idea. One moment she'd been walking home with Sunny, feeling strange and ridiculous and defensive, thinking about Yuri and longing to be in her arms, and the next she was in Sunny's apartment, sitting on a chair by her dinner table while the other girl removed her dirty clothes from their home on the floor. When they had reached Jessica's apartment, Sunny had begged with her, pleaded with her to walk her all the way home and keep her company for a little while. Thoughts of Yuri, who was probably at home waiting for her call, kept swirling around in her head and she felt guilty. Guilty for not wanting to go home with Sunny, guilty for being there with her in the first place - and before she had known it, she had given in to the shorter girl's wishes and walked her home.
Sunny's place was nice. Small, but nicely decorated for someone with no money. She imagined Sunny felt well at home there; truth to be told, even Jessica herself did, about 10 seconds after she stepped in the front door.
"Do you want something to drink?" Sunny asked her when the floor was finally naked. "I pretty much only have water," she added in response to Jessica's confused look, and walked over to the very small kitchen area.
Jessica cringed a little. She wasn't sure why, but she felt very reluctant to accept anything from the other girl. The long walk home in the sun left her very thirsty, though, so she let her body win over her own weird, mental desires and nodded shortly. Sunny filled two glasses of water, handed one to Jessica, and sat down opposite her by the table. Jessica fiddled with the cold glass for a moment, an unknown sense of anxiety lowering on her.
"Your place is nice," she said. Later she would realize the only reason she said it was to keep the conversation from going in other directions, but in the moment, she really meant it.
"Thanks," Sunny said, staring harshly at her unmade bed on the opposite end of the room. "Sorry about the mess though."
Jessica shrugged, reluctantly taking a sip of her water. "It's okay."
"What's your place like?" Sunny asked then, with genuine curiosity in her eyes.
Jessica looked around. "It's a little bigger," she stated without trying to sound too smug, "but not as nice as yours. It feels a bit more like a hospital room than a home."
"This place did too, before I moved in," the shorter of the two replied with a proud smile.
"I should make you do something about my place too then." They smiled at each other over the table, before lifting their glasses to their lips at the same time, drinking for a moment that lasted a little too long to be natural.
Jessica tried desperately to think of a subject to talk about, feeling her insides straining themselves in the process. She never had this problem. She may have seemed like an ice princess on the outside, but once she was in company of friends, she could usually never shut up.
Why couldn't she think of anything?
"So," Sunny said nervously, startling Jessica. "How come Yuri wasn't there last night?"
For a short moment, Jessica had been relieved that Sunny had said something, but the feeling quickly burned away and was replaced by... what? An irrational kind of fear? What exactly was she afraid of, if so? She hated how Sunny kept talking about Yuri, and she didn't know why. Yuri was a big part of her life, so it was only natural... but why did it annoy her so much?
"Oh, she has this job," she replied, trying to seem unaffected, but feeling anything but. "She doesn't like it much, she only does it to get out of her parent's house more." Sunny blinked, Jessica hesitated, wanted to stop herself from speaking. "Her relationship with her parents isn't that good either." She widened her eyes at herself. Was she suddenly spilling Yuri's secrets now too?! Wasn't it enough that she couldn't keep her mouth shut about her own troubles?
Sunny nodded, her mouth forming 'oh' but with no sound coming out. She clicked her nail against her class a couple of times, staring down into the water. The look on her face scared Jessica even further, so she fished up her cellphone from her pocket to check the time. 10 minutes since she arrived, and Sunny had only grown quieter and quieter. Why had she even wanted Jessica to come with her home in the first place?
"I want to ask you..." Sunny said, and Jessica's anxious heart started beating faster.
"What?"
Looking up, she gave Jessica smile that obviously had no heart in it what so ever. She titled her head a little, her face showing great discomfort. "I don't really know how to ask, so I'll just..."
"Tell me," Jessica said. She didn't want to know, not really, she convinced herself, but she was too curious not to. She wanted to throw up. Horrified, she saw tears start to form in the other girl's eyes.
"What's it like..." Sunny mumbled, her gaze fixed on the table, "to be in a relationship with a girl?" Her voice quivered a little, and Jessica was stunned by the question. Whatever she had been expecting, it certainly wasn't that. For some reason it didn't calm her down.
"What exactly do you want to know?" was all she managed to say. The look in Sunny's eyes told her that she didn't know either.
"I've never met anyone I've liked before," she said, and Jessica put down her glass. What did that mean? "How does it feel when Yuri holds you? When she kisses you? What's it like?" Sunny rambled on, suddenly bordering on hysterics. Unshed tears rested in her eyes, ready to fall. "I need to know." Her hand gipped at the flat surface on the table, closer to Jessica's side.
"Why are you so interested?" Jessica questioned, feeling scared and unreasonably offended that Sunny would ask those questions. She wanted to laugh the whole situation away, it made her so uncomfortable, but the desperate tears in Sunny's eyes left her unable to do so.
"I'm gay." It was almost a whisper, and it almost sent Jessica flying back out of her chair. She felt the urge to get up and run out of there, and she pictured it in her mind, but she remained seated for reasons she wasn't even sure about. And why did it bother her so much? It would seem a bit odd to her if she was to suddenly become some kind of homophobe... But Sunny's presence more than bothered her in that moment.
"Who else have you told about this?" she asked, her tone scolding and harsh. Sunny's tears fell.
"My parents. Seohyun." She dried her eyes and immediately looked back into Jessica's.
"No one else?"
Sunny shook her head. "No."
Jessica leaned back in the chair. Not knowing what she was doing, she stood up and grabbed her almost untouched glass of water. "I really have to get going, I promised I'd meet up with Yuri..." she said distantly. Sunny looked desperately up at her.
"But..." she mumbled. "Can't you stay for a while? Just for a little while? Please?" Seemingly shocked, her tears had stopped falling in an instant.
"I really..." Jessica began, not knowing anything else than her desire to leave Sunny's apartment immediately. "She's waiting for me. I have to go." She took her glass and walked over to the kitchen counter, emptied it of water in the sink and put it down on the counter. "I'm sorry. I'll see you tomorrow in school."
Sunny didn't reply, but sat with her back turned towards her, and Jessica assumed she had started crying again. If she ever really stopped. She knew she was being a coward, an idiot, and a horribly bad friend if nothing else, but were the two of them really friends? Wasn't it just a week ago they were throwing verbal knives at each other in the school corridor? What responsibility did she really have towards Sunny, to help her with her problems?
She tried to justify her own actions, but one thought kept breaking through all her other ones.
Why, why, why did Sunny have to be gay too?
Yuri came over to her apartment about 40 minutes later, when she had calmed down enough to be outside the risk zone of having a violent crying attack. She kissed Jessica forcefully as soon as she stepped in the door, as always showing her how much she'd been missed.
"How was the movie night?" she asked, taking Jessica's hand and leading her to the couch.
"It was good," the blond nodded, taking a deep breath and thinking back over the more pleasant parts of the weekend. "I learned that Sooyoung has a really fucked up taste in movies, everyone loves Seohyun and Tiffany, and Sooyoung and Hyoyeon may or may not hook up soon."
Yuri laughed. "Really? Another couple in our group, then?"
Why did Sunny say before? I've never met anyone I've liked before. What did that mean? What was that before? Had she met someone now? Did she like Jessica? What did she mean? I've never met anyone I've liked before. I've never met anyone I've liked before. I've never met anyone I've liked before and now, I like you, Jessica, and that thought only scares you because you know it's possible for you to like me back, isn't that right?
"Yeah," Jessica said, closing her eyes as Yuri treaded her fingers through her hair.
About 500 meters away, Sunny was still sitting at her dinner table wondering the same thing. Where had the before come from? She didn't even have feelings for Jessica, did she? If she was to have feelings for anyone at all, shouldn't it be Tiffany? she tried to reason with her own mind. Jessica was beautiful, that was plain for anyone to see, but so was Tiffany. Absolutely gorgeous. And Tiffany had a generosity and warmth to her that Jessica lacked, all traits that attracted Sunny, and yet...
