The End of the Party, a Suspicious Refusal
Had the bed always been this narrow? It was never a big one to begin with, but she could have sworn there was at least enough room to roll over once.
Yeoncheong blinked her eyes open, feeling that something was off from the usual.
Oh, right. This isn't my bed.
The realization came when she noticed the ceiling light hanging in a subtly different spot than at home.
Only then did the scene from just before she fell asleep come back to her. The last thing she'd seen was the desk, so of course this wasn't her own bed.
So my lovely friends just dumped me on the floor. Then who's sleeping in my bed?
Sitting up to check the faces of the culprits, Yeoncheong had no choice but to freeze in dismay.
From her right came soft, rhythmic breathing; from her left, a faint, murmuring mumble.
It felt like whispering right against her ear — they were far too close. She couldn't even turn her head, but she was certain it was Seoha on one side and Suyeon on the other.
Still, having confirmed her friends flanking her on both sides, a small sigh of relief escaped her. At least they hadn't abandoned her alone on the floor.
Now, careful not to wake anyone, she figured she'd slip off to the bathroom while she was up—
"Mmm... don't go."
Yeoncheong stiffened like a stone statue. The murmuring Suyeon went quiet too. Apparently it had been sleep talk. The moment her friend's mumbling died down, Yeoncheong tried to raise herself again—
"No..."
Ice, once more. This time it was Seoha who stirred on the other side.
She lost count of how many times she tried to get up, only for one of her sleeping friends to settle down again.
...Are they actually awake?
They stirred at the slightest movement, which drove Yeoncheong half out of her mind.
Worse, as if the constant rustling displeased them, arms reached out from both sides and pulled her into an embrace. Thanks to that, Yeoncheong was now trapped so thoroughly that she couldn't so much as twitch without waking them.
Completely pinned, she couldn't even use her phone, and sleep refused to come again — all she could do was blink at the ceiling.
And on top of that, she'd downed a mountain of drinks the night before and skipped the bathroom before bed. She'd crashed into a deep, exhausted slumber without once waking in the middle, so naturally, the moment she opened her eyes, her body was signaling loudly that the bathroom was non-negotiable.
I really need to go... but they'll wake up for sure.
But she didn't want to disturb her friends, sleeping so soundly. Yeoncheong chose to hold it in.
Since she herself had drifted off so suddenly last night, she reasoned the others must have fallen asleep not long after.
She was wrong.
Sleeping the sleep of the innocent, she had no idea that her friends had chatted away for over an hour with Yeoncheong sprawled right between them.
"Hahaha! Yeoncheong, is that for real?"
Suyeon, sitting on the bed and swinging her legs, leaned her body toward the kitchen.
Yeoncheong was frying eggs and thin slices of ham, while beside her, Hasol tucked the fillings between morning rolls to make simple sandwiches.
Yeoncheong glanced back and sighed. The look in Suyeon's eyes radiated a stubborn determination to wring an answer out of her one way or another. Better not to bother with a lie that would unravel in seconds anyway.
"Yeah, it's true."
"Should've just said so. If you needed the bathroom."
"I didn't know you guys stayed up that late."
Having foolishly assumed she'd only need to hold it a little longer, Yeoncheong had barely escaped with Hasol's help — she'd been the first to get up — and taken care of her urgent business.
"If it was that bad, you should've just woken someone and gone."
"You should count yourself lucky. If Hasol hadn't gotten up and helped me, I'd have been stepping on all of you to get there."
Handing the last of the ham to Hasol, Yeoncheong wiped down the pan in a flash and headed for the fridge.
It wasn't a paper carton but a plastic jug holding over two liters. Gathering every cup she could find — mismatched and mismatched alike — she poured milk evenly into each one.
Hasol, sandwich complete, carried the plates over to the others first, while Yeoncheong gathered the glasses onto a tray and followed her.
The delicious smell drifting through the house drew Nayun to hop down from her chair.
"Wow, this house's pajama party comes with a guaranteed breakfast service."
"Yep. So eat up quick and head home. You're all a handful."
It seemed like a skimpy morning for growing high school girls, but they'd eaten a hearty dinner the night before, plus piles of snacks with their drinks. A breakfast like this was plenty.
