before & after ‣ 엔하이픈

034 ; present

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AERI

Now that Aeri knew who to blame for all of this, it was much easier to go to school the next day.

Bora didn't go to school that day. Aeri couldn't help but commend her for making the right decision, because she wasn't sure what she'd do to Bora now that Jake and Sunghoon weren't there to keep them both apart. She sat quietly at her table as she scribbled on her notebook words that had nothing to do with the lesson being discussed by the teacher. Haesu wasn't currently at school and Seeun was running late that day, so she was sitting alone with both seats on her sides unoccupied. No one had the strength to sit beside her, and she could tell no one wanted to do it anyway.

"I heard from my friend that she saw Bora crying while Jake was comforting her. Do you know what happened? Are they back together? I thought Jake was with someone else?"

Aeri often forget how loud some voices were when they weren't muddled up by her two friends' own chatter or with Sunghoon's own annoying voice. The feeling that came with hearing their voices coherently for the first time suddenly returned with its haunting effect on her. She tried to cancel them out and focus everything on her teacher, but at those very moments, it seemed her ears had refused to follow her own will.

"They're probably going to get back together. It's Bora. Jake was so in love with her. The other girl was probably only a rebound."

"Oh! But did you know there was a rumor going around the other girl is actually Aeri? That's why they have been unusually close lately."

"Isn't she with Sunghoon? They're always going to school together and walking around. I even saw him carrying her bag once."

"I wouldn't be surprised if it ended up being true that she's bouncing around the two of them. Her mother's a gold digging whore and they're poor. She's not good with school and probably won't end up getting a good job. The only good thing about her is her face."

That was the narrative Aeri was so used to. That eventually she will end up being her mother because the only thing in her arsenal was her beauty. Even though she often joked around about it, hearing the words come out of someone else's mouth made it seem more real than when it comes from her. She wanted to confront the people behind her who spoke about her as if she was so far away from them, but she tried her best not to cause any more trouble.

"That's probably why Jake went back to Bora, because he found out Aeri is nothing more than a gold digging bitch."

Her fist tightened, but she kept her mouth shut. Just a few more minutes, Aeri. She repeated over and over again, but the voices remained loud and clear, and for every word thy  said, they scarred themselves in the corners of her mind.

Sure, it was easier to go school that morning, but she definitely forgot for a second how harder it was to stay.

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"Pitiful queen bee."

"She's sitting alone now. Did Haesu and Seeun finally come to their senses?"

"They definitely did. Who would want to be with the girl who pretends to be so almighty but is actually a beggar?"

Aeri could not help but slam the utensils she was using at the table, creating a thud that steals the attention of the cafeteria. It was definitely harder to cancel out the voices this time because of how loud they were. Unable to take any of this, she stood up from where she sat and gave everyone else around her a stare that obviously gave them shudders. Even when she was a beggar to them, she could see how much they still feared her.