She walked over to her bed and sunk down under the sheets. She had prayed so hard to fall in love with somebody, but now that she was in the presence, looking into the eyes of feelings she didn't even know were real, she wanted it all to go away, and fast. It just couldn't happen. Of all the girls she knew, was she really going to fall for the one she didn't fit together with? The one that was already taken?
"Are you okay?" Yuri asked, pulling Jessica closer to her.
"Yeah."
That night, after a long day that disappeared quicker than she would have thought possible - and maybe quicker than she would have liked, too, but she wouldn't admit to that - Taeyeon found herself once again in front of the mirror with the number to Line 49 in her hands. She didn't look at herself. It might have been because she didn't want to see herself for what she truly was; then she'd rediscover the need to change everything that was her, but it might also have been because she didn't want anything connecting her to reality at that moment. Her mind was tired after two days of wonderful company, laughter, too little sleep and too much candy, and she wanted it to stay that way.
She was about to call 49 again, and if it ended up like last time, she could just pretend she imagined the conversation. If she called in the state she was in right then, maybe it wouldn't hurt her as much as last time.
And well, honestly speaking, she was already pretty hurt. The way that The Junsu Person had handled her call last time wasn't the problem; it was the way Taeyeon herself did. She prayed to the high heavens that he wouldn't be the one to pick up this time. Would she ever forget his name and voice?
Walking over to her bed, she could feel her hands shaking. Her mother was out seeing a friend, so she had the apartment to herself. The fear of being caught wasn't the problem. On the contrary it was being alone with herself that scared her.
She held the note tightly in one hand while dialing the number on her cell phone. Beautiful thing, cell phones; no risk of the number showing up on the phone bill her mother paid every month. Very good. Without giving herself time to change her mind - she had thought this through enough - she pressed Call and shakily held up the phone to her ear.
Two signals sounded, and then somebody picked up. "Line 49, this is Stephanie."
Ah, so a girl's voice this time, Taeyeon thought. She didn't know if it was a relief or not. Weren't guys usually more accepting of... girls who like girls? she wondered. Either way, she supposed it didn't matter. Someone who worked at a helpline for gay people probably wouldn't be very homophobic either way, but maybe that was just what she needed to change herself.
"H-hi," she choked out when she realized that was her cue to answer. She shivered.
"Hello," Stephanie replied warmly, and Taeyeon already liked her voice. Rich, yet bright. "What's on your mind?"
For some reason, Taeyeon preferred that question a thousand times over Junsu's "how can I help you". She didn't know at all what kind of help she wanted. Did she want to be cured? Did she want to accept herself and get over it? Either option seemed as impossible. On the other hand, she definitely knew what was on her mind, no matter how hard it was to put into words. "I..." she tried, feeling her throat closing up with tears in a matter of seconds, thoughts swirling and tangling up in each other in her head. "I think I need some help." Her eyes blurred instantly, and she bit her lip, not prepared for her emotions to overwhelm her so quickly.
"Then you've come to the right place," Stephanie replied with the exact right amount of sympathy. "I will try my best to help you, okay?"
Taeyeon nodded, feverishly trying not to blink so the tears wouldn't fall. "Thank you," she mumbled.
"What's the problem?" Stephanie then asked, and Taeyeon's heart sank. She wished the question would be more exact, since she didn't know if she could make herself admit to anything out loud.
She took a deep breath. "I've been... I've been trying to ignore... who I am... for a long time now." Surprised at hearing the words come out of her own mouth, she drew another deep breath, shakier this time. "But I can't anymore. I just can't."
"And you shouldn't," Stephanie agreed. Taeyeon didn't know if she even agreed with herself. "When you say ignoring who you are... What exactly do you mean?"
Taeyeon tried to form the words in her mind, and they appeared as easily as anything. I'm gay. I like girls. I'm a lesbian. And as always the thoughts were coupled with feelings of total and absolute despair, enough to clog up her throat and for her mind to race. How could she ever say those things out loud? Her vision blurred further as she began to tremble, the tears shaking in her eyes. "I can't say it," she whispered. "I can't. Please, don't make me."
"It's okay. You don't have to." Stephanie spoke the words hurriedly, probably to make Taeyeon see that she didn't have to, and stop her from hanging up. Taeyeon sighed in relief. "Does anyone know... you know... about you?" Stephanie continued.
"I live with my mom, I only have her," Taeyeon replied, and the thought of telling her sped her breathing up. "She can't know, ever, I can't tell her, she would disown me, do you get that? She'd... I can't tell her, I just can't," she rambled before being able to stop herself. If Stephanie was about to suggest that she told her mother, then she was crazy, and she needed to know it. The tears that had been waiting to fall poured over her cheeks at her outburst. She did nothing to dry them away.
"Shh, sweetie, calm down," Stephanie cooed, and Taeyeon did, however unwillingly. "I won't ask you to tell your mother until you're ready. Okay?"
Taeyeon looked down to her lap dejectedly. "I won't ever be ready. There's no such thing. How can I be ready for my own mom to throw me out?"
Stephanie hesitated for a moment. "What makes you think she would throw you out?" she asked, curious. Taeyeon rearranged her position to try and become more comfortable, unsuccessfully.
"I just know," Taeyeon said shortly. "No one wants their child to be... like that."
"That's not true."
"Why?" Taeyeon asked. "Would you want your child to... be like that?"
"Maybe not at first," Stephanie replied. "Maybe it'd take some time to get used to the thought that there probably won't be any biological grandchildren... and maybe not even a real wedding." Her voice was strong, Taeyeon thought. "But if I got adopted grandchildren, there's nothing that says I can't love them as much as my biological ones. Either way, that's not all there is to my child's life, now is it?"
"That's not exactly what I meant either," Taeyeon said sourly, tears still pouring down her face.
"Then what? The only thing that would matter to me is whether he or she would be happy, and if that's with a male or a female, what is the difference?" Stephanie sounded very sure and very strong, but not scolding in the slightest. Taeyeon did feel a little embarrassed, but not enough for her to hang up just yet. She sighed, letting the tears fall.
"I guess so," she said, "but it doesn't matter. Everyone isn't as accepting as you. I don't want to be..." Taeyeon caught herself in the last moment before the word passed her lips. She cringed. "I want to be normal."
Stephanie didn't say anything for a while. Not until then did Taeyeon realize that there was a possibility that Stephanie herself was gay, and that that was the reason she was working at Line 49. She immediately felt guilty, but tried to not back down. It was how she felt.
"Look... What's your name? You don't have to tell me your real one, just something to call you by," Stephanie said.
"Tae..." slipped past Taeyeon's lips unconsciously. She frowned. "I'm Taeyeon," she then repeated in defeat. What did it matter, anyway - Stephanie could be on the other side of the country for all she knew. She didn't know anyone with the name.
"Taeyeon," Stephanie repeated after a beat. "You are normal. There's nothing wrong or abnormal about being gay just because the percentage of gay people is smaller than the percentage of straight people."
Taeyeon cringed a little. She couldn't remember ever having been in a conversation where the word 'gay' had come up so many times. But even if she wouldn't admit to it, for every time Stephanie said it, she felt more and more at ease.
"Do you think people deserve to be treated differently just because they're gay?" Stephanie asked when Taeyeon didn't reply.
Taeyeon looked around her room as if searching for a reply hidden somewhere. "I - yes, I mean... no?"
"Do you think being gay is something you should get beaten up for? Killed for? Bullied for? Do you think it's okay when that happens to other people?" Stephanie continued. Her tone was so intense that it made Taeyeon want to hide. She felt that she had spent half of her life thinking about this, but now it seemed more like she really didn't know what to say at all.
"No, of course not," she said quietly. "Why are you asking me this? It's not like I'm out there bullying those people," she questioned, feeling a little blamed and strangely guilty at the same time.
"I'm glad you aren't," Stephanie said. "But you sound like you really think being gay is wrong."
