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After Suho leaves, Jugyeong keeps the necklace he gave her in a drawer in her room. It feels like something no one else should get to see, even though she would have liked to show it off once— proof that the boy she loves loves her back, that someone could love her at all, even knowing her real face. But Suho's gone and all the necklace does is remind her of that, and to tell anyone the story would mean that she has to say, and then he left, and the only thing worse than the boy you love not loving you back is him doing so and leaving anyway.
Sometimes, in the upcoming weeks, she takes the box out of the drawer and looks at the necklace through the inevitable tears. She tries to remember the sincerity in his voice as he confessed, but the more time goes on without a reply to her texts the more that it all starts feeling like a dream. After a while, she just leaves the box in the drawer.
It doesn't make it hurt any less.
Graduation is a relief, because Jugyeong was starting to worry for real that she wouldn't manage to get to that point at all. She holds onto that for a whole hour before the thought comes, Suho should be graduating with us, and Sua has to drag her to the girls bathroom before her water-proof make-up gives up on her. But of course, there's a line, so Jugyeong has to lean on the arm Sua has wrapped around her and sob like a child while everyone in the corridor watches, muttering about how pathetic someone has to be to like school so much that they cry over leaving. The girls in the bathroom line watch, too, but at least they don't mutter where Jugyeong can hear them, and they rummage in their purses for tissues to press into her shaky, wet hands.
Then, because Jugyeong hasn't humiliated herself enough, Seojun walks past, sees her, and stops in his tracks.
"You look like a raccoon," he says, even though he sounds more concerned that anything else. Every girl in line gives him a dirty look, but he doesn't seem to notice. "Why are you crying?"
Jugyeong looks back at him, helpless. Her cheeks feel sticky from tears, running mascara, and probably snot— please, please, not snot. He's the only one who would understand, and she feels this with her whole heart even though he knows only as much of the story as Sua does, but she doesn't have the words to tell him. Not here, in a corridor full of people judging her.
"Why are you all staring?" Seojun snaps at the crowd, like he's heard that thought. "Get moving, let her in. Jugyeong, stop crying."
The girls finally shift, glaring at Seojun, and Sua pulls Jugyeong into the bathroom. Jugyeong does manage to stop crying, but only by thinking that she's already wasted enough make-up for the day, and that if any more people see her sobbing her heart out at graduation she might as well set fire to whatever reputation she's built over the past few years.
When she comes back out, make-up back in place over a mildly puffy face, Seojun is still there. They're friends, she's known this for months now, but then Seojun grabs her elbow and pulls her along, fast enough that Sua has to hurry to follow, and he starts cursing under his breath in a way that makes them both laugh out of shock, and Jugyeong realizes that somehow, they've become best friends. So later, when it's time for pictures, she calls him over to take one together. And he lets her— that's how she knows he agrees.
"Seojun," she says, when he picks up the phone, and bursts into tears.
"Where are you?" he replies, in that fake-irritated voice he still likes to use when she calls sometimes, even though they both know better. She can hear the world sharpen around him as he walks out of whatever room he was in, out into the streets to look for her. "I can hear you crying, Jugyeong. Was it your performance test?"
"I really tried," she tells him, although she isn't sure of how true that is anymore. "I wanted to do well. But now I'll never get into the program I wanted and I'll live at home until I die and work picking up the neighborhood's trash—"
He sighs. She closes her eyes and imagines him walking to her with that frowny, soft look on his face he always gets when she's sad around him. She's been sad a lot, lately, but he keeps agreeing to meet her anyway, texting her when he's bored, helping her study despite their mutual distaste for it. She didn't accept his help with her performance test and now she kind of regrets it, only she doesn't, because she knows that it wouldn't have changed a thing except to make this even more disappointing.
"Jugyeong. Wait until the program gets back to you at least, before crying." She makes an irritated noise, and would swear she can hear him smiling. "Are you at home? I'll be there in ten, let's have lunch. Something spicy."
"You always say that," she mumbles, but the promise of Seojun's hilarious face as he tries to pretend he can handle spice cheers her up just a little. "No beef tripe?"
"We'll save that for when you have something to be depressed about."
When it turns out she was right to be worried, he does take her out for beef tripe. She rests her head on his shoulder and sobs into his shirt, and he says Jugyeong, if you don't stop doing this every time we meet, Jihoon and Pilsoo are gonna go around saying I make girls cry, which makes her laugh. He lets her cry for a little longer anyway, and then he walks her home, and she's halfway back through her door before she looks back at him to say thanks, only to find he's already looking at her. She can't read the expression in his eyes, but it's soft, like she never used to think he could be.
He shakes his head and pulls her into a hug. It's the first time Jugyeong's been this close to a boy, and the smell of him hits her so unexpectedly that he's stepped away before she's decided how she feels about it.
She remembers it later, though, and blames the heated, uncomfortable twist of her stomach on the beef tripe.
