Eyes Wide Open to Dream: Catch My Breath (1/10)
Title: Eyes Wide Open to Dream
Pairing: Hyoyoung
Rating: G
Summary: Bored, bored, bored. Sooyoung is bored by everything in her life, but it might just change by the meeting with one random stranger.
A/N: Yeah, this is my first Soshi fic, written sometime during May and September 2010 (yeah, it took long...). This first chapter is really short and... well... enjoy, I guess!
Sooyoung took a deep breath as she stepped out of the car and looked at the building in front of her. It was absolutely huge! How in the name of hell was she supposed to find one tiny office? There must be at least 3 million of them in there! For about the 72nd time today, she cursed her boss for choosing her to go negotiate with this company.
She apprehensively walked towards to entrance and sighed to herself. This was gonna be a long day.
When she finally found her destination, she was breathing heavily and tiny drops of sweat was glistening on her forehead. Not only because this office was on the 11th floor, but because she had made the wrong turn more times than she could count. On the 6th floor, she had been more than completely lost, and had somehow ended up in the same office 3 times, resulting in the owner of the room throwing a sandwich at her.
She found herself now in a room, alone apart from two women at a desk, talking with a low voice. Sooyoung tried to repress her insane need to laugh of relief as she noticed a door with the nameplate "Kwon Yuri" on it, and began making her way to the door.
"Uh, excuse me miss?" one of the women at the desk said as Sooyoung reached for the handle. "Are you here for the 2 o'clock with Yuri?" Sooyoung nodded. "Would you mind waiting for a few minutes? Miss Kwon is not entirely ready for your meeting yet."
"Oh, uhm, okay, sure" Sooyoung mumbled and looked around in the room.
"You can sit down on the couch over there" the girl who Sooyoung understood was Kwon Yuri's assistant said, and nodded towards the other end of the small room. Sooyoung stared at the couch for a second. It was a blue leather sofa, and it looked a little misplaced: too luxurious compared to the rest of the room. Hey Sooyoung, stop pondering the luxury of the furniture and go sit on it. She quickly threw her thoughts into her mental rubbish can and hurried over to the couch.
As she sat down, she immediately started chewing on her nails. She had always hated these waits when there were other people in the room, the awkwardness was always so close to driving her completely insane. Besides, she had heard so much about this Kwon Yuri from her colleagues, she wasn't sure what to think. They all came back saying "Yeah, she's very professional" or "The moment you walk in, you know she's the boss." All positive things, that all made Sooyoung feel slightly threatened, as she liked the feeling of control. Not that she was so bad at dealing with people -- actually, she (and her colleagues, apparently) thought she was fairly good at it. So far, everything her company asked for, she got it done. Suddenly she remembered one of her male colleagues coming back from Yuri's office saying "she was real professional and all that, but you know what really got to me? She was sooooo hot!" and her need to laugh came crashing back at full speed. She coughed a few times and pretended to be observing the very few objects in the fairly empty room, before she heard the other two girls had started speaking in the same low voice as before.
"...No, God no, this was supposed to be a temporary thing" the assistant said with a slight shudder. "I can't believe it's already been a year."
"Then why don't you just quit? I mean, this place obviously makes you feel even worse than if..." the other woman tried.
"Jessica, no, we've been over this" the assistant said. "I don't really have a dream or passion in the work area, and at least this pays better than the last job I had. All the interesting jobs out there barely pays at all, so what would be the point?" She looked down and began to irritably poke at a stapler at her desk. The other woman, Jessica, just looked at her for a second.
"Everything doesn't have to have a meaning." The assistant sighed.
"Yes, it does."
"No, it doesn't!"
"Yes, it does."
"No, it doesn't."
"Jess, for God's sake!" the assistant cried out with a pained expression on your face. Sooyoung dared to sneak a look at the pair. She squinted and read the assistant's name tag: Kim Hyoyeon. "What's the point of doing anything if things don't have a meaning?" Hyoyeon asked. Jessica tilted her head slightly and observed the other woman.
"Hyoyeon, what's this really about?" Hyoyeon looked a little offended for a second and then surly looked out the window.
"Nothing" she said without emotion. Jessica continued to watch her a few seconds longer and then sighed.
"Hyo, your brother didn't die for a reason. It was an accident, you know that. There was no meaning to it" she said gently and put her hand on Hyoyeon's.
Her brother died? That's horrible! Sooyoung thought to herself. Oh, hey, wait a minute - Sooyoung, are you eavesdropping? Cut it out! She tried to find something else to think about, but she found the other two's conversation had erased her own feeling of awkwardness, and she felt she wanted to know what was coming next. She quietly pretended to be studying her nails as she kept listening.
Hyoyeon stared at Jessica again - she looked half apathetic, half angry. Jessica calmly looked back at her, apparently unthreatened. Eventually, Hyoyeon looked away with a deep sigh.
"We've been over this too" she said. "We're never going to agree on this." Jessica giggled slightly.
"Well, I don't know about that. Give me another few months and I'm sure we can work something out." She smiled at the other girl, and Hyoyeon answered with the tiniest of smiles Sooyoung had ever seen.
"Anyway" Hyoyeon said, "I think you should probably go. I'm not sure I want Yuri to see me with a psychologist too often. I'll probably be fired."
Sooyoung nodded inwardly. Man, I'm glad I'm not her right now... Losing a family member? She shuddered.
"I thought you said Yuri was nice!" Jessica whispered.
"Unlike some people, she is. I was just joking" Hyoyeon answered lovingly. "Now go."
"Right, right, I'm moving." Jessica got up and reached for her bag. "I'll see you next week." She said before walking towards the door.
"Yeah" Hyoyeon called after her with forced enthusiasm. Jessica opened the door, gave a little nod to Sooyoung and left the room.
The silence that was left behind her made Sooyoung's ears ring, and she prepared herself for the awkwardness to come crashing back... but she realized it never did. She carefully looked up at Hyoyeon at the desk again, and she was looking the window with an absent look on her face, while slowly tapping her fingers on the windowsill. Sooyoung smiled to herself and couldn't help but observe her for a while. Brown reddish hair just below the shoulders. A pretty unusual appearance actually, for the US -- dark, beautiful eyes... H-hang on - when did girls-I-don't-know's eyes become beautiful? I mean, when did girls' eyes become beautiful?
She was stunned with herself for a while before Hyoyeon's telephone rang with a loud, high pitched noise that made Sooyoung jump a half meter in the air. The action was not lost on Hyoyeon, who picked up the phone, but looked at Sooyoung with an amused look and a smile. Sooyoung felt her ears get red and couldn't help but feel a little embarrassed.
"Yeah? ... Okay." She hung up. "You can go in now" she said to Sooyoung, still with that amused look.
"Right" Sooyoung said and got up from the couch. "Thanks."
"No problem" she answered with a slight smirk.
Sooyoung tried to walk as fast as she could without running, but found herself getting very self-conscious when she was about to walk around Hyoyeon's desk. She pulled her jacket tighter around her and avoided looking at the brunette, but when she reached Yuri's door, she put her hand on the handle and looked back over her shoulder. Hyoyeon was sitting with her back towards her, and seemed to be making a puppet theater, only using paper clips. Not wanting to be caught staring, Sooyoung turned around again and saw the "Kwon Yuri" sign on the door. Right, Sooyoung, focus now on the task at hand. ...what is up with this girl? ...Focus! There you go. She shook her head and dismissed her strange wish to look back once more at the girl. Clearing her throat, she slowly entered the office.
Chapter 2: I'll See You Again