Taeyeon let herself fall backwards on the bed, and pulled her knees up to her chest, rolling over. "That's just because I am," she replied. It was the closest thing she'd ever come to admitting to her sexual orientation out loud. She was filled with something resembling horrified adrenaline at the thought, and she hurried on, "but just the fact that there are people out there who kill and bully people for it..." She sighed, not knowing how to continue.
"Taeyeon, what you need to do is surround yourself with the right people," Stephanie said firmly. "Good people who won't judge you. Then this won't be a problem for you."
"How can I do that?" Taeyeon asked, closing her eyes, feeling drowsy as more tears seeped through her closed eyelids. "How can you say that? I will have to get a job eventually, and it's not like I can choose the people I work with. It's not like I can choose the people I pass on the street."
"The people you work with and the people around you only need to know however much you choose to tell them," Stephanie reasoned calmly.
"So I just live a lie for the rest of my life? Is that it?" Taeyeon said, suddenly unreasonably angry at Stephanie for making everything sound so easy. For making it sound like there was some kind of hope, when Taeyeon knew that it was nothing but a lie.
"No, Taeyeon, that's not what I mean. What I'm saying is that if there is someone in your surroundings, at work for example, that seems like he or she shouldn't know about your orientation... then maybe they don't need to know about it either." Stephanie still sounded calm, even after Taeyeon's sudden outburst of anger, and somehow it angered Taeyeon even further. It hit her how brave she felt speaking over the phone with someone, especially when the person in question knew nothing about her.
"You don't need to tell anyone about you to hear those kinds of insults, though," Taeyeon muttered. "You hear them all the time. In the corridors at school, on TV, everywhere you go there's someone using that word as an insult."
Stephanie hesitated for a moment. "How old are you?"
"I'm eighteen," Taeyeon sighed, wondering why it was relevant at all. She wanted Stephanie to tell her she was right, that she should hide all her gay tendencies inside her, get a respectable boyfriend and live calmly for the rest of her life. She didn't want to challenge anyone's prejudices; she just wanted to live silently. Happily.
"Eighteen," Stephanie repeated absent-mindedly. "Kids in this age throw things like that around all the time without thinking about it. I'm sure that if there was an actual gay person in their company, they would think twice before saying it."
Taeyeon doubted it strongly, but she decided to give in. "Maybe. But they would still think it," she mumbled.
"Perhaps," Stephanie agreed. "But does it really matter so much what other people think, Taeyeon?"
She tried to open her mouth to say something, but she didn't know what, so she closed it again. Opened it, closed it. Not a sound came out. A part of her felt that yes, what other people thought mattered a lot, but she couldn't explain it. She didn't know why it mattered so much.
"Yes." She said simply.
"Why?"
Taeyeon sighed. "It just does, okay, I can't explain it." She tried to sound as hostile and unpleasant as possible so that Stephanie wouldn't want to approach the subject further.
A few silent moments passed. Taeyeon assumed the other girl was displeased with her answer, and the thought both saddened and encouraged her. "Do you really want to let them live your life for you?" Stephanie then asked. Taeyeon felt empty. The tears had stopped falling, but she remained on her side on the bed with her eyes closed.
"They would probably do it better than I am right now, so why not," she dead-panned, with no energy to think about what she really meant.
Stephanie paused again. Taeyeon didn't say anything, letting Stephanie gather her thoughts and trying not to think too much. She was starting to feel really tired.
"How long have you known that you are... you know?" Stephanie asked then. Taeyeon laughed a little at her poor attempt at censoring the bad G-word.
"I guess two or three years."
"Aha," Stephanie said, and Taeyeon imagined her faceless head bobbing up and down in a knowing nod. "And what made you call here now?"
"What do you mean?" Taeyeon asked.
"Well, you've known for three years but you didn't call here until tonight. Why now?"
Taeyeon opened her eyes, and they immediately ached from the lamp in the ceiling. She knew exactly why she called now, why she could take it tonight and not at her last call three weeks ago. But oh, god, that was the most embarrassing part of all. Tiffany.
Her crush was so pathetic she just wanted to die when she thought about it. They had barely spoken to each other, and yet Taeyeon was swooning like a pre-teen school girl over a handsome boyband member. And add to that the fact that Taeyeon could barely make eye-contact with the other girl, let alone make conversation, and Taeyeon squeezed her eyes shut again.
"I, uhm... I met someone," she admitted reluctantly. "I've managed to keep my heart out of too much trouble before, but not anymore." She was surprised she'd been able to say it, and she was glad. The way Stephanie was so clear, so harsh, so honest calmed her down greatly. It was just what she needed. Someone who wasn't afraid to tell the truth.
"Is she straight?" Stephanie asked. The smile could almost be heard on her voice.
"Probably," Taeyeon replied, almost hoping it was true. "I don't know. But she's way too perfect to be anything else, and either way she's too perfect to be into someone like me."
"You should ask her," Stephanie said. The ridiculousness of the statement made Taeyeon want to jump out the window.
"Ask her if she's straight? Are you kidding me?" she said, not caring about how impolite she may sound. "I'd rather play leapfrog with a unicorn." Stephanie laughed warmly. "Besides, I don't really know her that well. She goes to my school."
"It's hard to know about these things," Stephanie said sympathetically. "Especially with girls. But for what it's worth, I really hope -"
Taeyeon was distracted by the sound of the front door - or, well, terrified is probably a more accurate word. She sat up straight, hearing her mother call "I'm home" and completely missing the rest of Stephanie's sentence.
"Fuckfuckfuck," she hissed out, "I have to go, my mother is home."
"Oh, alright," Stephanie replied. "But Taeyeon, please, call again. You can ask to talk to me, Stephanie, if you want, and if I'm here and not already in a call I'll come talk to you. I promise." Taeyeon hesitated, listening to the sound of her mother removing her jacket and hanging it up on one of the hooks beside the door. "Would you do that for me?"
"If I call again, I'll ask for you," she agreed without really knowing what she was saying. The shock lay cold and untouchable in her stomach. "Bye for now."
"Bye, Taeyeon."
A/N: Dum dum duuum~
I take it you all know who Stephanie is, huh? ^-^
I really want to say thank you for commenting, the ones of you that do, because it really encourages me a lot. I'm trying to write as much as I can so that when I've posted all I've written so far, around chapter 25 or so, it won't be so long between each chapter. ^^ And I'm going to answer comments; I've just had my first week of a new schedule at school so everything is like MLEERGH in my head... Thank you guys so much. *heart* And here's my twitter & tumblr as always. See you soon ^^
Chapter 8: "Did somebody hurt you?"
Pairing: Yulsic, Taeny, Hyoyoung, Yoonhyun, one more to be revealed
Rating: G - NC-17
Genre: Drama, romance, angst, high school AU
Summary: The struggle is different for everyone; we all take different measures to deal with our problems. Friendships are created and tossed upside down, love is found, love is lost, and trust is formed and betrayed as these nine girls find their places in each other's lives.
Chapter wordcount: 8,334
Prologue
Chapter 1: "Would you have said paranoid or socially retarded, I would have done a dance of joy."
Chapter 2: "Line 49 for homo- and bisexual youngsters."
Chapter 3: "Do you know what kind of relationship Jessica and Yuri share?"
Chapter 4: "A real fight? With like claws and stuff?"
Chapter 5: "You were acting like a crazy person today."
Chapter 6: "Do you even know my name?"
- 7 -
Tiffany was the first to wake up the next morning, when she sun was beaming in through the window in an offensive manner. She groaned at its bad manners, pulled up her duvet over her messy hair and dragged herself off the couch. She walked over to the window, pulled the blinds down, and watched in half-hearted amusement as the rest of the girls woke up from the sound it made.
"No," Sooyoung mumbled, "no", rolling over on her stomach and pushing her face down into the couch. Hyoyeon raised her head and looked around the room with squinted eyes, before she too leaned her face against the couch. Jessica and Sunny stirred without opening their eyes, while Seohyun and Yoona, who got hours less sleep than anyone else, didn't move a muscle.
