And she was gone by morning || J. Heejin

[04: Dangerous Pleasures]

"Sorry I'm late. My friends had to drag me to band practice."

You looked up and saw your partner waving, holding a few bags you assumed held the research she made. She definitely did some work.

"I just came here. It's fine."

Heejin pulled out a chair and sat next to you, leaning closer to her to see what you were doing. Noticing she was right beside you, you raised your arm up to cover your notebook as if it was an automatic response. Heejin immediately backed off.

"So, what have you been doing?" Heejin asked.

"I don't know. I just got here."

Heejin pulled out her laptop and opened some files when she saw you busy with your own work. She placed her stack of books beside it. You glanced at her. As if things couldn't get any more awkward, you unintentionally made eye contact with Heejin. When you got caught, you immediately went back to your notebook.

After another empty minute, Heejin tapped your shoulder to grab your attention. She hesitated for a second, but was successful.

"Why don't we start of the project?" she asked. Your eyes widened as you realized you were delaying the process.

"Oh, sure. What do we do?"

"We decided on the Cold War, right?" Heejin asked. You nodded, remembering the brief discussion they had the day before.

"We're supposed to list five major events, its effects, and how it impacted our lives today. Also, some essay questions."

Heejin nodded. The notes you took definitely helped. She wondered how you were able to take them down, as you were just staring at the board the whole period yesterday. Maybe you did some work at home.

"How do we divide the work?" you asked.

"We need to divide the work?"

You sighed, your cold expression making Heejin shudder. Were you disappointed? Were you looking down on her?

"I prefer working solo and submitting my part to you so we can polish it together or something," you said. "If you want anything else, just say it."

Of course, you preferred to work solo. Your independence was one of your strongest points. Although her plan wouldn't work that way, she didn't want you to hate working with her, either.

"We could do that, yeah. But I need to see you work on it real-time," Heejin told you, crossing her arms to show that she was serious.

"I can't work on it at home?"

"You could, but it would be better if we could monitor each other instead."

While Heejin ran over her words, she noticed your eyebrows furrowing. You were questioning her.

"B-But you could go solo, though."

You nodded. The paper would take a few days to make if you were the only one working on it, but since you were with Heejin, the targeted end was unclear. It was obvious she wanted to collaborate.

As much as you hated it, you needed to take your mom's advice.

"We could work together. I'm fine with it. Let's just assign the parts we're supposed to be in charge of."

Heejin breathed a sigh of relief. You had actually agreed.

That was stage two of her plan completed. Now, the most important step was just within her reach. However, it was better to do the project first, and then introduce her big idea later.