to heaven & back

     “do you ever get a thrill from finishing a task?” daeun crosses her legs, leaning back in her chair as she thinks about the question. “when you’ve been working hard on something and you write the last sentence or finally send out that email or whatever it is. i think that honestly inspires me the most.” she nods with a certain finality that makes her seem like she’s sure of her answer.

     “i’m not the type of person who draws inspiration from others or from my environment, i think i get my inspiration from myself.”

( ... )

“hi,” subin greets her with a smile anyway when he finally finds her in the middle of so many broadcasting club members, his hand reaching out for hers before she can slip away. “are you busy?” is what leaves his mouth instead of can i help with anything? that is what he has asked to every booth he has stopped by.

     there’s a lot of things that daeun likes about school festivals. she likes the atmosphere of the outdoors areas, filled with people walking around and talking to each other. she likes seeing what the other clubs in the university are up to, because even though she has friends who are in the clubs she feels like it’s hard to really keep track of what’s going on. there’s also all the activities and free things and food ( which means that deaun won’t have to order takeout that day, which is always appreciated ).

     most of all though, she likes to show everyone that the broadcasting club is, in fact, the best club that there is here, with the most to offer and the most interesting thing to do, not to mention the best looking members.

     in fact, she’s convinced that a lot of the girls coming in and giggling with their friends are here to see junyoung, but she doesn’t mind as long as he’s bringing traffic to their booth and she can brag about it after. apparently no one is immune to his charms, which daeun would understand if she didn’t know him so well. as it is though, she does know him well which means she’s automatically less susceptible.

     but as usual, daeun finds herself pulled in all directions from the clubs that she’s in, the first years from the broadcasting club asking her another question about how to send out the videos ( which she already explained at least ten times, but she gives them a pass because well...first years are just kind of like that ). not to mention the student government group chat blowing up asking about various things and whether or not anyone has found a missing mic stand.

( ... )

     anyone who knows her knows that it’s a very daeun thing to keep her freshman year notes. she had worked hard on them, so why wouldn’t she keep them? daeun always felt like it was impossible to know when they would come in handy sometime in the future, like maybe she would need them for another class and want to look back on the fundamentals

     or maybe an underclassman would come to her offering money in exchange for some insight, and of course daeun would want to help her peers ( for a price, of course ).

     thankfully, eunbyul didn’t seem to have a problem with paying a price, so daeun was happy to find her notes ( thank goodness she had the forethought to organize them neatly ) and bring them here, and she could just explain a few things, talk to the other girl a bit, and walk away a good amount of won richer, maybe buy that perfume she’s been wanting for a while or the new bag that she had her eye on. if she’s strategic about her spending this month ( meaning not getting takeout every night ), she might even be able to get a new computer.

     she’s always loved university festivals like this, because it made her feel like a real college student ( as if the exams and essays and her millions of extracurriculars weren’t enough — and they’re more than enough, but in a different way ). she has a million things to do with the broadcasting club, but it’s now the tenth time that someone came over and talked about the maid cafe here so her interest was piqued. what’s a maid cafe? are there actual maids? what’s so great about it that two guys have now requested to send video messages to the people working there?

( ... )

as much as she hated messes, her stomach was aching and presenting a formidable reminder that she hadn’t had much more to eat that day than an apple and some rice on her way to class. her kitchen could wait.

     in daeun’s perspective, it’s not so much that she disliked cooking, but more that cooking just didn’t seem to like her. it wasn’t her fault that she accidentally put salt instead of sugar in the cookies she baked last week, they just weren’t labeled correctly and what is she supposed to do? anyone would have gotten mixed up! 

     ( daeun blaming inanimate things just so she doesn’t have to admit that she might actually be horrendous at something? more likely than you think! )

     but to her credit, daeun simply knows her own limitations, and she knows that even though she has other strengths, cooking isn’t one of them. and why would she need to if she has her cute, amazing, wonderful, talented friend kim yeji is here? ( and if not yeji then takeout is always an option, though she prefers the former if only because yeji is cuter and better company than the takeout delivery guy, though daeun does have some thoughts about him...but she digresses ).

     “it wasn’t my fault!” it was definitely her fault. “i got a text from one of the broadcasting club members and they have some issue again, i mean ugh...these first years, you know? they’re cute but just very confused.” which is fine, because she remembers all the stupid questions she asked as a fresh-faced kyungwon first year, but that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with, especially at the expense of the food she was supposed to be stirring.

JUN 

( ... )

shaking his head, he turns to daeun, a little apologetic that he’d chosen such a place for their first date ( inspection ) spot. “should we go in?” he smiles, “i promise i’ll pay,” he continues, nudging her towards the door.

     not to be daeun, but she loves saying no to people.

     she would say that out of all her past times ( which she has a lot of, though she seems to have no time to do any of them these days ), rejecting men is one that she never gets bored of. not that she says no too often — if they pay for her food then she has no real reason to refuse, and considering her extremely horrendous underwhelming cooking skills, it’s more of a survival instinct than anything else. how will she become the future president if she starves to death in college?

     but of course, she would never say no to junyoung, even if he tells her that they’re going to date spots for the club. it does hurt her ego a little bit ( he could have said he wanted to go because she was pretty! because she was fun! anything! ), but she’s known him for so long that she knows how he is, and she knows he wants to spend time with her. after all these years she likes to think that she’s figured him out a little bit, and even if he doesn’t say it’s because she’s cute she takes it as it is, telling herself that she’s reading between the lines ( more like squeezing herself between the lines, and there’s a slippery slope between self confidence and delusion but daeun has managed it quite expertly up until now ).

     plus, he said he would pay, so who is she to refuse?

     “i have a feeling that this will be good.” she says as she looks at the restaurant. it’s not the cutest one that she’s ever seen, not like the aesthetic instagram worthy restaurants on social media that are just a few moving parts short of an art installation, but it’s always places like these that have the best food.

     daeun liked to think that she had a certain sixth sense about things; she always seems to know when her professor is going to give a pop quiz, when someone thinks she’s cute, when her roommate is going to leave her dirty dishes in the sink again ( granted, the last one is pretty easy considering that particular roommate seems to have an aversion to dish soap and always leaves her dishes unwashed, why she does that is completely beyond daeun’s comprehension ). but one sixth sense that she finds particularly useful is that she always seems to know when subin is cooking.

     specifically, she knows when subin is cooking something she likes, which isn’t saying much considering she’s never been a picky eater. either way it’s convenient since she’s never been much of the cooking type 

     exhibit a: the unfortunate remnants of ramen that she unfortunately messed up the night before, the carcass of which is still sitting sadly and limply in the trash can. one might ask how daeun can mess up ramen, a foolproof college essential that requires just boiling some water and maybe an egg if you’re feeling ambitious ( which she never is when it comes to cooking ),  but she will not really have a good answer for you.

     but who needs ramen when the east wing ra is probably cooking something delicious and amazing? which he is right now, she’s sure of it. so she puts her laptop in her bag and walks the familiar steps to his dorm, ignoring the stares of the female students who see her when she arrives. she’s here a little too much for just acquaintances, and she could clarify but she would rather not, because if they want to say something about it then they should.