Tiffany sunk back down on the couch between Yoona and Sunny. "Morning, girls," she said hoarsely, pulling her fingers through her hair.
"No," Sunny and Jessica said in unison. They sat up and stared at each other.
"Morning," Taeyeon then chimed in, before Hyoyeon did the same. She had stopped clinging on to Sooyoung, and moved as far as she could out to the edge without falling down. Sooyoung herself laid deadly still, taking up a lot more space than she needed to. "Did anyone else have any zombie dreams?" Tiffany asked.
"No, but I'm living mine right now," Sunny said, heavily sitting up and letting her short bangs cover her face. Taeyeon scoffed, shoving her cold feet in under Sunny's butt, trying to warm them up. Sunny looked like she barely noticed.
Yoona, who was lying right in the spot where the sun shone in beside the blinds, suddenly opened her eyes, blinked a few times in confusion before starting to roll back and forward on the couch. "What is this hideous light?" she groaned, hiding under the pillow.
"That's the sun," Jessica dead-panned.
"Well, it needs to stop."
Tiffany shook her head fondly behind Yoona's back, and turned to Sunny and Taeyeon. "Would anyone like some breakfast?"
Indistinct mumbles greeted her from all around the room. She licked her lips once; her own mouth was still numb from yesterday's ungodly amount of popcorn. Breakfast seemed like the least thing she'd want. "How about some ice cream?" she added.
Sooyoung sat up instantly. "Tiffany, you look stunning this morning," she said, hopping closer to Taeyeon and looking at Tiffany over Taeyeon's shoulder. Hyoyeon directed a slap at her back.
Tiffany laughed, rubbed her eyes, pulled her hair back into a pony tail and slowly got up off the couch. The rest of the room, barred the two youngest, eyed her steps with interest. "Ice cream it is, then," Tiffany said, and Sooyoung raised her hands in joy. They walked out of the room, limbs cracking and necks aching.
"When the eight of us and Yuri rule the world, the first thing I will do is ban mornings," Seohyun mumbled into her pillow.
Sooyoung emptied her bowl of ice cream in a hurry. The ice cream was fantastic, as ice cream usually is, but for the moment, that wasn't the only reason. She was trying to still the worry that burned and ached at the pit of her stomach; it felt like she had been punched. Hyoyeon was eating her ice cream silently while alternating between staring down into her bowl, looking carefully at Tiffany or out the window. Not a glance towards Sooyoung.
The night they had spent just holding each other was the happiest and most alive Sooyoung had felt in a long time, and she thought Hyoyeon was there with her. Now, in the light of day, from the way the other girl was acting, it seemed like nothing but a big misunderstanding. Like Sooyoung was the one doing the holding, and Hyoyeon was only there because she couldn't say no.
Was that really it? Had Sooyoung misunderstood everything? She felt almost perverted; like some sort of hugging rapist. The ache in her stomach grew heavier.
She excused herself to the bathroom when she felt tears prickling in her eyes. Walking out into the hallway, she hid her face from Seohyun and Yoona, who were dragging themselves out of the living room to get a taste of the ice cream before it all went away. The bottom floor bathroom was occupied, so she hastily skipped up the stairs to look herself into the upper floor one.
She barely made it two steps outside the bathroom before two pairs of hands grabbed her violently and dragged her into Tiffany's room, slamming the door shut. Her tired mind thought for a second it's Hyo, she's going to tell me what's going on, oh god something is going to happen now, but when she stumbled into Tiffany's bedroom and turned around to see her kidnappers, they turned out to be none other than Taeyeon and Sunny. She sighed and stared at them in the bright morning light.
"What are you two even doing?" she asked.
"We wanted to talk to you," Sunny replied from the edge of Tiffany's bed.
Sooyoung frowned. "Are you going to torture me? Whatever it is, I swear, I don't know," she said sarcastically, wondering what exactly her friends were up to.
"No torture," Taeyeon said with a grimace. "We just wanted to ask you about..."
Sooyoung's brain clicked, and she looked down with a knowing smile. "This is about Hyoyeon, isn't it?"
"Right," Sunny nodded honestly. "You like her, don't you?"
Sinking down on the wooden chair by Tiffany's desk, Sooyoung sighed heavily. She knew her friends had probably known about her feelings from the very first day. She was truly terrible at hiding her crushes, so denying it seemed like a waste of energy. "I do. What about it?"
Sunny exchanged a look with Taeyeon. The latter leaned against the door frame. "You two seem to have gotten a lot closer, and quickly," Sunny stated. Sooyoung shrugged.
"Yeah. So what?" She felt strangely defensive, and not at all liking where the conversation was going.
"You know we don't have a problem with you liking a girl," Sunny continued. Taeyeon squirmed a little by the door. "But it's just... We're a little worried."
"About what?" Sooyoung sighed.
Sunny hesitated for a moment. "Please don't take this in the wrong way," she then said, "but have you thought this through?"
Laughing unhappily, Sooyoung frowned. "Thought this through? It's a crush, that's not really a thinking deal."
Sunny reluctantly nodded. "I don't mean anything bad against Hyoyeon," she said, looking over at Taeyeon who hurried to shake her head in agreement. "But you know... how things usually end when you get feelings for someone."
Sooyoung looked away with a bitter expression, hurt that two of her best friends would remind her of what she considered to be her greatest weakness. At least right then. "What's your point?" she asked unhappily.
"We just want you to be sure of what you're doing, so that the whole Donghae story doesn't repeat itself," Taeyeon chimed in. Sooyoung rolled her eyes. "It'd be a shame if you guys fell out like you and Donghae did, and Hyoyeon couldn't hang out with us anymore..."
"I know the story," Sooyoung interrupted, remembering all too well how her short-lived relationship with Donghae had ended. She had almost forced herself to forget it. “Do you think I found it any more fun than he did? Don’t you think I hurt just as much over the loss of everything I had with him?”
Taeyeon and Sunny kept silent for a while, exchanging nervous glances. Sooyoung pretended not to notice.
"If Hyoyeon would turn out to like you back," Sunny said hesitantly, "have you thought of the consequences of getting into a relationship with her?" Sooyoung stared at her in confusion. "I mean, she's a girl..."
"She's human," Sooyoung shrugged. "She's gorgeous. She's funny, she's smart, she's totally wonderful. Why would I care about what anyone else says?"
Again, Sunny fell silent. Taeyeon looked like she wasn't really sure what was happening. "I just want you to be absolutely sure," Sunny said slowly, "if Hyoyeon decides she wants to be with you... that you're sure what you're getting yourself into."
"And that she doesn't come to you only to become rejected," Taeyeon added. "We're worried about the hurt it could cause both of you."
Sooyoung's defensiveness melted away a little at Taeyeon's words. She had lost sight of it for a moment, but she knew they were always on her side, looking out for her. She sighed. "Well, I can't exactly tell the future," she said sadly, not wanting to deny her own worries that were still burning inside her, but not really wanting to confirm them either. "All I know is that I really like her, and... I want to be with her." A blush threatened to creep up on her cheeks, but she felt strong. Determined. And very much in love.
Sunny looked touched at her words for a moment. "Tiffany says Hyoyeon definitely doesn't need any more pain in her life."
Sooyoung scratched the back of her head carefully. The memory of the conversation she had had with Hyoyeon in that very same room flashed by in her mind, and her anxiety doubled in size. "What does she mean by that?"
Sunny shook her head. "I don't know. I was thinking you might."
Shifting her gaze between her two friends, Sooyoung shook her head. "I don't. But I hope I will, soon."
The three sat (or in Taeyeon's case, stood) in silence for a few seconds, all with different theories on Hyoyeon's life in their heads.
"She doesn't really say much, so it's hard to know," Sooyoung said mindlessly.
"That's another thing that worried us," Taeyeon said. "Because she's kind of silent, and mysterious, it might be the mystery that attracts you. When the mystery is gone, maybe the interest is, too."
Sooyoung smiled joylessly. She knew her best friend meant no harm with her words, but they still stung a little. She supposed it was because they had truth in them. "Well, if you never try, you'll never know," she said with a shrug.