Suyeon took a huge bite of her sandwich and mumbled through it.
"Mmm~ sho good."
"Finish chewing first. You're dripping."
Ketchup oozed out and smeared her friend's hand. Yeoncheong scolded her even as she passed over a wad of tissues with one hand, raising a glass of milk with the other to wet her throat.
Starting with Suyeon, the other friends picked up sandwiches one by one.
"Every household needs a mandatory Yeoncheong. She takes better care of me than my own mom."
"Ahem... saying that won't get you seconds."
When Nayun gave a thumbs-up too, Yeoncheong cleared her throat and turned her reddening face away.
Hasol, nibbling daintily at her sandwich, added her two cents.
"Plus the Daengcheongi we saw at the festival."
"Ooh, good one."
"Hasol, even you..."
Yeoncheong shot her a glare, and the friends burst out laughing mid-bite.
Everyone had slept soundly, it seemed — not a trace of yesterday's fatigue remained in the warm and cheerful(?) atmosphere.
The sandwiches vanished without a trace.
Nayun claimed the bathroom, Seoha changed clothes in the small room, and Suyeon settled in front of the vanity desk. Each of them claimed a spot and began getting ready to head home.
Having finished first, Hasol sat on the floor with her back against the bed, licking her lips.
"Ahh~ that was so much fun. I wanna do it again sometime."
Apparently the chances to goof off like this without parents watching were rare enough to leave her wanting more.
Yeoncheong understood the feeling, but...
"Nope. Suyeon said this was the last time, and that's the only reason I allowed it."
She had her circumstances too.
Doing this often would be nothing but a burden on the neighbors, not to mention the serious risk of her private space's boundaries being eroded away entirely.
Maybe over summer break, or the next winter vacation — if they spaced it out, that would be one thing. But Yeoncheong had no such plans for the immediate future.
Had Nayun washed her hair from the start? Her head wrapped in a towel, she poked it out of the bathroom.
"Wait, seriously, this is the last time? Because I was under the impression 'this winter vacation' doesn't count as 'the last time.'"
"My house. And even the 'my house' part isn't technically my own house. Have a little consideration for the people living around here."
Knowing any appeal about her private space being violated would be breezily ignored, Yeoncheong waved the common-sense reasons instead.
"That's fair..."
"We should be careful about that."
They liked to mess around, sure — but like Yeoncheong herself, her friends were fundamentally reasonable people.
Just as it seemed Yeoncheong's persuasion was landing, though—
"Then how about we do it at my place next time?"
Seoha's words, delivered as she emerged from the small room dressed, sent huge ripples through the settling atmosphere.
Heads whipped around, and gazes converged on her all at once — enough to make even Seoha flinch.
"Ah... was that too sudden?"
"No, no! We'd love that, seriously!"
"She's right. We were just surprised."
Seoha had been the one to suggest dinner first on Christmas, and now she was inviting them to her home. There was no clearer proof of how close they'd become, so her friends were nothing but delighted.
Seeing them so pleased, Seoha continued what she'd been about to say.
"If the house feels like too much, we also have a villa. It's been ages since I've been, so I can't promise what state it's in..."
"A villa!?"
Whether she hadn't anticipated the impact of her own words, or simply hadn't expected a reaction this intense, Seoha took a step back at the chorus of gasps.
"Seoha, your family has a villa?"
Seoha nodded as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Her friends could only gape.
Even without her saying anything, her daily commute made it obvious her family was well-off — but nobody had dreamed she was rich enough to own a vacation home besides.
The words everyone wanted to say slipped out of Nayun's mouth before she could stop them.
"Seoha... I keep saying this to myself, but you really are loaded."
"You didn't know?"
"No, it's not that I didn't know, it's more like... you're even richer than I imagined..."
"Ah, that makes sense. We've never really talked about the details."
Seoha, standing there a bit awkwardly, seemed to weigh something for a moment — then abruptly began telling them about her family.
A company expanding rapidly overseas. When the name of a firm her friends had all heard pass through their parents' mouths at least once came up, every pair of eyes except Yeoncheong's went perfectly round.
Nayun, who'd scrambled to search the company online, made a huge fuss about how its CEO shared the same surname as Seoha.
