before & after ‣ 엔하이픈

001 ; present

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AERI

"Aeri!"

Aeri could not help but look to her back only to see two of her friends, chasing after her and immediately tackling her on a hug that almost brings her down. A laugh escaped her lips as she tried to balance herself all while Seeun and Haesu do the same. Quite a time passed since she last saw her two friends, mainly her fault because she had rejected so many invites from them that she often wonder how she hasn't been ostracized by them yet.

A smile appeared on her lips as the three of them finally stood up straight to talk. "Where have you been hiding, Aeri?! We didn't see you all summer!"

She laughs nervously. "I've been busy."

Memories of Aeri's summer flashes in her eyes in an instant. She could not help recall his soft touch and gentle smile that filled every gap of her summer. Anticipation rushes through her as she hopes to see him today after not being able to meet him for about a week now due to school coming closer. But she could not tell her friends that. She could not tell them she spent the summer with the boy she swore she'd never like and that she spent every hour of it falling deeper and deeper for him. Although the secrecy hadn't just been her idea, Jake suggesting it didn't raise a protest from her either because she felt the need to hide them also.

"Busy with what? You found yourself a guy during the summer, didn't you? The one and only Min Aeri finally dating someone? This guy must be insanely good looking if he managed to bag you!" Seeun accuses Aeri but the girl quickly evades the question by simply not saying anything and focusing on the path ahead. "Or is it just a summer thing?"

Even as her friends continued to guess as to what could possibly be the reason why their friend ignored them for almost two months straight, Aeri kept her silence on the topic but chose to answer them when the question had nothing to do about the summer or the fact she's now in love. The path to their classroom wasn't much of a walk really and it had taken them about a few minutes to be seated at the middle part of the classroom, each of her classmates sparing her a glance before looking away immediately to avoid meeting her eye. As she looked around the proximity, her eyes widened to see Bora sitting at the far front, her head deep into the book she was reading all while she wears a large sweater over her uniform.

Aside from the fact that Bora was Jake's ex girlfriend and she found their situation uncomfortable, Bora isn't originally part of her class. She originally is part of the class where Jake is, which is essentially how the two of them met-- because they were classmates. So to see her in the same classroom as her had been something she hasn't anticipated when she first woke up this morning for her first day in class. Looking over to her friends, it seemed they also shared the same sentiments about Bora's sudden appearance in their class.

"I heard she and Jake broke up at the beginning of summer." Haesu whispers over to her two friends. "Maybe she transferred here because of the breakup and the rumor that Jake is seeing someone new."

"What?! Immediately?!" Seeun gasps that earned her a flick in the forehead from Haesu who tells her to shut up. "How did you know he has someone new?"

"Someone told me they saw him out in the city, holding hands with another girl. She didn't know who the girl was but from what I've been told, she was very pretty." Haesu continues to whisper and Aeri swore her heart stopped beating for a second because she immediately could tell that the girl in question was her. "Ah but that's not the only thing I heard!"