"You're right about that," Sunny said. "Well, that was all we had. We should probably head back down."
Sooyoung got up from her chair and watched Sunny do the same. "You know, for someone who's never had a crush on anybody, you seem to have a lot of opinions on how they work," she said as they made their way to the door.
Sunny half shrugged, half nodded. "I probably think about it more than anyone who's been in love a hundred times."
"That's only because people who are in love don't think," Sooyoung replied. Taeyeon nodded slowly.
The three of them skipped down the stairs to the lower floor and found Tiffany, Jessica, Seohyun and Yoona in the kitchen, the four of them bended over the now almost empty package of ice cream, taking turns in taking microscopically tiny spoonfuls to share every last piece together. The two youngest looked like they were still asleep, and Sooyoung gave them a sympathetic look.
It took her no more than one second to notice that a certain girl wasn't there. She backed out into the hallway and looked into the living room, but she wasn't in there either. The anxiety burned in her stomach like a ball of fire.
She walked back into the kitchen. "Where's Hyoyeon?" she asked no one in particular, and Tiffany pulled out her spoon from her mouth.
"Her father came by to pick her up a moment ago," she explained, watching worriedly as Seohyun was about to flip the ice cream off the table. "Apparently they were going shopping." Sooyoung's heart sank.
"She went home?" she repeated. Tiffany nodded at her and pushed the pack back towards the middle of the table. Sooyoung turned and stared at Taeyeon and Sunny. She knew she shouldn't blame them, but she couldn't help it. Now she had to wait all the way until Monday to see Hyoyeon again, and she was afraid the nervousness would physically kill her. Sunny and Taeyeon both shrugged apologetically.
"I should get going soon too," Jessica said, finally giving up on the miniature piece of ice cream in the box. "I'm seeing Yuri later, and I really need to shower and... brush my teeth." She clicked her tongue with a sour expression. Yoona let out a suggestive "oooh" from her spot on the kitchen counter beside Seohyun, and Jessica threw her a glare. "Shut up."
"Where do you live?" Sooyoung asked, feeling the need to go home as well, if only sulk in loneliness. For a moment she imagined herself being the one going home to make time for her girlfriend, but she pushed the thought out of her head as quick as she could. It left a bittersweet sense of regret and excitement in the back of her throat.
Jessica gave her only a brief description of her neighborhood, but it was enough for Sooyoung to know they weren't going the same direction. Jessica lived by a few blocks of cheap apartments, majority of which were used by students with low to little income.
"We're almost neighbors then!" Sunny exclaimed. Jessica looked at her in surprise. "I live there too, only a little further east, closer to the public baths. Maybe we can walk together?"
Sooyoung walked over to the kitchen counter where Seohyun and Yoona were sitting, and leaned silently against the cupboards with her arm on the youngest's lap. Seohyun gave her a questioning glance, but Sooyoung ignored it.
Jessica looked hesitant for a moment, but eventually nodded. "I guess, sure," she said.
Seohyun hooked her arm with Yoona's. The two were laughing about something unspeakable, something only they knew, completely ignoring the other five girls' existence in the room.
Sooyoung couldn't help but wonder what the hell was going on with her life.
"So, you live alone, too?" Jessica asked as she walked with Sunny in the half-hearted sunshine. There was something a bit off with sunny Sundays, Sunny thought, like the day hadn't quite understood the rule for Sundays. Sundays were supposed to be depressing, where you just wanted to hide under your bed sheets, and the weather should comply.
"I do," she agreed, pushing the Sunday thoughts out of her head. They were never very pleasant anyway.
"How come?" Jessica questioned, and Sunny thought she for some reason sounded like she was trying very hard to sound casual. She assumed it was just awkwardness (and boy was she used to dealing with that), especially since their fight in school. Hoping it would go away if she just kept talking, she tried to think of an answer.
She shrugged a bit. "Nothing much really happened in the town where I used to live," she stated. "My parents still live there, though, and it's not very far from here."
"So you're easily bored?" Jessica asked, and Sunny wondered for a moment if she was truly interested.
"I guess," she said, never really having paid much attention to that quality of hers.
"Me too," Jessica agreed with an excited smile. Sunny returned it, but she thought to herself how wrong the other girl was about that.
"So how about you? Why do you live on your own?" she hurried on before silence had a chance to fall.
"Parents," Jessica mumbled after a beat. She half shuddered and half shook her head, and her blond hair shone as it swung rapidly from side to side over the back of her bright jeans jacket. "I couldn't live with them. Actually, it's a little funny. They used to live here, and I wanted to move away. But when I told them that, they wanted to move too, and I immediately changed my mind to stay," she continued. Sunny swelled a little with joy that the other girl would open up even that much to her. "They moved pretty far though. I don't speak to them often, unless I need money."
Sunny couldn't help but feel it sounded a little sad, but Jessica showed no signs of regrets about it. "Why not?" she asked carefully, feeling more and more at ease around the other girl, but not enough.
Jessica shrugged again. "I don't know," she replied simply. "They don't even know that I'm in a relationship with..." she paused, glancing very indiscreetly sideways towards Sunny, before continuing, "someone."
Frowning, Sunny gave her a questioning look. "You're talking about Yuri, right?"
Jessica looked at her in surprise for a moment before bursting into laughter. "Right," she admitted.
"Everyone already knows," Sunny laughed along with her.
"Ah," Jessica said, holding her hand over her heart and looking very relieved. "It's still kind of nerve-wracking... making new friends and having to tell them about me and Yuri." She gave Sunny a dark look that still held some traces of nervousness. "I mean, it's not like we hold back when we're in public," she continued and Sunny nodded; she had seen more kisses between the two than she had ever bargained for, "but you never know how dense people can be about this stuff. To some people it's so common for girls to hold hands and kiss that they could never imagine us being in a relationship." She sounded bitter, and Sunny scoffed a little.
"So you think I'm daft?" she said, half amused.
"No, no," Jessica hurried, turning towards Sunny and walking sideways along the road.
"I sure hope not," Sunny laughed to show she wasn't all that serious. "I have on occasion been told I'm very emotionally intelligent," she mumbled, thinking back of her most recent conversation with Jinjeong at Line 49. Jessica gave her an odd look. Sunny felt herself sinking into a puddle of too deep thoughts for the Sunday morning's sunshine, and she clawed her way back to reality, uncomfortably aware that Jessica was observing her carefully. "H-how long have you guys been together?" she stuttered out.
"About four years," Jessica replied, holding her suspicious look for a few more moments and answering the question as if on reflex. "We got together even before my parents moved away."
Sunny widened her eyes. "Four years, and they still don't have any idea?"
Shaking her head, Jessica gave a smile that spoke of both victory and shame. "We never even needed to sneak around a lot. It's weird, you know, but I don't think my parents ever suspected anything."
Sunny nodded, not even really sure if she understood. "Don't you ever get thoughts of telling them?" she then asked. It sounded so off to her that Jessica could be in a loving relationship for years and years and her parents would have no idea - even though Sunny wasn't that close with hers, they would be the first to know if she found someone, no doubt about it.
Jessica looked at her as if she was insane. "No, no," she said, shaking her head and looking scared of the thought. "I mean, what would be the point? They're not really in my life anyway. Seems unnecessary to destroy something that isn't really that stable to begin with." For a moment, Jessica's defenses fell, and Sunny swore she could see a sadness glimmer around her dark eyes.
"But they're your parents," Sunny stated, immediately feeling ridiculous when Jessica gave her a confused look. "You don't think they'd take it well?"
Jessica shrugged. "I don't know, I haven't thought about it much." The sadness was gone, replaced by something that was meant to be - but only resembled - arrogance. Sunny knew at once that the other girl's careless attitude was nothing but a show. At least she hoped it was.
Something told her Jessica definitely thought more about her parents than she let on.
"What about if you and Yuri get married someday?" Sunny asked, smiling when Jessica immediately turned a bright pink at the thought. She gave Sunny a smile which she fought to keep from reaching her eyes and shrugged again.