Yeoncheong alone stood there blankly. Would it matter if I played the stock market? She'd always been in the dark about news like that, so she poked Hasol lightly in the side and asked.
"What? What do they even do?"
"Honestly, we don't really know either. Just some company that's blowing up lately. That's all you need to know."
Yeoncheong looked at Seoha with wide eyes — at the friend who seemed cold at a glance, but whose expression had only frozen out of sheer fluster.
Since Seoha deliberately steered clear of any talk about her family, no one at school knew the details of her home life either.
Hasol and Suyeon knew that too, and a faint air of caution crept in — as if they worried they might be prying into something she didn't want heard.
"But... is it okay, telling us all this?"
"Right. If you never bring it up, don't you have your reasons?"
"It's because there are people who'd latch onto anyone once they knew about the family, hoping to get something out of it..."
Seoha smiled faintly at her friends, whose eyes looked about ready to pop out of their heads.
There was no calculating scheme behind their reactions — only pure, unfiltered surprise shone through. And besides, these were the friends who had quietly kept Yeoncheong's secret safe. If she told them the secret she'd hidden all this time, she knew they'd just as quietly keep their mouths shut.
"That's why I figured you all would be okay."
It had taken nearly a year to get here.
But this was Seoha's seal of approval — a sign that she had opened her heart completely.
"Seoha~!"
Abandoning her half-applied makeup at the desk, the chain-hugging maniac Suyeon threw herself at Seoha without warning.
Dodge in that split second, or just take it? After a heartbeat of deliberation, Seoha accepted the tackle with her own body — Suyeon had thrown herself with far too much sincerity to do otherwise.
Rivals competing over Yeoncheong or not, they were friends first.
Seoha found the bouncing, overjoyed Suyeon a bit much — but she didn't push her away.
Once the assault finally subsided and Suyeon recovered her composure, she made an excited proposal.
"Hey guys, want to get together again sometime soon?"
"Now really is the best time. Easiest to match schedules."
You never know how things will go — over summer break, with studying and this and that, plans could fall through and meetings become hard to arrange.
Amid the noisy back-and-forth over dates, Yeoncheong heard them unanimously agree on one particular day, and cut into the conversation.
"Ah, I can't do that day."
Four pairs of eyes swung toward her at once.
She hadn't meant to dunk herself into a perfectly good mood, but somehow that was exactly how it had turned out.
At first, her friends let it slide.
Yeoncheong rarely refused anything to begin with, and if she had a genuine prior commitment, there was no pushing past that.
Except...
"Ho. W. Many. Times! Why won't you tell us the reason?"
Because Yeoncheong clamped her mouth shut and refused to explain, the friends could no longer just let it go.
After Seoha had gone so far for them, the mood turned pointed — who ditches a villa trip without even giving a reason?
Before anyone noticed, all talk of Seoha's villa had evaporated, and the whole room had shifted into interrogating Yeoncheong instead.
At the forefront of it all: Suyeon, eyes narrowed, lips smacking as she probed for an opening. Yeoncheong knew she wasn't serious, but the friend who usually wore a silly grin now had a fire in her eyes, and the air around her was a completely different animal.
"Wait — do you have another friend? No, that can't be... Yeoncheong doesn't have any close friends besides us..."
"Hey. There's Seobin and Siyeon, remember."
Brushing off the rebuttal with practiced ease, Suyeon's speculation continued.
"If it's not that, then... could it be a girlfriend!"
"Yeoncheong... that's not it, right?"
Suyeon covered her mouth with both hands in an exaggerated display of shock. As if even that one possibility was off-limits no matter how wild the guessing got, Seoha added a word of her own.
Yeoncheong briefly considered turning the question back on them, but Suyeon's expression told her everything: if she got caught lying, this would absolutely not end in anything resembling ordinary.
So Yeoncheong raised her voice and shot down the absurd theory.
"Are you insane! No! It's a personal matter, okay!"
The more tightly she hid it, the more curious they seemed to get. Hasol and Nayun just listened in silence, and the interrogation of Yeoncheong showed no sign of ending. If anything, it was escalating by the minute.
Judging that things were turning against her, she finally flipped the board over.
"Everyone out! Now! Pajama party's over! I'm going to rest!"
The best defense Yeoncheong had available: an eviction order.