calling off!au

*

I want you - she's so heavy - the Beatles

^ Oop that's random, I'm sorry ^
When did I even write that, lmao?XD

***

"we're gonna have the time of our lives out there, and NOBODY is fighting me on this!!"

"we're NOT fighting you... but there IS no 'out there,' unni!! don't you understand??!"

the girls all stood in joowonie's basement in the concert gear they had been prepping for ages. fists were clenched, jaws were tightened... a storm was just about ready to come and pick them up to whirl them around in an explosive fit of over-dramatic emotion. jae was heaving in fury, because apparently she was the only one who hadn't been told that soojin had called off the concert venue they had planned at the udon place down the street... who did this girl think she WAS??! joining the band, taking over the leadership position because of her meticulous work and organization skills, CALLING OFF THEIR FIRST OFFICIAL VENUE??!! that was 4 months of labor and figuring out everything they needed to do to properly work together and get proper gigs she had just called off!! and for what? just because jae had a fever didn't mean she wasn't perfectly capable of performing at her best!!!!

"i'm sick and tired of all of this fighting... unni, you can't perform with a sore throat and a high temperature, and we're not about to leave you out of our first venue!" soojin's eyebrows were knit together in their characteristic knot of consideration, as if they were trying to tie themselves close enough together to create a pink sweater to match haewon's. "i'm not doing this because i want to -- we've all been working so hard on this!! i would love to perform right now--"

"then why DON'T we?!" jae interrupted. she was still trying to control her breathing, but not pointing out her dissatisfaction at the current issue was NOT an option. "i can sing: see?" then her raspy throat croaked out a few off-pitch notes and she felt herself do the thing like in all those movies -- the thing where the main character slowly begins to realize that it's worthless to even try and time slows down as if it's a giant, red deflating balloon that has nowhere to go because of that one teeny, tiny hole in its side. hyunjae's head dropped with her heart, her throat throbbing in unease and irritation and her eyes blinking rapidly to stay clear, stay empty of salty liquid. the bleached-blond hair with those thick blue streaks in-between and over -- dyed specially for the venue -- was immediately met with the sensation of warm fingertips. they slid through the locks in a comforting waltz, and hyunjae soon felt her shoulders sag in new-found ease. her cracking voice let out her last thoughts in a broken whisper. "i just... i just don't want to mess this up for everyone, soojin. and the fact that you called off all that we've been working towards behind my back... i'm really disappointed in you."

as soojin turned away from jae in hurt, briana quickly tried to fix the mess with quiet yet kind words. "jae-unni... i think you should rest your voice—and yourself—for a bit. the busking we planned for next week can be our first venue instead. how about it?" jae looked over at the girl whose fingers were stroking her hair so sweetly, who was smiling at her with that soft spread of her lips, just enough to make her eyes crinkle and her teeth sparkle. the younger girl removed her hand from her unni's hair and instead gently grasped her belt-loop. "let's go over to my place... we can write some lyrics for that new melody all of us came up with a while ago!"

hyunjae's teeth nipped at her lip as her heart clenched in guilt at what she had just said to soojin, and she nodded in agreement.

*

Meanwhile, Haewon slunk closer to Soojin. The younger girl hesitantly brought her nervously quivering fingertips to her black-haired senior's shirt and tugged on it to get Soojin's attention. As soon as a clearly-upset face streaked with rain clouds caught her vision, the keyboardist pulled on her characteristic rectangular smile. "U— unni..." From the corner of her eye, she saw Joowon drop to the couch with her arms behind her head. As soon as her heart stopped hammering from its previous shock (she had initially thought something was wrong with her precious Joowonie), the brunette continued. "Unni, it's not your fault. Thank you for caring for Hyunjae-unni! I'm sure she didn't mean what she said... She was just upset, right? It's not your fault, okay?"

Soojin scoffed. Meanwhile, a soft smile tugged at her lips, hiding her angry act and exposing her true thankfulness towards her junior (ahem ahem... more accurately fondness, not like she'd ever admit that she was now, after four months, fond of the girl she had initially found annoying and intrusive). "Of course it's not my fault, Haewon. Am I the one who decided to get Jae-unni sick?!"