"Yuri isn't very fond of the thought of marriage," she explained.
"She's not?" Jessica shook her head.
"Hm," Sunny said, a little surprised, but not knowing why. "Well, a lot can still happen, right? You guys are only 18..."
Jessica nodded, again without saying a word.
They walked for a while in silence, both in deep thought. The warmth and careful wind that caressed the grounds of their small town soothed Sunny's mind. She was happy that her fight with Jessica didn't turn out to be bigger than it was, and she genuinely liked the other girl. But there was so much about her that Sunny couldn't figure out; small things and actions that kept Sunny on her toes whenever she was around. She didn't like when she couldn't read other people's intentions. She definitely hated it when she didn't understand why people did or said things, and with Jessica, it was like she was never sure. It seemed to her that Jessica was like a wounded animal, like someone who had been shot but was too proud to say anything, and just went about hiding her injuries.
After their fight, it seemed like she knew her inside out. Like all the cards were on the table, though they barely knew anything about each other. She knew almost nothing about Jessica's past, her interests, likes or dislikes, but she felt almost sure that if someone asked her how Jessica would react to something, she would know it instantly. Almost like Jessica had told her some big secret about herself through getting angry with her over nothing - and maybe, Sunny thought, you could tell a lot about a person from what they get angry about.
But there was something else as well. Something that weighed down heavier and heavier on Sunny's mind, consuming her day's happiness little by little. She wasn't sure what it was or where it came from, but it was unmistakably, undeniably there.
Something was eating away at her heart.
Jessica didn't know how it happened. She really had no idea. One moment she'd been walking home with Sunny, feeling strange and ridiculous and defensive, thinking about Yuri and longing to be in her arms, and the next she was in Sunny's apartment, sitting on a chair by her dinner table while the other girl removed her dirty clothes from their home on the floor. When they had reached Jessica's apartment, Sunny had begged with her, pleaded with her to walk her all the way home and keep her company for a little while. Thoughts of Yuri, who was probably at home waiting for her call, kept swirling around in her head and she felt guilty. Guilty for not wanting to go home with Sunny, guilty for being there with her in the first place - and before she had known it, she had given in to the shorter girl's wishes and walked her home.
Sunny's place was nice. Small, but nicely decorated for someone with no money. She imagined Sunny felt well at home there; truth to be told, even Jessica herself did, about 10 seconds after she stepped in the front door.
"Do you want something to drink?" Sunny asked her when the floor was finally naked. "I pretty much only have water," she added in response to Jessica's confused look, and walked over to the very small kitchen area.
Jessica cringed a little. She wasn't sure why, but she felt very reluctant to accept anything from the other girl. The long walk home in the sun left her very thirsty, though, so she let her body win over her own weird, mental desires and nodded shortly. Sunny filled two glasses of water, handed one to Jessica, and sat down opposite her by the table. Jessica fiddled with the cold glass for a moment, an unknown sense of anxiety lowering on her.
"Your place is nice," she said. Later she would realize the only reason she said it was to keep the conversation from going in other directions, but in the moment, she really meant it.
"Thanks," Sunny said, staring harshly at her unmade bed on the opposite end of the room. "Sorry about the mess though."
Jessica shrugged, reluctantly taking a sip of her water. "It's okay."
"What's your place like?" Sunny asked then, with genuine curiosity in her eyes.
Jessica looked around. "It's a little bigger," she stated without trying to sound too smug, "but not as nice as yours. It feels a bit more like a hospital room than a home."
"This place did too, before I moved in," the shorter of the two replied with a proud smile.
"I should make you do something about my place too then." They smiled at each other over the table, before lifting their glasses to their lips at the same time, drinking for a moment that lasted a little too long to be natural.
Jessica tried desperately to think of a subject to talk about, feeling her insides straining themselves in the process. She never had this problem. She may have seemed like an ice princess on the outside, but once she was in company of friends, she could usually never shut up.
Why couldn't she think of anything?
"So," Sunny said nervously, startling Jessica. "How come Yuri wasn't there last night?"
For a short moment, Jessica had been relieved that Sunny had said something, but the feeling quickly burned away and was replaced by... what? An irrational kind of fear? What exactly was she afraid of, if so? She hated how Sunny kept talking about Yuri, and she didn't know why. Yuri was a big part of her life, so it was only natural... but why did it annoy her so much?
"Oh, she has this job," she replied, trying to seem unaffected, but feeling anything but. "She doesn't like it much, she only does it to get out of her parent's house more." Sunny blinked, Jessica hesitated, wanted to stop herself from speaking. "Her relationship with her parents isn't that good either." She widened her eyes at herself. Was she suddenly spilling Yuri's secrets now too?! Wasn't it enough that she couldn't keep her mouth shut about her own troubles?
Sunny nodded, her mouth forming 'oh' but with no sound coming out. She clicked her nail against her class a couple of times, staring down into the water. The look on her face scared Jessica even further, so she fished up her cellphone from her pocket to check the time. 10 minutes since she arrived, and Sunny had only grown quieter and quieter. Why had she even wanted Jessica to come with her home in the first place?
"I want to ask you..." Sunny said, and Jessica's anxious heart started beating faster.
"What?"
Looking up, she gave Jessica smile that obviously had no heart in it what so ever. She titled her head a little, her face showing great discomfort. "I don't really know how to ask, so I'll just..."
"Tell me," Jessica said. She didn't want to know, not really, she convinced herself, but she was too curious not to. She wanted to throw up. Horrified, she saw tears start to form in the other girl's eyes.
"What's it like..." Sunny mumbled, her gaze fixed on the table, "to be in a relationship with a girl?" Her voice quivered a little, and Jessica was stunned by the question. Whatever she had been expecting, it certainly wasn't that. For some reason it didn't calm her down.
"What exactly do you want to know?" was all she managed to say. The look in Sunny's eyes told her that she didn't know either.
"I've never met anyone I've liked before," she said, and Jessica put down her glass. What did that mean? "How does it feel when Yuri holds you? When she kisses you? What's it like?" Sunny rambled on, suddenly bordering on hysterics. Unshed tears rested in her eyes, ready to fall. "I need to know." Her hand gipped at the flat surface on the table, closer to Jessica's side.
"Why are you so interested?" Jessica questioned, feeling scared and unreasonably offended that Sunny would ask those questions. She wanted to laugh the whole situation away, it made her so uncomfortable, but the desperate tears in Sunny's eyes left her unable to do so.
"I'm gay." It was almost a whisper, and it almost sent Jessica flying back out of her chair. She felt the urge to get up and run out of there, and she pictured it in her mind, but she remained seated for reasons she wasn't even sure about. And why did it bother her so much? It would seem a bit odd to her if she was to suddenly become some kind of homophobe... But Sunny's presence more than bothered her in that moment.
"Who else have you told about this?" she asked, her tone scolding and harsh. Sunny's tears fell.
"My parents. Seohyun." She dried her eyes and immediately looked back into Jessica's.
"No one else?"
Sunny shook her head. "No."
Jessica leaned back in the chair. Not knowing what she was doing, she stood up and grabbed her almost untouched glass of water. "I really have to get going, I promised I'd meet up with Yuri..." she said distantly. Sunny looked desperately up at her.
"But..." she mumbled. "Can't you stay for a while? Just for a little while? Please?" Seemingly shocked, her tears had stopped falling in an instant.
"I really..." Jessica began, not knowing anything else than her desire to leave Sunny's apartment immediately. "She's waiting for me. I have to go." She took her glass and walked over to the kitchen counter, emptied it of water in the sink and put it down on the counter. "I'm sorry. I'll see you tomorrow in school."
Sunny didn't reply, but sat with her back turned towards her, and Jessica assumed she had started crying again. If she ever really stopped. She knew she was being a coward, an idiot, and a horribly bad friend if nothing else, but were the two of them really friends? Wasn't it just a week ago they were throwing verbal knives at each other in the school corridor? What responsibility did she really have towards Sunny, to help her with her problems?
She tried to justify her own actions, but one thought kept breaking through all her other ones.
