쥐

and once he had found her, he a final response on the matter rolled off his tongue, “ there’s no fun in that, is there? people tend to leave no matter how it is you act. ”

she greets the hostess with as much of a smile and respect as she can muster. after giving the name for the reservation and being led to their table, mouse sits and tucks her hands beneath her thighs, eyes closed, doing her absolute best not to look like she’s fuming as viciously as she is. she’s here to enjoy herself -- there’s no way she’s spending this much money to have to sit here and stew in her anger. kai can soak in his own misery all he wants, for all she cares.

she unfolds the menu and impulsively orders the first drink she sees, purposefully, pettily asking the waiter to only bring one water out before kai arrives. her resolution to let her anger go lasts just about as long as the thought passes through her head, and the feeling only multiplies when kai follows in after her, looking far more unaffected than she’d like. 

maybe if she could make him feel something, besides apathy, she’d get some sick satisfaction in it. then again -- seeing him sad wouldn’t make her happy either. while he might, mouse doesn’t delight in making people unhappy. even the thought leaves a sort of heavy pit in her stomach, weighing her down unpleasantly.

“out?” he asks, his eyebrows furrow. “at this time? with who? you know it can get dangerous out there.” he presses his lips into a thin line.  "what were you doing?“

she watches the cat go, amusement lingering on the corners of her lips and eyes, only glancing away from where its disappeared when haneul gestures in her periphery. mouse doesn’t know what he’s been doing, nor does she much care -- she knows what’s coming out of his mouth next, though. they’ve been through this drill enough times over.

she could probably mouth along with him, if she wanted. instead, she just rolls her eyes, arms folding over her chest, “out! at this time, yes. with friends.”

the last of her amusement fizzles out as she sighs. she knows she’s small, she knows she looks frail, she knows it’s late. she knows she probably should have come home a while ago, but that doesn’t mean anyone else can tell her to. she’s an adult! even if she may not act like one.

“ you should say stuff like that more often, ” kai spoke aloud as he buried his hands in his pockets, mostly to hide the way his hands had balled into fists with nails digging into the skin of his palms. “ people will think you have no edge if you’re so nice to them all the time. ” 

she tries, wholly and honestly, not to let kai rile her up, but she’s never been very good about keeping her emotions under wraps. if it could, steam would no doubt be pouring out her ears -- as it is, it feels like her brain is about to come leaking out of them anyways. being around kai seems to wear her down like this, grating on her slowly, inch by inch.

mouse glares at his back a few moments as he walks past her, before she stalks her way after him, small legs moving quick til she catches up. she stuffs her hands in her pockets, tongue rolling against the top of her mouth to keep the hostile words sitting at its tip from spilling out. she doesn’t want to be mean. she doesn’t like being overtly hostile. but if he’s going to pick a fight, she isn’t going to sit back and just let him.

with his back facing away from the door, haneul couldn’t see the person who just entered the house, so when the footsteps stop (as if the person is shocked to find a single table lamp lighting the living room’s table) haneul turns his swivel chair to greet the newcomer. his face drops when he sees mouse.

“well, it’s a bit late. where have you been?”

sometimes mouse gets a little distracted; she gets a little lost in what she’s doing and what she wants to be doing and what she should be doing. juggling her time between work and busking and passion projects and sleep isn’t always possible, and she usually ends up sacrificing one. (it usually isn’t work or busking -- and passion projects always end up too difficult to tear herself away from.)

so, like she’s wont to do, she doesn’t realize it’s hours past midnight until she’s already way past the point of returning home at any decent time. there aren’t very many people left around anyways -- only a small group of tourists remain grouped round her and her friends, fascinated yet not coughing up any pocket money as they’ve probably blown it all already, and she bids them a hasty goodbye to hurry back to the sharehouse as quick as she can, phone dead in her pocket and streetlights blurring above her.

she tries, really, to be as quiet as he can in getting back, but mouse hasn’t ever been as mouse-like as she’d like to be. the door is loud, and her clunky shoes are even louder, her face twisting into a worse and worse wince with each step she takes on the linoleum of the first floor. she trips, getting out of her shoes, and is so wound up trying not to wake anyone up that she doesn’t notice someone’s already awake til she’s standing right next to the chair they’re in, and--

kai stopped in his tracks following the girl’s questioning of whether or not he’d bail out on their dinner; though he had a past of having little regard for any amount of money, that was when he had some to spare. he wasn’t about to let mouse know that, though. “ you can always test your luck to find out. ”

she glares up at him, playfulness unsuccessfully eking its way past the true annoyance as it blooms as a result of his indifference, bleeding through into her stare, her expression, her posture. it isn’t often, that anyone truly gets under her skin enough to make her truly mad, but with kai it seems to happen more often than not. maybe it’s just his personality and hers clashing so much, maybe it’s the fact that hearing the negativity in her mother tongue feels that much worse. maybe it’s neither. 

“you’re a dick,” she says, biting her tongue only at the last second to keep something worse from coming out. she comes to a stop a few steps past him, turning and folding her arms over her chest, trying her best not to look as childish as she feels. as small as she feels. it doesn’t help much.