Dongdaemun Market is loud, busy, and exciting. The only thing Jugyeong regrets is agreeing to come with Seojun and his friends, although they are now kind of her friends also and much nicer than Seojun normally is. So really, the main problem is Seojun and how he keeps joking about her new glittery eye shadow, which she is now regretting buying. The case was beautiful and glitter is pretty, but the more she looks at herself the more she realizes it's a bit too much.
"Don't worry, Jugyeong, we won't lose you here," Seojun says, when she almost gets pulled away by the crowd and instinctively holds onto his arm. "Just keep glittering."
She elbows him in the ribs, but he keeps laughing anyway. He has a nice laugh, and that has been bothering her lately, for some reason— probably because he mostly just laughs at her. Her hand is comfortable on his arm, fits right, and he's warm against her side where she's started to get chilly, so she doesn't let go even though he's getting on her nerves, and he complains about it for half the walk to the pet store Jihoon is pointing at, but doesn't ask her to.
"Seojun," Jessie says, glancing at Jugyeong's hand on his arm with a grin. "Get your girlfriend some food. I'll stay with these two until they get tired of the kittens."
"I'm not his girlfriend," Jugyeong stutters, cheeks flaming, and rips her hand away. "I—"
Seojun rolls his eyes and puts her hand back on his arm, pressing it down gently with his own hand as if to keep it there. Jugyeong has a sudden vision of having his friends hold him down as she gets glittery eye shadow all over his face, and the only reason she doesn't put it into motion is that it was actually very expensive eye shadow, and Jessie doesn't pay that much for modelling.
"Come on, Jugyeong." Seojun's hand leaves her, but she's too startled to move. "And don't let go, I can't actually find you if I lose you here."
Months pass and Jugyeong forgets how to look for Suho's face in strangers, forgets how to cry in hitching, desperate breaths for what never had the chance to happen. Her life isn't perfect, but she isn't unhappy anymore, and she's fine, she's fine, she's doing well—
"Jugyeong, when did you get this?" Seojun's voice says from behind her, as she reapplies her lip tint. She just meant to grab the purse with Seojun's birthday gift in it, but since she's here she might as well fix her make-up before they go. "I've never seen you wear it. And it's expensive."
He's been digging around in her room for the past few minutes, which he claims is payback for her constantly making herself at home in his room when she visits him or Gowoon. Jugyeong warned him that he might not like what he finds in a girl's room, but she had managed to hide everything embarrassing in a box under a jacket in her closet before he came in, so she's not worried. This way she can take her time without him complaining of freezing outside as he waits for her.
But then she recaps her lip tint and turns, ready to go, and—
"Give it back," she snaps, lunging for it, and ignores Seojun's shocked face when she rips the box out of his hands and shoves it back into the drawer.
She can feel her own scared, too-fast heartbeat in her throat. It's easy to pretend that nothing ever happened when she doesn't have the physical reminder of it in front of her face, which is why that drawer is now empty aside from the necklace and she hasn't opened the box in more than a year. But now it's all back, and her eyes are wet, and she fights the urge to reach up and touch her face to assess the damage.
"This is about Suho," Seojun finally says, looking lost and very far away, and she nods.
"You miss him too," she replies, half an accusation and half a reminder. There's a lot that Seojun feels that he doesn't say out loud, she's learnt— he's like Suho that way, and it hurts, but not as much as it could have.
Seojun glances at the closed drawer and his lips tighten. She watches him reach around her to grab her purse, lets him push her forwards with a hand on her back. They're meant to be going out for bubble tea and she almost says, let's get beef tripe instead, but she doesn't want to be that person anymore. She's still surprised to find, glancing back at the mirror to check her face, that her make-up is intact.
"You have to let him go," Seojun says, not unkindly. "I did."
Seojun goes to her school festival because she asks him to, even though she can see the way he moves like his skin doesn't fit quite right when he's around college students. He still teases her, and laughs at the faces she makes in response, and lets her introduce him to her friends. He doesn't say a word about what's bothering him, but Jugyeong notices anyway.
There's a small fireworks display they don't bother to watch. Instead, they hide away in a quiet corner so Jugyeong can touch up Seojun's lip tint.
"You know," she says, thoughtfully, "I used to worry that I didn't know what to do with my life. But now I think maybe that's okay as long as I'm being kind."
Seojun's lips quirk into a smile, and she gives him a look for disrupting her work, but she's smiling too. This is where he usually would say something grumpy or teasing to avoid dealing with what she's just said, but she's kept him silent through the lip tint touch-up and he doesn't seem to think it's necessary to say anything at all by the time she's done.
Later, as he walks her home, she says, "Thank you for being kind", and pretends she doesn't see him blush.
Seojun kisses her two years after Suho leaves. Jugyeong's head is spinning from the alcohol and shock both, but even though she knows it's coming she doesn't pull away, lets him lean in until their lips meet and the warmth of his hand on hers starts making a stupid sort of sense, like there really is something she was supposed to have seen all along. Her heart swoops to her stomach, dizzy, lost, and stays there even after he pulls away.
Despite the beer, despite the soju, she doesn't feel like throwing up at all. But he doesn't ask, so she doesn't tell him.
Somehow, it works out anyway.