Why, why, why did Sunny have to be gay too?
Yuri came over to her apartment about 40 minutes later, when she had calmed down enough to be outside the risk zone of having a violent crying attack. She kissed Jessica forcefully as soon as she stepped in the door, as always showing her how much she'd been missed.
"How was the movie night?" she asked, taking Jessica's hand and leading her to the couch.
"It was good," the blond nodded, taking a deep breath and thinking back over the more pleasant parts of the weekend. "I learned that Sooyoung has a really fucked up taste in movies, everyone loves Seohyun and Tiffany, and Sooyoung and Hyoyeon may or may not hook up soon."
Yuri laughed. "Really? Another couple in our group, then?"
Why did Sunny say before? I've never met anyone I've liked before. What did that mean? What was that before? Had she met someone now? Did she like Jessica? What did she mean? I've never met anyone I've liked before. I've never met anyone I've liked before. I've never met anyone I've liked before and now, I like you, Jessica, and that thought only scares you because you know it's possible for you to like me back, isn't that right?
"Yeah," Jessica said, closing her eyes as Yuri treaded her fingers through her hair.
About 500 meters away, Sunny was still sitting at her dinner table wondering the same thing. Where had the before come from? She didn't even have feelings for Jessica, did she? If she was to have feelings for anyone at all, shouldn't it be Tiffany? she tried to reason with her own mind. Jessica was beautiful, that was plain for anyone to see, but so was Tiffany. Absolutely gorgeous. And Tiffany had a generosity and warmth to her that Jessica lacked, all traits that attracted Sunny, and yet...
She walked over to her bed and sunk down under the sheets. She had prayed so hard to fall in love with somebody, but now that she was in the presence, looking into the eyes of feelings she didn't even know were real, she wanted it all to go away, and fast. It just couldn't happen. Of all the girls she knew, was she really going to fall for the one she didn't fit together with? The one that was already taken?
"Are you okay?" Yuri asked, pulling Jessica closer to her.
"Yeah."
That night, after a long day that disappeared quicker than she would have thought possible - and maybe quicker than she would have liked, too, but she wouldn't admit to that - Taeyeon found herself once again in front of the mirror with the number to Line 49 in her hands. She didn't look at herself. It might have been because she didn't want to see herself for what she truly was; then she'd rediscover the need to change everything that was her, but it might also have been because she didn't want anything connecting her to reality at that moment. Her mind was tired after two days of wonderful company, laughter, too little sleep and too much candy, and she wanted it to stay that way.
She was about to call 49 again, and if it ended up like last time, she could just pretend she imagined the conversation. If she called in the state she was in right then, maybe it wouldn't hurt her as much as last time.
And well, honestly speaking, she was already pretty hurt. The way that The Junsu Person had handled her call last time wasn't the problem; it was the way Taeyeon herself did. She prayed to the high heavens that he wouldn't be the one to pick up this time. Would she ever forget his name and voice?
Walking over to her bed, she could feel her hands shaking. Her mother was out seeing a friend, so she had the apartment to herself. The fear of being caught wasn't the problem. On the contrary it was being alone with herself that scared her.
She held the note tightly in one hand while dialing the number on her cell phone. Beautiful thing, cell phones; no risk of the number showing up on the phone bill her mother paid every month. Very good. Without giving herself time to change her mind - she had thought this through enough - she pressed Call and shakily held up the phone to her ear.
Two signals sounded, and then somebody picked up. "Line 49, this is Stephanie."
Ah, so a girl's voice this time, Taeyeon thought. She didn't know if it was a relief or not. Weren't guys usually more accepting of... girls who like girls? she wondered. Either way, she supposed it didn't matter. Someone who worked at a helpline for gay people probably wouldn't be very homophobic either way, but maybe that was just what she needed to change herself.
"H-hi," she choked out when she realized that was her cue to answer. She shivered.
"Hello," Stephanie replied warmly, and Taeyeon already liked her voice. Rich, yet bright. "What's on your mind?"
For some reason, Taeyeon preferred that question a thousand times over Junsu's "how can I help you". She didn't know at all what kind of help she wanted. Did she want to be cured? Did she want to accept herself and get over it? Either option seemed as impossible. On the other hand, she definitely knew what was on her mind, no matter how hard it was to put into words. "I..." she tried, feeling her throat closing up with tears in a matter of seconds, thoughts swirling and tangling up in each other in her head. "I think I need some help." Her eyes blurred instantly, and she bit her lip, not prepared for her emotions to overwhelm her so quickly.
"Then you've come to the right place," Stephanie replied with the exact right amount of sympathy. "I will try my best to help you, okay?"
Taeyeon nodded, feverishly trying not to blink so the tears wouldn't fall. "Thank you," she mumbled.
"What's the problem?" Stephanie then asked, and Taeyeon's heart sank. She wished the question would be more exact, since she didn't know if she could make herself admit to anything out loud.
She took a deep breath. "I've been... I've been trying to ignore... who I am... for a long time now." Surprised at hearing the words come out of her own mouth, she drew another deep breath, shakier this time. "But I can't anymore. I just can't."
"And you shouldn't," Stephanie agreed. Taeyeon didn't know if she even agreed with herself. "When you say ignoring who you are... What exactly do you mean?"
Taeyeon tried to form the words in her mind, and they appeared as easily as anything. I'm gay. I like girls. I'm a lesbian. And as always the thoughts were coupled with feelings of total and absolute despair, enough to clog up her throat and for her mind to race. How could she ever say those things out loud? Her vision blurred further as she began to tremble, the tears shaking in her eyes. "I can't say it," she whispered. "I can't. Please, don't make me."
"It's okay. You don't have to." Stephanie spoke the words hurriedly, probably to make Taeyeon see that she didn't have to, and stop her from hanging up. Taeyeon sighed in relief. "Does anyone know... you know... about you?" Stephanie continued.
"I live with my mom, I only have her," Taeyeon replied, and the thought of telling her sped her breathing up. "She can't know, ever, I can't tell her, she would disown me, do you get that? She'd... I can't tell her, I just can't," she rambled before being able to stop herself. If Stephanie was about to suggest that she told her mother, then she was crazy, and she needed to know it. The tears that had been waiting to fall poured over her cheeks at her outburst. She did nothing to dry them away.
"Shh, sweetie, calm down," Stephanie cooed, and Taeyeon did, however unwillingly. "I won't ask you to tell your mother until you're ready. Okay?"
Taeyeon looked down to her lap dejectedly. "I won't ever be ready. There's no such thing. How can I be ready for my own mom to throw me out?"
Stephanie hesitated for a moment. "What makes you think she would throw you out?" she asked, curious. Taeyeon rearranged her position to try and become more comfortable, unsuccessfully.
"I just know," Taeyeon said shortly. "No one wants their child to be... like that."
"That's not true."
"Why?" Taeyeon asked. "Would you want your child to... be like that?"
"Maybe not at first," Stephanie replied. "Maybe it'd take some time to get used to the thought that there probably won't be any biological grandchildren... and maybe not even a real wedding." Her voice was strong, Taeyeon thought. "But if I got adopted grandchildren, there's nothing that says I can't love them as much as my biological ones. Either way, that's not all there is to my child's life, now is it?"
"That's not exactly what I meant either," Taeyeon said sourly, tears still pouring down her face.
"Then what? The only thing that would matter to me is whether he or she would be happy, and if that's with a male or a female, what is the difference?" Stephanie sounded very sure and very strong, but not scolding in the slightest. Taeyeon did feel a little embarrassed, but not enough for her to hang up just yet. She sighed, letting the tears fall.
"I guess so," she said, "but it doesn't matter. Everyone isn't as accepting as you. I don't want to be..." Taeyeon caught herself in the last moment before the word passed her lips. She cringed. "I want to be normal."
Stephanie didn't say anything for a while. Not until then did Taeyeon realize that there was a possibility that Stephanie herself was gay, and that that was the reason she was working at Line 49. She immediately felt guilty, but tried to not back down. It was how she felt.