♠ for a drunk text(s)

[ txt to : 爸 haneulie ] YOU[ txt to : 爸 haneulie ] i jsut found a stick ynote in the BATHROOM this has gone TOO FAR[ txt to : 爸 haneulie ] img_0405.jpg enjoy :)

☏ for a vague text

☼ for a congratulatory text(s)

[ txt to : mandy ] your makeup looked really pretty today ^^;;[ txt to : mandy ] not that you don’t always look pretty!!!!! you just looked extra extra pretty today :)

⁇ for a worried text(s)

☏ for a vague text(s)

[ txt to : skip 哥哥 ] i think your death metal is giving my bowels good inspiration but not so much my head im sorry :(

☠ for a misguided advice text(s)

[ txt to : skip 哥哥 ] maybe if you put the bandaids on your knees BEFORE you do the dumb things and hurt yourself, you wont get as many scrapes??[ txt to : skip 哥哥 ] that way there isn’t as much of you to get hurt because it’s already bandaged :) ta-dah!!

☼ for a congratulatory text(s)

☏ for a vague text(s)

[ txt to : gorgeous daeji ] maybe if you put some butter on them it would help?[ txt to : gorgeous daeji ] that always helps me

♣ for a text(s) not meant for you

⁇ for a worried text(s)

[ txt to : 笨蛋 ] i know you’re having a rough week but you gotta get out and do something laying around isn’t good for you or your poor back[ txt to :  笨蛋 ] let’s go find a hotpot restau ok!!!! that’ll make you feel better :) 

send ☏ for a vague text

⁇ for a worried text(s)

sept 04.

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] hyerinie where are you[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] i haven’t seen you in so long

sept 07.

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] are you avoiding me?????

sept 12.

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] please get back to me soon [ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] jaeminie told me he saw you why aren’t you replying to me i haven’t seen you at home in so long

sept 16.

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] hyerin.[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] you can always talk to me. please. don’t keep doing this to yourself.

♠ for a drunk text(s)

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] hyerinie!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! guess wWHAT[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] ifve done somethign AZMZING[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] i balacned three (3) emprty cups on my head like in that movie. you coudl call me…….Your Princess Mousey. i think you would sound cute callign me princess lol

♣ for a text not meant for you

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] do you think my butt looks good in these pants 

✘ for a text that should never have been sent

[ txt to : 亲 ♡ ] this song made me think of you https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyj4JFSErrw

♔ for an angry text(s)

“I really appreciate you doing this, Mouse. I actually think she’ll be impressed with you. I mean, I did ask you for a reason.” The eye smile he gives her is genuine and full of admiration. “For tonight, I am proud to call you my girlfriend.”

she hasn’t ever been a girlfriend, before. mouse has been a lot of things -- a daughter, a friend, a dance partner, a makeshift sister, a nuisance -- but never a girlfriend. it makes her a little nervous, not really having much idea of what she should be doing, but she’s excited and eager nevertheless. being a girlfriend is probably cool, but being a fake girlfriend? it isn’t every day you get to be one of those. 

her back arches just slightly as he lays a hand on her, shoulder shying just a little from the touch instinctively, so unused to being touched by boys (who aren’t jaemin) is she. she smiles after a moment, though, catching herself and leaning over to bump a little into reece, an attempt at reassurance. for him, or for herself, she isn’t sure, but presses on, “don’t worry too much, reece.”

IN MY RUBY DREAMS.

They were both too familiar to these scenarios, and it was hypocritical of Hye to even hope for an alternative method in handling these occurrences when she had all the power to avoid them in the first place. “I wish I could explain, things just got so complicated… again.” 

hyerin is... hyerin is someone who mouse has a hard time putting words to. she means a lot to her, more than most (if not all) people she knows -- she’s known hyerin longer than she’s known anyone else she still talks to, save for her parents. they go back pre-sharehouse, pre-training, pre-korea. pre-the person mouse is today, she might say. mouse would trust her with anything and everything, and has done so in the past without fail.

which is why this feels so awful, she thinks. being ignored. untrusted, clearly. avoided. they practically room together, for god’s sake, and mouse still couldn’t catch heads or tails of her best friend even amidst near-constant messaging and lingering round to try and catch her off-guard. she’s all too aware of how many days it’s been since they’ve spoken -- twelve -- and it’s like missing a limb. 

standing here, finally, in front of her, mouse still feels that phantom pain of being so actively evaded. she knows, of course, why they haven’t spoken. she has ideas of where hyerin has been, who’s she been with, what she’s been doing. it hurts. she’d thought-- well, she’d thought wrong. under the thin edges of her anger, annoyance, thickened over the longer that hyerin had been away, is a deep concern that she can’t shake no matter how hard she tries. hyerin is her best friend, after all.

“ didn’t know paying for dinner with another person constituted as being selfish … we could just not go. ” a threat, mostly, and an idle one at that; it wasn’t something mouse needed to know.

“oh, don’t even pretend like you’d ask me to leave you alone. you enjoy my company more than i think you let on, gege,” says mouse, squinting and pointing at kai, her finger wagging in the most accusing way a finger can. “i think you spend so much effort pretending not to like me you can’t even realize how happy i make you. that’s probably why you were smiling so big earlier -- you unconsciously realized how lovely i am.”

——

“ what do you mean by that? ” he inquired, as if clueless, sparing the smiling girl a glance. “ if i’d won the lottery i’d be on a plane home by now. ” well, at least he was honest.

ah, there it is. his smile drops off his face in a manner of seconds, and mouse tsks under her breath. she’s never understood it -- wasn’t it tiring, being so negative all the time? frowning for more than a few minutes hurt the corners of her mouth, personally. 

she can’t imagine that his eyes don’t feel sore with how much he seems to roll them, not to mention moving them this way and that constantly, as if to avoid looking at her -- she thinks that might partly be due to the fact that she’s always smiling herself. (her mama told her that as long as she kept positive, the people around her would catch, that smiling was the most contagious thing there was.)