The brunette's lips puckered together in awkwardness and she warbled out, "Well... no—"

Briana's rushed, "Jae-unni and I are going to my place. Thank you for being a wonderful host, Joowonie! And I sincerely apologize about everything, Soojin unni!! Bye!~" interrupted what Haewon was going to say next, but she didn't take it to heart.

"I'm sorry for what I said earlier, Soojin-ah..." Jae followed up, surprising both Soojin and Youngmi, who hadn't expected their stubborn unni to apologize any time soon... Or ever... A bow decorated her words with a welcome layer of respect and depth. "I was wrong for acting selfish... Thank you for taking care of me and dealing with how stubborn I am."

There was a chuckle. Then: "Well, what can I say?.. I'm not much better. You and I have a lot of learning to do." Soojin brought her shirt away from Haewon's fumbling fingers and instead discreetly tangled their digits together behind their backs after stepping closer to the younger girl. "Now have fun with Youngmi-ah... But please, for everyone's sake... Don't get her sick."

Joowon finally looked up from the couch and joined into Jae and Briana's laughter. "Don't count on it, Soojin-unni... They're probably going to sit so close together that Youngmi-unni will get sick as soon as Jae-ah so much as breathes!! Or looks at her!"

"Wait up... What did you just call me?!"

Jae's faked expression of anger brushed the grin off of Joowon's face and the younger girl sprang off the couch and up the stairs with a generically-rendered expression of terror.

Haewon was too busy pinching herself to make sure that 'don't touch me'-Soojin was really stroking her wonderfully scratchy thumb over her hand (and that it wasn't all just a wonderful dream) to react to the hilarious situation. Soojin, however, didn't even make an effort to stifle her laughter.

Briana soon grabbed Jae's guitar case and left through the back door with the temporarily blue-haired girl close beside her (after another quick round of goodbyes and a giggly yell up the stairs for Joowon's sake).

Now it was just Haewon and Soojin standing together hand in hand in Joowon's basement. Silence loomed. Then, out of nowhere: "Let's go bowling."

Soojin turned to the girl fiddling with their interlocked fingers, sporting a look of confusion. "Bowling?"

Haewon bit her lip. Her head dipped forward in affirmation.

"When?" Soojin's free hand clasped over her dongsaeng's restless fingers to stop their irritating twitching.

"Now," came a mumble in reply.

A creak of stair boards carried over to them as Joowon made her way back down to the basement. She was holding a pack of ramyun in her hands and was munching on it in all its raw glory. Soojin immediately envied her. Instead of getting all fed up about Joowon's apparent lack of guest-warming (according to the older girl, the drummer was not the best host, or she would have been offered a snack long ago), she ignored her rumbling stomach in favor of being polite. "Let's ask Joowonie to come, too."

Haewon eagerly swiveled her head up and down. The corners of her lips tugged up into a giddy grin even with her teeth still clamped over her lower lip.

"Come where?" Joowon questioned.

"The bowling alley down the street from my house."

"Oh!!" The youngest girl happily munched on her (un)healthy snack while grinning at her brown-haired unni with sparkling eyes. Then, with her mouth full: "I'd love to!!~"

*

"this is my book of lyric ideas. here, you can take a look through it."

jae was sitting on briana's bed, her feet drawn up into a criss-cross position. the silver-haired girl brought her notebook over to her curious senior and sat in front of her on the soft mattress in the same position. a couple minutes of gazing through the pages and letting out grunts and hums went by when suddenly the older girl cracked up. jae's laugh may have been muffled by the one-time-use mask briana had leant her, but the sound still brought awarding tingles to the younger girls back. "are you sure these are all quality lyrics?"

"no." the silver-haired girl laughed along, watching her unni slide her fingers over the open pages of her song idea notebook. "why else would i ask for your input?"

"wow... but okay, okay. that makes perfect sense. your lyrics are usually amazing, whether i help you or not. but... but what the HELL is an 'emensation?!'"

"i think i wrote that after watching 'the breadwinner,' aaah... it's a mix between 'emotion' and 'sensation.'"