"Look... What's your name? You don't have to tell me your real one, just something to call you by," Stephanie said.
"Tae..." slipped past Taeyeon's lips unconsciously. She frowned. "I'm Taeyeon," she then repeated in defeat. What did it matter, anyway - Stephanie could be on the other side of the country for all she knew. She didn't know anyone with the name.
"Taeyeon," Stephanie repeated after a beat. "You are normal. There's nothing wrong or abnormal about being gay just because the percentage of gay people is smaller than the percentage of straight people."
Taeyeon cringed a little. She couldn't remember ever having been in a conversation where the word 'gay' had come up so many times. But even if she wouldn't admit to it, for every time Stephanie said it, she felt more and more at ease.
"Do you think people deserve to be treated differently just because they're gay?" Stephanie asked when Taeyeon didn't reply.
Taeyeon looked around her room as if searching for a reply hidden somewhere. "I - yes, I mean... no?"
"Do you think being gay is something you should get beaten up for? Killed for? Bullied for? Do you think it's okay when that happens to other people?" Stephanie continued. Her tone was so intense that it made Taeyeon want to hide. She felt that she had spent half of her life thinking about this, but now it seemed more like she really didn't know what to say at all.
"No, of course not," she said quietly. "Why are you asking me this? It's not like I'm out there bullying those people," she questioned, feeling a little blamed and strangely guilty at the same time.
"I'm glad you aren't," Stephanie said. "But you sound like you really think being gay is wrong."
Taeyeon let herself fall backwards on the bed, and pulled her knees up to her chest, rolling over. "That's just because I am," she replied. It was the closest thing she'd ever come to admitting to her sexual orientation out loud. She was filled with something resembling horrified adrenaline at the thought, and she hurried on, "but just the fact that there are people out there who kill and bully people for it..." She sighed, not knowing how to continue.
"Taeyeon, what you need to do is surround yourself with the right people," Stephanie said firmly. "Good people who won't judge you. Then this won't be a problem for you."
"How can I do that?" Taeyeon asked, closing her eyes, feeling drowsy as more tears seeped through her closed eyelids. "How can you say that? I will have to get a job eventually, and it's not like I can choose the people I work with. It's not like I can choose the people I pass on the street."
"The people you work with and the people around you only need to know however much you choose to tell them," Stephanie reasoned calmly.
"So I just live a lie for the rest of my life? Is that it?" Taeyeon said, suddenly unreasonably angry at Stephanie for making everything sound so easy. For making it sound like there was some kind of hope, when Taeyeon knew that it was nothing but a lie.
"No, Taeyeon, that's not what I mean. What I'm saying is that if there is someone in your surroundings, at work for example, that seems like he or she shouldn't know about your orientation... then maybe they don't need to know about it either." Stephanie still sounded calm, even after Taeyeon's sudden outburst of anger, and somehow it angered Taeyeon even further. It hit her how brave she felt speaking over the phone with someone, especially when the person in question knew nothing about her.
"You don't need to tell anyone about you to hear those kinds of insults, though," Taeyeon muttered. "You hear them all the time. In the corridors at school, on TV, everywhere you go there's someone using that word as an insult."
Stephanie hesitated for a moment. "How old are you?"
"I'm eighteen," Taeyeon sighed, wondering why it was relevant at all. She wanted Stephanie to tell her she was right, that she should hide all her gay tendencies inside her, get a respectable boyfriend and live calmly for the rest of her life. She didn't want to challenge anyone's prejudices; she just wanted to live silently. Happily.
"Eighteen," Stephanie repeated absent-mindedly. "Kids in this age throw things like that around all the time without thinking about it. I'm sure that if there was an actual gay person in their company, they would think twice before saying it."
Taeyeon doubted it strongly, but she decided to give in. "Maybe. But they would still think it," she mumbled.
"Perhaps," Stephanie agreed. "But does it really matter so much what other people think, Taeyeon?"
She tried to open her mouth to say something, but she didn't know what, so she closed it again. Opened it, closed it. Not a sound came out. A part of her felt that yes, what other people thought mattered a lot, but she couldn't explain it. She didn't know why it mattered so much.
"Yes." She said simply.
"Why?"
Taeyeon sighed. "It just does, okay, I can't explain it." She tried to sound as hostile and unpleasant as possible so that Stephanie wouldn't want to approach the subject further.
A few silent moments passed. Taeyeon assumed the other girl was displeased with her answer, and the thought both saddened and encouraged her. "Do you really want to let them live your life for you?" Stephanie then asked. Taeyeon felt empty. The tears had stopped falling, but she remained on her side on the bed with her eyes closed.
"They would probably do it better than I am right now, so why not," she dead-panned, with no energy to think about what she really meant.
Stephanie paused again. Taeyeon didn't say anything, letting Stephanie gather her thoughts and trying not to think too much. She was starting to feel really tired.
"How long have you known that you are... you know?" Stephanie asked then. Taeyeon laughed a little at her poor attempt at censoring the bad G-word.
"I guess two or three years."
"Aha," Stephanie said, and Taeyeon imagined her faceless head bobbing up and down in a knowing nod. "And what made you call here now?"
"What do you mean?" Taeyeon asked.
"Well, you've known for three years but you didn't call here until tonight. Why now?"
Taeyeon opened her eyes, and they immediately ached from the lamp in the ceiling. She knew exactly why she called now, why she could take it tonight and not at her last call three weeks ago. But oh, god, that was the most embarrassing part of all. Tiffany.
Her crush was so pathetic she just wanted to die when she thought about it. They had barely spoken to each other, and yet Taeyeon was swooning like a pre-teen school girl over a handsome boyband member. And add to that the fact that Taeyeon could barely make eye-contact with the other girl, let alone make conversation, and Taeyeon squeezed her eyes shut again.
"I, uhm... I met someone," she admitted reluctantly. "I've managed to keep my heart out of too much trouble before, but not anymore." She was surprised she'd been able to say it, and she was glad. The way Stephanie was so clear, so harsh, so honest calmed her down greatly. It was just what she needed. Someone who wasn't afraid to tell the truth.
"Is she straight?" Stephanie asked. The smile could almost be heard on her voice.
"Probably," Taeyeon replied, almost hoping it was true. "I don't know. But she's way too perfect to be anything else, and either way she's too perfect to be into someone like me."
"You should ask her," Stephanie said. The ridiculousness of the statement made Taeyeon want to jump out the window.
"Ask her if she's straight? Are you kidding me?" she said, not caring about how impolite she may sound. "I'd rather play leapfrog with a unicorn." Stephanie laughed warmly. "Besides, I don't really know her that well. She goes to my school."
"It's hard to know about these things," Stephanie said sympathetically. "Especially with girls. But for what it's worth, I really hope -"
Taeyeon was distracted by the sound of the front door - or, well, terrified is probably a more accurate word. She sat up straight, hearing her mother call "I'm home" and completely missing the rest of Stephanie's sentence.
"Fuckfuckfuck," she hissed out, "I have to go, my mother is home."
"Oh, alright," Stephanie replied. "But Taeyeon, please, call again. You can ask to talk to me, Stephanie, if you want, and if I'm here and not already in a call I'll come talk to you. I promise." Taeyeon hesitated, listening to the sound of her mother removing her jacket and hanging it up on one of the hooks beside the door. "Would you do that for me?"
"If I call again, I'll ask for you," she agreed without really knowing what she was saying. The shock lay cold and untouchable in her stomach. "Bye for now."
"Bye, Taeyeon."
A/N: Dum dum duuum~
I take it you all know who Stephanie is, huh? ^-^
I really want to say thank you for commenting, the ones of you that do, because it really encourages me a lot. I'm trying to write as much as I can so that when I've posted all I've written so far, around chapter 25 or so, it won't be so long between each chapter. ^^ And I'm going to answer comments; I've just had my first week of a new schedule at school so everything is like MLEERGH in my head... Thank you guys so much. *heart* And here's my twitter & tumblr as always. See you soon ^^
Chapter 8: "Did somebody hurt you?"