"ah. i see." their laughter soon died down to occasional giggles, and the blue-haired girl continued to scope the pages filled with scattered words (of all sizes, directions, and languages) with her curious eyes. "what's... what's this one mean?"

youngmi followed her unni's finger with her gaze and squinted in an effort to decipher the unusually messy script of the word(s??) scribbled on the page. she tried and tried, a hum stuck on repeat in her vocal box, until the continuous drone of sound died off in realization. her throat clenched and she eased it (unsuccessfully) with a gulp. "just something i wrote when i was really tired and nostalgic."

"oh. okay." jae left the messily scribbled 'park hyun jae, saranghae~' rhyme alone, much to youngmi's relief, after a few more seconds of trying to decipher it went by in vain. "what's this one, then? '그렇더라고요??'"

"geureoteoragoyo?" youngmi's nervous grin immediately settled into a calm and nostalgic one as she thought back to when she had hastily written the word down after witnessing jae tell off the kids who had been bothering her about her inability to 'speak as well as them' or whatever way they had put it. "it's like 'that's just the way it is,' i guess."

"oh!" the sorta-blonde's eyes lit up in comprehension. "i said that to some stupid first-years, once! it was great, their eyes went all wonky because they thought i didn't know korean. like shit i don't know korean!"

briana fondly nodded. "i was really proud that you stood up to them, unni. but that's not why they were scared."

"really?"

"the principal was walking up behind you."

youngmi held back her laugh as her unni awkwardly scratched at her temple. "oh. and here i was, thinking i was actually being intimidating for once..."

the younger girl immediately placed a comforting hand on the guitarist's knee. "i'm sorry i didn't come to help, unni. i should have been there every time those kids hurt you..."

"well... geureoteoragoyo, amirite?"

"that's not how you use that word, unni," briana laughed out, reaching over to brush hyunjae's hair away from her eyes.

the older girl looked on, mesmerized. her mask-covered lips soon released a hushed, "then how did you mean to use it when you first wrote it down, young k-ah?"

the younger girl's heart wrenched and she tentatively drew away from her unni. "i—" she licked her suddenly dry lips. "i wrote it... like in the way you say, 'when you love someone, that's just how it is...'" her thumbs twiddled together in a nervous dance. then there was a barely audible: "'i like you, that's just how it is.'"

"how what is?" jae breathed out through her word-muffling mask.

"everything."

"oh."

silence. both girls were quiet, both thinking their own thoughts. their heads swum in their whirlpools of 'should i have said that?' and 'is she mad?' and 'shit, i think i said/asked too much...'

finally, jae's impulsive self took over, and she cleared her raspy throat to get her dongsaeng's attention. "sis..."

youngmi's brows furrowed together in confusion. "jae-unni... are you okay?"

"sis?.."

jae made a 'hurry-hurry, you know what i want from you' kind of motion with her hand. the girl being addressed doubted her knowledge of her unni's desires, however. "yes??" when said unni gave her a 'go on' gesture, youngmi added a drawn out, "siiiiiis??.."

the soon-to-be-blonde's face lit up in satisfaction and youngmi heaved a sigh of relief. "i'll give up my 'bro' habit for you, sis. under one condition."

so jae had picked up on the silver-haired girl's dissatisfaction of constantly being called 'bro...' what a relief, indeed... "and what is that condition? also, please stop calling me 'sis,' it sounds weird coming out of your mouth."

hyunjae heaved her own sigh of relief at losing the 'sis'-calling privilege. "i'll stop calling you 'bro...' if you go out on a date with me."

youngmi's heart froze. was she hallucinating?!! "and what if you call me 'bro' accidentally?"

jae's grin was unstoppable. she gripped her dongsaeng's hands and her eyes showed that she was smiling even though her bright grin was hidden by the mask covering her mouth. "that won't happen. as my girlfriend... you will always be 'youngmi,' 'briana,' on rare occasions 'young k.' no more 'bro,' no more 'sis...' and most definitely no more 'hey girl!'" youngmi's close-eyed smile lit up the dark room with its warmth and affection. jae squeezed her hands in closure. "when you love someone... geureoteoragoyo."

briana stifled a laugh at the weird grammar and awkward korenglish. "you're still using it the wrong way..."

"shit."

***

SHOOT ME AND WARNING AND FEELING GOOD ARE STUCK IN MY HEAD PLEASE SEND HELP